When It Suddenly Becomes Enough To Just Be Alive

The most difficult part of surviving breast cancer has been the risk to my fertility. It is one thing when you choose not to have children. It is something completely different when you have the choice taken from you. Not only taken from you, but taken from you in a whirlwind of decision making and fear. The most anger that I felt when the shock wore off was over the potential loss of my fertility. I felt angry that I had accomplished just about everything else I had set out to do in my life and the one thing that I really felt I still wanted and that I really felt was important to me, was taken, unfairly. I struggled through wondering how I would live the rest of my life with that and not knowing whether I could or whether I could find purpose and meaning in my life. The birth of my nephew was bitter sweet. I struggle constantly with why I can't just be happy. Why isn't it enough too just be alive?

I've been waiting since September to know whether my fertility would come back. I am not the most patient person. Actually, I am not patient at all. I've prayed a lot, not for my fertility, but for God's will. Only once have I asked for my fertility. Instead, I say, "thy will, not mine, be done." I've done a lot of reading lately on how to attain conscious contact with God - and I remind myself constantly, that God can do anything and that God will help you do anything he asks you to do. When I say the serenity prayer, I say, God, grant me the serenity, to accept the things I cannot change, my fertility, the courage to change the things I can, my attitude, and the wisdom to know the difference. I pray for knowledge of God's will and the power to carry that out and I pray for knowledge of the purpose of my life that is independent of me.

Christmas was hard. I love my nephew in a way I can't describe, but the pain cut almost as deeply. I fluctuate between gratitude for everything that I do have and sadness and anger over the things that I don't have. But I have been striving for acceptance. One of my friends reminded me recently that God doesn't save you only to let you drown. And I try to remember that when I don't get what I want, when things don't work out the way I want them to - they usually work out better. Even if what I get turns out to be completely different than what I hoped for, I have to have faith that the outcome will be greater than I can even imagine.

I've thought a lot lately about what else to do with my life or how to find meaning or how to help someone else. I've thought a lot about what the point might be and I believe that there is one - a point to my life that is beyond me because God saved me twice in one year and gave me this incredible story to tell. I started a college fund for my nephew for Christmas, knowing that if I never have my own children, or maybe even if I do, I will be able to pay for my brother's to go to college - I hope.

Today I was making my bed, thinking about powerlessness, thinking about acceptance. Thinking about the process of achieving it and the negotiation phase of the process. There was a time at the beginning of this when I thought I would not choose my life. If given the option, I would not give up my fertility in exchange for my life. I thought about the things that I am really grateful for today - and that is simply my life - that I get to live and live from the perspective of someone who almost didn't get to - that because of that perspective, I can live with a greater appreciation of what ultimately matters. When I thought about it today, I thought, I would choose to live, if given the option. A few hours later, God blessed me again with my fertility.

Volkswagen Sucks

I drive a 2006 Volkswagen Passat and if you are ever thinking of getting a Volkswagen, don't. The dealer in Ann Arbor and downtown Chicago both suck for different reasons, but the manufacturer really sucks. I drive a brand new car and my check engine light comes on all the time. I've been caught up in a battle with Volkswagen customer care and the corporate headquarters in Michigan since summer over why I think Volkswagen should replace my car. At the beginning of this argument, I didn't really think they should necessarily replace it. Now I am so annoyed that I feel entitled to a new car. The problem is, until my check engine light comes on for the same reason three times, I can't really go after them under Michigan lemon law. Every time the check engine light comes on, it's for a different reason - I'm hung up on a technicality in the way the law is written. This, however, is a matter of interpretation and I personally think I can argue that they should replace my car under the law. I can argue for almost anything, so, this technicality in the law hasn't stopped me from arguing with them and sending a letter to the head of the corporate office in Rochester. The people at customer care are complete assholes. They have threatened to stop talking to me if I threaten them with a lawsuit again. I tried the better business bureau but I don't want to deal with arbitration.

Anyway, two days ago, I dropped my car off at the dealer in Chicago for an oil change and 20K service. I asked for the price sheet and list of everything included in the service. I was hesitant to take my car there - the last time I took it there for the check engine light, the dealer drove all of the gas out of it. When I picked it up, the car was 2 miles to empty - the refuel light comes on at 45 miles. I registered a complaint with the idiots at customer care. So, I thought the price was kind of high so I called the dealer in Michigan to see how much the service is there. Much to my surprise, it was $230 cheaper in Ann Arbor. While I agree that the cost of labor could be more in Chicago, this seemed ridiculous to me. So I asked them in Chicago why it cost so much more and asked if I could fax the price sheet from Ann Arbor over for comparison because I just didn't see that the Chicago dealer was providing $230 more worth of service. Was I taking this too far - trying to get cheaper car service, or was I being taken advantage of by the asshole at the dealership who apparently thought I was stupid?

I faxed the price sheet from my work email - which happens to state "Attorny at Law" in the signature line. Ten minutes later the dealer called to apologize - saying, we are so sorry, we quoted you the wrong price. (I thought, yeah, I know you did). The price we quoted was for the wrong engine - and we will give you an additional discount. Clearly this person thought I was just a stupid woman who didn't know what I was doing. Little did he know.... I don't appreciate being taken advantage of in these types of situations. It really pisses me off. Sometimes, it comes in handy to be able to sneak in there somewhere that I am a lawyer. Anyway, I picked up my car, only to find that they had driven it 40 miles, which seems a bit excessive for the "road test" portion of the service. I won't bother registering another complaint though. They make it more trouble than it is worth. One time, the so called "highest" person that I could possibly talk to at Volkswagen customer care told me that they don't have anyone in the company who handles replacement vehicles and he flat out refused to connect me to anyone else. What a crock of shit. So, I'll just keep waiting for my check engine light to continue to come on until I can eventually get myself a new car - and you know I will!

Mmmm Tasty (and I Get the Hint)

So I just got back from spending time with my brother and sister-in-law at my sister-in-law's parents house in Indiana - lovingly referred to as "down on the farm." I haven't really taken the time to post about it or about spending time with my nephew, but I had a great time and it was hard to leave knowing that I won't see them again until probably mid May. I got to eat my all time favorite thing for breakfast, twice. Biscuits and sausage gravy. I have no idea why I love this so much. In fact, I had never eaten it before until visiting the farm years ago. Actually, I've only ever eaten it at the farm - I think I might have eaten one other person's poor attempt at making this. It's like eating pure fat. I love it. It even looks like pure fat. You know when you cook something that is greasy and then put the leftovers in the fridge and the fat congeals into that whitish color when it gets cold. That's what it looks like - it's that color. My second favorite thing to eat for breakfast - grapefruit.

Anyway, this post is an attempt at sitting still. I got back to Chicago today and immediately began to tear the house apart like a crazy person. Now it is a disaster and I am going to have to put it back together, but a friend suggested that I try sitting still for a while. No need to tear the entire house apart in one day. So I decided to pull out these cards from my friend Claire and select one to meditate on. They are self-care cards and there are 52 of them. They say different things like "boundaries," "relaxation," "goals," "progress" etc. There is a phrase on the back of each one - "Set boundaries." "Protect your precious time and energy."

When Claire gave me these cards, I decided to pull one out twice a day when I pray, once in the morning and once at night. The first time I pulled "retreat." "Listen to the voice of your soul." That night, I shuffled the cards and I pulled "retreat." The next morning, I shuffled the cards and I pulled "retreat." That night, I shuffled the cards and I pulled "retreat." What are the odds of this? Okay, I get it, I am supposed to retreat! Finally, I pulled two different cards, "playfulness" and "goals." It's been a few days since I've pulled one because I did not take them to Indiana with me. I just sat down, I shuffled them and I pulled "retreat." Okay, seriously, I get the hint.

Anyway, I promise I'll post about the past two weeks that I spent with family later tonight and I will include some pictures!

Merry Christmas and happy holidays!

If My Life Had a Title

I don't really have any thing to write, but I feel like I should post. Actually, I probably have tons to write, but don't really have time to sort it out. I've just had a week off of work and my first day back I worked from 7 until 7. Oh well, I can't really complain. I just spent a week with my brother, sister-in-law and nephew who are visiting from Germany and I honestly enjoyed the time I spent with them more than I ever have before. I think it is my slightly improved ability to live in the moment - a by product of thinking I was going to die of breast cancer. Although I am still not great at it - living in the moment - I've noticed a drastic improvement.

We celebrated my AA anniversary which was amazing. One of my friends presented me with a token at a meeting and then as scary as it was, I had to go up and get it and say something. But it was really amazing actually. I don't know where the words came from, but I think I might have helped a few people that night. I hope anyway. Then I came back to Chicago to celebrate my anniversary here and that was amazing also. It sort of made me want to get more involved in the program and it definitely made me feel extremely grateful for a lot of things. Anyway, it was good to see family and friends. I am heading back down to my sister-in-laws later today to spend a few more days with my family. I'll post pictures soon of my cute nephew.

My brother wrote a post the other day called the "The Wheels Have Come Off." All I could think was that if my life had a title, it would be that. That's how it feels. It's always felt that way though. I don't think I've ever not felt that way. It's like a constant but sudden feeling of something coming apart and it could be dangerous, but I get through it almost unscathed. The feeling of panic you must feel when the wheel suddenly comes off your car while driving down the road - that's how my life feels. It's always felt like it could be good, it could be really good, but a part is missing. And just when I think I've found or replaced or have the part, something else falls off suddenly. I am quite sure that the missing part is something inside myself and I am sure I will be reminded by several people reading this that the problem is most definitely me. At any rate, I really don't want this to be the title of my life. My relationship has just come undone and while I am not surprised at all, maybe this is why I am feeling especially like things are coming apart.

