KISS...Keep It Simple, Sweetheart

Yes, indeed.  Blogging is excellent for keeping my ego in check.  Lest I ever forget who's large and in charge.  

This is a picture of my ever faithful, loving  dog, Elvis, who by the way, seems to think he is the one running the show.  I tell him that GOD made every single hair on him just beautifully, wouldn't you agree?  Amazing.

When I get the guitar and sing to the Higher Power, Elvis is at my feet.  He seems so relaxed and peaceful.  I'm grateful for his company and unconditional love. 

This is such a simple thing but certainly one of those blessings given so abundantly by the Higher Power.  Yeah!  I must remember to Keep It Simple, Sweetheart...

The Baggage and the "Scab"

Andie and I were talking last night about love, friends, acceptance, etc.  She reminds me so much of my boss.  The love they have for others is evident and I told her when I grow up that is how I want to be.  She said I'm already like this I just don't see it.

"Well," I said, "there is still a part of me that is cynical, hard and I know it."

"Like a scab," she said.

Hilarious!  We both erupted into laughter!  That was soooo funny!

"Yes.  Like a scab." I replied.

I remember when I was a little girl with a boo-boo, a scraped knee.  It started to heal by scabbing over and my mom said to leave it alone but I was fascinated.  I hid and picked at it a little.  It was too tender.  A few days went by then I picked at it some more and it loosened some but was still sore. Finally, one day it was picked enough until it fell off.  That felt so good to not have it on my skin anymore.  The minute it was off I felt free...maybe it wasn't freedom from the scab...it was freedom from the obsession/compulsion to pick the scab off?  Maybe the "scab" on my love for others is my healing, like Andie said?  I hand this over to my Higher Power.

Anyway, she sent me the picture posted today.  GOD bless and keep you...love, Carol

The Shitty Committee

This morning I was in the kitchen, wiping down the counter, microwave and oven toaster when I noticed my thought-life was activated.  The "voices" in my head had a quiet, under the radar rendition humming along about Sho, my lifemate.  He was this and he was that, all kind of character assessments, past and present, etc.  There was not one kind thought in the mix.  Before long this Shitty Committee was full steam ahead, no subtlety whatsoever.  It became a blatant, flurried bunch of negative chitter-chatter, gossipy, character assassination "voices" busy, busy, busy taking HIS inventory!  I was fine when I walked into the kitchen but in a few minutes I felt angry, resentful and wondering what the hell am I doing with him if he makes me so unhappy!   AND HE WASN'T EVEN HERE...IT WAS ME, MY THOUGHTS THAT ROBBED ME OF MY PRESENT MOMENTS OF POTENTIAL HAPPINESS.  This happened so fast, too.  I'm an expert in doing this to myself with so many years of practiced repetition.  I really don't need anyone's help in getting the Shitty Committee going, obviously.

I do need help in stopping it though.  That's where the 12 Steps help.  It gives me the format, configuration, structure, frame of reference or whatever you want to call it, to change my brain...my thought-life...my learned way of being in the BONDAGE OF SELF instead choosing to enjoy my present moments, embracing life, celebrating each privileged breath and opportunities to love and be loved.

tHe BraIN

Today I plan to help my garden this morning.  I want to go to Home Depot and buy a screen cloth to provide shade relief.  Wow.  The sun is very hard on some of the plants.  I do my part and I put this in my Higher Power's Hands.

I woke up about 1:30 am and I listened to a video posted at La Hacienda regarding the brain and addiction.  Amazing.  This woman is highly knowledgeable and an expert in this field.  Here's the link.   ADDICTION & THE BRAIN  I hope you take the time to listen to her...if not for you, maybe for someone you may know who suffers with this condition.

GOd bless and keep you this glorious day...

Realm of the Sunlight of the Spirit

Where is this Realm mentioned in the book of "Alcoholics Anonymous"?  I believe it is the Kingdom Within talked about by Jesus Christ and so many others.  I believe it is real, not a theory. The interior space, not outer space.

I l-o-v-e the 1999 movie "The Matrix" starring Keanu Reeves and Laurence Fishburne.  This movie seems to perfectly describe the spiritual warfare between living in the BONDAGE OF SELF connected to its artificial life-support mechanism called "addiction" vs living in the FREEDOM OF SPIRIT connected to The Source of All Life called the "Higher Power" (or whatever you call it).  Fascinating.

Every morning I get to choose "between the red pill or the blue pill".  I have the responsibility...the ability to respond...to make a decision...stay in the dis-ease of fear, hurt, hate and resentments or take full flight in the freedom of love, healing, acceptance and forgiveness soaring above it all, buoyed by the "wind beneath my wings" called GOD's grace.  A private self-torture hellhole chamber all in my head or the Realm of the Sunlight of the Spirit in my heart?  Which is it going to be?  Just for today, this minute, this second...?  One day at a time.

I am...

