I Want to Be Good So Bad
September stories you may have missed, and a call for October check-ins.
Before we get to our usual end-of-month stuff, if anyone is in the New York City area this weekend, Saturday is DopeyCON Six and tickets are still available. Dave is a great friend and long-time champion of TSB, so if you have the time and motivation, show him the love in return. Look at the lineup:
The night will feature a live Dopey Podcast recording with host Dave Manheim, joined by special guests including Hank Azaria, James Frey, Adam David, Roddy Bottom, Carl Radke, Sam Miller, Brandon Novak, and others. Fans can expect comedy, music, recovery stories, audience games, prizes, and Katz’s Deli’s legendary pastrami.
Not many people are doing what Dave does — his story is remarkable, and how he’s using it to rebuild himself and an entire community of discarded and broken-hearted people touched by addiction is eye-opening and inspiring. So, TSB East Coasters — swing through if you can.
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Also, last call for October Check-Ins: Tell us how your recovery is holding up.
The perfect length is 150-300 words. Here’s a great one from last month.
Bottomed out of SLAA withdrawal for the second time in August. Or was it the third? I guess it’s neither here nor there. Either way it’s back to day one and attempting some achingly brilliant and resonant closeness with a higher power, the program, and the thing I’m most terrified of — myself. Brilliant and resonant was how I described life after I quit drinking for the fourth and last time to an unavailable person I’d seen on and off throughout their own long-term relationship. Next time I question whether or not SLAA is for me, I’ll replay those details. May I stay willing to put a halt to the harm, to heal my dumb heart this time.
EMAIL US HERE: tsbcheckins@thesmallbow.com SUBJECT: OCTOBER CHECK-IN
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MOST POPULAR STORIES FROM SEPTEMBER:
“But Weed IS Me”
by The Small Bow Family Orchestra
“A journal entry from August of 2022: ‘I need to white knuckle through getting off pot. It is, for sure, the change I need most. But weed IS me. It’s funny, it’s gross, it’s happy, it’s sad, it’s silly, it’s interesting, it’s joyful, it’s depressed, it’s lazy, it’s me. All of me. It’s been my identity for 20 years. How sad is that? It’s not all bad but it’s not who I want to be. I need to learn an entirely new life to get off pot but I just don’t have that in me.’”
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The Same Sad Lullaby
by Allis Perry
“I relax my posture and take his hand in mine. We sit together, for a while. He tells me he loves me. He tells me how powerful heroin is. People who haven’t used it don’t believe it, but it’s the most powerful substance. It’s more powerful than love. That’s the saddest part, he says. It’s more powerful than love. Just is.”
AND:
Cold Blooded Old Times
"Whenever I stopped taking SSRIs, which was frequently, it wasn’t because I felt good. It was because I didn’t feel anything. I now know that the feeling of nothing is preferable to the feeling of incapacitating depression and anxiety. But, at the time, with zero hours of therapy under my belt, I expected medication to be a quick and complete fix. If it didn’t render existence immediately, perfectly, tolerable, it wasn’t worth a good goddamn."
MORE!
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ALSO: PODS-PODS-PODS
ALL ILLUSTRATIONS BY EDITH ZIMMERMAN
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