I guess that is all for now. I'll try to sort something out to write about while I am "down on the farm."

Happy One Year Anniversary

Today is my one year annivesary!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll post soon...I am in Indiana with my brother, sister-in-law and nephew and am traveling to Michigan tomorrow to spend some time with family there. Hopefully I will have pictures of me and Ellis to post soon! He's super cute. We have similar hair dos right now! Ha ha. My hair has been growing for about two months and is about an inch long. I'm too chicken to unveil it in public. I have more hair than my nephew, but I think his is longer on top!

Gratitude For My Car (Am I Lazy, or Is It Convenient?)

Or am I procrastinating at work? I think I might be lazy about this, but I actually rationalize it well. It does happen to be very convenient and as I was driving across downtown Chicago, on lower wacker to avoid traffic, this morning - in the pouring rain (it is 50 and raining in Chicago today - in mid December), I was very grateful for my car. Cause what would I do if my oh so real looking fake (but actually real) hair got wet? It wouldn't be good. This morning, for 14 dollars, I went from my parking garage at home to my parking garage at work, without setting foot in the pouring rain.

The thing is, I do this every day - rain, shine, snow, 20, 75. If I can get to the parking garage at work by 8, it costs me 14 dollars for the whole day. This seems really reasonable for downtown Chicago. If I can't get to the parking garage by 8, then I park across the street - and yes, walk outside, for 13 dollars. If it's raining, and after 8, I pay 23 to park under my building. I once went 3 days without ever setting foot outside in the beautiful Chicago air. It actually did happen to be beautiful these particular three days, 75 and sunny. I went to Dominicks (the grocery store), Trader Joe's, Target, my office, the hospital - all without going outside. I just went from one parking garage to another.

When I moved here I thought - how great it will be to live in a place with really good public transportation. I'll never drive. If I don't drive, then it costs me 2 dollars to take a bus to work, 2 dollars to take a train to a meeting, and then about 8 to take a cab home. I figure this way, I pay 14 dollars for the convenience of my car and I just park at the meetings - which is surprisingly easy. It costs basically the same amount and then I am not at the whim of the public transportation. I've missed meetings before waiting for trains. You probably wonder why I don't take something besides a cab home for two dollars? I'd have to take a bus and a train and in the winter it starts to get dark here at 3:45. So, for only 6 dollars more a day, I have the convenience of my car - or about 120 a month.

What this all boils down to, is that when I move next, I won't live in the West Loop. It's far more convenient to live just a little bit north where I can walk home from meetings. I would go to more meetings actually and probably never drive to work. It's much easier to take a train from Old Town - two red line stops north of my office - than it is for me to get here from where I live which is technically closer. So, am I lazy or is it just too convenient? Or am I making excuses for not going to more meetings? Anyway, I am sure people are horrified that I am currently spending 280 a month driving to work. When I look at it that way, I'm a little horrified too. Will I stop? In April probably when it warms up and doesn't get dark so early. So, until then, I'll spend about another 840 dollars on parking.

Nothing To Report

Hello everyone. Apparently people have been checking for something to read and I haven't posted anything. I haven't really had time. I've been sick for over a week and in Michigan the past two weekends. My brother, sister-in-law and nephew arrive on Wed. which I am super excited about and I have a week off of work! As of tomorrow, 5:15 central time, I will officially be a breast cancer survivor. Yeah me! And this Th. the 14th is my one year AA anniversary. Again, good job me! Hard to believe that I just went through what I went through sober. The past year of my life feels like a dream and I keep hoping I wake up.

Really, I have nothing to report. My job has slowed down (although not enough that I should be writing this while at work) and knowing I am taking some time off has pretty much obliterated my motivation. Right now all I really care about is getting my time entered and cleaning out my email for the flood of traffic that will come in while I am gone - as if I won't be checking it every day.

Anyway, I am a little sad that I will be spending my actual one year anniversary in a town where I have never been to a meeting before. I've only gone to one meeting out of town - so not in Ann Arbor or Chicago. It was in Florida. You know what is really weird actually, thinking about that meeting - there was a guy there at the meeting from the program in Ann Arbor - he was on a trip in Florida at the same time. How strange is that? Small world I guess - or small recovery community.

I am looking forward to spending some time with close friends and family though and am really happy to get to spend my anniversary with so many people I care about. I have like 14 people coming to dinner and the meeting where my friend Pam will give me my token. Honestly, I sort of feel stupid now that all these people are coming - like this isn't that big of a deal. Then again, I just covered every major life stress in my first year of sobriety. Next year, I hope literally nothing happens. I hope I am bored, the entire year.

Okay, well, no time to spell check this - I have to get back to work. Hopefully I will get to post some pictures of me and my nephew soon!

God Bless Whoever Left the Note On My Car

(The program of AA says that I should pray for those I dislike. I should say, God bless you, and change me).

Dear whoever you are,

(You are an asshole). God bless you and I hope you have a happy holiday season. I pray that God removes from you, every single character defect that led to you leaving a nasty note on my car - calling me names and describing how you felt that I parked too close to the yellow line and prevented you from comfortably exiting your car. Seriously, I feel sorry for you for a number of reasons that I won't waste my time going into. Instead, I will pray for your happiness this holiday season.

Just in case you didn't notice this morning when you parked your car, I PARKED FIRST. And for future reference, next time you consider parking next to me, or anyone for that matter, and you feel that I (we) have parked too close to the yellow line, or you feel that the space is just too small for you to comfortably exit your vehicle, by all means, feel free to park some where else.

Trust me, we won't mind. Thanks and happy holidays. I hope you feel stupid.

Sincerely,

Me

All It Takes Are Two Stupid Drunk People

All it takes are two stupid drunk people to ruin a great show. Actually, it probably only takes one drunk person - but in this case, there were two. I went to the Ray LaMontagne show at the Masonic Temple - it was in the Scottish Rite Cathedral part of the theater. I had never been to a show here before, and the short story is that I'll never go to a show there again, and if I ever go see Ray again, I'll see him in Chicago. The show was great, but the crowd was awful. This was the worst crowd I have ever been at a concert with. Not only was the crowd bad, the people working at the venue were horrible.

To begin with, they let people in the doors at 6, possibly earlier, when Ray didn't come on until nearly 8:45. So generally, everyone was drunk by the time he sang. When it was time to open the doors of the theater - several people, including my friend and I, walked right in a side door without presenting our ticket or being searched. Everyone who entered the right way got their purse searched and were checked with a wand. This seems safe. It's actually funny that Ray's opener posted on her blog that Ray was scared of the venue and scared to play there. As he obviously should have been. Anyway, the show started off great, until the two stupid drunk people went down in front of the stage and flailed their arms wildly in a hideous display of what was supposed to be dancing. Soon after, the two drunk idiots were joined by a third, and then it was all over.

People flooded the stage, stood in the aisle way, stood right in front of the front row. Then the inevitable happened. Row one stood up and row two couldn't see. Row two stood up and row three couldn't see. And so on. We were in row 4 and had great seats, until everyone stood up in front of us. Soon we were all standing. This just wasn't the type of venue for this or the type of show. And there was nothing the venue staff could have done about it - they clearly had no control as we entered from the side to begin with.

Up above our heads a few more drunk people sat on the ledge of a balcony and at one point, one person needed out of our row and in the process, we knocked the row of seats over onto the people behind us, because obviously these seats were not bolted to the floor. As lame as this is - all I could think was - this is one great big huge LIABILITY. It screams of liability. Just imagine if one of those drunk people fell off of the balcony and landed on ME, crushing the people behind as the row of seats fell over. They would be sorry if I were the one they landed on. I half feel like calling them and complaining. One time, I was going to call up the electric company and bitch them out for my brother because he had no electricity in the dead of winter for 3 days. I'm good at this kind of thing - not that I should be proud of that.

I hope Ray never plays in Detroit again.

Anyway, the drunk people stood in the way and yelled and screamed stupid shit to Ray through the entire show. He barely said a word, other than thank you. And at the end he expressed his gratitude in such a nice way that I thought - you dumb fucking assholes. Then, on the way out - all the stupid drunk people just stood there and looked at the revolving door whirl by - too drunk probably to figure out how to get in it. Ah well, no one got hurt and fun was had by all and he sounded phenomenal. And at the end of the night, what a great reminder of why I want to be sober.

AFGO (Another Fucking Growth Opportunity)

Pardon my French. It's been too long since I've written. So of course, I choose right now to write, the worst possible time - busy at work. I can tell it has been too long because when I don't post for a while, people stop checking. When I post, they check. Funny how that works. I haven't posted because I've been too busy. Too busy at work and too busy to think about what to write about. Not to mention - not sure whether to write about what is really going on. I mean, I don't want to freak anyone out - I have enough to deal with and last thing I need is to freak anyone out. The truth though, is that I am not doing very well and haven't been for a while. Let's just say that I would be lying if I said that I haven't recently thought about what it would be like for this to all be over. You can take that however you want, but please don't call me freaking out.

Anyway, I can't seem to figure out why I have suffered so much and so much of the pain that I feel is a longing for the suffering to be over. I feel the need for the end of so many things to come in a desperate kind of way. There is no answer to the question why. This pain, that people so affectionately call "another fucking growth opportunity," feels bad enough to kill me. I know some of you AAers can relate to that. It feels intolerable, it feels permanent and it feels unfair - which is the grossest understatement I have ever heard. I had a shitty childhood, again, an understatement. I've had nothing but bad and unhealthy relationships, to put it mildly. I've been nothing but miserable my entire life. I have struggled to say the least and much of the reason I have gotten as far as I have is reliance on self will and my tremendous strength in an effort to prove that I am worth something.

