The material presented
here is not Al-Anon Conference Approved Literature. It is a method
to exchange
information, ideas, feelings, problems and solutions on a personal
level.
Well, I am going to be Clinical Director of an adult rehab after a year and a half of being director of a program for Juvenile Delinquents. Obviously a big raise but it's anxiety provoking. It is mostly just change. It is going to be a stressful transition. Short staffed where I am at and also where I am going. And again alanon tools will be more needed working with adults in rehab. I am praying that this will be a good move.
Congratulations. I know you will be terrific. I only know you through this board, but what I have seen I have been impressed. You have every qualification to be the best they have ever had. Congrats.
pinkchip - Congratulations on your new position! I agree that you will be terrific. I am sure the job will be a challenge but I believe you got the mojo, program and skills to make it great!
Woo-hoo for you - try to relax and celebrate the change - I know....easier said than done - but you wouldn't get the job if you weren't worthy/qualified!
Party for pinkchip - yay!!!!
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Practice the PAUSE...Pause before judging. Pause before assuming. Pause before accusing. Pause whenever you are about to react harshly and you will avoid doing and saying things you will later regret. ~~~~ Lori Deschene
wow! Good for you! I knew you'd been looking but so glad you found something you think will be a good fit for you. and, so grateful you get to take program with you!
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Never grow a wishbone where your backbone ought to be!
Thanks all! Balancing people pleasing with boundaries is a challenge in the work place. I will have to fire people and kick folks out of rehab for using. Those things will be new. Also, just in the year I spent working in adult rehab in 20013, I have found out 3 of my former clients OD'ed and died. These are young adults in the 18 to 26 age range. Most rehab clients are opiate addicts...like 80 percent. They are challenging...but in human services, all client have challenges or they wouldn't need service right? The disease is the same pretty much (as alcoholism) but drugs make people hit bottom at younger ages (typically). Alcoholism is a wretched beast as well...more insideous though. Really no such thing as a funtional heroin addict.
That's awesome, all positive change is anxiety causing really. You'll rock at it.
Yay!!!!
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If I had a world of my own, everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is, because everything would be what it isn't. And contrary wise, what is, it wouldn't be. And what it wouldn't be, it would. You see? (Lewis Caroll)
Congratulations! I know you will be wonderful this job. My AH's sponsor actually owns and operates several rehab facilities. He did not know this when he asked this person to sponsor him. It was an amazing choice and one that he has not regretted for a moment. This is the man who gave him one loan piece of white peppermint candy... To symbolize a chip he was not yet ready to receive. My AH is now 3 months sober and in full swing an I credit some of his success to this man's unwavering honesty, help, and straight forward behavior.
My AH keeps that pace of peppermint candy, in its wrapper, with his chip wherever he goes. He doesn't carry them in his pocket like most people, because he has to go in places where metal detection is an element of his employment. I am constantly amazed at the changes I see and I have never even met this gentleman. Right now my husband is not ready for me to meet him and that is OK! It is his program and he should work it however he feels is correct for him.
When he received that piece of peppermint candy he came home and cried. He is never cried in my presence before he reached his bottom. He says that piece of peppermint means as much to him as any chip will ever mean. That is because someone he did not know took the time to reach out to him when they saw he needed it and gave him an opportunity to live.
It's actually funny in a way that he had never met this person and everyone else already knew him. Generally this gentlemen does not sponsor because he has too much to do running these group homes, running a DUI school, and attending AA meetings on a very regular basis. When my husband asked, he told him that he usually has to go home and pray on things for quite some time before he will consider sponsoring a person snd that he rarely has the time to put what is is needed into sponsorship. In this case however, he decided immediately that sponsoring my husband was the right thing to do. I thank God for that!
