This is 6.

Six years sober. Unbelievable. A miracle truly. As I sit here writing this, I am blown away and honestly shook by what my life looks like today, and as I reflect on the last six years I am more grateful than ever to be exactly where I am in this current moment. Never in my wildest dreams did I picture having anything like what I have now. I thought I’d hotel hop until I ultimately died, or live a long drawn out miserable life. Instead, it has turned out to be quite the opposite.

Let’s rewind a little, my name is Melissa and I am certainly an addict. My sobriety date is August 8, 2015 which means today I am celebrating six years sober, by nothing other than the grace of God and the help of people who have loved me when I was the most unlovable version of myself. I am one of the lucky ones who survived the “opioid epidemic.” I was the straight A student, the most likely to succeed, the little blonde girl from New Jersey who ended up with a needle in their arm on a one way path to a grave. We will get more into that story later. Fast forward six years and I am sitting in my apartment with my dog next to me writing this blog while my fiancé who has eight years sober sits in the other room playing video games.

This year has been a big one. A lot has transpired, a lot has happened – both good and bad. I walked into five years sober feeling euphoric, like nothing could bring me down. I was 25, engaged, I had the dog, the house, the job; the outsides were all right in line with what I thought they should look like. Little did I know, if God gave us what we wanted when we wanted it, we would be selling ourselves short. I called it all off, left the house, took the dog, ditched the life I clung so desperately to in order to maintain that social acceptability I thought I needed. Work had to be done, growth needed to happen. I didn’t know what the remainder of the year would bring, but I knew God didn’t bring me this far to drop me on my rear end. Well, needless to say, I am now 26, I am still sober, the house has been sold, the ring is back on, the dog is still here and still very cuddly and man oh man did the growth happen. In my experience, time has a funny way of mending things if you allow it to, and if you work with it. Time mended my relationship with my family after getting sober, time has allowed me to grow beautiful new friendships, time has mended my failing relationship with my fiancé and blossomed it into something I never could have imagined. Time and God go hand and hand for me. I have to trust the timing of my life is aligning with exactly what God would want for me, it’s all part of the plan.. all the time, always. Easy right? HA. That was always my problem, to be honest it still is on somedays, trusting the timing of my life as well as trusting God’s plan for me. It’s like I know deep down inside everything will always work out, but I still try to fight it with every fiber of my being, when it isn’t working out the way I need it to in that moment.

I’m not sure what came over me, or inspired me to write this and be so vulnerable with the world but here I am, spilling it (with plans to spill more) to a laptop for all of you to read, criticize, do what you may – but this is me. This is 26 and sober. This is me figuring it all out, one step at a time. As life unfolds, I hope you figure it out with me. Hopefully, the perfect person at the perfect time will find themselves reading this and think, hey.. maybe that could be me too. If that happens, it was all worth it. Talk soon.