Just at the moment when I finally thought I had found happiness, or the potential for happiness in my life, my entire life was shattered by breast cancer. The pieces that are left don't fit together and don't resemble anything like a life that I think I can find happiness in. I just can't put the pieces together in a way that looks even tolerable to me. Just as I approach the end of the treatment process, my relationship is falling apart. I said to a friend that I don't understand why. To her it is simple, there is something I am not getting. Growing up with an alcoholic parent in hell, raising myself basically, working my ass off to get where I am in my career and all on my own, being an adult child of an alcoholic, an alcoholic, being sober, surviving breast cancer - as my relationship is about to crumble and I face the greatest lesson in patience that there could ever be for me, she tells me it is just "another fucking growth opportunity."

Clearly, I have missed the point of something. So I get to try again, through the end of my relationship, to learn what was apparently lost on me by surviving breast cancer or getting sober or any of the other things I have been through. I resist reliance on my higher power and my higher power has really been in my face a lot the past few days. Blatantly and obviously trying to tell me something. People keep asking me whether I believe in miracles. Of course I do. Maybe the point is simply to have faith. Have faith, trust God. I have heard that when you have faith and trust God, you don't get what you want, but what you do get is even better than you could have imagined. But you have to have faith. Is it really all so simple? I don't know.

My higher power, I think, is trying to tell me that is that simple. Have faith, trust God, have faith, trust God. I've been walking around saying this all day. One thing I do know, is that you have to do something different to get a different result. And have I tried this? Have I really tried to have faith and trust God - when God is so clearly right in front of me - have I tried to give it away? Have I tried to hand it to him, the control, the pain, any of it? He's trying to take it out of my hands and I don't even have very far to reach. But how much pain does it take to give it up? Enough to kill me?

In the intervening moments, those moments when my mind wanders away from what I am doing at work, to thoughts of how much pain I am in, both physically and emotionally, to worries about my fertility never coming back, stress about money, anger and resentment, the end of yet another relationship, the impact of my childhood, the desperation that I am trying not to give into, I am directing myself instead towards God - at least for today, or the next two days. I will remember, in every moment possible, to have faith and trust God.

Angels Everywhere (And Ann Saves Thanksgiving)

I just thought I would write a quick post to let those of you who were worried know that I did not spend thanksgiving alone eating frozen pizza. As much as I wanted to, I didn't. My friend Ann from AA took me and another person from the program to her parent's house. It was a case of giving in actually. An instance of okay, I'll do what I should do, instead of what I want to do. A lot of the time I know what I should do, and I just don't do it. So I went. Dinner was good, Ann's family was nice and it was nice to be with people instead of alone. In some ways though, it made me sad. It was sad not to be with the people I wanted to be with. It was sad to sit around and listen to other people's stories - to listen to other people laugh and to try to laugh with them, and to wish that I had stories like their stories.

My brother and I laugh about things sometimes, but like I have said, I think sometimes I laugh when I really want to cry, or when I really should cry. Laughing is easier. It hurts less I guess, to laugh about it. When I think of Thanksgiving I think of my aunt Ellie - and I miss her. I miss her and I miss aunt Vi. I miss "my turn" playing dominoes at Vi's house - where the food always tasted better. I wish I could go back there - to when I didn't know what I know now - but wishing that I knew differently. I might have had a little more appreciation. Some times you just have to wish that certain people know how you feel, because you never told them. Some times you hope they can hear you when you talk to God. Some times you hope that they are the ones listening because they know you and maybe they understand. You hope they feel what you feel. If I could have angels watching over me, I would choose aunt Ellie and aunt Vi.

I almost started crying during the toast when Ann talked about how much her sister meant to her over the past year and how much she had helped her. I thought about all of the people who have helped me over the past year and how they don't know that they helped me and how I can't really tell them. It made me sad. I wanted to tell Ann how much it meant to me that she would go to all the trouble to drag me to Thanksgiving. Or to tell Heather how much I love her and how I cried and cried when I read her comment to my "Unhappy Thanksgiving" post. Or how I miss my brother even though I talk to him all the time, because I haven't seen him since February. How I miss walking with Claire and all of the conversations we had over miles and miles of walking. How Jodie is supportive no matter what I tell her I am doing. How touched I am that Pam wants to present me with my token on my anniversary. How much Patricia's card meant to me - and that I carried it in my purse for weeks. I could go on and on - all of these things that I can't tell people. How amazed I am, that people I don't even know show up again and again. These people, these almost strangers, they show up for each other no matter what. They are like angels everywhere.

What Do You Mean, the Meeting is Cancelled?

Am I understanding this correctly? In Chicago, AA meetings get cancelled on holidays? I guess so. I am sure it is meeting specific, because every meeting is independent in a sense - but cancelled, really? Are you sure? Are you kidding? In Ann Arbor, where I got sober, a holiday is like one great big giant continuous meeting. Meeting after meeting at the Alano Club. One would suppose that such a thing happens here, but where? I haven't heard about it and these are the types of things that get announced. Instead, all I hear about are meeting cancellations. I am horrified at this. Why, because I want to go to a meeting tomorrow night. But even more importantly than that, I would hate to be the newcomer who needs a meeting, is too afraid to pick up the phone, doesn't know who to call anyway, knows of a meeting, shows up, and no one else is there.

Service work people! I would give up any holiday, I would give up any plans etc. to make sure a meeting happened when it was supposed to, for that one person who needed to show up. I remember one time back in Ann Arbor, only myself and one other person showed up for an ACOA meeting. It happened to be my brother and I, and we couldn't really have a meeting, just the two of us - but damn it, we were there. I firmly believe that meetings should not be cancelled. Not on Thanksgiving, not even on Christmas, not ever. As a member of this fellowship - we have an obligation to show up. Last year, on Christmas Day, the first thing I did was go to a meeting and I was damn grateful that I was not the only one there.

My concern of course is that there is no real way to know about these meeting cancellations. What about the newcomer specifically, or the visitor? What about the person who isn't a regular at the meeting, and misses the announcement. The person who isn't on the phone list and doesn't really know anyone yet, so again, he or she misses the announcement. The person who is too terrified to call the main Chicago AA office, which by the way is closed and therefore useless on Thanksgiving anyway. The person who doesn't know to call the Intergroup hotline number, and when they figure out to call it, they find out that the person on the other end of the phone doesn't have clue which meetings were cancelled anyway. It seems to me rather difficult to find a meeting on a holiday here and I find that extremely disturbing.

Unhappy Thanksgiving

The holidays have always been a particularly bad time for me. I don't know how old I was when I first realized that my family does not deal with holidays in a normal way. It isn't a time of fun and sharing and togetherness. It has always seemed like a chore, so why bother participating. Why do these people who outwardly seem to hate each other, want to buy gifts for each other anyway? You might say that it isn't about the gifts, it's about being together. But not in this family. I have always complained about how terrible it is and how badly it makes me feel, but what's the alternative? I have almost always participated anyway because otherwise I have no where to go and no one to spend the holidays with. I always thought it was better to have a crappy family than none at all. Only recently have I realized that it is ever so slightly less painful, to just stay home alone. Two years ago, I actually spent Christmas Day alone because I didn't have anywhere to go. I sat all day in front of the t.v. and ate spaghetti for dinner. This Thanksgiving, I will do the same thing. Maybe I'll eat frozen pizza instead.

It all started when I was a kid and a certain part of the family stopped attending holidays and birthdays if they were at my parent's house. Confusing to a little kid- why does the whole family go to her birthday and no one comes to mine? Eventually, we stopped attending theirs because my mother was made to feel so unwelcome that there just wasn't any point. It was obvious that we weren't wanted there. Finally, when my brother was old enough to drive, we started participating again, although I never felt welcome and I still don't today. Eventually, once I was an adult, my parents divorced, my dad re-inserted himself into the family, cockeyed I think, and the same old traditions of judgment, lack of acceptance, exclusion and just being down right mean fester. There is usually a lot of talking behind the backs of other people, some are invited while others aren't, certain people only show up if the holiday is at a certain person's house, people are picked on, jokes are made. Some people I am sure leave feeling just satisfied with themselves and their behavior. I leave feeling disgusted, sad and hurt. That is what transpires on my dad's side of the family. My mom's is a different story - equally sad.

I have decided, finally, not to participate anymore. This year I have used the excuse that I can't leave Chicago because I have to be at the hospital for radiation on Wed. and Fri. But the truth is, I could have worked around that. I could have rescheduled. But it's the perfect excuse to not have to go participate in the horror that is my "family" on a holiday. People will say, "don't you have friends you can spend the holiday with?" Yes, I do - if I am willing to admit that I have no where to go, and someone else feels just sorry enough for me that they invite me to tag along to their family dinner. Then I can sit there in some other mother's or grandmother's house and watch their family and wish that I had one. I don't want to be that person, who sits at the stranger's dinner table and makes up a story about why I don't have anywhere to go. One that is less sad than the truth, and something that sounds reasonable. I don't think I have it in me this year. I would rather stay home than be the person who is there because someone felt sorry for me. All of the pieces of my family have places to be and people to be with, except me. All I wanted was to go to Germany and spend Thanksgiving with my brother and sister-in-law. Instead I'm going to sit here alone and think about how much fun they are having in Germany. How nice it must be to have family you like and people to be with. They are my family and I am really just sad and angry that I don't get to be there.

