Step 4: Truth

Before getting into step four I think I'll talk about the progress I've been making with the addiction itself.  Last week I was determined to have a good week.  I really want to be ready for this coming baby and I want to be organized and on top of things so that I can focus more on the transition from two kids to three rather than having to focus on my problems and addiction.  I want to overcome this at least for the most part before the baby gets here.  So anyway, I was determined to focus on my goals and have good days every day so I could have a good week I was proud of.  It started out great, and by the end of the week there were only a few goals that I had fallen short on by missing a day.  Unfortunately this week has not had the same great start and now I have to play catch up.  Our heater broke on Saturday, and I spent all Monday afraid to do different things I needed to do because I didn't want to be in the middle of it when the apartment maintenance men would show up.  Well, they didn't come till the afternoon so I wasted my whole morning when I should have just conducted life as usual and if they interrupt so what.  I had the wrong attitude about the whole thing and I have to make up for it now.  I was even thinking of postponing this blog post, but then that would be one more thing on my list of things I need to catch up on. **sigh**

So. . . Step four.  Make a searching and fearless written moral inventory of yourself.  I found myself thinking that because my addiction is not morally wrong in and of itself I don't really need to do this step.  But upon further reflection neglecting the physical and emotional needs of your children is wrong in very many ways. Now I want to clarify.  I never allowed my children to actually go hungry or be without any of their physical needs except on a short term basis while I checked something on Facebook and when I was done I saw that their needs were met.  But what does this send as a message to my children?  It says that Facebook is more important to me than they are.  Well if this is the case, then I need to change my heart because that is wrong.  If this is not the case then I need to change my actions to agree with what my values and my heart tell me.  The thing I know for certain is that this is not the message I want my children to receive.  I want them to know my priorities are God, then husband, then children, then chores.  But what I know my priorities SHOULD be, and what they actually HAVE BEEN leaves a huge disparity.  I want to fix this and ultimately that is why I joined the Addiction Recovery Class.  I just don't know how to fix it completely.  It seems when I have a week where I am great and successful in one aspect of my life I fall drastically short in another.  Then when I work to improve the other I lose the progress I made in the first.  I guess it's like the thought that they opened class with yesterday.  It was about the fact that we can't be perfect all at once.  No matter how much we might want to it is impossible.  We can just make today better than yesterday, and tomorrow better than today until eventually either before or after the end of this life we achieve perfection.  Well, I think that's about as much of my inventory as it is appropriate to be public on this blog.

Next week my husband and I are planning a temple trip, and I may end up missing class.  I have many issues I will be thinking and praying about on the trip, and so I don't know for sure when I will complete step five I may try to do it on my own without the class Wednesday morning and still get the blog out.  We will just have to see what happens.