We’re all far more than an accumulation of all of our shitty decisions, dubious parenting mistakes, failed relationships, and let’s not even talk about how we can morph into becoming our own worst enemy. Alcohol and drugs will take you there, and when we decide to step out of the lake of confusion, we have to find a whole new equilibrium, one at first that feels foreign and counter-intuitive to our previous lives. At times I felt as if I was stumbling in the dark up a rock-strewn mountain path, and there were moments along my journey where I also felt more than a little hopeless and wondered how the mess I had made of myself and aspects of my life would ever sort themselves out—but in time, they did. We don’t have to be the architect, but we do have to be the dutiful worker. It helps that we can lean on a community of other strong women who have been there and glean much from their love and support, but our journey is ours alone and we best get to it.
The most empowering decision I ever made was to get sober. I gave myself permission to figure out who I was; I mustered every ounce of courage I could find, because I knew that if I wanted to find any sort of contented life—I had to change. Hence, the arduous journey toward self-discovery began.
My quest was to learn how to live a sober life, and I wanted to do it well. When we get those sorts of determinations, we need to act on them, and when we do, I think that that’s about as empowered as any gal can get. We need others—but somewhere along the way in early recovery, it dawned on me that I cannot expect other women to make me feel empowered—it had to come from within and from a relationship with the higher power, who I choose to call God. There’s no doubt that every single person who touched my life, touched my sobriety, and shared with me their experience strength and hope, added an integral ingredient to the pie, but all those lives couldn’t do the work that I needed to do to find wholeness. I had to find my own way, work on a relationship with God, and trust in the words of those who had tread before—that living sober is truly a process, not an event.
My mother had thirty years of sobriety when she died, and she wisely said, “We come into this world alone and we shall leave this world alone.” Recovery is an inside job, and we have to feel okay with who we are, where we are, and get right with the God of our understanding. Empowerment comes from a strong spiritual program and our efforts to live an authentic life.
We will feel empowered with each new, and good decision that we make. We will feel empowered each time we can get through a rough patch and realize that we did so with a little more dignity and grace than we ever thought we were capable of mustering. We will feel empowered when we can say, no, without explanations and without guilt. We empower ourselves when we figure out who we are, what we like and don’t like, and what our priorities are, and then, start living true to that vision.
I don’t believe there can be empowerment without humility. We have to be humble enough to say, I have no clue what I’m doing, or how to live life. Humility allows us to be teachable, and teachability, in my opinion is the secret to empowerment. We cannot grow if we stubbornly refuse to accept constructive criticism or get to a place, regardless of how many years we’ve been sober, to where we think we know it all and have it all together. I pray that the day never comes where I think I have nothing left to learn from the new-comers and the old-times in sobriety. I am constantly humbled by their struggles and their willingness. That’s why all these years later, I choose to keep going to meetings. I don’t want to ever forget where I came from and where I could end up it I don’t nurture of my sobriety.
Recovery is hard, but so was active addiction.
It’s no easy task to juggle drug or alcohol addiction while trying to make others believe we’re fine, and the truth usually is more like we’re the messed-up kind of fine, (Fucked-up, Insecure, Neurotic, and Emotional). It’s hard work to shoulder the daily dose of guilt and shame. It’s hard work to keep track of fabrications, sins of omission, and sins of commission. And, once we get into recovery it can take a whole lot of hard work to let go of that baggage, but c’mon, ladies, we already know we can do hard; let’s not underestimate the beauty of the fourth and fifth steps. It’s when we’re in this process of looking at the reality of our lives and the messes that we made and seeing that twisted thinking and skewed perceptions rested at the bottom of most all of those resentments. When we can leap over the hurdles in our minds, the feeling of not being good enough, not accomplishing enough…is when healing begins.
After I unloaded the baggage of my fifth step is when I started to look at myself with new eyes. I quit drinking in my late twenties, and I was grateful that my drinking career was relatively short so the amount of baggage I had to wade through and unpack was closer to a duffel bag size rather than a Kardashian size fleet of suitcases, but no matter the size of the load, it had to be addressed. The awakening came when I was able to see the truth and understand that in many respects, a good number of my hardships while drinking were hardships of my own making. The blame game had to end. I had to learn how to accept the past, yet be willing to move away from it in a new healthy direction, and for me, that’s where I started to feel empowered.