On Friday nights now, my husband attends the meetings at one or two of the group homes. He spends several hours with his sponsor and takes the opportunity to learn from the men in the rehab group homes as they work toward their goals. Almost no one is ever turned away if alcohol is a problem for them. Drug issues may be involved, but they are not the basis for the program and are rarely dealt with the way alcohol is. The reason my husband attends these meetings is because he gains knowledge from every person there. Hey said to start with "man, these people are worse off than I am....but I would have been there if something hadn't changed and I hadn't stopped drinking and found AA". I don't believe he is saying I am better than they are...but that he understands how they got where they are now. And, that he would have most surely been with them had he not found help.
You remind me a great deal of this person in the way you respond to posts. This is why I know you will be great at this job.
Only someone who's been there can truly understand what an alcoholic or a person Al-Anon is living and only someone who has great compassion will be willing to reach out to a person who is living at the lowest point in their life and to throw them the liferaft they need to pull themselves in. I doubt it will be a piece of white peppermint candy...but you will find what works for you in helping these people to live their lives in a way they don't yet know.
I do realize this board is not about the alcoholic, but where the alcoholic is affected and change occurs, the entire family is affected.
You have a gift. I believe God is putting you in this position to use your gift to help someone else who is where you have been and have climbed your way out of, inch by inch, day by day, and sometimes by simply staying in the moment and relying on your HP to carry you.
Again, congratulations on your new position and I pray things go well for you and for those you are meant to help. You will be a wonderful tool in this program and both the addict and the families will gain some much from your experiences and your candor. I know I already have!
-- Edited by Doingmybest on Wednesday 15th of July 2015 08:15:29 AM
Again thanks, especially to Doingmybest. When you were describing your husband's sponsor, I felt like that about my sponsor too and it reminded me of my early journey in sobriety. it's an honor to think perhaps I could be that person. I've sponsored folks before but yeah...not recently because of being so busy at work in a profession that already gives of myself in that way kind of. Last night I woke up at 2 am and couldn't get back to sleep. My mind was reeling with "how am I going to finish up all this work at current job?" and "how am I going to fix this mess at the new job?" "How will I structure this thing and handle X, Y, Z." I told the new boss I would help out as much as I could while putting in 2 weeks notice. So that has me working like 12 hour days for the next 2 weeks. STRESS. Plus, to be 100 percent honest, I do have an anxiety disorder that has come a LONG ways since getting sober...but still, when stress hits, my mind locks in and obsesses about things and I have a hard time letting go. It can even be good change like Mel said. So this is a reaction I have had before. I know me now through the program. I don't really like that this happens, but I have some tools to deal with it and move forward.
If you are depressed, you are living in the past. If you are anxious, you are living in the future. If you are at peace, you are living in the present. - Lao Tzu
Congratulations! It is wonderful that you are moving up in position and that they will have you at the helm.
Since your current place is understaffed - I get that you want to not short the people receiving help as you move out of the role - but remember that by making up for the understaffing with those draining 12-hour days, you are enabling the bad decision of the head honcho to understaff it. Overfunctioning so someone else can underfunction. Would you advise your newly sober in-recovery guys to overwork like that? It just crossed my mind, because I know how we in the helping professions (and yours is as helping as it gets) can lose sight of taking care of our own selves when someone (including our own selves) plays the 'But you're needed!' card. The line of people who can use up our time and life-energy will never shorten...
Take very good care of yourself, and congratulations again!
I know you will remember not to take anything personal well except the pay check right? You have enough time in the profession and I'm sure the admin checked you out so go do your thing. Congratulations. (((hugs)))
You, my wee pal, are an inspiration for me. You will be brilliant and you have your special tools, these folks are lucky to have you. Happy for you.xxxxxxxx
Congratulations! I know you will be wonderful this job. My AH's sponsor actually owns and operates several rehab facilities. He did not know this when he asked this person to sponsor him. It was an amazing choice and one that he has not regretted for a moment. This is the man who gave him one loan piece of white peppermint candy... To symbolize a chip he was not yet ready to receive. My AH is now 3 months sober and in full swing an I credit some of his success to this man's unwavering honesty, help, and straight forward behavior.