Ten Years
March 6, 2010
Ten Years...
Ten Years…
Of living one day at a time.
Of living life on life’s terms.
Of living with courage rather than fear.
Of living a grateful life.
Of living.
Ten Years…
Of not wondering if I would wake up in the morning or die in my sleep.
Of not being afraid for my children when in my care.
Of not feeling worthless and useless.
Of not using anything I can get my hands on to not feel.
Of not hating myself every day I drew a breath.
Ten Years…
Of learning how to be powerless but not hopeless.
Of learning not to regret my past nor shut the door on it.
Of learning to love others more than my own self serving desires.
Of learning how my experiences can help others.
Of learning to let go, let God and live life.
Ten Years…
Of saying ‘No’ when yes would be so much easier sometimes.
Of saying ‘I am sorry’ when I have amends to make.
Of saying ‘I love you’ to a husband who never left my side through it all.
Of saying ‘Thank you’ to friends who love me in spite of rather than because of.
Of saying “I am grateful today’ everyday and meaning it.
(more…)
Posted by Jenn @
1:45 pm |
First you slip, then you fall. But sometimes, love and family catch you before you do either.
February 7, 2010
Here it is Sunday night and all I can think is “Oh, please, do not let this weekend end! I am not ready for Monday!“ I had a great weekend with my family and got a much needed mental break. Last week was hellacious. Horrible. One of the worst I have had in years. I do not want to get into details because suffice it to say that 1) I do not want to relive it and 2) I really don’t want to relive it.
Wednesday was just bad. For reasons I cannot get into (I am just not comfortable sharing since things here have been used against me in my real life), I was thrown into a really bad place. What amazed me was that a very dear friend of mine hundreds of miles away could tell- with only a few words- how bad off I was. In fact, she talked to me until I was doing better. She sent me phone numbers I needed and links to make sure I had some local backup. After seeing that I was doing better but needed to talk to someone in recovery, she reminded me of a mutual friend of ours that would be there for me in a heartbeat if I called him. I sent out an SOS message to him and we were almost immediately on the phone. The timing was not good and I knew he had things to do but he stayed on the phone with me for over an hour just getting me back on track and reminding me of who I am, where I’ve been and how hard I’ve worked. Together they helped get me out of my own head and back to a peaceful place. Two friends in two different states who care enough to come to the aid of a friend.
I have to state the obvious here but I really, really do hate addiction. Here I am with almost 10 years of hard work and recovery and yet there are times when I am just as vulnerable- sometimes I think even more vulnerable- than I was just 10 months or even 1o days clean.
I woke up feeling better and happier on Thursday. I had a good day despite a very difficult morning of struggles and that afternoon was so grateful that Gabby and I were able to spend a couple of hours catching up with good friends. That night it was all throw to hell and everything came tumbling down on my head.
I lost it in a way I have not lost it in years. It was the first time in many, many years that a situation came along that filled me with such despair, pain and desperation that I feared for myself. In my head at that time, I no longer cared about anything but not hurting. I didn’t care about the 10 years of hard work. I didn’t care about anything I have accomplished in the past decade. I didn’t care what it would do to me, my kids or anyone else around me. All I wanted was to not hurt like I was hurting. I wanted to drown myself in the momentary release that being high gave me. All I wanted was to escape. To get away from the life of hell that was baring down on me and about to swallow me whole.
Escape.
Escape.
For the love of all things peaceful, I had to get away from the pain!
I had to let someone know I was going to slip fall hard.
But I didn’t want to say it because right then, right there, I wanted to fall. I wanted to give in. Ten years of saying no when I hurt. Ten years of “talking through it” and “finding alternatives” when I felt horrible. Ten years of staying strong when I really did not want to be. None of that mattered. I was willing to throw it and myself back to hell.
A friend of mine who knew only a third of my story and half of the pain I was in came over and wanted to make sure I cleared out any medications or alcohol in my house. If she knew only half and knew to just come over and get things out of my house, can you imagine how bad I actually was?
Again, there were phone calls- this time it was Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect $200, Go Directly to AA.
I talked to people in recovery who got me back on track. I talked to people who really knew me and spilled it out. I talked to friends late into the night. I cuddled up with my kids who saw me almost lose it for the first time ever in their lifetime and let them know I was okay. Cuddled the fear out of them.
I snuggled up with my husband and told him everything. I felt him tense. I knew a part of him wanted to bite his tongue and resist the urge to give me advice. He just listened as I worked through it. I know how hard it is on him when I hurt and feel so hopeless. I know it breaks a part of him every time I feel broken. I know it makes him feel helpless when I let life beat me down and head into a tailspin. But he always stands by me and loves me. He listened. He let me pour it all out. He didn’t judge (me) and didn’t blame (me) but listened, loved and waited for me to work through it knowing he was standing there as my safety net.
