40

It's here. 40. I may have made a few self deprecating comments about dreading 40...turning 39 "for the second time" but in reality, I've never been so excited. The hysterical sobbing is just an off shoot of that. Emotions are all messed up, but that's okay. I've only got an hour left of this old life. This is the danger. I will put too much stock in turning 40. I will pin all my hopes on this birthday. And then I'll get in a car wreck or I'll run my stockings or something. I want to start something tomorrow. I want a new page. I want a new start.
I want to be better and I want to do better...at everything. That's a tall order. How do I not let myself down with that? When I wake up tomorrow and I look in the mirror, who am I going to see? The same person I saw this morning. If I wasn't happy with this mornings me, how can I be happy with tomorrow's me?
Okay, so what am I doing correctly, right now, at the age of 39?
I did a "grown up" thing today and went to the doctor to hear the magical words, "That lump is nothing and should be gone within a week."
I went to a meeting tonight
I walked 3 miles to get to that meeting
I recognized that love is all around me and available to me in unconditional form, if I am willing to open up to it
I did the best I could today as a mother
I worked hard at my job today
I am not married
I am seeking a better relationship with my child

So that's not such a bad list of things to carry with me into the next decade. Or to just carry with me tomorrow, as I accept good wishes from the wonderful people I love and dodge cake at all costs. What can I build tomorrow? What can I create tomorrow? What can I do, for that 1 day, that is, in reality, just like every other day?
That's a good question. I'll have to ask myself that when I wake up 40.

Ruth

She came of age during the Depression. She looked like Linda Darnell (Google that name and you'll see how stunningly beautiful Linda Darnell was). She could jitterbug like a professional. She would insert dirty words into the stories she read to her grandchildren to make them giggle. She never went beyond the 5th grade, yet she ran her own business for more than 30 yeares and raised two children mostly as a single mother in an era when single mothers were not the norm. She married an alcoholic and learned to be fully self sufficient for her family. She single-handedly cared for her aging mother for 10 years. She never turned away her grandchildren who were dumped unceremoniously on her doorstep for years. She was sensible and frugal and kind and loving. At the age of 60, she found God and fell madly in love with the her spiritual side she had never entertained. She died 22 years ago today.
Every year my grandmother would call me on my birthday. No matter where I had been dragged to, I always got a phone call. Sometimes a card, sometimes a little money, but always a phone call. My father didn't even call me every year on my birthday, but my grandmother (my mother's mother) would never dream of missing it.
My mother and her mother fought like cats and dogs from moment my mother came out of the womb (after 48 hours of labor!). My mother was like her father. A dreamer, someone who couldn't stay in 1 place, someone who couldn't hold onto money. Everyone always said I was like my grandmother, sensible, down to Earth and no matter where I was being dragged to by my mother, I always knew that my rock and my stability was in a two story house in Piedmont, MO. I can't speak to her strengths as a mother, but as a grandmother, she was wonderful and never failing in her love.
When I was 17, I returned to Missouri for Thanksgiving and she was there, as always. We had some talks and later, I was laying in bed and I could see her, sitting on the couch, watching TV. And I remember thinking how out of touch she seemed, how her opinions and view seemed wrong. It made me sad to feel so disconnected from the woman I had always considered my best friend.
A little over 3 months later, 11 days before I turned 18, she died. Her heart gave out. She was in the hospital less than a week before she died. I was living out of state, but I couldn't bring myself to come back to see her in the hospital. I couldn't bring myself to see her hooked up to tubes and wires.
I realized, after she died, that I was waiting for a phone call. I think, in a way, I still do. It's amazing to me that it's been 22 years. Life goes on and no one understood that more than my grandmother. She would have never wanted anyone to wallow and dwell on the fact that she was gone, but the fact that I graduated high school, went to college, worked, got married, had a child without her...is odd. Like maybe I should have ceased to exist when she did. It just doesn't seem natural, when it's really the most natural thing in the world. But as each year passes and each generation arrives, it feels that the memories of her are growing dimmer. My daughter will have her memories of my mother, who is her best friend and she may remember a few stories I've told her about my grandmother. God willing, someday, there will be at least 1 little one who will remember me as their best friend. This is the cycle of life, exactly the kind of thing my grandmother would have appreciated.

