Earlier this month, A.J. asked our beloved TSB community to tell us what they were afraid of. “Terrorists? Financial ruin? Public embarrassment? Being trapped in a loveless marriage? Sharks in flooded roadways?” Our readers answered and, not unsurprisingly, the truth is: all of the above and oh, so much more. Part One of your responses are compiled below.

As for me? Well, while we’re sharing: it’s everything except what you’d expect—what I’d expect. I wake up afraid of the thing I don’t know enough to be afraid of yet. My therapist calls my anxiety the black hole: when I stumble in, the fear is totalizing. Nice to know, reading along with all of you, that I’m not alone in the darkness. —TSB Editor

by The Small Bow Family Orchestra

I have at least 25 things on my Step 4 Fear inventory, but I think the most crucial fear I have is of being “found out,” which is something my therapist pointed out to me in early sobriety. For a long time, that looked like keeping up the image to family, friends, coworkers, and strangers that I was perfectly fine during my active addiction, when I was actually miserable and sinking deeper into the quicksand of my alcoholism. Now that I am nearly 2.5 years sober, that looks like also appearing to be perfectly fine while struggling to stay motivated in a very difficult and draining year+ long job search, getting the courage to date and not fall back into the arms of unavailable men, holding my inner critics to a reasonable degree of helpfulness, and trying not to convince myself it would be okay to go back to weed and finally try psychedelics because after all, alcohol is my real problem. However, one of the many gifts of the program and therapy I have done is that I am now able to more clearly recognize my behavior and try my best to adjust and move forward. I am still finding a lot of difficulty in allowing myself to feel my feelings (vs. intellectualizing them), which is in a way my own version of avoiding “finding out” my core self, but I am glad I am becoming more and more comfortable in knowing myself in sobriety. What could be so bad about being “found out” as a messy, complicated person who makes mistakes but is trying to do better anyway?

Running out of money while being unemployed for a very long time.

Never being able to find another reasonable job, or any job.

Growing old or becoming incapable of caring for myself with no support network that is able to help in the way I need.

Our insufficient health care system.

Being insulted or ostracized like I was when I was a kid—and having to confront “never having grown” out of this.

Being ignored.

The tipping point where I really can’t change my situation and there is nothing left to do other than rot.

Receiving a look of pity or contempt.

Losing another friend due to my negativity and learned helplessness and inability to overcome it.

Niggling injuries becoming permanent.

Not being able to move out of living very small to a proper life.

Never being able to feel discomfort and do it anyway. I guess that’s courage.

Considering myself intelligent yet never properly embracing an experimental or growth mindset. Seems like a waste of a life.

I feel a bit better after writing this. I saw A.J.’s writing about doing this list every morning and then a gratitude list. I may try this. I feel a little lighter writing these down. Maybe it needs to be a top 10 in the moment as opposed to the same 10 huge ones everyday. I don’t want to get caught feeling worse after doing this list.

As a kid I was always afraid of my dad getting drunk and shooting up the local c-store, which I just realized I was carrying around with me all this time, until he went into a memory care facility earlier this month. Packing up his apartment I found a box of guns in his closet and thought, well, I can stop being afraid of that now. Suddenly there's more room for me to be afraid of an e-bike running me over.

But on a less tangible level? Paranormal Activity. Holy shit, that movie fucked me up. And the thing is that I love horror movies. So I dug deep. I picked it apart. And what I came up with felt ridiculous. I wasn’t afraid of being bludgeoned. I was afraid of the person closest to me deciding to trick me (and then bludgeon me). The bludgeoning is peripheral, though. I could put up a fight against a physical attack, even if I lose, even if I die. But how does a person protect themselves from betrayal? It has been almost 20 years since I saw that movie, and I still sometimes yelp in my sleep over it.

1. What would happen if I submit a fear list; err “my” fear list?

2. What do people think of me?

3. I wonder if my list wins?

4. Do I look 89? I will be 90 in Dec.

5. I’m a widower of one year. I have no idea what that IT is supposed to look like and I “SHOULD”?

6. WHAT HAPPENS TO ME AFTER I DIE?

7. I have been sober 44 years and I am afraid that I am afraid? (I’m giggling right now.)

8. Damn this short word continues to touch every aspect of my life. The fabric of my existence is still shot through with fear . . . and I can now look at it. And I still remember three drinks made it all go away. And I mean all go away . . . 

9. My kids are coming over tonite. Man I do love them and they love me. (I hope I don’t do anything stupid and they do not show up.)

I guess my fear is that my life might be defined by the person I used to be. I’m celebrating two years of sobriety today, and while I’m so grateful for that accumulation of time without a drink or drugs, it’s mostly just another day of distance between the person I was and the person that I am trying to be moving forward. I got sober at 44, so if I’m really lucky, I’ll have maybe roughly the same amount of time to live more carefully, to be someone who puts more good into the world than harm, to at least try and repair the damage I’ve done to myself, and to the people who love me, and to any other poor bastard who happened to fall into my orbit when I was driven only by my ego and self-centeredness and endless capacity to destroy. I hope that’s enough. What scares me is I’ve had a few stretches of sobriety before, so there’s always the lingering anxiety that, despite my newfound clarity of purpose, somehow my dark passenger might escape containment and wrest control of the wheel once more. That I could go back to being the person I used to be. But then I remember that what I had before wasn’t so much sobriety as abstinence, and as this is the first time in my life that I’ve earnestly engaged in a program of spiritual recovery as outlined in the 12 steps, I am actually having a new experience. And I am actually changing. And I don’t ever have to go back, no matter what. And hopefully, with enough days, maybe the me I am trying to be will just become who I am.

Almost 10 years ago, I cracked up. A dark, horrible part of my past that I had worked very, very hard to pretend wasn’t there burst through the surface thanks to the news cycle at the time (I didn’t learn until later that I was definitely not the only one experiencing this). At the time, I was working at a demanding job where my colleagues were very accomplished academics and professionals—I am not exactly a slouch in those areas, but I am from a welfare-class family and am the only person in my family to finish high school. In addition to this, I had a young family and many volunteer commitments. I had to be “on” all the time. 

When it started happening, and before I could really acknowledge it even to myself, and definitely before I could ask for any help, I would sit in meetings at work and find myself overcome with terror that everyone in the room knew I didn’t belong there. That they all knew what I was really like—that I was a trashy fraud who hadn’t really earned anything for myself, that I was ruined and worthless from the inside out. I had broken totally open. When anyone would look at me, I would just feel their pity resting on me. Of course none of this was really happening, which I understood intellectually, but I could not stop the visceral response in my body. My truest fear, I learned, was that my pain could destroy me, and that there would be no way to hide that.

fin

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