Friday, I woke up feeling like I had gone 10 rounds with a heavy weight fighter. I guess in a way I did. I fought my demon.
And I won.
It took a while on Friday to work through things but again, it took talking on the phone with people who really do know me and being with people this weekend who really do accept me for who I am that made me realize that things have to change. For me. For my family. For my sanity and sobriety. Things have to change. And I have hard work ahead of me but I am not alone. I just know things have to change.
In a huge way.
And I have started to take steps to go back to being me and not anyone else’s version of me.
Because you know what? That person doesn’t work.
Not for me.
Posted by Jenn @
11:47 pm |
Diving off the high dive– One day at a time
February 1, 2010
“Always do what you are afraid to do.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
There was a time in my life when I was fearless. I felt almost invincible. I never feared new situations, new people and loved new experiences. The only fear I would readily admit to was my fear of heights. But for the most part, I lived life to the fullest. Fearlessly.
I used to say I don’t know when I became afraid of life but the truth is I can look back and see when it happened. April 6, 1992. I was living my fairytale life. I was young, healthy, married to my best friend and pregnant with our first child. With a picture perfect pregnancy, we eagerly awaited the new addition to our family. On that day we went to what was to be a typical OB check-up. But it became anything but typical. On that day we found out our little boy had died in utero. My idyllic life shattered. I was not invincible. Death could take me by the heart and slam me to the ground. After giving birth to my son, nothing inside me ever felt the same. Life scared me. I knew that everything could change in a heartbeat- or lack of one.
I had changed. My outlook had changed. I was afraid. Not in ways you could always see but in ways that pulled me deeper inside myself. Years later after delivering two very healthy babies, I was living life more fully but never to the fullest.
Maybe that inner fear is one of the reasons I fell so deeply into my addiction. I was a broken, fearful, unhappy woman. The drugs were just an attempt to mask it all. Then somewhere deep inside myself I found the courage to admit I needed help. With a lot of hard work and a lot of help from amazing people who were also beating their addictions, I began to live life more fearlessly. In fact, for a few months, I was fearless again.
I had looked death in the face and kicked it to the curb. With my new found friends, I was living life. I was riding on the back of my friends’ Harleys. I was going to Karoake with them. I was meeting people I would never have met otherwise and seeing a side of life I would never have known. And I embraced it.
A few months into my recovery I became pregnant with my daughter. There was nothing about that pregnancy that was not filled with fear. It went as far as being told that she, too, would probably die before birth.
Enter fear.
My daughter was born perfectly healthy. I searched again for the fearlessness. I began to find it again. I tried to find it in big ways. (I should have been looking for it in small ways.)
When my Mom became so sick and I sat by her side watching her die, Fear took over again. It completely grabbed me by the throat and choked out whatever fearlessness I thought I had found. This time, Fear stayed around much longer. The very core of my being was shaken, tossed around and thrown to the ground.
This year I decided to do something about it. A project- if you will- began to take root in my mind.
The Project
I decided the only way to conquer living fearfully was to do something about it and begin my path to living fearlessly again. One step at a time. One day at a time. I wanted to see if I could do it for at least a month before I openly blogged about it.
One year. A new challenge every day. Nothing huge or outrageous. Just simple acts that help me move forward in an attempt to challenge myself away from the big and little things that can cause me to withdraw or let fear win. This is not an experiment in trying to find perfect happiness in a year. It is just my way of taking small steps, small challenges towards living fearlessly.
Some things will be bigger than others. Some will be as easy as simple acts of kindness. Acts that I would normally think about doing but never actually put into action. I may find inspiration from books, blogs, friends, suggestions, movies, self-help books etc. But every day I will do something to force me outside of my comfort zone a bit. And I know there will be many times I will need to explain why a certain act is stepping outside of my personal comfort zone.
I have been successfully doing this for one month. I have kept a personally diary that I will copy over to the blog as soon as I can so you can follow along. Nothing huge yet.
Here are some examples:
- I reached out to a friend from my past where our friendship ended badly and we talked things over. It felt good to let that go.
- I went to lunch alone without any props (you know: books, phones for texting etc) and just enjoyed being alone and enjoying myself.
- I called a tech service rep just to tell him how much I know his job must be thankless but how much I appreciate that he is on the other end of the phone when things go haywire. (I didn’t even have a tech problem.)
- Those of you who know me know I am terrified of mascots in full uniform. At a recent hockey game when the mascot jumped RIGHT IN MY FACE, I did not scream, run or cry. I actually reached out and touched him. (I missed the photo op but do have witnesses.)
See? Simply things. Small steps. Hopefully big results when all is said and done. It may seem crazy but if you know me, that is nothing new.
Learning to find the courage to live fearlessly!
