Category Archives: Everyday Life

The Written Word

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I haven’t written anything since the 20th, Day 43. Between this place and my handwritten journal, I haven’t connected with myself in over 3 days. I actually had to write it out to figure out what Day it is.

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Skullmuggery

Hey, I am still working on getting through my first cup of coffee so fuck off. LOL

Anyway, I’ve been dealing with the effects of a flu for the past few days which has not made me overly introspective. At the same time, I started physiotherapy for my shoulder and the exercises are pretty tough; my shoulder and my entire back are a complete mess after doing them. Add the muscle pain and joint ache associated with the flu and… well… I’ve been in a particular little slice of Hell for the past few days.

Well, it’s Christmas-fucking-Eve. December 24th. Despite the fact that I haven’t spent a penny on alcohol, my bank account is still running on empty.

I’ve funnelled all of my limited resources into this friggin’ holiday… and so soon after returning to work. My last paycheck was about ¾ of what it normally would have been since I was on short-term disability leave but with all of the same expenses. I had to get another damn payday loan to buy gifts after all that.

I hate payday loans.

Having spent what I have, I have nothing left until New Years Eve. There isn’t a lot of food in the house and I’m all out of painkillers for my shoulder. But at least I’m almost out of the woods with this flu.

All of this sounds a bit “bah humbug” doesn’t it? Really, I’m not that cranky. I’ll make it through. It’s Christmas time and I’m relaxing right now. I don’t really have anywhere I need to be and having nothing that I really need to do right now. I have as much wrapping done as I can do right now and I have a bowl of Mac N’ Cheese in me guttyworks. It could always be worse.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

Day 40 rerun

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On Wednesday, I was trying to find an image of the number 40 that I would find suitable for yesterday’s Day 40 post. I didn’t have any grand ideas for the post… 40 is just a nice round number to comment on.

After entering ’40 days’ into Google, the search results came in with an unusually heavy weighting in Christianity and the bible. I’m not religious but this caught my interest. What is the significance of the number 40 in the bible?

It seems that there are many biblical stories where God would test man with various trials and, often, the duration of these trials were… 40 days. Weird. I didn’t look into thoughts or theories on why this was; I only have so much tolerance for preaching and every website had just too much preaching for me. I did take note of the biblical stories in question and, unfortunately, none of these trials would have starred Charleton Heston or involved Jesus riding a raptor. Sorry.

I’m not making any religious parallels here. Unless there’s a parallel that involves Nic Cage… then, why the hell not? 40 days… it’s just an interesting coincidence.

But, yeah, yesterday was my 40th day of sobriety and, holy fuck, it was boring. I had text messaged a friend earlier in the day saying, “I don’t need a drink but I could really go for a beer right now.” It wasn’t like I was going to actually have a beer but it was just one of those days where I was needing to unwind. A beer was just my old familiar way to unwind. Instead, I relaxed in my chair after work, watched some hockey on TV and ended up in bed around 9:30 pm out of pure exhaustion. That’s kind of been my modus operandi lately. Chillaxing. 

Back To The Grind

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Today was my second day back at work; my first day back in the office was so tiring that I ended up in bed at 8:30 pm and I was only there for about 6 ½ hours. 

It was very mentally stimulating though because I was asked many, many, many times what happened and how I’m doing etc. Being ‘on‘ and engaging was mentally tiring and then traveling to the clinic to find out the results of my MRI didn’t do me any favours either. 

The good news of the day yesterday was that surgery on my shoulder is not required. Two more weeks of wearing this brace and then 2+ months of physiotherapy and I’ll be tip-top. My rotator cuff was not torn and the bone fracture in my socket (I don’t know the technical term of where the fracture is) apparently looks like it hasn’t changed or grown larger and should heal on its own. 

Today, I started doing a lot more work. I should maybe be a lot more tired than I am but I think that, in a way, the work was less stressful and helped me to be ‘off‘ a little. I am also re-learning my job since I was relatively new to the position before having my seizure and was then on Short Term Disability for a month. 

My biggest point of contention is that I’m now a one-handed typist. Specifically, a one-finger typist and I was a relatively adept typist with two hands. Now, I’m ridiculously slow and it pisses me off. 

Both yesterday and today were challenging though. I wanted a drink at the end of the day… not a real hardcore craving but just the feeling that a drink would be nice to relax. Regardless, the feeling was fleeting and I maintained my sobriety. It’s been 30 days since my last drink and I’m feeling proud of that and it’s something I want to maintain. 

This is reading to be a very short, disjointed collection of anecdotes rather than some kind of proper blog posting. I think this is a signal that I’m maybe more tired than I thought. Time for me to close this off before I crater completely. 

Idle Hands Are The Devil’s Workshop 

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I’ve been keeping busy today. I have been cleaning, doing dishes, getting some laundry done. I’ve also been watching TV in between my duties. Plenty of dinosaur programming on the National Geographic channel followed by my first exposure to AMC’s new show Into The Badlands (which is pretty solid, by the way) and now for the all-time classic, Predator, starring Arnold Shwarzenegger.

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I’ve had no cravings for booze either but feeling some lingering pain and ache in my left arm from the shoulder all way to my forearm. The pain is significantly less than it was when I first put it out but the locations and depths of the pain have me concerned that this may require a little more than just physiotherapy. We’ll see on Monday though. That’s my appointment to discuss the results of the MRI.