The first time in sobriety where I truly felt empowered is when I was around fifteen months sober, and my twins were about six-month-old. I announced to my husband that I planned to start nursing school in the fall. He was livid; he bubbled over with resentment. He felt my first priority should be that of being a mother, and that’s precisely why I felt the need to make the decision to return to school. I had messed up my education in my drinking years, and I wanted to rectify my previous bad decisions. I also felt compelled to be able to have a way to support my kids by myself should the need arise. That day and time never came as I am still with my husband and my sons are grown, but my decision to finish school was one of the best decisions I ever made. I didn’t let anyone stand in my way. I was doing something worthwhile and I had a plethora of reasons why I would not be deterred. I told my husband if he didn’t like my decision he could show himself to the door—I was resolute, and that was empowering!
I feel empowered every time I decide to take care of myself, do the next right thing, and live as honestly and authentically as I can.
My sober birthday is June 22, 1989, and after twenty-nine years of sobriety, I continue to learn about me, and I continue to draw from and learn from others. Many of my most valuable nuggets of wisdom that I’ve picked up through the years have come from the newly sober person and those who have relapsed over and over. Their experiences are gut-wrenching, but I am grateful that they share so openly so others may learn from their mistakes. I have been helped and continue to be helped by all of those anonymous people who think no one may be listening, but I am. I want to hear your truth and I want to learn from you. Everyone reading this who is on their own path, never forget, you’re all gems, and with a little polish, the sparkle shines through.
As I sit here writing this, I’m at a ranch in Wyoming. I’ve got a view of the Big Horn Mountains. The larkspur, lupin, and mountain phlox are in full bloom. I can hear horses neighing, cows mooing, and birds chirping. I feel as if I’m in heaven. I came out here to ride, and yesterday I spent six hours on horseback riding up to nine thousand feet, the views, spectacular, (today I can barely move!)
Horses are my one true love. Sorry family, I love you all madly too, but there is a special place in my heart for horses—perhaps because I believe it was my own horse that I acquired when I was twelve years old that saved me from sinking into alcoholism at that young age. I learned to ride at five years old and spent the next twelve years in the saddle, riding whatever horse or pony I could get my hands on until my parents relented and bought me one of my own. I chose a horse that had been abused and sent to pasture, and with help, I broke that horse. Both of our spirits were shattered (my crazy childhood) and together we mended ourselves back together. The relationship I developed with Sham, was the first solid relationship I had ever had. To this day, my favorite place in the world to be is in a barn, though sadly, my adult life has kept me out of the stables and mostly away from horses.
I ended up in the suburbs where we raised our kids and spent countless hours like so many other moms, sitting in bleachers instead of a saddle; a football mom instead of a cowgirl—but I chose to accept the cards I’d been dealt. Though I love my life, there are times when I feel a stirring so deep in my soul that I have to honor it and go back to the place that’s home for my heart—the place where I feel the most at peace, and that place is anywhere around horses. It’s empowering to say this is who I am; If given the choice between glitz and glitter or the scent of new mown hay, a clean barn, and a ride through the woods or up the mountain, well, I think you know which one I’d pick.
During the years of raising my sons, I didn’t have the luxury of jetting off to Wyoming to play cowgirl, but recovery allowed me the maturity to bloom where I was planted; it helped me to grow-up so I could make selfless decisions instead of selfish decisions. Sobriety taught me that sometimes we have to wait—and we may have to wait a damn long time, but remember, we can do hard, and we can do it well—that right there is empowering. Ladies, you got this! If you want sobriety, you too can have it and all the gifts that go with living a sober life. I wish you all happy travels on your journeys and remember this ladies—we can live sane and sober, and by God’s grace, we can all do it with some dignity and grace.
Lisa is the author of the multi-award winning book, Raising the Bottom: Mindful Choices in a Drinking Culture. After short stints where she trained polo horses, worked as a flight attendant, hairdresser, and bartender, she revamped her life and settled in as a registered nurse. For past twenty-nine years has worked with hundreds of women to overcome alcoholism, live better lives and become better parents. She was prompted to write Raising the Bottom when she realized after twenty plus years of working in hospitals, that doctors and traditional healthcare offer few solutions to women with addiction issues. You can also follow her on Twitter @LBoucherAuthor and Instagram