I am open to your challenges. Bring ‘em on. Now, nothing that is illegal or involves nudity. No ONE wants that. What do you suggest? Challenge me. One thing a day- some big, some small and some just random acts of kindness that we all think about doing but rarely follow through with. They can even be daily steps towards a bigger goal. (Jogging? Queries? World Domination? Kicking out Leno and bringing back Conan? You get the idea.)
You see, what I hope to find at the end of 2010 as I ring in 2011 is a Jennifer who lives life fearlessly.
Are you with me on this journey? Do you want to join me on this project as I take a jump off the high dive one day at a time? I’m climbing the ladder and am ready to jump!
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(I will add the link the the daily challenges as soon as I get them all written up from my journal to my computer. BUT, I will keep you updated here until then. Just so you can help hold me accountable. Are you in?)
Posted by Jenn @
10:36 pm |
Decisions. Changes. Life without regrets.
March 1, 2009
Every year at this time I get restless. I get very reflective. I get ansty. I am moody. Basically, I am coming out of my skin. Even after all of these years, this time of year makes me crazy. Maybe close to jonesing but not quite. I crave. that is the best way to say it. I crave.
I crave something different. I crave what I knew. I crave stability. I crave change. I crave closeness. I crave alone time. I crave. I craze. I crave some more.
My mind just flies into directions that I just deal with rather than try to understand. I guess this post is an example.
I crave. Something.
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I had a long talk with a friend of mine the other day about the decisions we make and learning to live with them. It really got me thinking. Most of the major decisions in my life have been made because I am taking other people and what they want or need into consideration first. Before what I truly want.
Let’s take for example getting clean and going to rehab. It wasn’t that I woke up one day and said, “Gee, I sure don’t like getting high anymore. I should get clean!” Far from it. I still loved it and felt I needed it and I really wanted it. But when I looked at my boys and saw what it was doing to them, I knew I had to change things or they could be hurt, killed or left without a mother. For them, I decided it was time to make that life changing decision. And I was absolutely right in doing so, but the catalyst for getting there was not my own desire. It was my desire to make things right for others. And then for myself. (But trust me, in less than a matter of hours that focus changes quickly and you learn how to be in rehab for yourself and yourself only.)
I have always tried to be one of those people who does not live with regrets. You cannot change the past. You cannot undo things that have been done. There are no do-overs in life.
But what if there were? What would I do?
There are friendships I would have ended much sooner and some I never would have ended at all. There are jobs I would have never taken and some where I would have done everything differently. There are some “secrets” I would never have kept and some that I would never have shared. There are things I would never have said and things I would have said much sooner.
But to what end does any of that bring me? Every decision I have made, every friend I have had or lost, every opportunity I have grasped or let pass me by have brought me where I am today. No matter how much I wonder about (and I do wonder about), taking a different path, making a different decision, choosing a different way of handling things, I cannot go back and do anything–not one thing–differently. And so I live with where I am, who I am and all of the good and bad, whole and broken, happy and sad wrapped into this person I am today. But some days…some days I let myself wonder. What if…
Drink to all that we have lost
Mistakes we have made
Everything will change
But love remains the same
In the end it is all about love. Having it. Keeping it. Sharing it. I have had a wonderful life of love. I have great friends in my life that make me laugh. I have children who amaze me every day. I have a husband I have been with for almost 22 years. Every decision we make brings change. If you are blessed and have a bit of luck on your side, through those changes, love remains the same.
And you can push forward.
Posted by Jenn @
9:49 pm |
NEWSFLASH: I am updating my blog.
March 16, 2008
This past week I put in nearly 40 hours of school volunteering. (Or maybe eleventy hundred. I lost count.) Some at home but most at the school. Does this mean they have officially “gotten” me? Am I now a Stepford? Let’s say no. I did have fun doing it, though. I know. The first step is admitting there is a problem. So really? I don’t really have a “new” post worthy of a Newsflash, but I do have something you may not have read yet. Seeing as I know you don’t all follow me around the ‘net to see what I have to say. And the links in the post? Follow them. Some amazing women writers were quoted. You may find a great new read!
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The past week I have been adrift in volunteer work, a new freelance job, house cleaning and one other thing. What was that? Oh, I remember. Celebrating my eighth year being clean from a painful and life altering drug addiction that nearly took away everything I cherish and love. I’ll be honest. I wanted to find be around at least one person who “got it” and would realize what I was going through on that day. It was a day that I desperately needed to be understood and on familiar ground with another person.
Blogging is much the same way for many people. Some people read blogs as a way to find others that are going through the same life issues, have the same interests or maybe even just because they entertain them. And then we have the bloggers themselves. Those who put themselves right out there in front of the Internet and share to let it all lay bare. Those writers who dig deep into their souls and pull out a part of it and share it. Hoping it connects with someone else. Sometimes hoping someone else will connect with them.
