Climbing the Last Few Steps
Dec 4, 08- (by Mama MPJ)
- 4 responses
- Family and Friends, Sober Salon
Email This Post
I have had some mixed feelings recently around the 12 Step work I’ve been doing. I’m on Step 10 now, and I’m exhausted. And this is not the good kind of exhausted. It’s not the “I’ve just had a great workout and I’m really tired and achy but I know I did something great for my body” kind. It’s more the “I just stayed up all night fueled by Coke and Oreos to finish a my midterm paper” kind. Maybe I’m growing and learning, but I sure feel cranky and icky right now. I’m torn between wanting to quit and take a very long nap and wanting to power through and get it over with, neither of which is a great spiritual place to be.
I was sharing these feelings with my husband last weekend and saying I really didn’t know how I felt about the work I’d been doing. I don’t know if I wanted to go through this process of working the Steps again. And I don’t know if this is something that is working and is right for me personally in my own recovery.
“Do you want my perspective?” Mark asked.
“Sure,” I said.
“Well, I feel so much more intimately connected to you since you’ve been working the Steps. I feel like it’s been really great for our relationship, that it’s brought us closer.”
Oh. Well, if he puts it that way. Be still my little codependent heart! I guess maybe working the Steps isn’t such a bad thing after all. Can someone pass the Coke and Oreos? I’ve got two more Steps to go.
Related articles:
Stumble it! 
Delicious Facebook
Respond now.
Previous post: « Closure
Next post: Mama is Hostess of the chatroom this Sunday »
So, what happens when you’re done with all the steps? You’re, like, cured, right?
Kidding! I’m kidding! But seriously, I’m curious–what’s the post-step-12 process?
Virginia, that’s what we all joke — that we’ll be cured when we finish 12! But the actual process is to do it again. Go right back to Step 1 and do it all over, again and again. Each time you get a little deeper, like peeling layers of the onion.
It is exhausting battling your shadow side. It has been said that we are our own worst enemy. Our shadow side has some intense tactics.
Virginia–I’ve also asked what is the next step after one finishes all 12.
MPJ–I like your metaphor–you get a little deeper…
[...] Steps really, really fast: spending just one to two weeks on each. And while that was definitely exhausting, that very exhaustion and stress brought some of my issues into very sharp relief. It was like my [...]