Alumni of The Month Joe M

My name is Joe M and I am a grateful recovering addict / alcoholic. Four years ago my life was a complete disaster. In order for me to continue to drink, I had to lead a double life.

On one hand telling my friends and family that I was sober and on the other I was isolating and associating with people who were there to help me self-destruct. I was caught in the endless cycle of addiction. Thinking that I had my life under control and I was the master of my own domain. That it was not me who was the master, but my addiction and it was spinning my life out of control.

In February 2012, after another intervention I ended up in New Westminster at the Last Door. This was my fourth treatment center and countless attempts on my own to stop using. I was trying to stop for all the wrong reasons; I was doing it for others and not myself. I thought to myself when I arrived at the Last Door. I know what to say and I know what to do. I will stay under the radar and finish this treatment as quick as possible. So hopefully then my family and friends would leave me alone.

Something was different; I don’t know what it was. It could’ve been the sense of community at the Last Door, it could’ve been at last I felt a part of something, it could’ve been my heart and soul was awakened for the first time. Maybe I was just tired of living the way that I was living. Whatever it was the Last Door showed me that there was a better way and all I had to do was want it.

I am now coming up to my fourth year of sobriety. My life is completely different from what it was four years ago. I am happy, I am in a committed relationship, I have a family that trusts and loves me, I have friends that I can count on and I give back whenever possible. Life is good and I want this feeling of love, gratitude and happiness to stay with me until I leave this earth. My life is not all sunshine and rainbows but I now know how to handle life without turning back to what almost killed me.

I want to give a heartfelt thank you to David, who showed me that I did not have
to continue living my life, the way I had for close to 50 years. That there was a
better way and all I had to do was ask.

Joe