Yesterday I went to a speaker meeting where it was a honor and privilege to listen to a woman tell her story.  Just when I think I had it so bad...jeesh.  The anger and grief I felt was powerful.  I wanted to kick that woman's father and mother's asses for hurting and failing to protect her.  How moving to listen to this woman's honesty, compassion and forgiveness as she spoke of her recovery, the work its taken to get where she is.  Lovely, absolutely lovely to behold.  I thank my Higher Power for her.  Wow.  After the meeting Jean asked if I'd played my guitar.  So we all ended up singing Hank William's "Your Cheating Heart".  It was fun to hear our mixed voices.

Andie, one of my sisters in the program, sent me this picture and I just want to pass it on to you.  I'm hoping you have a sweet, lovely day, look for the good and thank the Higher Power for the love so freely given to us all!  Yeah!  

Pre-program 12 Steps

Before working the 12 Steps, my internal world ran for the most part on the premises talked about in the following "Pre-program".  I still can be very selfish, self-centered and make decisions based on fear.  The 12 Steps shift the interior matrix to where the Higher Power is the center of the world, I take responsibility for my recovery and then I ask how I can be of service to the Higher Power and the Higher Power's children.  Simple...when I work the Steps...one day at a time.


                                            12 Steps of Pre-Program

1.  We admitted we were powerless over nothing - that we could manage our lives perfectly and those of anyone else who would allow us.

2.  Came to believe there was no power greater than ourselves and the rest of the world was insane.

3.  Made a decision to have our loved ones and friends turn their wills and lives over to our care even though they couldn't understand us at all.

4.  Made a searching and fearless moral and immoral inventory of everyone we know.

5.  Admitted to the whole world at large the exact nature of everyone else's wrongs.

6.  Were entirely ready to make others straighten up and do right.

7.  Demanded others to either "shape up or ship-out".

8.  Made a list of all persons who had harmed us and became willing to go to any lengths to get even with them all.

9.  Got direct revenge on such people wherever possible, except when to do so would cost us our lives or at the very least, a jail sentence.

10.  Continued to take the inventory of others and when they were wrong promptly and repeatedly made them aware of it.

11.  Sought through bitching and nagging to improve our relations with others as we couldn't understand them at all, asking only that they knuckle under and do things our way.

12.  Having had a complete physical, emotional and spiritual breakdown as a result of these steps, we tried to blame it on others and to get sympathy and pity in all our affairs.

Uniquely Qualified to help like no other

Why an alcoholic/addict/co-dependent/ACOA/Alanon/compulsive overeater or compulsive anything is uniquely qualified to help like no other...


A drunk fell in a hole and couldn’t get out.

A businessman went by.  The drunk called out for help.  The businessman threw some money and told him to get himself a ladder.  But the drunk could not find a ladder in this hole he was in.

A doctor walked by.  The drunk said, “Help, I can’t get out.”  The doctor gave him drugs and said, “Take this, it will relieve the pain.”  The drunk said thanks, but when the pills ran out, he was still in the hole.

A renowned psychiatrist rode by and heard the drunk crying for help.  He stopped and said, “How did you get there?  Were you born there?  Were you put there by your parents?  Tell me about yourself; it will alleviate your sense of loneliness.”  So the drunk talked with him for an hour, then the psychiatrist had to leave, but he said he’d be back next week.  The drunk thanked him, but he was still in his hole.

A priest came by and the drunk called for help.  The priest gave him a bible and said, “I’ll say a prayer for you.”  He got down on his knees and prayed for the drunk, then left.  The drunk was very grateful; he read the bible but was still stuck in the hole.

A recovering alcoholic happened to be passing by and the drunk cried out, “Hey, help me, I’m stuck in this hole.”  Right away, the recovering alcoholic jumped in the hole with him.  The drunk said, “What are you doing?  Now we are both stuck in here.”

But the recovering alcoholic said, “It’s okay, I’ve been here before; I know the way out.”

When in crisis---Remember to Breathe!

Just b-r-e-a-t-h-e....

close your eyes...

follow the breath....

in....

relax

out...

"Be still and know that I am GOD".

The Mule Who Fell In The Well

One of my favorite stories...

Once upon a time there was a mule who fell in a well.  The farmer tried and tried to pull the mule out but he couldn't so he called his two sons over to help him.  No matter how hard they all tried it was to no avail.  Finally the farmer gave up and told his sons, "I'm going to town.  While I'm gone, get some dirt and bury that damn mule."

So he left and his sons got some dirt then started throwing it down in the well so they could bury the mule.  But lo and behold, every time the dirt flew down in the well, the mule managed to step on it.  Finally the mule was able to step out of the well.

The moral of the story is sometimes the very dirt that's meant to bury you...can be the dirt that liberates you.

