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.
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Friday, November 24, 2006
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.
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.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
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.
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.
Sunday, November 19, 2006
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.
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.
Thursday, November 16, 2006
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.
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.
Monday, November 13, 2006
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.
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.
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
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.
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.
Saturday, November 04, 2006
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.
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.
Thursday, November 02, 2006
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?
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?
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