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Stories represent one person's experience, strength, and hope. They are not D.A.-conference-approved, and may not represent the views of our group or of D.A. as a whole.
If you have been a member of D.A. for at least 6 months, and have health issues, we need YOUR story of experience, strength and hope! To submit a story, send it to da...@gmail.com. (Click on da... to reveal the full email address.) A million thanks!
A Member Finds A Spiritual Recovery In Facing The Challenge Of Chronic Illness
A Member Finds A Spiritual Recovery In Facing The Challenge Of Chronic Illness
(reprinted from Ways & Means, 1st Quarter of 2010)
When I first came to DA, my partner and I were both suffering from devastating physical illnesses. We could no longer work. We were living off student loans, but were too sick to attend our graduate school classes. I was about to discover that I also had a spiritual disease: the disease of compulsive debting.
On the way to our first DA meeting we ran out of gas, so the two of us hobbled into our first meeting leaning on each other and carrying an empty gas can. Boy, did we look like losers! In fact, running out of gas was not uncommon. That was the level of vagueness in my life. I couldn’t even plan ahead well enough to make sure I had gas in the car.I would eventually become grateful for the physical illnesses that brought me to my knees and drove me to DA. I came to realize that I had been a debtor and underearner for many years. Severe, chronic illness shredded my denial. I knew I was powerless. In DA I found love, compassion, and help for my disease through working the Steps with a sponsor and using the Tools of the program.
My road has not been easy. Health issues increased expenses while making it extremely difficult for me or my partner to earn income. I had mental, emotional, and physical health problems that exacerbated the effects of my spiritual illness of compulsive debting. Our Pressure Relief Group (PRG) helped us address our overspending, and we cut up our credit cards. However, for a time we continued living on student loans, so we were still debting. One day at a time, we were able to make small improvements in our health. Our PRG helped us think of ways to begin generating income, such as selling things we did not need. Our PRG also helped us to stop blaming and fighting with each other. Instead, we became a team as each of us struggled with our own spiritual disease. Finally, over time, we began to earn some money and stopped debting.
One of our PRG members quit after several months, saying that we were not making enough progress. This was devastating. Sometimes people in DA do not understand the unique challenges of coping with severe illness. Eventually I found a sponsor and two Pressure Relief Group members who would support me and accept my health limitations while lovingly confronting my DA disease. They helped me distinguish between my physical illness and my character defects, such as vagueness and procrastination. They helped me take baby steps toward solvency and serenity. Baby steps were usually all I could handle. I even worked the Steps in baby steps.
At first I struggled to believe that a Higher Power really cared about me. Why would God make me so sick? Why would God place me in a situation where I could no longer work? I also had a profound struggle to believe that I deserved to live if I couldn’t support myself. I believed that my self-worth was based on what I could do and accomplish. Eventually, with much prayer, I found that total surrender to a Power Greater than Myself resolved all of these problems. My Higher Power and my friends in the program loved me and accepted me just the way I was. This acceptance helped me become willing to work the Steps, which allowed me to experience a radical transformation in DA.
Paradoxically, I found that accepting the limits of my physical illness led to an awareness of new options for me. For many years I tried to work at a regular job. I was able to increase my earnings and address my underearning issues. But eventually I had an accident and could no longer work. Once I admitted my powerlessness, I was inspired to begin a new career taking photographs and selling them in a nearby gallery. I believe my creative work is an expression of my Higher Power’s will for me. However, over the years my health has continued to decline. This year I finally admitted that my desperate efforts to support myself without debting were resulting in even more illness plus an unfair and unhealthy dependency on friends and family. Today my Higher Power’s will, as expressed through my sponsor and fellow DA members, is for me to apply for disability benefits from the government. Thanks to DA, I have years of excellent records to support my application.
I have had to adapt the program of DA to fit my limitations. Often I cannot make it to face-to-face meetings, so I now attend phone and Internet meetings. It has also been difficult to accumulate a prudent reserve. Sometimes I have even had to incur a debt for emergency medical care, but first I tried every action in my power to avoid debting. I’ve had to take steps such as asking health professionals to barter or lower their fees, asking for help from friends and family, or throwing a fundraiser, such as a simple spaghetti supper at my home for $10 a head, or a sale of my photographs. I also tried to find a way to take out a loan secured with some sort of collateral. Even if these efforts were unsuccessful, they increased my clarity about my situation and my determination to stop incurring unsecured debt, one day at a time.
The DA program has helped me in many ways to cope with my situation. First, a loving sponsor and fellow DA members helped me grieve the losses of my illness, such as the loss of the ability to work and of my self-esteem. Working through these emotions helped me gain clarity. Second, my Pressure Relief Group helped me set priorities on the use of my money, time, and energy. All of these resources were severely limited by my illness. Holding regular Pressure Relief Meetings also helped me cope with the chaos caused by my illness. DA members also helped me practice patience so I did not waste valuable time and energy on frustration and anxiety. I learned to listen to my own body and accept its limitations. I was eventually able to find ways to perform service in DA that respected those health limitations. For example, I could sponsor people if they were willing to talk to my answering machine when I was too sick to pick up the phone. Doing service, no matter how tiny, has helped me feel I have something to contribute and that my struggles can benefit others.