Blogging keeps me humble

Blogging helps so much because it keeps me humble.  Writing down the material which presents itself is challenging especially when some of it is not very pretty.  What will people think of me?  Selfish to the core.  I want to keep my experiences closed-in, to myself...me, me, my, my.  What I forget is maybe, just maybe, there is one other human being out there in the world suffering alone, isolated, socially withdrawn, hurting, shut-in with the pain of guilt and shame.  And maybe, just maybe, the sharing of my story can help them know they are not alone and know there is a way out, freedom is possible.  If we do the work.

Some of us have some pretty ugly stories.  Some of us have rough developmental issues from growing up influenced by life's circumstances and not having the tools or skills to deal with it.  We  used defense mechanisms to survive but they no longer work.  Now what do we do?  How do we change?  

My experience is...for me to change...it's like the saying, "My back was against the wall and the wall was on fire."  The pain decibel has to get high enough on the register of heart, mind and soul so I can hear it.  Pain for me, normally is like white noise or background noise, a steady drone in my life only noticeable when it's not there or it's so elevated I can't block it out.  I believe this is one of the long term effects of living with an alcoholic and a part of early childhood conditioning.  Dr. Phil is so right when he talks about how mistreating children changes their brain chemistry and alters them.  The drone of pain was instilled...and I want it to stop.

Anyway, I know what needs to be done...rework the 4th Step.  I worked it in early sobriety to the best of my ability and level of honesty at that time.  I wrote a narrative then worked the 5th Step with Charity.  But I missed something and I am willing to be rigorously honest in this next inventory .  GOD help me.

The Re-set Button

What I love about the 12 Steps program is also the "One day at a time" slogan.  When I first came in I really didn't believe I'd be able to quit the addictive behavior.  I'd been doing it for so long.  But Charity, my sponsor, encouraged me to just stay focused on a day at a time.  "Most people put their pants on by using one leg at a time otherwise they'd fall.", she said. A friend, Nancy, uses the concept of a "re-set button" to start her day. I love the visual of this.  "One day at a time" helps me ground, to start a fresh new day by morning meditation and prayer, writing and reading recovery literature.  Same thing.  For the grace of my Higher Power, the 12 Steps program and the fellowship, I've learned how to re-set my day.  Before, it's like I used to live one continuous day on and on, never-ending.

In early sobriety, I remember how amazed and awed I felt by the multiple epiphanies I experienced.  It was like a new world.  Like I'd been living on a different planet that required artificial air support, a spacesuit and space shoes...the alcoholic world is bleary, same old/same old, lifeless, a dark, living death.  Wow.  In sobriety the air smelled sweeter, the grass greener and the earth sparkled.  It gave me just enough hope to keep coming back.  One day at a time, sometimes a minute at a time and I keep coming back.  It's 19 years later and I still keep coming back.  I may not work this program perfectly and most definitely will never be the posture person of recovery...GOD-willing, I hope and pray to stay in this program until the day I die.  When I quit drinking I grieved and mourned as if my best friend had died.  Well, in sobriety I now have a bunch of new friends, a worldwide fellowship, and the very best friend of all...my Higher Power that I choose to call GOD.   I am truly grateful.

Father's Day...and terrible memories

Well, I survived Father's Day and the memories it brings back up so close to the surface.  Jeesh.

I hero-worshiped my father when I was a little girl.  He could do no wrong.  He had a beautiful singing voice.  Sometimes he'd come home and start singing to my mom the moment he arrived at the door.  "Hey, hey, Good-looking" a song by Hank Williams was one of his favorites and he'd win my mom over every time.  He was kind, gentle and a lot more reasonable than mom. I could talk to him and he took the time time to listen if he was around.  But he wasn't around very much.

He was a gambler, a thief and a con man plus he was addicted to heroin.  So he was either in hot pursuit of "The Big Game" or acting as if he was an exterminator with a spray can mostly filled with water and a little bit of roach spray or busy talking mom out of the rent money she hid away.  But he could do no wrong in my eyes.

He kept going to jail then finally to prison and the time he spent with us got less and less while mom got meaner and meaner.  Once, while we lived on East 2nd Street, he went to the restroom with his newspaper in hand so we all knew he'd be in there for quite a while.  This time he was in there so long and no amount of knocking and banging on the door got him out.  An ambulance was called...he had overdosed and was unconscious.  There were times he and his buddies crowded the kitchen as they laughed and talked, the best of friends as they got a spoon, cotton, dope and rig ready to do the deed.  Their bare arm extended with a tourniquet to help find a vein.  No big deal.  We knew not to say one word about these things.  Not one little slip of a word.  This was one of our family secrets.  No matter what, loyalty to family was paramount for our survival.