It is not surprising that in this week I found Redsy. As she began her Odyssey to stop drinking she posting these words that so resonated with me that I wept remembering the feelings she described.
I’ve found a place to go every day to talk about my problem with drinking. To listen to others talk about their struggles and fears and recovery. And it is a complete and total miracle. If I’d known how great these meetings would be, I honestly would have stopped all this wine nonsense a long time ago.
But of course I wouldn’t really. Because outside of those wonderful comforting loving meetings, life is once again scary as hell. And this time I’m standing there without my favored weapon. Facing an army of tigers with a pea shooter and one bean, which is how we’re supposed to feel at the beginning (I’m told).
And I feel like the outside layer of my skin (the adult, fake-put-together part) has been taken away and I’m this sea creature –shell-less and shaky–lolling around waiting for sunlight to reach all the long way down to the ocean floor.
I read through her pages and found her four months later with these words:
So it’s been 75 days since my last drink and nearly 4 months since I began this odyssey — to sober up, wake up to my life, start a daily spiritual practice something like worshiping a higher power, something like trying to be a more loving person.
As slowly the cravings, mental and physical subside, replaced by new rituals and people and habits, hope increases. Hope that there is more that I can give, more to experience, and a greater sense of gratitude folded into the dailyness of things.
…
All is not perfect happiness by any stretch, but broken down into 24 hours segments, I can say I haven’t felt this hopeful and resourceful for years and years.
I cheered for her. I wanted to shout to her that I get it and I am so proud of her. I remember hitting each milestone month of being clean and you can damn well bet it is worthy of a celebration. She is now 5 months sober. I am 8 years clean. We are alike and we can both learn from each other. That is the beauty of putting it out there. I don’t know her. But really? I know her.
I also came across a post about loss written by Jenn of Breed ‘Em and Weep that caused me to suck my breath in and hold it as I read it. I cried with the writer as she described her feelings. I felt my own anguish over losses in my own life (though different from hers, losses nevertheless) and I felt her pain as she knew that things would never be the same. I could feel her anguish as she knew the lives of her children would never be the same after this peaceful night of sleep– not knowing.
Tomorrow we will tell the girls about a difficult loss. It is a peculiar thing to sit on the edge of your child’s bed, watching her sleep, knowing that tomorrow you will say something that will stop her heart briefly and force her through a door she would not have chosen herself. Children do not take kindly to loss, and why should they? As adults we can barely stand it, barely have the ability to comprehend the who-was-who-now-isn’t, the what-was-that-now-is-lost.
I watch her dark profile. She is a beautiful girl, as still sometimes in her waking hours as she is right now, asleep. I think, This is her last night of not knowing. Tomorrow we take away the not-knowing.
When I first read the post I didn’t even know what the loss was but it did not matter. I felt it. I felt her loss. I felt the losses in my life. I felt her turmoil as a mother. I remembered that late night knowing I had something to tell my own children that would forever bring them from before to after. From innocence to life-changing. Her ability to open up and share from the bottom of her heart was so universal while still being so personal, you were not only there with her, you were at that place in your own life where you went through your own loss. That is the incredible power of blogging.
You see, when bloggers really open up and share, we find a way to connect, find support and feel as if someone out there gets us. To those of you who bare your souls, thank you. I appreciate and understand how hard that is. I have found bloggers who write about just about everything. They share what they know with people who may need or want to hear it.
I can find bloggers who help me with support for my addiction, the death of my Mom, my stillborn son, and my frustrations and dilemmas in parenting. And when I read the following quote from Mamma Loves, I realized that there is a certain type of blogging that is harder to find.
Mamma Loves called it to the carpet when she wrote:
What I’ve noticed though is that there seems to be one topic that remains fairly off limits (unless addressed anonymously). I understand why. Many people have discussed their reasons for not talking about it. I see this in my real life friendships too.
I just have to ask though…when will we all stop pretending like marriage is easy??
I love that question. I would love more people to just say it. “This marriage thing? Good. Love it. But, damn, it can be hard.” I know many divorced bloggers who will talk all about it. Or bloggers who openly admit they are in a bad marriage. But what about those of us who are in good marriages and are happy? Just something she asked that I thought I bring to the table since we are talking about baring our hearts and souls in blogging.
The bottom line is blogging has power. A mighty strong power. Blogging connects people. We can find others who get where we have been, where we are and where we are going. And that is vital at certain times in our lives. So, bloggers, it is okay to bare your soul. Some of us need it. Most of us admire it. And there are even a few of us who are counting on it.
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Comments are acting wonky so if you try to leave one and it won’t let you, please let me know. You can always email it to me and I will post it for you. No idea what is wrong. Sorry!
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Cross posted on BlogHer
Posted by Jenn @
1:27 pm |
