Three Years in Recovery: Nothing and Something All at Once

Three lessons, three practices, and three unexpected gifts from a life I once couldn’t imagine

“I think we should buy one more hydrangea for out front, don’t you? The two we got are beautiful, but I think there’s something more balanced to the eye about three.”

I looked up at my wife as we both sat on the couch, winding down our day. I wondered if the deadpan stare I cast outward communicated the complete lack of knowledge or opinions I had about hydrangeas, their placement, or their quantity.

“Sure, there is something appealing about groups of threes, I suppose,” I finally responded.

Our conversations on this couch have shifted dramatically over the last three years. Sitting on the couch discussing flower placement out front is a far cry from the agonizing conversations we would have as I slid further and further into despair and isolation as I continued to weave the web of lies to hide my drinking.

May 14th, 2023 is the day that I was gifted the opportunity to change course. It, and the following days, were the most fear-ridden I have ever been in my life. I had no idea what recovery meant, what it looked like, nor how to sustain it. Even though I had this opportunity in front of me, life felt all but over. I couldn’t actually envision a life in recovery.

Three years in recovery is both something and nothing all at once. It feels like such little time, yet I know how agonizing it was to go three minutes without thinking about alcohol before recovery. To have the obsessive thoughts eradicated from my life is a miracle in itself.

Recognizing three as an oddly harmonious and powerful number, I wanted to put together my three learnings across three important topics that I have been gifted and discovered over these last three years.

Three Bits of Advice for People in Early Recovery

1. Stop asking ‘Why?’
   You don’t need to understand why you’re an addict to find recovery, you simply need to accept the fact that your life has become unmanageable in its current form. Chasing the ‘why’ is a distraction. Even if you discover an answer to it, so what? What are you going to do with that information? By letting go of the ‘why’ you can focus all your effort on figuring out what it takes for you to live in recovery each and every day.

2. View alcohol as your solution, not your problem
   When you frame alcohol, or your drug of choice, as a solution you can start asking yourself: ‘A solution to what?’ That question can lead you to deeper, more fundamental issues that you are more than likely attempting to numb, suppress, or hide from. If you can face those problems, name them, and start working on them, you will start to discover other solutions, besides a substance, to help you manage through those root problems.

3. Be selfish in protecting your recovery
   Nothing should come before your recovery. Absolutely nothing. Not your marriage, your kids, your job, your other relationships. If you don’t prioritize your recovery, you should be prepared to sacrifice everything. And I mean everything. I have seen it, I nearly experienced it myself. This is where the relationships become difficult. Some people won’t accept you prioritizing your recovery, and that’s okay. They’ll either come to accept it, or move on from your life. If they can’t handle you prioritizing your recovery, they’re not meant for your life anyway.

Three Steps to Live One Day at a Time

1. Pray
   First thing in the morning: request your selfish desires and ego be stripped of you for the coming day. Pray for continued faith, learning, and progression. The simplest version of this prayer, that I can go to even in the most rushed of mornings, is: “Thy will be done, not mine.”

2. Act
   Do the things that keep you in recovery with intention. Be quick to apologize for missteps and genuinely change your behavior, if needed. Simply put: Do the next best thing.

3. Reflect
   Sit at the edge of your bed before retiring for the night. Recount your day. Do you have any house cleaning to do? Do you owe anyone an apology for your actions? How did you make progress today? What occurred that you can be grateful for that you might not have noticed in the moment? By taking these steps, I guarantee you will find a deep and sound night of sleep each and every evening.

Three Unexpected Benefits of Recovery

1. Feeling feelings
   It’s frightening to reflect back and realize how numb I was for so many years. I feared the ups and downs of life and went to alcohol to relieve that fear and numb those feelings. Ironically, alcohol made the highs higher and the lows lower to a degree that was completely unmanageable. “Feeling the feels” these days has become a beautiful component of life. Experiencing life as it was intended to be lived, both the ups and downs in their raw unaltered form, is a joy that I never expected to achieve three years ago.

2. Navigating hardship
   I have been asked on numerous occasions what has made me proud about living in recovery. Pride is a tough thing for me to talk about. I still honestly don’t know how to approach it, and I take a very cautious stance towards stating pride about anything. But knowing how much our lives were falling apart before recovery, I can say that I am genuinely humbled and honored to be able to navigate the difficult periods of life over the last three years in lockstep with my family. Our journey has been on the more extreme end of the spectrum than most in early recovery, but even navigating the hardships that most everyone faces such as job problems, financial concerns, and other aspects of life has become an honor in itself. To not crumble under the weight of life, to actually find yourself strengthening and drawing closer to God through these hardships, is something I never imagined being able to discover in my life.

3. Finding power in living an honest life
   Let me be straight with you about this one. Living an honest life, focused on transparency and seeking the truth, is a horrible short-term strategy. Especially if you work in corporate America. Doubly if that corporate America job is in financial services. However, there is incredible long-term power in living honestly. No one has anything to hold against you. Your fear of man slowly starts to dissipate, and you establish yourself on a new foundation that can stand any attack or hardship. What is someone going to do, blackmail me for being an alcoholic? I think I’m comfortable with anything that will come on that front.

That’s all I have for this week. It has been the greatest honor to be able to communicate with you through this channel, and I genuinely hold each and every one of you who read these posts close to my heart. Isolation and shame nearly killed me. Faith, community, connection, and a willingness to change and live honestly have saved my life. You all have played a part in that. From the depths of my heart, thank you.

Keep showing up,

Kyle Layne

P.S. Interested in joining a small advanced read group for my new book Chasing Control? Find out more, and sign up here. You’ll get early access to the book (for free) and insight into the launch! Advanced readers like yourself are a huge help for self-published authors.