I made it through that wave/PTSD episode I wrote about the other day. I made it through because of a few things, but mostly because of people.
So this post is simply to say, “Thank you.”
There’s no adequate way to convey how much it meant to me that so many of you reached out. Your messages, your stories, your encouragement, they weren’t small things. They steadied me. They reminded me I wasn’t alone inside that storm.
I especially want to thank my wife. She has stood by me through all of it, the good days and the hard ones. She held my hand when I had seizures while getting clean from benzos. She sits beside me now when my heart is racing or my mind is spiraling. Thank you so much, mein Liebling! I truly would not be here without you.
I had people reach out through Facebook, Blue Sky, and email. People shared their own experiences with being triggered, with nightmares, with waves that felt unbearable. And they also shared how they made it through and how they continue to make it through.
That’s one of the reasons I write. When someone reads my story, I want them to know they are not alone too. I’ve received so much help in my recovery, from friends, from the recovery community, from people who were willing to be honest about their own struggles. And I want to pay that forward. If my words can help even one person in the middle of their storm, then it’s worth it.
The recovery community, both in person and online, has been a lifeline for me. The kindness, the patience, and the understanding… it matters more than I can say.
So to everyone who reached out, thank you. Truly. You helped more than you may know.
I was having a good day early yesterday. Just going about my daily life when, out of nowhere, memories came flooding in. It was like someone threw open a door I didn’t even know was unlocked and allowed the monsters in. One memory at first, then another, then many more.
Before I even realized what was happening, I was hyperventilating. That’s when I knew I was in trouble.
I went outside and walked. That helped for a while, but my nervous system was already lit up. Fight-or-flight had taken over now. My body was reacting as if the past was happening again right now.
By evening the intensity had returned with a vengeance, so I meditated longer than usual. It steadied me enough to be able to eat. But when I went to bed, the nightmares came almost immediately. I woke up gasping for air, my heart pounding so hard it felt like it might burst right out of my chest.
It’s astonishing how powerfully the body remembers. My mind knows I’m safe, safe in our home, in this present moment, but my nervous system doesn’t always get that memo. When it’s triggered like that, it’s like a terrified child has taken the controls. Except this child lives in an adult body with adult strength.
When I woke up from that nightmare, I was throwing punches. Trying to defend myself from something that happened long ago. I maybe slept an hour in total.
But what unsettled me even more than the nightmare was where my thoughts started drifting afterward…
Anger.
I realize now that anger used to be my shield against fear. And that shield almost destroyed me in the past. When I felt that old heat flicker back to life, I got terrified. Terrified of hardening myself again. Terrified of losing the progress I’ve fought so hard for. Terrified of slipping back into patterns that nearly cost me everything.
I even found myself craving benzos. That scared me.
So I did the only healthy thing I knew to do at the moment, I told my wife the truth. I told her how bad it felt. I told her I was craving the benzos. She took my hand and we went walking. That helped. A lot.
Today I’m still reeling. I don’t know if the flood of memories triggered a withdrawal wave, or if the lack of sleep just amplified everything, or if it’s simply the nervous system doing what nervous systems do when trauma resurfaces.
What I do know is this… I didn’t give in and I didn’t numb it. I didn’t lash out. I didn’t isolate. I didn’t pretend I was fine. I walked, I meditated, I talked to my wife. I stayed present.
That’s recovery.
It isn’t linear and it isn’t pretty. It ain’t candles and pixie dust. Sometimes it’s nightmares and pounding hearts and white-knuckling through the present moment. But it is survivable.
I promised when I started writing that I would keep it real. I won’t sugarcoat this path. I share the good days and the hard ones because I remember what it meant to me, in the dark depths of acute withdrawal, to hear someone say, “I went through this too, and I’m still here.”
If you’re struggling today, if old memories have ambushed you, if your body feels like it’s fighting ghosts, you aren’t broken. You’re healing, and healing sometimes shakes things loose.
We aren’t defeated just because we were triggered. We keep walking. We keep breathing. We keep choosing to do the next right thing.
Like many people in recovery, there are things I have said and done that I regret. Words I wish I had never spoken. Choices I wish I had made differently. Years I wish I could re-do with the clarity I have now.
But I can’t. And neither can you. What we can do is refuse to let yesterday steal today.
