Quotes About Recovery

And it hits me, the reason for all the metaphors in recovery. Because the bald truth would too terrifying. What she's saying is I may need an all-new career and all-new friends. p 85

The truth about healing is that you don't need to heal to be whole. By whole, I mean damaged, missing pieces of who you were, your heart—missing what feels like some of your most important parts. Yet not missing any part of you at all. Being, in truth, larger than you were before. Because all of us are made not only of what we have but of what we lost. And loss is not a subtraction. As an experience, it is an addition.

In 1934, Bill W., cofounder of AA [Alcoholics Anonymous], was treated for his alcoholism with a hallucinogenic belladonna alkaloid. The resulting mystical experience led him to become sober and inspired him to write the book and cofound the organization that have changed the lives of so many millions around the world. In the 1950's Bill W underwent LSD therapy, and found his experience so inspiring that the sought to have the drug made part of the AA program.

Bruised and bleeding, he picked himself up and continued on. Eventually, he found a new path.

It's a rare hurt that can stand under the advice, help, and sympathy generated by upwards of thirty people that care. Callahan loses a lot of his regulars. After they've been coming around long enough, they find they don't need to drink any more.

But I would prefer not to dwell any longer on these unpleasant memories; a man who for an entire week does nothing but hit himself over the head has little reason to be proud.

I'm learning to master self while rising from the ashes of madness.

The tides here are too rough. I sink here, happy only when I hoard my little blue sleeping pills, stash the blades of my razor. I accumulate a drawer of drop-out devices, so by December I can escape to a Merry Christmas.

Don't be so damn hard on yourself. Yeah, you screwed up. You're not perfect, fine. Learn from it. But don't punish yourself. Be kind to you, even when you screw up. You'll bounce back eventually. You'll make up for it.

Oh good, everything was back to normal - I was talking to myself again.

The thing is, Ian, life is too short. Not only is it brief, but it's full of so many hard things that there's never a time to breathe or recover. So, when you get a moment like this, you have to drink it into your soul to sustain yourself when all that's around you is darkness. She sighed. I was so stressed down there that I forgot about slowing down and appreciating each moment that I have. This moment is a blessing, and I need to notice it.

I feel like a big faker because I've been putting my life back together, and nobody knows.

I don't want to start thinking again. Not like I have this last week. I can't think again. Not ever again.

In other words, there was no pain. There was no pain anymore.

I'm not a bulimic, I'm a bulimist, I love bulimia.

No todas las heridas dejan huella

And for the first time, something nice like that made me smile and not cry.

She was a very unhappy person most of her life. She went to hospitals all the time. All kinds of hospitals. Finally, she went to a hospital that helped her figure things out enough to try and make things normal, so she moved in with my family.

The tears that heal are also the tears that scald and scourge.

And now, all these years later, it seemed to him that the most horrible fact of human existence was that broken hearts mended.

Time heals all wounds.

I watched Titanic when I got back home from the hospital, and cried. I knew that my IQ had been damaged.

When you want to feel better, call something a piece of shit. It usually works.

Beating heroin is child's play compared to beating your childhood.