Most importantly, DA helped me choose gratitude and hope. Even though my health has deteriorated, my experience has brought unexpected gifts, such as the discovery of creative talents I never would have explored if I could still work a regular job. Most of all, DA has steadily deepened my dependency on a Power Greater than Myself, who is the true source of the abundance and joy of my life today. I can honestly say that I have experienced every single one of DA’s 12 Promises. Today my life does not look anything like the life I once expected, but it is a rich life, full of meaning and purpose.
Liz G.
Facing Health Issues, Yet Forever Grateful
(reprinted from Ways & Means, 2nd Quarter of 2012)Facing Health Issues, Yet Forever Grateful
Hi, my name is Mary Jane and I am a compulsive debtor with health issues. I wasn’t always a debtor and I certainly spent most of my life enjoying your average healthy body except for the many times of self-induced states of over indulgence. I was sober in AA twenty-one years when I discovered D.A. My husband was a compulsive debtor and my Al-Anon sponsor suggested that I write down my numbers and send him to D.A. Why I had to keep track of my money was a mystery. I had perfect credit and rescued our financial circumstances after every crises that was created. I would listen to the phone bridge meetings on Sunday and remark on the wonderful recovery I heard. Yet I still didn’t think I qualified. A.A. and Al-Anon were my fellowships, D.A. was his. But he never grasped it and to this day hasn’t had the willingness to be part of D.A., but through God’s Grace I have. I lost my job in May of 2009 and could no longer afford to pay my credit cards. I had managed to take over the family debt since my husband declared bankruptcy in 2001. I thought that if we combined our money there would be no more secrets. So I remodeled the condo on a second mortgage to the tune of $30,000 and managed to rack up $23,000 worth of debt on two Discover cards. We went to Europe twice, bought a car, a new computer, a forty-two inch TV and new speakers for my husband’s collection of about 400 CDs. Now the cool thing about these Discover cards was they had 0% interest as long as I charged $25 and made two purchases on the other card a month. I never thought of asking anyone in D.A. if it was OK to continue with these purchases. I mean who could argue with 0% for life? It was a debtors dream. So when I lost my job, I started going to face-to-face meetings and tried not to debt. Pretty soon we had our first pressure relief meeting (PRM). Since my husband was chronically unemployed and we had no savings, our pressure relief group (PRG) team suggested that we take a moratorium on our credit cards for three months. I need to mention that in 1995 I was diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome. I was so ill that I had to change my profession from being a massage therapist to working in an office so I could sit most of the day. My life changed drastically on the outside, and inside the fear of financial insecurity that plagued me throughout my whole life escalated. I started working two jobs even though I didn’t feel well, and I started using credit cards. I soon became the responsible worker in our marriage in spite of my health issues because I was afraid that our house of cards would fall if I didn’t. You see, I grew up in a house that looked really nice on the outside, but inside there was total dysfunction. My father drank and, even though he had no trouble getting up in the morning, he didn’t feel he should have to work for anyone. He had four kids and a house with no mortgage since my maternal grandfather bought it for my parents. But he had that alcoholic/debting disease that told him he was better than all his employers. He decided to start his own business and to use my mother’s inheritance to do it. Well, he did this over and over with no success until it was all gone. Then he went into the kids’ college trust funds. He just couldn’t seem to make it in the business world. At the time, my mother and I didn’t know he was having a long-term affair with another woman and had another life with her, which may account for the money not making it back to us kids. I remember my entire childhood there being money issues, my mother complaining of sleepless nights because she “had” to worry about money. My parents would argue about money all the time and I thought that was the only issue of concern in their relationship. So, when it came out that my dad had a girlfriend for years, I was just as shocked as my mom. I was the youngest and felt just as abandoned as she did. It took me seventeen years to realize that I married my father. I knew my husband was unable to make a living but I thought he was true to me. In the past year it has come to light that he had been involved with many women and treated me just as my dad had treated my mom. In the past couple of years, I was diagnosed with chronic lyme disease and fibromyalgia, have filed for disability, and have hired a lawyer for my credit card debt and divorce. The reason I wanted to share my story is because when a person in D.A. recovery has health issues, there are so many more complications. In my case, I felt so helpless and hopeless because I was misdiagnosed for over twelve years with practically no medical treatment. Then when I found out I had Lyme, I felt I had to work to keep my health insurance. There was no local doctor to treat me so I flew up to PA four times a year to be under a lyme-literate doctor’s care. This of course contributed to my credit card debt since I always lived above my means and had no prudent reserve. I have been solvent in D.A. since October 8, 2009 in spite of all of these complications. Believe me, it’s through my surrender to a power greater than myself that has given me the hope, faith and prosperity, not anything I could have done for myself with my unaided will. I am very grateful to D.A. and all the people that have given me support. I sleep at night instead of waking up and worrying about how I am going to pay my creditors. I live in the day and try not to project the worst possible financial future which is what my disease wants me to do. I have a local sponsor and a phone sponsor that I work the Steps and Traditions with. Both women have wonderful, long term recovery in D.A. I wanted to be a part of the D.A. and Health Issues meeting, so instead of feeling left out and not part of the group, which is what my disease would have me believe, I volunteered to be the timekeeper for six months and then chaired for six months. I’ve become an active member and feel a connection with these people like no other meeting. Now I am working on accepting my illness and my limitations and learning how to take care of myself the way the program has shown me. This past year D.A. and its members have helped carry me through a divorce and qualifying for disability. I am forever grateful. Mary Jane B.
If you have a story of recovery in Debtors Anonymous, and you have health issues, please consider contributing your story to this page. Send it to da.health.issues@gmail.com.
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