Regret may visit. It may knock on the door and remind us of who we were. But it does not get to move in and rearrange the furniture.
We are not who we were then. We are who we are now. And now is still alive with possibility!
The sun still rises. Breath still comes and goes. There is still time to choose kindness. Still time to love well. Still time to live well.
Regret can be both a teacher and a tyrant.
Healthy regret teaches. It helps us recognize where our actions were out of alignment with our values. In that sense, regret actually reveals something beautiful… it proves we have values. Many of us who survived addiction or trauma forget that. But regret is evidence of a conscience still alive and active.
The trouble begins when regret becomes chronic.
Psychological research shows that persistent regret is closely tied to depression and anxiety. When regret turns into rumination, replaying the same scene over and over with no resolution, it keeps the brain focused on failure. Reflection asks, “What can I learn?” Rumination says, “Let me punish myself again.”
Regret isn’t the same as reflection. Reflection is honest and constructive. Rumination is repetitive and self-punishing.
Unresolved regret also affects the body. Chronic stress elevates cortisol, the stress hormone, and over time that can disrupt sleep, raise blood pressure, and strain the cardiovascular and metabolic systems (diabetes anyone??). The body keeps score. Many of us in recovery know that firsthand.
But there is a crucial difference between saying, “I did something I wish I hadn’t” and saying, “I am something I can’t forgive.”
The first is wisdom. The second is shame.
Regret says, “I wish I had chosen differently.” Shame says, “I am the mistake” And that simply isn’t true. We made the mistake, we are not the mistake.
Spiritual traditions across the world refuse to trap us in our worst moment. In Christianity, repentance is met with forgiveness and a clean slate. In Buddhism, impermanence teaches that the past is no longer occurring. Karma is dynamic, not fixed. What we do now matters. Compassion applies to ourselves as much as it does to others.
There is no path of genuine healing that requires a human being to remain imprisoned in yesterday. We cannot change who we were. But we can choosewho we are becoming.
And that choice, made today and every day, is more powerful than anything we did before!
Some mornings, the path isn’t a windy mountain trail. It’s the distance between your bed and the bathroom. It’s the weight of your tired arms and legs, the fog in your brain, and the familiar ache of a tired body.
Today is one of those days for me.
I’m writing this on very little sleep, after another night spent wrestling with the shadows that PTSD can still summon, even after all this time. My body is weary, still recalibrating after a years long journey to freedom from high-dose benzos. A journey that took over a year of tapering and has left me with waves of exhaustion even now, a year clean.
And my mind wants to tell me that because I’m tired, because I’m struggling, that I’m failing. It whispers that I can’t show up for my readers today, that I have nothing to offer because I can barely think straight.
But here’s the thing about this path of recovery and about the spiritual practice that has become my anchor. I had a realization recently, not in my head, but in the very core of my being. It was unsettling at first, but now it feels like a most profound truth.
Everything is the path.
I practice Chinese Pure Land Buddhism and Chan (Zen). For a long time, I thought the path was the formal meditation, the sitting, and the chanting. And it is. But I’ve come to understand that it’s also everything else.
“Just sitting” in meditation is the path. It’s the practice of being present.
Cooking a simple meal when you’d rather hide is the path. It’s the practice of taking care of this body and this life.
Lying down to rest, even when the guilt whispers you “should” be doing more, is the path. It’s the practice of compassion and listening to what you truly need.
And making it through a day like today… exhausted, mentally fried, and a little bit afraid is absolutely the path.
The Nianfo, the practice of reciting “Namo Amituofo,” isn’t just something I do on a cushion. Today, that gentle name is the rhythm of my breath as I try to stay upright. It’s the silent prayer for strength with every step. It’s the reminder that I am not alone, even in this mental fog.
For decades I used alcohol and then prescription meds to try to outrun these kind of feelings. Now, clean and sober for the first time in decades and approaching my 60th birthday next month, I’m learning to just walk through them. And I’m learning that walking through them is the practice. The nightmares, the exhaustion, and the fear… it’s all part of the very same path as the joy, the peace, and the moments of clarity.
So if you’re reading this and you’re having a “three feet from the bed” kind of day, please hear me, you are not failing. You are on the path.
If all you do today is brush your teeth. If all you do is drink a glass of water. If all you do is simply endure one more minute than you thought you could, you have practiced. You have walked the path.