As things got progressively worse, my father ended up in prison on quite a stretch of time and when he was out briefly was when he molested me by allowing me to put his member in my mouth.  When my mom came to pick me up I told her what happened and she slapped and hit me, saying it was all my fault.  He went back to prison not too long after because of drugs.  For years I thought this was all my fault but Bernard, my therapist, assured me that as an adult my father should have known and done better.  I told Bernard I thought I was "The Abomination" like the girl on the movie "Dune".  I felt guilt-stricken and ashamed.  I had done this after my two older brothers, Ray and Rudy had acted out with me by forcing their members in my mouth and would bend my fingers back until I was on the floor on my knees.  They demanded I say, "Mercy." and for some reason I felt such a rage and rebellion against saying "Mercy" so I fought back with tears streaming down my face until they won.  And I lost because I was too stupid to learn to just submit instead of fighting back.  When they zeroed in on my younger siblings I would throw myself back in the arena just to lose again.  I loved my brothers but I hated them for this.  Such opposing strong emotions..jeesh.

My father died June 7, 1970.  He was my grandmother's only child and had been staying at her house.  In the restroom, early one morning she discovered his dead body with the hypodermic needle still in his arm.  May he rest in peace.  Addiction has no mercy.  I hate the disease and the devastation it wrecks not only on the alcoholic/addict also the family and society at large.

I love the 12 Steps...because there is a way to heal, to survive and to triumph over a seemingly helpless, hopeless situation.  May the Higher Power, I choose to call GOD, help us all.

The Blah Day...Internet was down (sad face)

Wow...on Friday a technician upgraded our cable but right after he left I noticed my Internet was off!  Grrr...I called the cable company which provided an automated voice giving instructions on what I could do to troubleshoot this problem.  To no avail, no matter what, the Internet stayed off.  It was time to go to work so I decided to leave it alone until afterwards, but when I returned home I fell asleep.

In the morning I called the cable company and the automated voice came on again...I felt my body clench, a-l-r-e-a-d-y.  1 is "yes" and 2 is "no".  I punched 2 on my dialpad so was transferred to a tech.  This was good.  She coached me but it still didn't work then finally she said to get a pin and push it into the reset hole on the back of the modem...oops! Something broke off and clinked around inside the modem so it needed to be returned and then replaced.  Grrr...ok, I'll put this on my things-to-do.  So after disconnecting and bagging the modem I put it in my purse so it'll be ready.

I get a basket with my gloves, knee pad and scissors then go outside to my garden. Cut the veggies ready to be removed, cut-off any leaves or stems that look gnarly then I water the garden.  I put it in GOD's because I really don't know what the heck I'm doing but it seems to be working.

Blah-blah.  While pulling off the tab from a beer can in his hand, Sho (my life partner) tells me a couple of his relatives are coming over and I ask him if there's going to be a party, are there other people expected..no, they're just coming over to drop him off a TV and a while later he mentions they'll be helping him cut the grass since he just  bought a lawn mower.  Grr...I need to move things out of the way for his TV and I feel my body stress some.

I shower and go to the crowded lobby of the cable company where I pull-down a number.  "103".  The red sign shows "93" is currently being served so I go take a seat to wait.  Finally it is my turn, get the new modem and return home by about 2:30pm.

There's a big TV (NOT the slim panel digital type) in the living room and I get busy moving furniture around to accommodate the TV but to no avail.  Terribly awkward.  So everything is finally in its place, more or less, then Sho asks, as he pulls off the tab of another beer can, if I'll cut up some lettuce, tomato, onions, etc. because he's making fajitas.  Then I get busy rinsing, dicing the vegetables then arranging them in a  a container with compartments to hold it all.

Then Sho comes to tell me they will be coming to eat inside and by this time I feel a bit overwhelmed because the table is laden with clutter, like the watering can, the fresh cut veggies from the garden plus a bag from the grocery store, mail and I start telling him I wish he'd told me this morning it was going to be all this.  And he starts telling me blah-blah then I go into blah-blah, he says I don't know what it's like to have family, I tell him he's probably right, next thing I know I'm yelling at my alcoholic and he's telling me to wait until the morning  then I'll get to hear him, etc.  Jeesh.

I relocate things off the tables and get it ready for them then I retreat to my woman-cave to rest.  They're happy and I'm happy.  They eat, relax, laugh and talk while the TV plays in the background.  They thank me and I tell them they're welcome.  They leave after awhile.

I make amends to my alcoholic who, although he'd been drinking most of the day he had been working real hard on the outside.  He showered and I served him a plate the way he'd served me earlier.  All's well.

Whew.  Where was my program in all this?  I remember thanking GOD on several occassions and turning it over a few times.  It helped.

The Carousel named Denial

IF this illness only hurt the ones who have it that would be one thing BUT in reality it spreads and spreads and spreads...

I absolutely l-o-v-e to listen to Salvador Valadez, a Spanish Al-Anon Speaker, talk about alcoholism and the effects it has on everyone involved with an alcoholic.  One theme of his talks is about the Carousel of Denial based on something he read so I googled the phrase and found this.  Please read and enjoy the description of this perspective on the illness.  (NOTE:  I sometimes substitute the words "alcohol/alcoholic" with the words which better describe what I may currently be dealing with, for instance, "co-dependence/co-dependent", etc.)  If you know of another description please let me know, I'd love to read and share it.