Living As If

People in the program always say, "fake it 'til you make it." I call this "living as if." Living as if you are okay when you aren't - until you actually are okay. Living as if you believe your higher power will come through, even when you doubt it - until you actually believe it. I say I don't want to pray. People say pray anyway. Pray even if you don't know who you are talking to. Pray even if it is only to say "fuck you" to your higher power. Just fake it, until eventually you actually get it. I say I am unhappy, they say to pretend. Pretend. Pretend. I say I am tired of pretending. They say to pretend anyway. I say I have no acceptance. Again, they say pretend. Just fake it. Live as if you have acceptance. Live as if you are happy. Live as if you are okay.

In order to actually accomplish this whole "faking it" concept, you have to pretend, while pretending that you aren't pretending. Am I actually fooling myself here? Am I fooling anyone else? I have figured out, while pretending not to pretend, all the while pretending, and at the same time saying I am tired of doing this - that there is only one way to live. I have learned this the hard way, perhaps the only way. It is a balance, that I can't seem to strike. It is the delicate balance between the present, the future and the past. I've lived my whole life everywhere but the present. Even today, after everything I have been through, I can't seem to wrap my mind around this and actually do it.

When I found out I had breast cancer - I had what seemed like life altering shifts in my perspective. I had a true appreciation for just how your whole life can be altered in a split second - a true appreciation for just how short life is. I had deep feelings of regret about the way I have lived my life for the past 10 years and certain things that I have done. These feelings are balanced by feelings of just how long life is, just how much is left for me, hopefully, maybe, or maybe not. All of these feelings are balanced again by the reality that I have to live with. The elephant in the room which is my own mortality. The thing no one talks about. Only one person has ever spoken frankly to me about it and talked to me about what it feels like to have an appreciation of just how fragile my own life is. People ask me all the time how I got through this and the truth is that I have absolutely no idea. I only know that the only way to get through it, is to live as if you are going to in fact get through it.

My shifts in perspective have shifted back without me even realizing it. My regret dissipates and re-materializes as I find new ways to achieve acceptance, and create new things to have regret about. I live in the future and the past again. I am only here, right now, in the present, on a very momentary basis. What brings me back to the moment, to right now, is when I can manage to remember that someday, maybe sooner than I hope, sooner than my time, sooner than everyone else I know, I will wish that I had one more chance to do this right.

I have realized, in this process of getting sober, living sober, living through breast cancer, dealing with the past and my childhood, that there is only one way to live. You have to live as if you are going to live forever, while at the exact same time, you have to live as if you have only one more day left.

God Takes Up Residence in Chicago

I used to think that my higher power resided only in Ann Arbor, where I got sober, amongst all of the people that I got sober around. My higher power shows up for me regularly when I am there - I have those "God moments" that I wrote about before - all the time. My higher power constantly reminds me of his or her presence when I am there. That hasn't been my experience since I have lived in Chicago. Very rarely do I feel God in my life - but then again, praying hasn't exactly been easy since I got here given the circumstances. It's hard to see sometimes how God is going to get me out of this. Lately I have been doubting the presence of my higher power completely.

Every once in a while I get desperate enough to ask for help. These are the most amazing types of "God moments," when you ask for help and you receive it very immediately and very obviously. It restores your faith completely. So last month, I wrote about being in Ann Arbor and really needing to run into this woman who was a cancer survivor. When I met her she had been sober about a month and I had just been diagnosed with cancer. There isn't even a way to describe how much she helped me in a single conversation. Of course I never got her name or phone number. When I was in Ann Arbor a month ago I was feeling very strongly that I just couldn't get through the last part of the cancer treatment. I needed to talk to this woman but I didn't know how to find her. She had the strength that I thought I was lacking. Well, I found her, at a meeting, just as I sat there and thought about how much I needed to borrow her strength, she walked in. That time we exchanged names and phone numbers. Even though I haven't called her, it is a relief to know I can talk to her any time I need to.

Anyway, today I had a perfect moment of - ask God for help and you will be given it - in such a way that it almost makes you say - now I will trust that my higher power will come through for me. Now I have faith. Now I'll let go and believe that if I hand this over, it will be okay. Lately I spend hours a day crying. So it was no surprise that today, while at the hospital, lying on the table as they lined up my body to do the daily radiation treatment, I started crying. I said please God help me. You have to help me. You have to do something cause I'm not going to make it. You just have to do something. You have to help me. As I came up off the elevator from the basement of the hospital, my cell phone signal kicked back in and it was ringing. It was her - the answer to my prayer, the woman who has given me the strenth to keep going.

To Surrender or Not Surrender

I don’t know what to write about, but I feel l like I should post. I went to a meeting tonight, my favorite meeting that I have found in Chicago. A relief from the hours I have been working. All I could think about was how alone I felt in a room of thirty people. How much I don’t feel a part of the program here. How little I want to try to integrate myself. How much I feel like no one here would want to be friends with me anyway – if they actually knew me. This is something that most people in the program feel. So afraid of what other people think of them. I’m holding so much in because I am too afraid to talk to these people about it. It is eating me alive. The anger has become more than I can deal with. It’s anger, it’s pain – it’s all fear. Everything is fear. The fear of not getting what I want or losing what I have. Mostly, it is the fear of not getting what I want. The key to my happiness – that ever changing and always elusive thing that drives me and disappoints me again and again. The truth is, I have most things I want – or most things I have thought I have wanted. They just don’t make me happy and I only want them until I actually have them, then I just want something else.

I know that happiness is not a destination and I know better than to look outside of myself for it – I know better than to move in an effort to escape whatever is preventing it. Funny that everywhere I run to, I keep showing up - as a friend likes to remind me. I am the problem. I remember the moment that I actually got that – that alcohol is only a symptom, the problem is me. I have all these AA sayings running through my head. Feelings are not facts. You have to change your behavior and your thinking will follow.

I try all these things and nothing seems to help. I try the things that people suggest, but I sit on my bathroom floor crying every day anyway. All I do is try. I try and I try and I am running out of effort. I have never been able to figure out what giving up looks like. Giving it up - turning it over, letting it go - although I can imagine what it must feel like to feel the freedom that one feels when that kind of surrender is possible. I can imagine it, but I don't know whether I've ever felt it. I must have felt it at least once - when I decided not to drink and take a few suggestions from people in AA. There is a kind of willingness that goes along with that, a kind of giving up where you say, okay, maybe I'll just try to do it your way.

I say that I give up all the time, that I literally do not have the effort to keep going. Nearly every day I think I tell at least one person that I give up. I say that I'm done and then every day I get up and keep going. But the inability to continue is not the same kind of giving up I am talking about. Every day someone tells me that my strength amazes them and that my resilience is incredible. I just shrug my shoulders because I don’t know how to do it any other way. I want to give up, I need to give up, but I can’t figure out how to.

As I Exist On Paper

I used to write a lot - journals and other stuff. In fact, at one point, when I was really young, I thought I wanted to be a writer. I was always amazed at the way that I could express something on paper that I could never express out loud. I could say the same thing and it would sound completely different. I think I have always had an ability to be honest on paper that I don't have anywhere else. Sometimes I used to be afraid to sit down and write, knowing that the truth would come out there and once you write it down, it's harder to take back. It can become hard to unconvince yourself.

I have written about being tired of hiding, tired of pretending. I have always felt like there are three different versions of me, at least, and I can never quite get them to converge. The way I perceive myself, the way other people perceive me, and the way that I exist on paper. None of these are true - none accurate, except maybe the one on paper - they definitely are not the same. I don't know if most people feel this way. I used to always say that the real me existed only on paper - that I am most me when I write something down and that I could only be myself if hidden in the pages of a notebook. Perhaps why I find writing this blog to be such an interesting exercise. I can be honest because I am not face to face with anyone and you don't know me. It is not unlike hiding.

Anyway, one thing that I like to do from time to time just for fun is look back at stuff I've written on a particular day - this time last year or this time 5 years ago, just to see where I was at or what I was thinking or doing. I did that last night. I looked back at stuff I wrote this time last year, which was right after coming into AA, and I found only one thing in November. It struck me because it describes very much where I am at today even though the underlying cause is very different. So, for a lack of anything better to post about, here it is.

November 18, 2005

The pain is unrelenting and it envelopes her, it coats her, it follows her like a shadow, trailing behind her, distorting her, and it precedes her into every room she walks into. It is the absence of light surrounding her that is the most noticeable and the most memorable.  The fact that she stands out now is only because she has tried so hard to go unnoticed. What used to exist and not exist in her world, what used to be true and not true, correct and incorrect, what used to be and the absence of what used to be - what was love or not love, hate or not hate, the poignant desire in stark contrast to the overwhelming fear - now co-exist entirely and only in varying shades of gray. They are tangled and inseparable. They are no longer the compartmentalized emotions from which she used to choose the seemingly most appropriate based upon her observations of other people. The clear path she used to walk in between them, between what was and what wasn't, is no longer there. It isn't love or not love, it isn't hate or not hate, it isn't this or the opposite, and she is no longer standing in between them - it is far more complicated than this. She relates to the present as if she is still living in the past and she has never been able to separate the two. What exists of her now is what has been left behind and what she has managed to narrowly escape with although the pieces don't fit easily together. She does not recognize herself and the glimmer of recognition in the eyes of other people is lost on her. What is left of who she is and what she has to offer, is laced with shame and regret, and among other things, fear. A Fear that is pervasive and unyielding, except when it gives way to the indescribable anger.