There is no special outfit, no special mindset required. Just you, in your tiredness, in your fear, in your hope. Just showing up for your own life, as it is in this very moment.
That is the practice. That is the path. And it is enough.
Some people seem to find their path early in life. I didn’t.
But I’ve found it now.
“Better late than never” isn’t just a saying, it’s definitely a truth. I’ve known people who never found their purpose. I’ve known others who never got the chance because addiction, prison, or death took that chance from them. I understand deeply that I am fortunate simply to still be here.
I’m approaching my sixtieth year of life. And for the first time, I don’t feel lost. I don’t feel like I’m wandering around without direction. That feeling, after decades of confusion and survival mode, is hard to describe to someone who has never felt it.
There was a time I didn’t think I’d make it to thirty. My wife still teases me about that. “Look at you now,” she says. “You’re already twice as old as you thought you’d ever be!” And she’s right.
Recently, a lifelong friend and I were reminiscing when he stopped and said, “Where did the time go, Buck? Seems like only a year ago we were young. Now we’re sixty!” Time does fly. People we knew are already gone. Others are actively dying. Time waits for no one. But what we do with the time we have, this moment right here and now, that is still ours. Our choice.
Somewhere along the way, without me even really realizing it, a mission formed.
When I was getting clean, I was helped more than I can ever properly express. Not by lectures. Not by statistics. By stories. People told the truth about what they had lived through and how they survived. Their honesty gave me something priceless… hope.
Hope is like oxygen in recovery. So now I tell my story.
When I shared my clean date, the length of time I was on the drug, and the taper process on a recovery group’s website, the response shocked me. Over sixteen thousand people read that post. Sixteen thousand people searching for relief. Searching for reassurance. Searching for someone who made it through.
Only 53 commented.
And that’s something a lot of people who’ve never been addicted to a controlled substance don’t understand.
When someone is struggling with addiction, especially involving a prescribed controlled substance, speaking or commenting publicly can feel terrifying. It can feel exposing. Vulnerable. Risky. Silence doesn’t mean no one is listening. It often means someone is reading quietly at two in the morning, holding onto hope. I know that because I was once that person!
So if my blog doesn’t explode with comments, that’s okay. I know people are reading. I receive the private messages. The private “thank you” messages. The “I needed this today” messages.
That is why I write.
I didn’t survive what I survived just to coast through the rest of my life. I didn’t walk through fire just to sit comfortably on the sidelines. Others once extended their hands to me when I was burning in that fire.
Now I extend mine.
If I can help even one person feel less alone, less afraid, less ashamed, then every word I share of my own story is worth it.
I may have found my purpose late, but I have found it.
Here’s another thing I’ve noticed since getting clean… disagreements don’t have to be disasters.
That probably sounds obvious to a lot of people. But for those of us who have trauma or lived through addiction, disagreements can feel very different. They don’t just feel like differences of opinion, they feel like personal rejection. Like being attacked and abandoned at the same time.
For most of my life, that’s how it felt to me.
Now that I’m clean and my mind is clear, I now see disagreements for what they really are, just disagreements. Nothing more. And I can’t even describe how freeing that is! It’s like this huge weight I didn’t even realize I was carrying has finally been set down.
People aren’t cookie cutters. We all come with our own experiences, beliefs, and opinions. Everything from favorite ice cream flavors to politics and religion. These days, my outlook is pretty simple, as long as someone isn’t hurting me or my family, I don’t care what they believe.
That wasn’t always true.
When I was younger, I lived inside a very insular world. Everyone around me believed the same things, thought the same way, and reinforced the same viewpoints. I honestly didn’t even know people existed outside that bubble, much less know how to talk with them.
Looking back, I realize I wasn’t really thinking for myself. That kind of environment doesn’t encourage curiosity or reflection, it rewards conformity. And that’s how disagreements become dangerous. When a group or community depends on or demands sameness to survive, anything different feels like a threat.
So of course disagreements felt personal. Of course they turned ugly fast.
But recovery has changed that for me.
Now, if someone wants to talk honestly and respectfully about something we disagree on, I’m open to that. I don’t mind listening and I don’t mind learning. But if a conversation turns into gaslighting, insults, or one sided lecturing, I simply walk away. No arguing. No proving. Just stepping back and walking away.
That’s new for me.