The Carousel of Denial description

I want to stay off that carousel.  The problem is sometimes I don't even notice I get right back on it!  Jeesh.  Nobody else does this to me.  I do it all on my own. 

I went to amazon.com last night and bought "The Tools" Transform Your Problems into Courage, Confidence and Creativity by Barry Michels and Phil Stutz.  I downloaded it onto my Kindle and read until I went to bed.  Fascinating book, well written and I certainly enjoy the material regarding how to use "the tools".  I am a firm believer the more tools I have to work with the better I'll be able to do my job...to heal, grow and share the wealth of my experience, strength and hope.  GOD-willing and the creek don't rise.

A $1,000,000 program given a nickle at a time

The 12 Steps work.  There is a certain skill involved and it's not like it's impossible to work them without help, it's just that when someone helps show how to work the Steps I get there quicker.  Where do I get to?  I get connected to the Higher Power I choose to call "GOD" as I understand GOD.

It sounds so simple but it is one of those things that take commitment, courage, and staying connected.  It takes what it takes...one day at a time.

The other night on the PBS "Charlie Rose" TV program I heard a couple of authors talk about their new book, "The Tools".  Interesting.  Sounded like the Steps reconfigured to look different but same old thing.  One more time.  Kind of like what Bill W. did with the Oxford Group teachings.  An old saying is, "There are many paths leading to the same place."


  

You spot it....you got it.

A dear long-time program friend, Sally A., listened to me complain about an individual that really got on my l-a-s-t nerve.  I went on and on until finally Sally told me in a light hearted joking manner, "Well, you know , Carol, what they say?---You spot it, you got it!"  Ouch.  I really didn't want to hear that and certainly by no stretch was I able to see where I possibly had the very same characteristics I reacted so vehemently to!  No way!

Now, many years later, I am quicker to see my part in things.  I'm quicker to see my reflection and get busy cleaning my mirror by working the 12 Step program.  Go to meetings, pray, meditate, put pencil to paper to write it all down in a 4th Step, call my sponsor or another program friend, read page 552 in "Alcoholics Anonymous", and get busy helping another suffering human being who wants what I got...a program that works if I work it.  This is not about perfection...it's about progress and following "good, orderly direction" aka G.O.D. as I understand GOD.

MYOB...Mind Your Own Business

MYOB is a life skill that really works.  Where do my rights to live my life however I want end and your rights to live your life however you want begin?  At the end of our noses.

Before arriving in the 12 Steps rooms, I thought and believed in such a different way it is hard to explain.  Lying (although in my mind there was no way to admit this because it was ALWAYS justified), manipulating, conniving and relying on my best thinking as if I am the solution to mine and everybody else's problems was how I lived my life.

I was always nosy, asking questions, wanting to sniff out the "problems" so I could be "helpful".  I was a busybody wanting to be "needed".   My family of origin promoted this.  I remember visiting my mom, to say "hi" and see how she was doing then she'd start telling me all the problems of her household from the smallest to the biggest and before I realized it I was enmeshed, very busy in problem-solving and cleaning up her messes.  Or there were times I arrived at her house, no one would be there because she was on a binge and staying at her lover, Pilo's house.  Well, I'd get busy washing the piles of dirty clothes strewn everywhere, picking up the beer cans and wine bottles, and cleaning the kitchen where maggots crawled on stale food on dishes and pans, and disinfecting the house.  Normally my mom was not like this and took a lot of personal pride in her house cleaning except when she was on a drunk, she didn't give a damn.  I learned to stop doing this and to keep hands-off, let her clean-up her own messes.

I remember talking a lot on the phone and the main topic of conversation was about "other people's business".  This took-up a great deal of my time.  It was quite titillating, entertaining and kept the focus off me.  After all, oh my gosh, have you heard what happened to so-and-so? It has taken MANY life lessons for me to learn to stay out of other people's business.  This doesn't mean I stopped caring about them.  It means I stopped playing the role of "rescuer" and moved out of the way.  Sounds so simple but hard as heck to do because I am one of those who has a natural, built-in inclination to want to help others.  Not everybody is this way.  Where I needed re-education was in learning the difference between "helping" vs. "enabling".  Al-Anon is a powerful teacher in helping learn to keep the focus on me.  I am forever grateful to the Al-Anon program and fellowship for its tremendous gifts of love.  Here also are a few resources that helped me re-educate...

Enabling - When Helping an Alcoholic or Addict Really Isn't Helping

alcoholism.about.com/cs/info2/a/aa052197.htm

Many times when family and friends try to help alcoholics, they are actually making it easier for them to continue in the progression of the disease.

Enabling Behavior

www.internet-of-the-mind.com/enabling_behavior.html

Enabling behavior is born out of our instinct for love. It's only natural to want to help someone we love, but when it comes to certain problems -- helping is like ...

