office in tears. She did get through my defenses but I felt hopeless about her prescription. How could I possibly do anything for three years?
Then one day at work I heard some women gossiping about a woman I admired. I didn’t know her well, but she seemed smart and kind and had a refreshing sense of humor. The women at work were whispering, “Well, you know she goes to AA.” I know they thought they were saying something awful about her, but I thought, “Oh my God, she goes to AA . . . and she’s so pulled together . . . she goes to AA!” It was my first experience of “If you want what we have . . . ,” and I hadn’t even been to a meeting yet.
I think of that day whenever I hear someone say, “You may be the only Big Book someone reads.” That gossip was a gift. It was the first of many experiences in recovery where something bad, like listening to gossip, turned out to have a higher purpose.
So I went to my first recovery meeting. In a church basement of course, and the rest is history—or my history, actually. I remember how in those first months I would hear people with three or five years talking about their lives and “working a program.” I could see that they had decent lives; they smiled and laughed and seemed to be moving forward.
Some of them had been in recovery for many years. It seemed impossible, but in that way that recovery happens—one-day-at-a-time, and spending so many hours sitting on folding chairs and drinking coffee—one day I had ten years. My gratitude was inexpressible. My life was new in almost every way; my faith in the recovery process absolute.
But in these later years, I have begun to have new questions and different ideas. There are life issues that no one talked about when I was younger in recovery. It seems that when I look around I see fewer of “us”; people with ten or more years are harder to find. Does it mean that we relapse or we simply drift away after ten years? Does it suggest a lack of commitment or gratitude?
When I look closer though, that is not what I see happening.
I am gifted with a group of women friends who have between ten and thirty years of recovery. Sometimes when we have dinner or we take walks together we talk about these changes in our recovery. We share about the tools we still use and those that we depend on less now. We talk about what has stayed the same and what hasn’t. When I take a close look at these friends, and myself, I see happy, busy women. Like another recovery slogan says, “Recovery didn’t just save my life; it gave me a life worth saving.” And that is now truer than ever.
The good news is that with double-digit recovery there often is less pain. The bad news is that pain was what motivated us toward change and continued spiritual growth.
I notice how subtle recovery can be. After a period of ten years we are different people. The big glaring chunks of our disease have been removed. We look better both inside and out. Sometimes we tell stories about what we struggle with today—yes; struggle remains as long as we are committed to growth. “Progress not perfection” is the slogan of choice. There are rewards that begin to come true with ten or more years of recovery, but those specific rewards sometimes take us away from the people and practices that built our good recovery.
The good news is that with double-digit recovery there often is less pain. The bad news is that pain was what motivated us toward change and continued spiritual growth. So what is a recovering woman to do? And what does remain? I think the answer is in more questions and more vigilance.
In earlier stages of recovery our shifts of mind and changes of attitude were mirrored by external changes. We saw people gain or lose weight, or cut and color their hair. We dressed differently, dated differently, took jobs, quit jobs, changed career fields, got married and got divorced, and sometimes got married again. The changes were obvious and dramatic. If you laid the photos of our first year next to the photos from years five and seven and ten, you could see women change. It shows on the outside, but if we could X-ray the minds and hearts of women in later recovery we’d see that dramatic change continues, but now more than ever, it’s an inside job.
In later recovery we find our stride and our style. The work we do is less obvious from the outside. Now it’s not so much about losing weight or getting a promotion or a diploma. We’ve learned to incorporate self-care; we can be decent coworkers; we’ve changed careers or gone back to school. Now maybe it’s about being kinder and not about being the smarty-pants; it’s about taking pride in our work and not needing applause—or even better, now we can be the one who applauds others. It’s more about what we don’t do than what we do.
ALL THESE YEARS AND YOU ARE STILL NOT ALONE
What women in recovery for ten or more years have is a set of skills and a wealth of experience to fall back on. We recognize our patterns, we can cut through our defenses sooner, and we learn not to fight the inevitable. We learn to surrender when we see the wall coming at us instead of waiting, as we did in the past, to slam right into it.
We are also able to see those difficult circumstances that we find ourselves in with a tiny bit more perspective. By the time we reach the ten-year mark, most of us have had at least one or two experiences of having something we were sure wasn’t supposed to happen turn out to be the stepping stone to something unexpectedly good.
Life at ten-plus years can have its challenges. This book was written by a woman for women with ten or more years of recovery. To help us compare notes, to see that there is common ground, and to reassure us that there is no one right way to be a recovering woman. I hope to enhance your recovering lives and offer you markers along the path as you grow out of the woods.
Chapter One
When we were new to recovery we measured time much like parents do with a new baby. We gave our recovery “age” in numbers of days or weeks or months until we turned two and then we started counting years. In those “younger” years of recovery, someone who had been around longer probably said to us, “It will take you three to five years to get out of the woods,” and we wondered how we’d ever survive.
But we begin to grow up. We make friends, develop new habits, and practice new skills. Working the steps and listening to others takes us through layers of self-examination. As we closed in on that crucial five-year mark we realized that while we did have more stability