What Exactly Did We Do in Meetings Before the Internet?

Well, the answer to that is that I don't know - because I wasn't sitting in meetings before the Internet. Nevertheless, what DID we do before the Internet? In my house growing up, we weren't exactly technologically advanced. My brother and I used to have to write school papers on an old Comodore 128/64, where you had to put in some weird code, ^#JTUCLSOSVV*#@, just to ge the document to print with double spaces. We didn't have email either, like literally everyone does now. No Internet access. My first exposure to email and the Internet was when I started college in 1995. That is when I had my first email address, at 18, not 5. Then again, I never flew either until I was 21 - but that's another story.

Anyway, I am sitting in a meeting right now, a negotiation actually. We are all hooked up wirelessly, half of us are on instant messenger, we are all checking and responsing to email, some are asleep, a few are on a computer AND a blackberrry, I am blogging, at least one person is looking up something weird on the Internet (I can see over his shoulder), I'm taking notes, every time the other side leaves the room, we play funny sound bits evidencing the utter stupidity of our country's President, I'm talking to my sister in law in Germany, I really don't know what the hell is going on, and I am starting to wonder when we are going to eat again. There is a partner on one side of me and a client on the other making this a very dangerous activity. I am trying to look non-obvious and deeply involved in something important - err, uh, I mean, deeply involved in the negotiation. Termination charge, um, formula - what did I just miss - payment of actuals. Important note to self - YOU ARE THE PERSON DRAFTING THE DOCUMENTS. Oh good - it's time to eat! But seriously, what would we all be doing right now if we didn't have the Internet?

52 Things to be Grateful For

Once again, I've been told to write a gratitude list. A common suggestion when I call up one of my AA supports to complain about how horrible my life is and how terrible how I feel. I usually moan and complain and don't do it - only to be told that it is my own fault that I feel so bad. As if a gratitude list can fix everything. Yes, I have things to be grateful for, and I know that, but being grateful for things doesn't change the things I am upset about.

Today actually, I was told that I was acting like a two year old. I happen to think that a two year old couldn't come up with the clever things that I was saying and the intelligent ways that I apparently rationalize my behavior, feelings, reactions etc. I think at the youngest, maybe I was acting like a 7 year old. Truthfully, I don't much feel like acting any differently than I did earlier, or yesterday, or the day before that. I happen to be rather annoyed at this particular friend of mine and I am really resisting applying any program principles to the things that I am feeling. Every once in a while I experience this extreme resistance to the program, where I just don't want AA to be the answer. I just don't want to admit that it works and it works for literally everything, not just staying sober.

Anyway, I actually hate writing gratitude lists. Maybe because I like to wallow in my own self pity. I guess I just don't like to think about the things that are good in my life. What's wrong with me? I remember the first time I wrote one - I think I had been sober for 6 days. I'd been trying to be sober for a little over a month, but I went and drank a few times. I really thought that I wouldn't have anything to put on it, but I wrote it anyway, just to humor my friend. By the time I was done, I had thought of 52 things to be grateful for. So, in no particular order, and just to humor the people who are bothering me lately about how I feel - here you go:

I am grateful for/that:

My sponsor in Michigan, my sponsor in Chicago, that I got to be a part of Michelle's step study, Tom, Heather, my brother, my sister-in-law, my friend who brought me to AA, my cousins Jodie and Kellie, Ann, Jenny, Carrie, Leah, Claire, all of the people who have reached out to me (I guess I should lump people as one huh?), my job, my financial stability, the people that I work with who have been incredible to me through out this whole treatment process, that I have money saved, that my job is flexible and lets me work from home or wherever I want, that I am alive to write this, that I can feel things - even bad, Ryan - who has taken good care of me during this, the fact that I never hurt anyone else as a result of drinking, that I never got caught drinking and driving, that I never lost my driver's license or a job or a house because of drinking, that I never did drugs, for my cat Emerson - even though he pees on the floor when he is mad at me, that I don't commute to Detroit anymore, that Greg didn't hire me, that I have a good career, that I am educated, that I have the cutest nephew ever, that I have somewhere to go on Christmas if I choose to, for caller i.d., that I have learned to not answer when certain people call (although this needs a little more work), that I have learned to say no when I don't want to do something, that anywhere in the world I go - there will be a community of people who reach out to me, that my job considers family and health more important than billable hours, that I can buy myself anything that I want, that I have had some opportunity to travel, that I have learned to cry in front of people (heck, I cried in front of my boss twice on Sat.), that I have learned to say that I am not okay instead of always saying that I am fine, that I haven't had chronic back pain in over two years, that I have a nice place to live and food to eat, that I am able to help other people and touch other people's lives, that my sister-in-law let me borrow her piano, that my brother talks to me every day from Germany, that when I wake up in the morning I look forward to going to work instead of dreading it, that I never got sick during chemo, that I survived breast cancer with relative ease, that the cancer didn't spread, that I have a higher power who repeatedly shows up for me - even when I don't ask, that I am healthy.

I don't know how many that is - should I keep going?

What if This is As Good as it Gets?

The grieving process is described in stages - denial, anger, negotiation and acceptance. You don't always go through these things in that order and this process applies to things besides what you might think of as grieving a loss. I think most of us go through these stages all the time with all sorts of different things. The process was clear cut when I came into AA, it is less clear sometimes in other situations. This experience, though difficult for me and extremely painful to go through, is fairly simple actually. I leanred very quickly in AA the power of acceptance - only when you have real acceptance of where you are at in your life, will your life begin to change. Getting to this point of acceptance - to the end of this grieving process, however, is not as simple as the concept. To achieve acceptance, of anything, the ultimate question is always the same - what if this is as good as it gets?

When I found out I had breast cancer, the negotiations with my higher power began. When you are faced with something like a life threatening illness, or any number of other things that I can imagine - you think about what you can and can't live with, what you are and are not okay with, even though it is ultimately out of your control. I promptly told God to fuck off, but turned around and said, "if you just get me through this, I'll be a better person, I'll live differently, I'll do whatever you want."

Then, as I made my way through my life, now changed forever, I really started to think about the tradeoffs I would make. What would I give up, and in exchange for what? You find yourself hoping against hope that this higher power that seems to have dropped you on your ass really has a hold of this, because if not, you are basically fucked. I suddenly found myself saying I could live with it if my hair never grew back. It became a series tradeoffs, one for another. I'll give up this in exchange for that. I'd give up my hair in exchange for my fertility, anything in exchange for my fertility. Begging and pleading with God. I'll do anything. You can have anything you want. I'll give anything up you want to take, if you just give me that one thing back. But would I give up my fertility in exchange for my life? That's basically what I've been forced to do and it isn't a bargain I felt willing to make.

The ultimate question is always the same then. What if this is as good as it gets? Sometimes the things are insignificant. What if I always drive the car I drive and have the job I have? What if I always make the amount of money I make and live in the condo I live in? Sometimes the things are more significant. What if my hair never grows back and my skin never fades from the radiation? What if every time I look in the mirror, all I have is a constant reminder of the ways my life will never be the same. What if I am infertile? What if this is really the most I will ever have in my life and the best that it will ever get? I just can't live with that. I just can't get there. I have to be able to say, that if this is as good as it gets, I'm fine with that, and I'm just not.

The Sound of Relief Flushing

Every once in a while, as I accumulate things that I shouldn't have in the house - meaning various potentially mind or mood altering substances - I have to purge them. First I tell on myself for having them in the house, then flush them down the toilet so that whoever I am on the phone with hears me dumping it out and flushing it. The thought process goes something like - hmmm, I feel like crap, maybe I'm not an alcoholic. A couple days later - I still feel like crap, okay, maybe I'm an alcoholic or I wouldn't still be thinking about the White Hen across the street. Now I am also thinking about the vanilla. Okay, definitely an alcoholic. Hmm, I still feel like crap - what else do I have in the house that I could take, besides vanilla?

Let's see, Nyquil, Tylenol with Codeine, hmmm, Alkaselzter cold medicine, Ambien, Ativan, hmmm, Oxycodone. The reason I have all these things in the house is because I had to take pain killer during the cancer treatment periodically, as well as Ambien and Ativan to sleep. The Nyquil is because my step daughter was sick and the Alkaselzter cold medicine is because I was sick. It made me nervous to have to take anything during the treatment, but I really had no choice and I was taking it as prescribed and very carefully. Of course, I didn't want to take it at all - but once I didn't need it anymore, I also didn't want to throw it away - you know, just in case. In case of what exactly? In case I get a headache? Uh, no. In case of the night I'm sitting here alone thinking about the White Hen across the street and don't want to drink vanilla.

Well, anyway, I called Tom, he made me flush all the dangerous stuff down the toilet. I have kept the Ambien and Ativan because I am still going through treatment and occasionally still have extreme difficulty sleeping. I just mention that I have it still though, because I do have to be careful with it. It amazes me sometimes that I give this so much thought. I never did drugs. Not exactly. I had a brief period of time years ago when I took a friend's muscle relaxers. First I took them because my neck hurt after taking the bar exam, then I switched to a half dose because I liked the way it made me feel. I remember saying to my friend - wow - this must be how most people feel all the time - I'm way too tense! So then I cut myself off because I liked it a little too much. That was pretty much my only experience with drugs. On the other hand, I did take Nyquil for quite a while to sleep, even when I wasn't sick. Eventually this stopped working. Hmm. I also don't keep mouthwash with alcohol in it in the house because I know someone who relapsed on it. I even have to be careful with the Alkaselzter cold medicine, cause honestly, I like the way it makes me feel. I pretty much avoid taking anything if possible because just about anything can mess with my head.