I’m clean and sober for the first time in decades, and for the first time in my life, I’m genuinely happy. And part of that happiness comes from realizing I don’t have to “win” conversations anymore.
One thing I’ve learned in recovery is that getting clean isn’t just about stopping substances. It’s about building a new life. A life with healthier thoughts, healthier habits, and healthier relationships. The old ways that kept me stuck just aren’t compatible with healing.
So these days, I choose peace.
I choose the things that support my recovery like good food, gentle movement, meditation, and kind interactions. Disagreements will always be part of life. But destructive arguments don’t have to be.
We get to choose what we engage with.
And for me, choosing peace has been one of the wisest choices I’ve ever made in my life.
Actor Eric Dane recently died at 53. I didn’t know much about him beyond the fact that he had ALS, but I saw part of a video he recorded for his family. In it he told them something simple but very powerful…
“Live now.”
Don’t wait. Don’t assume you’ll have time later. Live now. That message hit me hard.
Life has a way of keeping us busy. Responsibilities, fatigue, stress, doctor appointments, bills, errands, the endless “I’ll get to it when things slow down.” We tell ourselves things like, When I have more time, when I feel better, when I’m not so tired or when things calm down. But things rarely calm down on their own that much.
None of us are guaranteed another minute. That’s not meant to be morbid, it’s meant to be clarifying. We all know people who went to bed expecting tomorrow and didn’t wake up to see it. We know people whose health changed in a single visit to a doctor. It doesn’t even have to be death, sometimes it’s a diagnosis that rearranges everything.
When I was diagnosed with diabetes, I was shocked. I’m not overweight. No first degree relatives have it. But there it was. I remember the fear and the anger. The “Why?”
Then came getting clean. I knew it would be hard. But I didn’t know it would nearly break me. Benzo withdrawal changed my nervous system. Multifocal PVCs became part of my daily life. My body feels different than it used to. Some days are harder than others.
And yet… Here I am. Alive. Breathing. Walking under New Mexico skies and watching ravens ride the wind.
Laughing with my wife. Video chatting with my granddaughter. Writing these words.
That’s the shift.
Living isn’t about waiting until everything is perfect. If I waited until my body felt 25 again, I might never start. If I waited until anxiety was completely gone, I might never step outside. If I waited until life felt predictable, I might never do anything at all.
Living is doing the thing anyway, within reason, within wisdom, but without postponing joy indefinitely.
So whatever that thing is for you… What have you been putting off?
Is it a trip? A conversation? A creative project? Starting over in some small way? Taking a class? Calling someone? Watching a sunrise instead of scrolling your phone?
If you can’t do the whole thing today, can you take one small step toward it? Make the plan. Buy the ticket. Start the outline. Take the walk. Say the words.
We don’t need a terminal diagnosis like Eric Dane to gain clarity. We don’t need a catastrophe to wake up. We can choose to live now.
Not recklessly, not fearfully. But intentionally.
I’m heading out now to chase one of my dreams, not because everything in my life is perfect, but because it isn’t. And that’s exactly why now matters.
It was cold and windy yesterday as I took my daily walk. Very cold. But unless the weather is utterly unbearable, I walk. I even walk in the rain here. For me, there’s just something about being in and surrounded by the mountains that heals me and clears my mind.
After I complete my rounds of Niànzhū (Buddhist prayer beads), I use the rest of my walk to simply contemplate. I look at the beauty around me and feel how fortunate I am to be here, still alive after benzo withdrawal and everything else I’ve survived. I feel blessed to have my family. The walks also give me a chance to work through anything that might be going on in my life. I simply don’t feel as well on days I miss a walk, so I go pretty much regardless of the weather.
Something that I’ve been thinking a lot about in recent days is how divided people seem right now. Religion, politics, culture, even families. It feels intense and it feels overwhelming. And sometimes it feels like everyone is yelling and no one is listening.
But honestly? I don’t think division itself is anything new.
History is full of it. Wars have been fought over beliefs. Families have been split apart over differences. Entire civilizations rose and fell while arguing over who was right and who was wrong. All throughout history.
What is new is the way we experience it. We literally carry it around in our pockets now.
Social media and news feeds don’t just show us what’s happening, they show us carefully selected versions of reality, tailored to confirm whatever side we already lean toward. Add anonymity to that mix, and suddenly people say things online they would never say face to face.
