10 Ways to Know You’ve Hit Rock Bottom

Rock Bottom - You'll Know When You Get There

1. You have no money.
2. No one will lend you any money.
3. You owe a lot of money.
4. You have no place to live.
5. You own parents won’t even look at you let alone talk to you.
6. You have no friends.
7. You have no job.
8. You have no clothing, but those on your back.
9. You have not showered in a month.

10. You are an outcast, everywhere.

This is a VERY, very “over-the-top” scenario, and there are, of course, many varying scenarios ranging from very-low to very-high in between.

You have had an example of an extremely “bottom-of-barrel” low, and now I will give you an example of a much less noticeable one.

1. The bank is beginning to breathe down your neck.
2. The only people that will still lend you money are your parents.
3. The bills are starting to pile up.
4. You have not paid your rent in months.
5. Warnings are starting to come from loved ones, that, if things don’t straighten out soon, your life is about to change dramatically.
6. Your friends are thinning out.
7. Your boss says, one more time, one, and that’s it.
8. Your clothes are running low.
9. You are starting to care less and les about your appearance.

10. You re beginning to be less and less welcome wherever you go.

Whether you are attending a holistic program, or a 12 Step Based program, “your” goal, actually, is to hit a bottom.  It is – bottom line – the ONLY thing that gives you a real chance at staying sober for any real length of time.

When I first got into trouble with the law, I had still not yet hit rock bottom. I was one of the types that had to learn HARD to learn at all.

It took a huge amount of pain and suffering cause by me, to both others, and myself to finally realize that enough was enough.

I still pray daily, that I never feel the need to return to that place, and those places in my life.

I would have to say that realistically, I had to hit roughly 10 different bottoms, or what I thought at the time were bottoms, before it all made sense in my head, or at least I pray to G-d that it has.

Today I feel good, I feel centered, I feel grounded. I pray everyday, maintain a solid spiritual program, and am as rigorously honest as humanly possible.

And yet, sobriety is an extremely tentative thing.  Or at least it has been in the past for me, and many others I know.

I know that I have hit rock bottom, literally.

I know that my Higher Power has saved my life directly, and left me with, Him willing, all of both the physical and mental scars to prove it.

When one has such an accident as I did, and lives to tell the tale, with all the pain to back it up, they should be incredibly grateful. I could easily have died.

I did not.

I could easily have been partially or fully paralyzed, but was not.

And I most certainly have been maimed beyond recognition.

I was not.

You see, G-d has always known, or at least it appears He has, that if I am to be taught a lesson, that it must be in a big, loud, screamed out way.

I must never be allowed to forget, ever.

I must literally hit rock bottom!