Flushing all this stuff down the toilet brings back a memory from when I first got sober. I didn't believe I was an alcoholic when I fist quit drinking. I actually thought I was taking a temporary break. Little did I know that only alcoholics take breaks. Anyway, I remember the first night that I desperately wanted some relief from the things I was feeling. I did exactly what I did today. I searched the house - for anything I could take since I knew I wasn't going to drink. Benedryl, Nyquil - anything to just make me feel something else. My brother was living with me at the time and I had to throw his cold medicine and mouthwash away. So, here I am. Still thinking about the White Hen. Fortunately though, the sound of relief flushing, actually sounds a lot like relief.

Almost a Post, But Not Quite

I am basically a mess. I haven't written because I can't put together a coherent post. I have three almost posts, but I am lacking direction. To be truthful, I'm struggling lately - or still - and I definitely can't concentrate. Sometimes I say I don't know why I can't sleep, or why I can't concentrate or why this is so hard - but hello? Have I just been present for everything I've gone through? No, actually, I haven't been, and that's precisely the problem. I've been fooling myself I guess. Thinking I was dealing with things when in fact I wasn't. I'm an escape artist of sorts. Anything to avoid the pain and avoid feeling - it's all the same, any addiction really. Drinking, shopping, eating, working, obsessing over other peoples' problems - I look for distractions to avoid the pain. Or, I just plain run from it.

I remember the first time I really considered that I might be an alcoholic. I was about a week or so into trying to get sober and I realized, while talking with my friend who brought me into the program, just what was suddenly missing in my life - that numb feeling. That perfect numb feeling - the oblivion and the thought that I don't give a shit what happens next. When I get in a bad spot, I miss that feeling, or lack of I should say. This is how I know I am an alcoholic. My husband is out of town for a week or so and all I can think about for the past two days is the fact that the White Hen convenience store across the street sells wine and maybe I shouldn't be trusted here alone. One time I was making cookies and the recipe called for vanilla. My husband happened to look at the amount of alcohol in the vanilla - kidding around he told me to make sure I didn't relapse on it. For two days, all I could think about was whether I actually would ever drink vanilla. TWO DAYS I spent thinking about this.

My sponsor always likes to tell me the story about the guy who convinces himself he isn't an alcoholic - and to celebrate that revelation - he gets drunk! The point, only an alcoholic would drink to celebrate something like that. Anyway, the truth is, I'm a wreck and I'm desperate for a little relief and drinking is on my mind because it is the quickest way for some immediate, although very temporary relief. Quitting my job and moving away sounds good, this would probably be my first choice for handling what I am going through, but I can't execute it fast enough. My sponsor would tell me to pray for some relief. I used to do things the really hard way. My sponsor would tell me to do something and I would purposely refuse to do it. I carried on like this until I realized I was only hurting myself. Today is a perfect example though of old behavior. She told me to go to a meeting every day and to call her if I didn't. So, today I didn't go and I called her up, crying, and told her so - as if to say - so there. The truth is, I'm only hurting myself. I know what to do to get some relief, but I just don't do it. I don't do it and I lie to myself and tell myself that I don't understand why I feel so bad. Well, thank god other people see through my bullshit, cause I can convince myself of anything.

A "God Thing"

I have always believed that certain things happen for a reason. I have a hard time believing that nothing happens by mistake, but I do think that at least some things happen for very specific reasons. Certain people enter our lives at just the right time. There are some coincidences that just aren’t coincidental at all – an event that we in AA refer to as a “God thing.” Ever since coming into Alcoholics Anonymous – even before actually – I have experienced a number of these events. Usually these experiences involve walking into a meeting and hearing just exactly the thing that I need to hear, but often these experiences also involve just the right person unexpectedly stepping into my path.

In May of 2005, before I got sober, I used to attend ACOA meetings (Adult Children of Alcoholics). In May of last year I was having a particularly difficult time – things were happening that led up to my eventually making it into AA. Anyway, for two months I had been driving around in my car crying, sinking deeper and deeper into depression. One Tuesday night at the ACOA meeting, I finally broke down – which is something I very rarely do in front of anyone. I finally lost it in front of the group, talking about how I didn’t know if I could continue to live and that I didn’t know what to do. A visitor to the meeting who was visiting from the northern lower peninsula of Michigan asked for my phone number. She called me the next day and saved my life. She talked to me for 4 hours that day and over the next couple of days we talked for several more hours. She went home and we lost touch.

This past February, I walked into an AA meeting, on what was the most difficult day I had had in sobriety up until that point. I lost it at the meeting, talking about how I might be moving and my brother was leaving in a couple of days to move out of the country. She was sitting across from me but we didn’t recognize each other at first. In fact, I had sat down at one table and then moved to another. She followed me – telling me later that although she hadn’t recognized me until I started talking, she knew when I moved tables that she was supposed to follow me. If she hadn’t, we wouldn’t have reconnected that day. We talked later that day – I had a chance to thank her and tell her just how much she had helped me the May before – and I found great comfort in the things that she had to say to me. She went back up north and we again lost touch.

I went home to Michigan last weekend and while I was there, I went to a bunch of AA meetings – my old meetings that I used to go to. As I was talking about my visit to Michigan and that I had come home because I was having an extremely difficult time in Chicago – a hard time staying sober, a hard time living life, a hard time with everything – she walked into the meeting. This woman who had saved my life, who had helped me tremendously in just a few conversations, who has shown up, coincidentally, at all three of the hardest times I have had in the past year and a half – walked right in and reminded me in a moment that can only be described as a “God thing,” that my higher power is watching out for me even when I don’t ask, or can’t ask or don’t want to ask. Those little God things are just the kind of reminders I need sometimes and they always happen when I find myself the most mistrustful of the process and doubtful of my higher power’s presence in my life. Over and over again I experience such coincidences that are just too perfectly planned to be coincidences at all.

This actually happened twice this weekend – I was reconnected with a different person this morning who helped me tremendously when I found out I had breast cancer. Although she had told me how to get through chemo and how to survive cancer (herself a fellow survivor), she never told me her name and I didn’t really know how to track her down or if she was even still in the program. Just this morning as I sat at a meeting and thought about how much I wanted to see her, how much I needed her help and her positive energy right now, how much I wanted to thank her, she walked into the meeting – a not so subtle reminder that in any given moment my higher power hands me exactly what is needed.

A Day Off, What's That?

I have this thing that I need to finish ASAP for work - so I am posting instead. Ahhhh, procrastination - that means I must not be busy enough. Maybe I will clean my office next.

Anyway, so, I am taking this Thursday and Firday off to go "home", however, in my world, there is no such thing as a day off. The clients keep emailing, everyone wants everything this week - I see the days slipping away. At the very least, I will be chained to my blackberry, checking it constantly and responding to emails. This is probably not because I have to, but because I feel guilty if I don't. Nevertheless, I've taken Thursday and Friday "off," in theory anyway.

In my world, I call days off, even sick days, "days off in theory." In theory I can take as much time off as I want - just as long as I find enough extra days in the year to make up for it. In fact, I have spent the past two Saturdays working and will probably work next Saturday, just to make up for the fact that I have taken these two days off. The lack of real time off is probably the only thing I don't really love about my job and it's the only thing I miss about my previous job.

It would be nice to have a day off. A real one. One where I don't have to worry about finding 8 plus hours split over other days to make up for it. One where I can relax and shut my email off. The trouble is, if I actually shut my email off for two days, I would lose at least half of a day trying to weed through my email to pick out the important stuff. I can't remember the last time I didn't, at the very least, check email when "off" work. Even when I was going through cancer treatment, I would sit there in the hospital and respond to emails. Am I nuts? Or do I just have good work ethic?

Besides not really being able to take days off, I feel bad even asking for a day off because I took days off for doctor's appointments. The fact is though, I worked like 50 hours a week through the entire treatment process and only missed a day and a half of work because I was sick. The other day one of the secretaries said to me - oh so and so stayed home today, he didn't feel well. I thought - didn't feel well, didn't come to work - people actually do that?

This morning in our weekly group meeting the head of my group said to the group that I was planning to be out for a week or so. I'm not sure where he got this idea. I told him I needed a day or two to regroup after everything I've been through. I should have gone with it. I could have gotten a whole week without even asking. Try finding an extra week's worth of time though - it isn't as easy as you might think.

The Coolest Pumpkin That Wasn't

I have this thing for pumpkin carving – it’s one of my favorite things to do. Pumpkin carving and cookie decorating. I like to take these things to the extreme – as my brother and sister-in-law know all too well. A few years ago when I was living with them, Rachel made sugar cookies – I forced us to decorate them exactly as they appeared on the Williams Sonoma cookie cutter tin they came in. This meant we had to hand pipe all of the frosting on to every single cookie. The elves had to have stripes on their tights! This took like twelve hours and the cookies were so cool that I don’t think people wanted to eat them. Needless to say, I’ve never been able to get them to do this with me again. We sort of tried it up north a few years ago with a tin of zoo animal cookies, but my 8 year old cousin didn’t cooperate – his cookies were like Jackson Pollack paintings – even more yummy than mine because of all of the extra frosting.