Someone a little older than me recently said during a conversation, “We didn’t talk to people like that back in the day because they’d get punched in the face.”
Crude maybe, but true.
There used to be an immediate human consequence for cruelty. Today, there’s just a screen. And when there’s a screen between us, it becomes easier to forget there’s a real person on the other side. Someone with fears. Someone with wounds. Someone with a story we know nothing about.
I’ll be honest, all of this gets to me sometimes. Especially on days when my heart is messing up and my nervous system feels raw. But that’s exactly when I come back to my daily walks. To my beads. To the mountains. To breathing. To remembering what actually matters.
Out there, surrounded by wind and sky and quiet, none of the shouting exists. There’s just life. A raven calling from overhead. Clouds drifting over the mountain peaks. My own footsteps on the trail.
And in those moments, something softens inside me. I can feel it, I can feel tension leaving my body.
I remember that every person I might be frustrated with is also trying to survive something. I remember that everyone is carrying something heavy we don’t see. I think about how showing kindness is not weakness, it’s courage.
Spirituality, for me, isn’t about having the “right” beliefs or winning arguments. It’s about remembering our shared humanity. It’s about choosing compassion even when it would be easier to harden. It’s about listening more than speaking. It’s about noticing beauty even when the world gets loud. It’s about doing no harm, to others or to ourselves.
Some days, just getting through the day is the practice. Some days, choosing not to lash out at someone is the practice. Some days, putting one foot in front of the other on a cold, windy trail is the practice.
And sometimes, the most radical thing we can do is simply stay open-hearted in a world that keeps trying to close us down and divide us.
If you’re reading this and feeling overwhelmed by everything going on, please know you’re not alone.
Take a breath. Go outside if you can. Look at something alive. Be kind to your nervous system. Be kind to yourself.
The world doesn’t need any more outrage. It needs more gentleness. More listening. More remembering that we are all human after all.
That’s what I try to concentrate on during my walks. And today, I’m offering it to you too.
Today I’m getting to exercise my ability to choose the good.
I remember a long time ago a man I had a lot of respect for told me that when things are rough is when we really get to see that we have choices in how we react to unpleasant situations. I was telling him about something that had been bothering me, and he said, “That’s the perfect opportunity to practice patience!”
The operative word was practice.
It really doesn’t do much good to say we’re working on patience when everything is going fine, only to fall apart or fly off the handle when things aren’t going so well. I can honestly say I’m doing much better in that area these days than I was back then. Withdrawals forced patience upon me. Now when things get annoying I tell myself, “This is nothing compared to what I’ve been through before.”
I also draw inspiration from people I love. Two people especially come to mind. One deals with chronic abdominal pain from a medical condition, and the other deals with chronic joint pain from another condition. Chronic pain is no joke. It doesn’t just hurt physically, it takes a toll emotionally too. Yet they keep going, and their positive outlooks inspire me to keep my own outlook positive.
I used to not believe it when people told me I had a choice in how I reacted to things. Now, I absolutely believe it. Yes, we can condition ourselves through habit to react badly. But we can also slowly rewire those patterns and learn to respond in healthier ways. That doesn’t happen overnight, it happens through repetition, through small choices, through practice.
That’s what I’m getting the opportunity to do today.
I didn’t sleep well again last night because of the nightmares. They’ve been happening more often lately. I suppose it’s because my brain isn’t drowning in alcohol or dulled by benzos anymore, so memories that were once buried are now finding their way to the surface. On top of that, I don’t feel well today.
So I’m choosing to focus on the good things in my life instead of how bad I feel in this moment.
The good things are still here, my family, quiet evenings, kind messages from readers, fresh air, hot tea, the miracle of simply being alive. It’s just harder to notice them when you’re tired and hurting. But they’re still there.
And choosing the good doesn’t mean pretending everything is perfect. It doesn’t mean denying pain or forcing positivity. It just means deciding, again and again, to place your attention on what nourishes you instead of what drains you.
Some days that choice seems big. Other days it’s tiny, like getting out of bed, taking a few slow breaths, being gentle with yourself, sending love to someone else who might be struggling too.
Today, for me, it looks like appreciating what’s still beautiful even while I’m not feeling my best.
If you’re having a rough day too, maybe this can be your invitation to choose one small good thing. Just one. And let it be enough for now.
Whispering Wyrd 