Enabling Behaviors and the Effects of Enabling

www.egetgoing.com/drug_addiction/enabling.asp

Information about enabling behaviors, the effects of enabling and how to identifyenabling behavior.

The Professionals and Divine Intervention

Well, then...my stats show 0 interest in my blog.  How is that for ego deflation?  Excellent!

What's the only good thing about hitting bottom?  There's only 1 way to go...up.

I survived the stomach bug and made it to my meetings yesterday without incident.  Yeah!  I felt the absence of my traveling friend but she's doing fine wherever she is.  GOD bless her.

One of the topics was how some of us may need help from professionals from time to time.  No kidding.  I certainly wouldn't take my dental problems to my sponsor or ask her help for chiropractic problems, etc.  My sponsor signed-up to work me through the Steps and to help keep me honest...not to be my doctor, therapist, or what other professional I may need to consult.  Although she may have some kind of expertise or license under her belt that is not what qualifies her to be my sponsor.  What qualifies her is she has taken the 12 Steps and is willing to pass it on by helping someone else take the Steps.  We cannot give what we do not have and we cannot have it if we do not give it away.  This is my experience in recovery.  It is about the Steps, all about the Steps that lead to Divine Intervention.

The Fellowship is important, too.  The camaraderie of those who survived the flames of Addiction Hell.  We have been through hell.  We who have survived know what it took...the Grace of GOD.  We asked for help and it arrived in Divine Intervention otherwise we would be another statistic on somebody's number chart.

Before I ever arrived to the rooms of the 12 Steps there were multiple incidents of Divine Intervention where my Higher Power was obviously taking care of me and I was blind, I didn't see.

Once I had just received a ticket from a police officer because my car's inspection sticker was expired, the registration sticker was expired and I had no insurance.  The children's father was in jail again, my children were crying because they were frightened, I was pregnant, the car had no air conditioning, no money to fix it, barely enough gas to drop them off at the babysitter and to make it to work where I hoped to ask for a $20 advance just to make it to payday.  The sizzling, sweltering heat oppressed even more when I drove up to the STOP sign.  I just couldn't take it anymore and I started crying, too. So there we were.  I cried big sobs of grief, overwhelmed by how ineffectual and inadequate I felt in that moment.  After a while a slight whisper of a breeze blew through the car and it felt so good.  Then another and another.  I kept crying but in-between my sobs I heard a light tapping sound that wouldn't stop.  Finally lifting my head,  I saw the tapping came from a little stack of phamplets I'd stuck on top of the car dashboard.  The gentle breeze was rifling the paper.  I reached over to remove it so the annoying, insistent tap-tap-tap would stop and that is the first time in my life I ever read, "Footprints".

 In that moment I knew I was being carried and it made all the difference in the world to know I wasn't alone...Thank GOD for Divine Intervention.

65,500,00 pages

My brother, Cliff, sent me an email about how he googled to see how many people had recovery pages:

Substance abuse:              65,500,00 pages

Depression:                        271,000,000 pages

Feelings:                             292,000,000 pages

Millions.

My blog is just a little, bitty, wee speck among so many.  This certainly satisfies my herd instinct! Lol

My son visited me Saturday and he helped take some things to Goodwill.  I'm very grateful for his willingness to load up his truck then go drop the stuff off.  He is so handsome, intelligent and hard working.  His wife is pretty amazing, too.  She loves to paint, create, get things done...definitely a producer.  I missed seeing her yesterday because they usually visit together.

I still seem to have a stomach problem and today I go to my meetings.  I put this in my Higher Power's Hands.  I hope to be of service today.

Also, my friend and her husband start today on their yearly trek only this time they are going East.  She says she has a feeling about it and doesn't know if she'll make it back.  I rebuke this and put her and her husband in the GOD box for additional blessings on a safe return home!  I love her for being who she is.  She's very caring, attentive and willing to help without having to be asked.  She has helped the Spanish Al-Anon meeting by posting flyers and getting the word out.  This is truly appreciated.  What will Sundays be like with not seeing her at the meetings she so faithfully attends? May GOD bless and keep her.

This is where I work the program because I let go and let GOD.  I trust everything will work out just fine without any interference from me. Thank GOD.







Well, I figured out the way to make sure any comments made are kept private from now on.

Party of One...aka the "Pity Party"

Well, this morning I'm feeling sorry for myself.  I have some kind of stomach bug so I won't be leaving the house today until I feel better.  My self-care becomes the focus.  I'll do this by drinking lots of water, avoid solid food, etc.

