Argh! I haven't given away anything to HAshem. I still believe I'm self-sufficient.

you will get there just keep working the program.

Hey!! I think I just hit Full Member!! Hooray!!!!! :-)

Nice! Enjoy all the perks  ;D ;D

Okay, sorry to be so quiet lately, I haven't had computer access since thursday. Today I reached 14 days clean! My longest ever! And its been the smoothest. B"H. This shabbos i went to New York and met up with Velvel, Shmuel (OTR), and Yoni. It was really great. A couple of us spoke to Dov afterwards and he mentioned to me a point which I thought was very good. He said that these instances really remind a person that recovery isn't all about hard work. There can also be some fun involved. Not to negate hard work of course...

Some thoughts after two weeks clean. First off, BH in the past couple of weeks I have been able to do many things which to the average Joe might seem simplistic but for us, (for me at least,) were very hard tasks to accomplish. For example, there were several times where i got really nervous, frustrated, anxious or was just too lazy to do anything. I didn't have internet access to just spend my time there, so I only had a couple options. One was to remain in the mood i was in and just sit in bed doing nothing. However after a few minutes I couldn't stand doing that either. In those moments I felt like I was really wasting my life away. Possibly more than when I was acting out. Because here I wasn't doing ANYTHING!

So I had two options of what to do. Either I could call or text someone and just tell them what was on my mind. This helped a lot. Just because there was someone who 1) I could tell what I'm going through without being afraid that he's going to start thinking what a big baby I am, and 2) could give me some objective advice to deal with the issue or ignore the issue depending on the circumstances.

The second option was to write it down. It seems very simplistic but in reality is a life-saver. For a few days I was going nuts because I had so many things I wanted to do, at the same time because I wasn't wasting my time i had already accomplished a lot that day and therefore wasn't sure what else I wanted/needed to do and therefore was just sitting around in a haze of accomplishment/time-wasting. So I realized that the only thing I could do was to write down everything. I wrote down what I wanted to do on a daily basis, what I wanted to do in general, things I needed to do and things that I had already done. This accomplished several things. The first list gave me more of a direction in my daily schedule. The second and third list accomplish two things. First they give me what to do when I feel that I've already done everything I need to do on a daily basis. Second, they take all the things that are flying around my head and bombarding me with stress telling me I have SO much to do, and put them down in an orderly bite-size fashion.

The fourth list gives me a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction that I can look back at and say "See?! I AM doing something!." It also serves as a reminder of what I have already accomplished and that I don't need to be worrying about it.

Another thought/observation I had after two weeks clean. When I was going into New York this past thursday I started getting butterflies in my stomach. Till now I was in yeshiva and no real distractions around, no girls in the community (at least that I know of who hang around yeshiva). Now I was going to New York where there would be many girls around and how was I going to handle that?

Honestly looking back after shabbos I can't really say whether the situation became infinitely harder in New York and that I somehow became weaker or maybe nothing changed and I'm still in the same place I was. I definitely had some more questions pop up in my head about the future and had to look away many more times and felt that it wasn't the ideal situation for me to be in at this moment in time. But at the same time, all that amounted to was me texting and calling a little more often to other people and saying tehillim a few extra times. If no one had answered their phones I probably would have written out my stress on my ipod. Except for one time which I dearly thank Velvel for hearing me out and responding immediately.

Truth be told, now that I'm writing this and looking back, I realize that I'm not 100% sure I would have written those stress moments out on my iPod or not, because for a couple of those moments I had a few minutes time and I for some reason pushed off taking out my iPod and writing. Now I know another thing which I need to work on.

However all through the weekend I found myself wishing that I had access to a computer that I would be able to post from and read some emails. Which brings up another issue which I wanted to bring to everyone's attention and maybe get some feedback on. Till now for the last two weeks I have been using the computers of a couple bochurim in yeshiva. Today one of them is returning his and the other is getting more strict about when people can use his computer, namely when he is around. This brings up a bit of frustration for a few reasons. First, because my chances of using his computer when he is not using it nor anyone else and yet him being in the room become a lot smaller. Although I can't argue with him that he should be around and I am very appreciative that he takes such measures, it becomes much more limiting and therefore stressful. A second issue which comes up is that I was hoping to take a class on his computer when he is not using it for an hour or so a day, and because he is making it harder for me to use, the opportunity for me to take this class is slimmer.

There is a second computer that another bochur has and he has agreed to let me use it, but I am VERY apprehensive about using it because he keeps his computer in his bedroom and I don't want to trust myself yet in that situation. The other computers are in an office, with semi-public access.

The idea has popped into my head to "borrow" a laptop from Costco. But disregarding the halachic questions involved, I immediately push that thought away because even if I could keep it in the office, I don't begin to trust myself not to record anything on the computer and then take it to my room when I feel weak.

That's my rant.

Hope everyone is having an awesome day!!!