“Laughter boosts the immune system and helps the body fight disease. Being happy is the best cure of all diseases.” – Patch Adams
I will never forget the first belly laugh that I had when coming out of active addiction. I was fortunate enough to start clearing up in a very nice rehabilitation center. Surrounded by the wounded just like me. I was sitting smoking cigarettes outside and we all started to converse and connect.
I started sharing about how I would visit different liquor stores on different days so the package store people wouldn’t think I was drinking every day. I talked about how I would pretend to be buying wine for company. I would try to fool the liquor store clerks because I didn’t want them to know that I had a problem. However, I would then take that booze home, get fallen down drunk in front of my child and husband at the time -and I cared what the liquor store people thought of me ????How absurd!!
And then it happened someone else said “me too” and the belly laugh of a lifetime was let out! I laughed until I cried. It felt like years since I had experienced a true joyful emotion. Truthfully it had been years. I was so busy trying to numb the bad feelings with booze and drugs that I also numbed the wonderful emotions as well. I had not felt a true emotion in YEARS. That is why when we come into recovery, we are like super sensitive newborns. Everything IS new because we have been in such a fog for so long.
In one of the recovery fellowships they speak of a rule # 62 which is “don’t take yourself to seriously.” I love that. It speaks to me today of a freedom.
Today I laugh often, at myself and with others. I don’t have to pretend to be anything I am not. I am free to be me. Society/social media is wonderful at a painting a picture that we should have it ALL together. Well I don’t have it ALL together but I don’t need it to be. More importantly I don’t have to pretend that it is – especially not to the liquor store clerk!
The daily addict 