One time I visited an AA meeting where there was a beautiful, older, fast thinking, smooth talking woman who quoted pages from her memory of the big book, "Alcoholics Anonymous".  Fascinating.  Everything she said made perfect sense and she seemed perfect.  Wow.  It seemed as if she had arrived to a place of perfection.  I kept waiting  for a twinkle of sunshine to sparkle from one of her perfect, white, gleaming teeth.  I immediately felt drawn to her and I thought, "I want to be like her."  It was like I was meeting a "movie star" of the program!  Anyway, during the meeting I disclosed how imperfect I felt, it was a low day for me and how working the Steps help change my attitude and focus.  Blah, blah. After the meeting, this beautiful, perfect woman told me how I shouldn't ever feel this way and started to tell me how I should be, think, feel and believe. Wow...fascinating...and I realized I just want to be me.  I felt grateful and humbled.

Today I thank her and my Higher Power (that I choose to call GOD) for the opportunity to grow-up just a little bit more in the 12 Steps program...one day at a time.  

The 5,000 pound phone

One of the hardest things I had to learn to do is to use the telephone as a tool in recovery.  Oh, my gosh, and to ask for a person's phone number was a really big deal.  I avoided this for a long time.

I encourage my sponsees to collect numbers as if collecting pearls.  Then pickup the phone and dial those numbers!  At first, it's good just to say something like, "Hi, ________, this is ________ do you have a moment?  I'm just calling to say hello and to practice using the phone in connecting with others while between meetings.  How are you doing?......Thank you for talking with me.  Hope you have a wonderful day!"  

At first, I really didn't want to bother anybody.  The thoughts I had were a bombardment of negativity and fear.  "What if they're busy?  It's too early.  It's too late.  I'll just bother them.  Who wants to hear this crap?  What will I talk about?", etc.   

Now, after practicing, it's much easier to do and the resistance has faded away slowly but surely.

Usually I like to do my calls on Wednesdays, just a brief checking in, and I feel such a warm, loving connection for having done so. I have a specific, structured day because I get so busy, time seems to fly by, then I forget to call. 

Too smart, too good-looking and the GOD hole

I've heard the only two people who don't make it in the 12 Steps programs are too smart and too good-looking.  Why do you think that is?

To do the work is not dependent on how cute I look today or whether I'm wearing the latest fashion clothes, hairstyle, shoes, fancy fingernails, etc.  Nor does it depend on my best thinking, trying to arrange people and life to suit me as if I am the authority on how everyone and everything "should" be.  Where's my Higher Power in all this?

I love the descriptive phrase my friend, Andie, gave me. The "GOD hole".  The deep void...the empty space within we ineptly try to fill with alcohol and other drugs, sex, gambling, shopping, debts, controlling, criticizing, judging, eating compulsively and other acting-out behaviors that only hurt ourselves and others.  The space only the Higher Power is expansive enough to fill...when we plug-in on a daily basis.  

I've learned what helps me plug-in is doing the work. One foot in front of the other.  Trudging along the Road of Happy destiny as described on page 164 of the big book, "Alcoholics Anonymous".  I may not do it perfectly, all the time, every day, exactly.  I just do it.  I also whip it out when necessary.  I know exactly what to do cause I've practiced it so many times that I don't have to stop and think about it.  It feels like it is a part of me, the way a body part feels a part of me.  As if I was born with it.  The 12 Steps work when I work them.  Period...thank GOD for that!  Yeah!

"Today I love an alcoholic"

This is what Sue Drum from the Gottawanna Group in California likes to say.  That she loves an alcoholic.  I enjoy listening to her online speaker tapes.  Sue gets so down-to-earth, real about her recovery and what it has taken her to do the work.              Sue Drum---working the Steps in Al-Anon

Maria V. from the Creedmore AFG always says, "Alcoholics need love, too."

"A family member has no more right to state, "If you loved me you would not drink," than the right to say, "If  you loved me you would not have diabetes."  Excessive drinking is a symptom of the disease.  It is a condition, not an act."---from A Guide for the Family of the Alcoholic

There is a blog titled "The Immortal Alcoholic" about Riley's later stages of alcoholism as he's dying and his wife, Linda is writing the blog.  Not to judge or anything like that, it seems to me the blog's title might be better suited as, "The Die-Hard Al-Anon".  For every alcoholic there's usually a good little enabler around that co-signs the B.S.

I hate the disease.  I do not go to AA and Al-Anon meetings because I'm cured, know-it-all, my life is smooth sailing all the way, and perfect.  I continue to go because this is a necessary part of recovery from an incurable, lifelong illness that I live and need help with.

I live with an active drinker and today I can say I love him.  GOD help me, one day at a time, to work the Steps to freedom from the bondage of self.
 

"This too shall pass"

I remember in early sobriety when Charity, my sponsor, used to say this phrase.  So much happened during my first year.   About 3 or 4 months in sobriety, a doctor in the ER of a local hospital acted-out sexually by rubbing his privates against my leg while I held my head in my hands during a terrible migraine.  The feelings I felt were like a tsunami of self-loathing because I experienced this as if it was my fault.  Then in my 8th month I watched a live action news that showed police and EMS personnel at a site where 4 young people were shot only to find-out one of them was my oldest son.  I had no cellphone at that time.  The long drive in the night to town stretched into an eternity of darkness, the grief washing over me and the deep terror of not knowing whether he was dead or alive.  (They all lived and apparently were shot with pellets but I didn't know this at the time.)

