February 20

First we used drugs, then drugs used us. What started out as fun and recreation, we thought, ended up being all we could think about. As our disease progressed, it became a priority in our Lives.

Our whole Life was centered in drugs, in one form or another. As we used to Live and Lived to use, our personal Responsibilities were neglected. Our unmanageability was apparent to those around us.

It seems that we were the last ones to know that we could have a problem. Our days consisted of constant squabbles with our Loved ones, some of us became unemployed, and some of us were incarcerated. Using drugs isolated us from our Families, Friends, our jobs, and finally ourselves. Drugs that were once our solution, became a problem for us.

What once filled our void in our souls, was actually making our void even bigger. We thought if we could just stop using drugs, our Lives would get better. We filled our void with new jobs, new lovers, religion and other drugs.

We moved to different areas thinking that our feelings and emotions would change. Our inner unmanageability became more and more apparent, nothing we tried worked. Sooner or later we returned to the only thing that once worked for us, our drugs.

Beaten into submission we found Narcotics Anonymous, here we met folks just like us. The people we met in Narcotics Anonymous like us, suffered the horrors of addiction. They seemed to be Happy, Joyous and Free; they seemed to have the answer of Freedom from active addiction.

We heard if we weren't the problem there would be no Solution. We started to feel Hope that we also can Recover.