So much for my mind to process.

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I am finally beginning to accept that I will never gain any respect within my blood family. I am also beginning to accept that the only respect I really should be seeking out is my own. I do not have to impress anybody else. Except for my boss, but that is not nearly as important as trying to build some self-respect.

I do not have to live in my past. I do not have to associate with anybody I do not want to. I do not have to sacrifice my integrity and self-respect for any bully or predator. Not anymore.

I do not need to seek out external validation. Anybody can get that. I need to validate myself to myself. I have to really be who I want to be. I have to really live how I want to live. I have to find what truly challenges me, and what truly pleases me. I have to work to sculp my mind, body and spirit into the whole man I want to be. Everything else will fall into place in the process.

Selfish? Perhaps. But how can I care for others when I am not caring for myself? How can I help the ones I love when I am showing them a bad example of how to live through my actions? How can I be an effective piece of a much larger society if I allow myself to fall into complete ruin?

I have a YMCA membership. I have a library card. I have my own apartment. I have loving friends in recovery. I have some solid sobriety going on. The key piece that was missing was that self-respect. The thing that was holding me back from starting to take steps in the right direction was a general feeling of unworthiness, of inferiority, of doubt, of obligation to the very people who have damaged me.

I am embracing faith. Not only in God, but in myself.

This stems from many conversations with my sponsor over the last 48 hours.

I am ready to accept, process, and let go of my emotional pain. I am ready to grieve all that was never there, and all that was lost. But most of all, I am ready to start working towards being the kind of person I can see in a mirror and seriously have no animosity towards.

This post is a way to process what is going through my mind. A mental vent, if you wish to call it that. Thanks to everybody here for the support and the unfiltered honesty. I am not going away anytime soon.

^ I wish you every success.

Much love to you

It's good to let go of things that are just an endless source of pain. When you have had such a bad start as you have, it's so easy to want to think that it's really not that bad, that if you just change a few things, things will get better. Letting go of that dream is painful. It starts a grieving process, and you have to be ready for that process, with its ups and downs. However, when you start, there is finally a hope that you will get to the other end of it, and that your life will take a new direction.

Rooting for you.

Good for you man. I find myself at a seemingly similar crossroads of my own mind. With a decidedly less positive outlook at the moment.

But I do know that I'm the only one who's going to take control of this life and if I don't I'm just going to regret even more lost time.

Good luck to you and keep up the focus. That always seems to be the hardest part