BUDD.

Today I taught our phase 2 clients about the "BUDD concept" of recovery..."building up to drink or drug". Part of this concept explains that we must have at least one person in our lives whom we trust emphatically, someone who we know will never come at us out of spite or jealousy or ill will. This person is then given permission to warn us when we are "BUDD-Ing", aka heading toward a relapse.

BUDD has symptoms that must be present over the course of weeks, as we believe relapse is not an event but a process. We want our clients to understand that they cannot stand still and expect to remain clean and sober. Any rest they take must be IN CHRIST, who is the source of life and growth. Christ enables us to humbly hear when we are behaving in dangerous ways we can't recognize on our own. Oh, how humility truly is the key to so many of life's lessons! And yet so painful at times.

All of this teaching left me grateful. You see, the majority of our clients do not have many options of trustworthy people, let alone even one.  My mind drifted back to the various dramas of just this morning: watching mother and son, both seemingly schizophrenic, come in to explain to us the confusion and chaos in their minds resulting from mental illness and drug addiction, or the young man who couldn't accept he had told us a lie and instead faked a total mental breakdown and convulsion.  It's been one of those days! And yet, in the midst of such a chaotic day, I could find thankfulness oozing out of my being for the people I love and trust in my life.  I am so blessed to not have to think to hard for an example of a friend I can rely on to warn me when they see me in personal danger.

I heard a guy once say "true friend when tell you when you are full of crap".  That's what this BUDD idea is all about.  So anti the "independent self" idea valued in the world. The BUDD concept teaches interdependence. 

I'm thankful for the blessed life God has given me. The older I get, the more grateful I become.