Retreating further

Ok so I really wanted to share as much as I could about my intergroup retreat. It was awesome, and I want to milk the experience for all it's worth by writing about it, sharing about it and reflecting on it as much as I can...now where was I up to?..

Ah yes, after the candlelit meeting on the Friday night, most people went to bed, but since I'm a nightowl I stayed. I had the added incentive that somebody was setting up a Scrabble game. I LOVE Scrabble! But I have nobody to play it with. I play it on the computer sometimes, but I always see board games as social things.

Of course socialisation for the compulsive person with Asperger's is a real double-edged sword. I was terribly nervous because I didn't know anyone there. Now I'm doing my fourth step I'm becoming aware of many of my faults. I know I'm not as spiritually fit as I thought I was. I was frightened that the people in the program would look down on me for not being spiritual enough. I felt my old need to show off and impress coming through. I had to win the scrabble to prove I was "smart". That is my self-worth and my social worth...I have to be smart. That's the one thing I can do. I'm fat, annoying, clumsy and socially awkward...but I can win a scrabble game. That's how I think. But then of course, I started to worry that my showing off would be obvious, and that these "spiritual" people would think me an arrogant smart-##S. So I slipped into the defence of "I'm not upsetting you am I?" "Sorry if I did...". It tends to work, people are like "Oh no it's fine." Few people have the courage to answer "Yes you are." to a question like that.

But that's the thing about spiritually fit people, they don't need to judge others. They just cared for me and accepted me. That became even clearer that night, when I woke several people up in my dorm by having a late shower. I said I was sorry, and everyone was ok with it. They seemed genuinely forgiving. I tell you what...people who disturb my slumber don't get much sympathy from me. I just felt the serenity from some of those people.

Getting away from it all

OA Intergroup Retreat

Hi everyone. I hope you are all well and abstinent. I had a wonderful time this weekend just past at a retreat organised by my local OA intergroup. It was amazing. I knew I needed to go. My sponsor went to great lengths to get to her retreat, and recommended I do the same, and I’m a big fan of retreats anyway. I had wanted to go on one ever since I started the program.

We arrived on the Friday night at about 7pm. Everyone was eating dinner. It was lovely to be around people who also had physical allergies to certain foods, like me. The food was free of gluten, and somebody else asked whether there was sugar in the chutney (the only thing on the weekend with added sugar). When I waited to have lunch, a simple “I don’t like to have eat too early” sufficed, without any need to worry what people were wondering.

After dinner we had a late night identification meeting which included a beautiful ceremony where the lights were dimmed, the chair lit a small candle. After her share, she told us one quality that she’d like to pass on to the person nextto her, and then used her candle to light theirs. As we each shared our experience strength and hope the room gradually began to light up and we became a circle of hope united against the darkness. I can be a very visual and kinesthetic learner, and I'm a bit of a romantic at heart, so I enjoyed the symbolism. It was also good to see teh variety of people there. Several of us were in our twenties, whilst others were in their seventies or eighties. Some has been in teh program a few months, and some had been in it for decades. My usual face to face meeting is very small so there was no one whom I knew. That was actually a good thing because it gave me an extra level of anonymity which enabled me to share more honestly and openly.

The Flatlands

Have you ever been in the Australian outback? It’s a wonderful experience and I really recommend it. There’s nowhere else on earth like it. The remoteness is unimaginable to all but a few. The colours are brighter than anywhere else on earth, and contrast with each other in a raw primeval way, even as they blend together into one another to form strangely beautiful new hues like green gold, red-blue, and silver-cream.

Of course all this can be observed fairly early on in one’s journey, and, since journeys through the Australian outback take hours.....and hours....and hours on end, the novelty can wear off, or at least become drowned out by the car-sickness, boredom, drowsiness, and other more familiar, if less pleasant, sensations we associate with road trips.


I feel that my recovery is in a bit of an outback spot at the moment. I’m travelling along a flat road, neither improving nor deteriorating...at least the landscape around me isn’t deteriorating. It’s been the same for the past couple of months. But I am deteriorating. My recovery is going backwards. Recovery is a mountain, not a plane. I haven’t been climbing it. I’ve been content to coast along and hope things improve. I was so excited by my progress, that I just let things slip. This program requires so much dedication and perseverance. Sometimes we can be deceived by the beautiful country of wellness that we are entering, into thinking that we have left our disease behind for good. The moment we forget our first step, we are bound to slip. I keep forgetting my first step.

I think part of the reason is that I don’t like the second and third steps, and the first step makes them necessary. If I can’t manage my own life then I have to let someone else manage it. It’s hard not to admit I cant’ manage my own life. Just the other day my mother said to me “We’ve tried so many things to make you happy, and you’re never happy. You need to spend a long time with God.” I knew the first part was true. I didn’t like what she deduced from it. But that second part was true too. I need something outside myself to manage my life. If nothing else that means the program. I need the program, and I need to be devoted to achieving recovery through spiritual renewal. To get that spiritual renewal I need to work the steps and use the tools. Even if I don’t want to. Well at least I’m writing here now.

The biggest problem for me at the moment is in the relationship department. I finally laid stuff on the line to my boyfriend over a month ago. The way he treats me would be totally unacceptable under almost any circumstances. (I don't mean he hits me or anything like that). But our circumstances are very unusual, and he is going through a LOT at the moment. I said I would stick by him through this hard time, but I still feel taken for granted and besides, what's so great about this relationship anyway? We don't really have that much in common to be honest.

Anways, I layed things on the line. I was sure that was God's will. But I was angry and resentful in the way that I spoke to him. That was not God's will. And I wasn't honest. I blamed him for our problems, and ignored my own part in them. Moreover, I was insecure and distressed. I said in the email I sent him that "I don't suppose you'll even bother to answer" but the fact was I really hoped he would. He didn't, and I felt so rejected and alone and lost. So, about a week or two after that, when I hadn't heard from him, I sent him another email, saying I was so sorry for being so mean to him in his hour of need, and would he take me back. (Can anyone say "coward"?) Now I'm back where I started....thinking I'm in a relationship that isn't God's will but not trusting God to get me out of it and take care of me...after all I tried that. Oh yeah...my boyfriend replied to the second email, and we talked, but I haven't heard from him since. (can anyone say Jerk?)