Anyway, pumpkin carving is like cookie decorating. I can sit there for hours, literally. I usually go for the patterns that you put on the pumpkin, but this year I tried something new. A few weeks ago I came upon an issue of Ladies’ Home Journal that had the latest and greatest pumpkin carving ideas. Bas relief pumpkin carving with a u-gouge linoleum cutter. Granted the article said to get a practice pumpkin, but how hard could this possibly be? I went in search of the u-gouge tool, a little confused as to how you could possibly cut linoleum with this thing. Little did I know there is more than one kind of linoleum. The people at home depot tried to tell me to just cut the linoleum with a pair of scissors or an exacto blade – and they looked at me like I was crazy when I told them that I actually planned to carve a pumpkin with a tool that cuts linoleum. One of my friends told me to be careful not to cut the pumpkin in half which I just thought was silly – there is no way you could cut the pumpkin in half with this thing. Anyway, I finally found the tool at a craft supply store. This was when I discovered there is more than one kind of linoleum and this tool looks like something that would be used for soap or wood carving.

Anyway, I guess this is the latest craze in pumpkin carving, but I couldn’t find any stencils to use so I had to make my own. The short of it is, 3.5 hours later, my back hurt and I was bleeding. I have two half carved pumpkins, two pumpkins I just don’t feel like carving, and a useless u-gouge linoleum cutter. This pumpkin would have been so cool, but even I don’t have the patience to sit there and do this. I should probably stick to cookie decorating – if I can find someone to help me who is willing to do it my way!

To My Best Friend Heather

My fondest memories of childhood, the things that make me smile and laugh the most, are the times that I spent with my best friend Heather. I am blessed to have someone in my life who has been there forever, who knows everything about me and who I can tell anything to. I don’t think most people have a friendship like this one and I consider myself really lucky. Heather and I met when we were three and we’ve been friends ever since. She was the one person when I was growing up that I could have over to the house without worrying that she would find out what was really going on there. She may have been the only person that I ever had over to the house. She spent quite a bit of time there actually and although I don’t remember talking much as kids about what was going on when no one was looking, I think it was because we didn’t have to.

We haven’t lived in the same city since we were seven, so I find it extraordinary that we have remained friends over all these years. Our parents drove us back and forth in the summers and for school holidays. Before she moved, I remember riding around the block on my big wheel to get to her house, and my dad lifting her over the back fence in the raspberry patch so she could get home. We spent weeks at each other’s houses and I would cry and cry when I had to go home. No matter what has happened in our lives, what we have been doing, where we’ve been living, she has been a constant in my life. Being diagnosed with breast cancer sort of prompted me to evaluate my life in a way that I think most people only do when they are older. What do I regret, what do I love, what am I grateful for, what do I wish for, what would I change, how can I live differently? It has made me realize the value of certain people in my life and how important it is to share with these people what they mean to you. I have an appreciation, like only some people can have, of just exactly how everything can change in a split second.

One of my favorite things to do with Heather over the years has been to sit around and talk about the silly things we did when we were kids. We laugh and laugh. To other people these stories probably aren’t all that funny, but they make me laugh, they make me cry, and they are my favorite memories of my childhood.

There are so many stories, 26 years worth. There was the time we crushed a box of cheerios on her parent’s kitchen floor by stomping on them. The time we washed rocks from the driveway and tried to sell them. The time we locked my brother in the corner – two doors came together when they were both open and we put my brother in there and tied the doorknobs together. Actually – in reality, my brother must have gone in willingly. There was the time we made a refrigerator in her bedroom out of a cardboard box and a fan and kept pickles in it. And the time we locked our selves in my parent’s bathroom to drink pickle juice and called it “dill wine” and then hid the jar in the closet when my mom knocked on the door. We used to sled down the stairs at my parent's house in sleeping bags.

We had this thing we called the “fund” and Heather used to lug it to my house every time she came. Every time we saw each other, we counted the fund and added to it. It consisted entirely of change and at its peak I think we had about $125. Every time we saw each other we would take some money out of the fund and go to the corner store and buy tons of candy – jolly ranchers when they used to come in the long flat sticks. We used to buy all the Garfield comic books and read them together. And for some reason, we took a lot of walks. We would get together and walk for what seemed like hours, talking about everything. There was the time we went to the Lilith Fair concert, got soaked, I lost my shoes, we ran to the car - were covered in mud by the time we got there, we stripped down to almost nothing because we had driven her mom's brand new car, got stuck in accident traffic on the way home and went through the Taco Bell drive through at 3 a.m. in our underwear. Even now, things happen that make me laugh when I think about them. Recently when Heather visited me – we sat at my dining room table for what I think was a total of about 9 hours doing a jig saw puzzle, saying almost nothing to each other the entire time. I think she is the only person I could do this with.

Anyway, in twenty-six years, Heather and I have only gotten in to one fight that I can think of. We must have been 7 because it was before she moved away. We got into a fight over the stuffed Garfield animals we were playing with – I wanted hers because hers could wear underwear.

Much of my life I have felt like no one knows me, no one knows the real me, with the exception of Heather. She has been there through everything, the good and the bad, and everything in between. I would be lost without you.

Happy Anniversary To Me!

I've been sober for 10 months today! I probably make too big of a deal about my anniversary and usually feel annoyed that other people seem to forget it. Some people have even told me that the "in between" ones (meaning, not your 30 day, 90 day, 6 month, 9 month or one year anniversaries) don't really count. I just disagree. The fact is, every day counts and a lot of people say we all just have the same 24 hours.

I have special appreciation for the fact that I have 10 months today because the truth is, for as easy as I have seemed to sail through surviving breast cancer - I almost went to the bar last weekend. It was probably the closest call since I first started this endeavor called not drinking, otherwise known as living in reality. Anyway, I usually "get weird" around my anniversary as people often say happens. This month, I just feel incredibly grateful that I didn't go out last weekend. If I had, I would be sitting here on, I don't know, day 5 maybe if I were lucky, or perhaps I wouldn't be sitting here at all. I forget sometimes the life and death of what I am dealing with, but two people I knew from my home town where I first got sober committed suicide this summer after they went back out and couldn't get sober again. Over and over I hear this story.

So, there are moments like last weekend - the day after I almost went to the bar, where I have a real true appreciation of how deadly this disease is, very deep gratitude that I am sitting where I am sitting today, and complete acceptance that I do in fact have this problem. I usually - lose the acceptance, forget that this can kill me and, gratitude - what's that?

Today though, I really am grateful to all of the people who have saved me time and again. I don't just mean saved me from going to the bar when I didn't like the way that I was feeling, but who have saved me by teaching me how to live differently through the situations that arise in my life. I am especially grateful to my friend Tom who has probably kept me from drinking on more occasions than he realizes. He always gives me tokens for my anniversaries and never forgets it. (Let's see if he remembers it today!!).

I remember very early on when I first showed up to meetings, Tom had just had his 6 month anniversary. I don't know if I even had 30 days at that point, but I remember thinking wow, there is no way I could ever not drink for 6 months. Anyway, he gave me his 6 month token and I carried it around with me every day. This meant more to me than he probably knew. Now I carry his one year token around every day. I never announce my anniversaries at meetings like you are supposed to, and people are always reminding me that the reason I announce my anniversary is not for me, but for the benefit of other people - for all of the people who are sitting there wondering if it is in fact possible to stay sober for 6 months, one year, 10 years - and it really deepens my sense of appreciation when someone announes a 30 day anniversary and I am able to remember what it felt like to have 30 days sober and think I was going to die from the pain that I was feeling. Anniversaries remind me where I am going and where I never want to be again.

Anyway, I don't think Tom knows how much I appreciate his friendship and how much he he has helped me, but if it weren't for Tom, and a lot of other people, I'm not sure I would even be here right now. So, Tom, if you are reading this, I am deeply grateful for your friendship and truly appreciate eveything you have done for me. Whenever I thank people for their help, they always remind me that I don't have to thank them, I should just go help someone else. That is, after all, how it works. Nevertheless - Tom, thank you, for little things - like answering your phone 15 times the other day when I didn't think I was going to make it.

A Holy Crap Moment

Do you ever have those moments when suddenly reality dawns on you? All of a sudden the truth about something becomes clear. Either you've been living in denial and don't know it - usually you've been living in denial and don't know it - or you just haven't been paying attention maybe. It's like you aren't living in reality and then suddenly you are. Time starts to pass so quickly that you just can't keep up. I call those "holy crap moments." Holy crap - how did I get here - how did this become my life? When did I get to be almost 30 and almost 4 years into a career? Holy crap, I'm a real live functioning adult. That one surprises me every time actually because I've been like an adult since I was, oh, about 10 probably - at least in some ways. Emotionally, probably not, but always overly responsible and overly worried - dealing in some ways with adult issues from the time I was a little kid. People in AA will tell you that you stop growing emotionally when you start drinking. Hmm. Does that mean I'm a 21 year old? I don't know. More on that later....

Anyway, I have those holy crap moments a lot. I think because life moves so fast and I fail miserably at staying in the day, staying present in the moment and enjoying it. One minute I'm 25 and graduating from law school, stressed out about everything and it seems like the next minute I'm 29, everything is different, and I'm still stressed out about everything. What happened in between? I don't even know because I'm always so focused on something specific that I miss all the details only to find myself wondering - how did I get here again? I've called off a wedding, had 3 jobs since law school, gotten sober, stayed sober, moved to Chicago, gotten married, survived breast cancer. I know I posted about getting sober and having breast cancer the other day - but even when I wrote that post, I don't think I had an appreciation for what I was saying.