It's true.  When we get sober we do feel better.  We feel all our feelings better, close and up personal.  No numbing or diluting, pure unadulterated feelings.  Jeesh.

So I hunkered down and worked my program one day at a time, sometimes just one minute at a time was all I could do as I learned a different way to live life.  Thank GOD, it does get better, not perfect but a hell of a lot better than it was before.

I am grateful for one of my recovery tools which is "The Courage to Change" Al-Anon book where this phrase is a meditation on pages 77 and 315.  GOD bless...

How hard is it?

The saying is, "If it ain't hard, give me a minute."

I seem to have a natural inclination to complicate things instead of keeping them simple.  Working the 12 Step program means I am willing to follow a few simple directions clearly written about in the book  "Alcoholics Anonymous".

Yes, "after all GOD gave us brains to use".  So I want to analyze, intellectualize, figure it all out, it has to all make sense FIRST before I'm willing to do it, I must know the whys and wherefores, etc.  It's like I have to "think it" then be able to "say it"---as if that is the magic formula...as if I can "think" and "speak" my way into sobriety.  When in reality I just need to get off my assmosis and "DO IT".  There is a whole chapter titled "Into Action" not "Into Thinking".

My experience is when I rely on my Higher Power for the solutions to my problems (that in one way or another my self-centeredness and selfishness more than likely contributed to in the first place) I get quicker in the Sunlight of the Spirit solution versus sitting in the murky hellhole abyss of the problem.

Which do I chose today?

The miracle of today

"Any day above ground is a good day".  I read this quotation at an OA website and I used it on a daily basis when I was struggling.  This helped me keep a positive attitude and a focus on recovery.

I have a fantastic book that has pictures made from pixal art.  The pictures are almost holographic in nature.  They look like colorful paints put together but if you keep looking at them in a certain way, almost magically you begin to see what is really there.  A landscape, or fishes in the sea, or a statue of "The Thinker" by Rodin are examples.  Some people say they try and try but just can't see the pictures.  It has to do with relaxing and focusing.

Same as the spiritual life.  It is available.  I just need to let go and let GOD.  Take a deep breath, relax, trust that there really is a Power greater than all of us holding the Universe.  It's real.  I just need to slow down..

"Be still and know that I am GOD."      

Light, Polite and Meaningless

In 1993, when I first went to AA, I kept everything to myself. I didn't want anyone knowing what I thought or how I felt.

In 2006, when I first came to Al-Anon, I walked around in the world ready to say anything that entered my mind.  Unfortunately most of the material was of my past or present traumas, deep, profound, and disturbing events...well, in my mind they were. Most of the time I was either deeply sad or angry. I would tell anybody that looked like they were kind of listening all my business...whether they really wanted to know or not.

After one of the Sunday night Al-Anon meetings, some of us went to a local Mexican restaurant and enjoyed dinner.  I talked about how I hated to visit my relatives because a lot of the time I was sucked into the vortex of pain in the family pathology.  One of the Al-Anons told me," it's okay to keep it light, polite and meaningless especially when you want to stay out of the drama".  Wow.  I use the "Light, polite and meaningless" with family, coworkers, etc.  Not all the time, just when it may be in my best interest to avoid volunteering to be the solution to their problems, as if they don't have a Higher Power.  Jeesh.  I'm not perfect at this but I am getting better!  Yeah!

Another of my Al-Anon friends created a small card that was adorable. On it were written some reminders on how to stay out of the drama.  These are some of the ones I remember and will add the rest of them later on, when and if I remember them too!

1.  MYOB--- mind your own business (people pay thousands of dollars in treatment to learn this skill!)

2.  Be kind and polite

3.  Don't ask questions

4.

5.

It's quiet this morning

The ENT specialist said I have acid reflux and prescribed Prevacid.  OK.

Today my mind is quiet.  Nothing is presenting.  No clamoring thoughts begging for attention.  As I write this, I wonder if this is the calm before the storm?  So I take a deep, soothing breath and relax.  I let go.

The phone rings and it's one of my multi-winner sponsees using her 5,ooo pound telephone tool.  I tell her how delighted I feel to know she's making phone calls and connecting with others.  She starts laughing and says, "It feels good to laugh."  She talks about some of the things happening this morning in her life and I ask her if she's done her morning meditations. "Not yet cause I don't have my Big Book".  I encourage her to keep an open mind, that she doesn't need the Big Book to meditate.  Just be quiet, avoid saying or asking for anything for anybody, the Higher Power already knows everything needed or wanted.  Sit quiet and make space for the Higher Power to fill.  She said, "ok".  I tell her how proud I am of her efforts and we talk for a bit.  Finally we exchange our goodbyes and mutual thank yous.  What an honor and privilege to be of service.  Thank you, GOD.