Author David Palmer has recently completed a unique book about his own recovery.
Now available for purchase and instant download.
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Introduction
About Your Addiction…
A Message of Hope and Recovery
This book is mainly about people who have experienced the blessings and joy of recovery from their addictions, how they did it, and how you can do it. My purpose is to give you hope and encouragement. The rest is up to you.
With regard to the cover. In 1981, Joan, far left, and David Palmer (one year sober) with goggles on his head, and their eldest son, David, far right, prepare for a dive near the Mauna Lani resort hotel on the Big Island of Hawaii. David’s mother, an accomplished snorkeler, has just given him a briefing about staying out of caves while scuba diving. It struck everyone as funny.
You will find my story, the one I tell at 12-Step meetings, in appendix 1. I hope you will conclude when you read it that, “If this guy can do it, I can, too.”
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But this is mainly a “how to” book not a memoir. There are eighteen chapters in the book that will help you better understand the resources available to you. There are chapters, for example, on people we are especially interested in—adolescents, veterans, and prison inmates—and about programs like Alcoholics Anonymous, Al-Anon, and Celebrate Recovery.
I call these chapters “pathways to serenity” in the title of the book and emphasize taking it no more than “one day at a time,” a vital key to recovery. The photo on the front cover is meant to reassure those who seek recovery that there can be happiness after you drop the alcohol, drugs, or other addictions. And there will be moments of serenity, but not every moment. That’s where the “one day at a time” comes in.
The stories about people and programs are snapshots. People and programs change; some in recovery have slips and may never come back, while others succeed. It is also true that some programs succeed while others fade away. That’s life, and readers must take this into account in charting their own recovery.
This, then, is a freeze frame of people dealing effectively with their addictions through programs that work. We must remember that they are contending with an adversary—addiction—which chapter 5 of the Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous describes as “cunning, baffling and powerful.” Many, regrettably, will not make it.
Of the many courageous people introduced to you in this book, we can only say with some assurance that they were clean and sober when we spoke to them. Two years ago, my eldest son, David, sent me an e-mail on my eightieth natural birthday and close to the thirtieth birthday of my recovery. He asked me to publish his letter in One Day at a Time, my nonprofit newspaper and website, and I quickly agreed.
If you are suffering from an addiction, I hope you will read his letter, as well as the rest of the book, and will be encouraged to give recovery a chance. If you are already in recovery, I hope you will find in these pages further confirmation that you have made a decision that is changing your life for the better.
– David Palmer