I was getting ready for work yesterday just like I always do and it finally dawned on me - in one of those holy crap moments. I just did something incredible. I survived breast cancer. Holy crap people, I survived breast cancer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Significance of Today

I said before that I am a survivor of my childhood. I might have said it in a way that makes it sound unremarkable or like I am ashamed of the person that I am. Like I would rather be something other than a survivor of anything when in fact being a survivor of any tragedy or adversity is nothing short of amazing. I am survivor of a lot of things and that is what has given me my incredible strength. I have been told recently by a lot of people that my strength is unparalleled and that I should be more open with my story and my past because you never know who is listening and you might just say the very thing that saves another person’s life. This has been my experience anyway, in the program of Alcoholics Anonymous. Time and again, we save each other’s lives.

I remember the first time I ever said, “I am an alcoholic.” It was not at my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous and I didn’t show up there because I thought I had a problem. I said it at my twelfth meeting and the only reason I said it on that particular occasion was because the lights were off. It was a candlelight meeting and in the darkness I felt somewhat less of the shame that I associate with this. For days I had walked around the house saying the words, “I am an alcoholic, I am an alcoholic, I am an alcoholic.” “I am an alcoholic and I have been sober for ten days.” How does it sound? Does it feel true? What does it mean? Do I believe it? Can I say in front of someone else or do I feel too ashamed?

For the first eleven meetings I said my name, and that I wasn’t sure whether I belonged there, I just knew I felt better on the days I showed up. Eventually someone said to me, “you know, people who aren’t alcoholics, don’t just show up to AA meetings, what the hell do you think you are doing here?” “People who aren’t alcoholics don’t sit around and wonder about whether they are or not.” Eventually I would understand exactly what they meant although it would take a couple of months, a couple of slips and a lot of really bad days before I really believed what I now know for certain is true about me.

Well, it was a year ago today that I went to my first meeting of Alcoholics Anonymous with the thought in my mind that I might qualify. It was a day after the worst hangover I’ve ever had - a two-day hangover, two days off of work, and midnight emails to a friend about how I didn’t understand what was happening to me. Although that meeting was an “open meeting” and I thought I was attending as a member of Al-Anon and ACOA, my friend had brought me there with something else in mind, watching me the entire time to see if I was relating. Little did I know that this was the beginning of what would ultimately change and undoubtedly save my life.

Today is important to me - dates are important to me in general – anniversaries, milestones - the date of that first meeting, my sobriety date which is December 14th, the day I found out I had breast cancer and the day I found out that I was cancer free, which was just last Tuesday. I am a recovering alcoholic, a 29 year-old breast cancer survivor, a survivor of my childhood and my past. It is remarkable and it is amazing and it is nothing to be ashamed of.

I put on a breast cancer survivor bracelet today for the first time and felt empowered by having experienced what I have been through in the past year in a way that I did not feel before, in a way that allows me, hopefully, to internalize the lessons that come from suffering so much and emerging on the other side, better, stronger and believing you are able to survive anything.

What Am I Doing Here Again?

I was going to write about something completely different – actually, I wasn’t going to write at all. Two posts into this endeavor, I had decided to call it quits – except to my surprise, a couple of people asked me when I was going to post something. It’s like a T.V. show that you don’t necessarily want to watch, but you just keep watching because you have to find out what happens next. There are blogs that I check regularly – okay, obsessively, waiting for that next post.

Anyway, the truth is, something happened between a friend and I just over a week ago that has made me question myself and question what I was going to do on this blog. Actually, it’s made me question just about everyone I know and whether I can really trust anyone with the truth about anything. Why put my feelings and fears out there for everyone to criticize and judge? That isn’t going to help me. Why not just keep it all to myself? The point was to be honest – because I was tired of hiding behind the overwhelming shame that has kept me quiet for so long. Yet at the same time, I guess I would rather hide than be judged or criticized. I would rather not lose friends in the process of being myself - but then again, if people can't accept me, I guess they were not my friends anyway.

My mind wasn’t even really on the risk of judgment that goes along with truth telling and putting yourself out there. I just wanted to be honest, blind I guess to the consequences. A “good friend” of mine made some terrible and unfounded judgments about my husband last weekend, which were indirectly judgments of myself, and this has resulted in the end of our friendship. I decided after that I was probably better off continuing to be myself, while at the same time pretending not to be. It’s worked so far I guess – so, so much for this blog.

For completely different reasons, I am tired of peoples’ reactions to me in general so I guess I am not sure what I am doing here at all really. I can’t be picky though right? I can’t expect people to react to me exactly the way I want them to. I don’t just want to be honest to elicit a specific response and certainly not to elicit any sympathy. I guess I can’t focus on peoples’ reactions at all, or I would entirely miss the point. Nevertheless, I am fed up with peoples’ assumptions and judgments and I don’t really feel like having to justify anything.

I have been through hell in the past four months, and mostly I am tired of the people who say they understand and relate or can imagine. I can tell you for sure that you cannot even begin to imagine, most of you can’t, and almost no one that I know personally. Even if you are one of the people who have observed me over the past year, deal with what I have had to deal with and you claim to have your own experience that parallels mine as you have watched me and gone through certain things with me – you still don’t have what I have, which is my own very personal experience.

You don’t feel what I feel and you don’t think what I think. You don’t know what it is like to get up every day and live with what I live with. I believe now more than ever that until you walk in the shoes of someone else, until you get up every day and live what they live and do what they do, you really aren’t in a position to judge them for anything. Until you are me, and you never will be – how can you question my motives or choices, the things that I feel and the ways that I deal with things? You can’t.

Homesick For a Place That Doesn't Exist

For the first time in my life, I feel homesick - a deep sense of longing for the comfort and safety of childhood. I feel homesick for a place that doesn't exist. It doesn't exist because the home that I grew up in is not the kind of home that you long for or miss. It isn't a place that you ever look forward to returning to - it's a place you hope to get out of, you dread going back to, and you spend a lifetime trying to get over it. What I long for is just an idea, a fabrication. It's a figment of my imagination built out of other peoples’ stories.

I wonder sometimes what it would be like to go home to a place where I still had a bedroom that still had my own things in it. The benign remnants of my childhood like old art work, favorite toys and books - things that might evoke fond memories or make me laugh. There isn't much left, only photographs really. Photographs and memories – but they are memories that can't quite be trusted.

I like to think sometimes that I escaped my childhood and in escaping, I left it all behind. The exact moment that I thought I had escaped was when I first moved to Chicago after graduating from undergrad. It was only a matter of time before I realized that the past had beaten me to Chicago and already unpacked and settled in before I even got there. I hadn’t escaped - I had merely survived, which is entirely different.

My home is here in Chicago, or wherever I go, but it isn’t where I came from. What is left of my childhood exists really only in my mind, and is recreated sometimes when I spend time with close family and friends who have known me my entire life. We laugh about it sometimes, but the truth is, I don’t ever really know whether to laugh or cry. I just miss a time and a place where I could feel safe and secure, free from worry and anxiety and the things in life that children shouldn’t have to deal with. I miss these things that I’ve never had and I miss them tremendously for some reason. I’m homesick for a place that I can only imagine and a place that doesn’t really exist.

This Too Shall Pass

My brother seems to know a lot of people who are doing this, writing blogs I mean, so I thought I might give it a whirl. Of course, like any overly self-conscious person, I’m afraid I have nothing interesting or intelligent to say and that no one will take the time to read this anyway. Fear of rejection I guess - just like the fear of having a party and no one showing up, so you don’t have the party, and you will never find out whether anyone would have come. I’ve actually never tested this out. I’ve never thrown a party at my own house. Besides the unnecessary stress over what to title this blog, I seem to have a lot of anxiety about what to write about. I don’t live in a foreign country or have a new family to write about, my job is not particularly interesting to anyone else and I have no real hobbies to speak of at the moment – something I am trying to remedy. I’m basically a corporate lawyer at a really large firm in a big Midwestern city – which is not really inspiring me here.

Unfortunately, the biggest things in my life – the two most life changing things that have ever happened to me, both in one year – are the two things that I’ve tried the hardest to keep secret. I am nine months into the best and the worst year of my entire life and unsure whether to write about it or where to begin, although I am quite sure that these are the things that now define me, and these are the things that will shape me going forward. I live every day in fear of people finding these two secrets out, and I am beginning to feel like my life is not authentic because I can’t seem to just be honest about who I am.

The title of this blog and this initial post is one of my favorite slogans from twelve-step programs although I hear these slogans elsewhere from time to time. If I had to capture everything about my life right at this moment in a single phrase, it is summed up in this slogan. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately, reminding myself that the good and the bad and everything in between is momentary. I was sick a couple of weeks ago and I spent most of the time lying in bed and wondering if I would ever feel better, if I would ever feel the way I used to and dwelling on the thought that the moment I was caught up in was permanent – a permanent state of feeling bad, a permanent circumstance that I could not live with.

I’ve learned a lot in the past nine months that I am not even sure how to put into words - like I said – I don’t even know where to begin – in fact, I’m starting to wonder if this blog won’t be nothing but an account of life lessons I probably should have learned (like everyone else did) but somehow missed. Anyway, the temporary nature of things is what has been plaguing my mind lately. People say, if you don’t like something, just wait a few minutes and it will change. Even those circumstances in life that have turned out to be permanent – and there really aren’t many of them – the way I feel about them always changes. What seems to trouble me right now about knowing that everything is temporary, is accepting that the good stuff is temporary also, and that I’ve been so caught up in everything except the good stuff, that I have missed out on moments that are irreplaceable. Why is it that the things we most want to be over seem to last forever and the things we want to savor pass us by in a second?

So, I guess I am just going to be honest. I am going to write about myself here, the secrets I’ve been keeping, my experiences as of late and my struggle to live through them and learn from them, while I try to savor them, appreciate them, and also let go of them.