Today is Day 27.

Day 26

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 26 MUTHAFUKKA!!  
I was about to write, “I’m not sure if it’s stupid to keep writing posts like this,” but fuck that noise. This is my blog, my journey and my little space to track whatever I want. I’m not fishing for a virtual high five or a pat on the back; I’m making this statement as a matter of public record. 

It’s Day 26 of me being sober. It’s also the fifth session of a five day workshop at Edmonton’s downtown Addiction Services office for Self-Evaluation & Support. This session is about Relapse Prevention. 

So far, I haven’t felt a lot of challenges with respect to wanting or needing a drink. I’ve learned a ton about addiction and substance abuse; some of the things apply to me and some of the things, I feel, don’t apply to me. But that’s one of the things about addiction, it’s not the same for everyone. It’s pretty much like anything in this world, the experience can be vastly different because people are inherently different. 

This workshop has taught me first hand, amongst many things that I will likely write about in the future, is that addiction and substance abuse affects people from every demographic of society that you can possibly imagine. I base this statement upon the fact that there are all kinds of people from all walks of life in these sessions. 

While I know that I have had it pretty easy with respect to cravings and challenges to my sobriety, I know that I haven’t been living within the exact same routine that got me to the point of having a seizure at my workplace because of alcohol withdrawal. I’ve been off work for 4 weeks with a significantly reduced stress load. 

I realize that, besides my stress load at work, there are significant triggers for me that are based around not having a supporting family environment. My home isn’t terrible (I know there are people who have to face violence or other people’s addictions or abuse) but the thoughts of not having a spouse who I can talk to or rely upon to just listen has caused me to well up with tears in these sessions (and right now just writing about it) and I’ve had to redirect just to not break down. 

But that’s something for Future Jeff to deal with. Right now, this Jeff has to get his ass to the Churchill station to hop on the LRT for home. 

My Experiment With Facial Hair

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 Beards, motherfucker!I’m trying to derive the borderline between what classifies as a ‘bad’ beard and what classifies as a ‘fucking brutally terrible’ beard.

Just to be clear; after 3 ½ weeks without touching a razor to my face, I’m not having great results. This is the furthest I’ve ever gone with growing a beard and I don’t think mine is freakishly patchy. That being said, the hair from my ear to my chin, including my cheeks and jaw-line are a touch on the sparse side. I mean, I’ve got rookie year Sidney Crosby beat all to Hell.*barf*But the real issue I have is with respect to the aforementioned fullness of my facial hair. The experiment isn’t exactly scientific in nature. I think the decision making process is based on criteria that is more qualitative than quantitative but still requires data collection from various, independent sources. 

While I’m not ready to fully reveal my findings yet, I have explained my facial hair growth to people in a few different ways. 

  1. The first explanation is to completely confess to the experiment. That I recognize I’m folliclely challenged and that I’m doing this for the betterment of mankind. 
  2. My second explanation is that I’m trying to grow a turbo-sad beard to make other men feel more secure and confident about their own beards. 
  3. The third explanation is that I’m getting an early start on my Edmonton Oilers playoff beard… for next season.

I have to return to work on Monday of next week so I have to bring this experiment to a conclusion by then and decide on whether I should go into the office with facial hair and, if so, to what degree?

The things I do for science. Sheesh. 

The Sting Of The Sling

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 Stevie Ray Vaughan is dead and we can't get Jon Bon Jovi in a helicopter.I mentioned it before but with regular sleep patterns, I’ve started dreaming again and playing guitar is a recurring theme. And, holy shit, I can fucking WAIL when it’s my brain making it all up. I’m a virtuoso when my fingers don’t actually have to touch a fretboard. I’m the Stevie Ray Vaughan of the unconscious world. If Donald Trump would play guitar will the skill he displays being a giant blow hard, I’d totally be a dreaming Donald Trump. Anyway, the total bitch of it all is that I can’t even hold a guitar with this stupid sling on. I don’t even have the hand strength to play it, even if I found a way to hold it. 

The positive side is that I won’t have my illusions about my abilities shattered for another 3 to 5 weeks 

Can Santa Do This?

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 Ginger snaps!Once you get into the month of December, mention of the word ‘workshop’ conjures images of Santa’s Workshop where an assembly line, sweatshop of green-clad elves/Chinese children toil over the latest in electronic devices or most coveted and fashionable athletic apparel. But for me, today… on December 1, the word ‘workshop’ relates to something different. 

This week (including yesterday November 30th) I am attending a Self Evaluation & Support workshop that seems like it is very much of an education/information session about addiction. The sessions are not specific to any one addiction but tries to address all addictions in a general fashion under a single umbrella. 

In the first two sessions, there are some broader concepts that I have never heard of before however the elements of addiction that were highlighted and discussed are things I can easily latch onto as they are things that I have researched before. 

Thursday and Friday seem to be the sessions that I am taking the most interest in as they deal with ‘Living Well’ and ‘Relapse Prevention.’ I feel that I am doing well with recovery thus far and haven’t felt like it has been too challenging yet. Granted, I still have some Valium to finish up and I haven’t returned to work yet but I feel strong and positive. Plus, I have access to further support through the Addiction Services department as well as Alcoholics Anonymous, if I really feel like I need it.