Hangover

Slept in my makeup, didn’t get my teeth brushed, slept on the couch and now my mouth taste like yesterday’s news… Wake Up Older by Julie Roberts

It’s been awhile since I was hung over. Today, I am hung over. I wonder if people realize how similar an alcohol hangover can be to a food hangover. My head hurts, my stomach is all over the place, I look like a raccoon because I didn’t go to sleep last night. I literally passed out. I passed out on a recliner in front of the TV, woke up to stumble to the couch before waking up again to finally fall into bed.
I had to drive to get my daughter this morning and of course, God’s flashlight was right there, assaulting me. I know what you did!!! the Sun was screaming at me.
I was out of breath and agitated and tearing my car apart at every red light in a desperate search for my sunglasses. Once I finally found them, I was upset because I had forgotten my phone. And the thought actually entered my mind once I retrieved the offspring, “I should not be driving with my kid in the car…”
Dropped her off at school and went home and tentatively ate a small bowl of cottage cheese and sipped some juice to get something on my stomach. It stayed down. I grabbed an orange and a piece of vegetarian lasagna for lunch, but at this point, still not sure how that’s going to work out.
The elevator’s out at work and I have to climb 4 flights of stairs to get to my office...still not sure how I made it up those steps. My boss appeared at my cubicle to ask me a question and I think I jumped 10 feet. I wish I could keep my sunglasses on all day.
I am still that person. Still the person I don’t want to be. I am still not turning things over. I am still getting buried in everything that gets thrown at me. It’s a lot. I know there are people worse off and there always will be, but sometimes even my sponsor admits, “I wish you could get a break!”
And I knew it was coming. Screaming “Mother fucker” when I drop my spoon, rather than picking it up and rinsing it off, that means something is coming. Impatience, anger bordering on rage which I usually don’t get…it means that it’s all building up inside me and at some point it’s going to blow.
I want a solution to my situation with my ex-husband. I ask friends, I ask family, I ask my therapist, my counselor…and no one can give me the answer I want. I don’t want to know how to change my behavior. I don’t want to know how to disengage myself. I don’t want to learn how to accept that he won’t change ever. I want to know how to change him. I couldn’t make him the husband I needed (and the husband I needed was basically a guy who needed to just not treat my like crap! Tall order I know!). I’ve truly accepted that. Now, my energy is focused on making him the ex-husband I need. Someone who is working with me to raise our kid, who communicates and who listens and respects my opinion but I DO NOT want to wait 14 years to get the message that this man is incapable of being that person.
Living with my mother is pretty much what I expected. Some days I measure the success of this arrangement by the fact that I haven’t pushed her head into a wall, and some days its fine. I’ve accepted that she’s not going to change.
40 is coming. And I don’t know what I wanted it to look like. Maybe my usual, unrealistic delusions of grandeur whereby things were all in line, I was at a consistent level of peace and serenity, dealing with all things as they came.
Why do I keep doing this? This is a life. It is never going to be consistently anything…consistently changing maybe. That’s the human condition, for everyone. It’s time to stop waiting for everything to be different and start working with what’s in front of me. And I keep making these promises to myself and never following through on them.
I used to love playing Russian roulette. I love seeing how close I can get to the edge and still pull myself back. My brand of Russian roulette were things like seeing how close I could get to the cancellation date of my car insurance policy without paying the bill. Seeing how many work projects I could put off before anyone caught on. Seeing how much food I could steal, hoard and binge on without people noticing. And I’ve really turned a corner in all these things. Now, apparently, I’m just playing it with my life and with my health. I’m not 22 anymore. I can’t even sleep on my couch without waking up having lost complete use of all my neck muscles. My cholesterol is up. It’s not the end of the world and probably easily rectified but maybe it’s a message. These things are only going to get worse. Your body is not going to hold up forever. I am getting older.
But I think I can dodge the bullet some more. And I can’t. I may live to be 90. I may keel over and die tomorrow. I have no idea and would go completely insane if I did know. Today. Today. All I can worry about is today. Not my birthday. Not next Christmas. Not my daughter’s graduation or wedding. Not even tomorrow. The ONLY thing I know about tomorrow is that I am supposed to have my daughter’s sleep over guest home by 11am. That is it. And for all I know, my car will break down, so I can’t even call THAT a certainty.
I am going to be abstinent today. I have no grand plan for my entire life. Today the Universe loves me…good and bad. Today, I am going to turn it all over because I still feel like crap and am incapable of doing anything else apparently! Today I am going to do the next right thing and deal with tomorrow…tomorrow.

The Seventh Step Prayer
My Creator, I am now willing that you should have all of me, good and bad. I pray that you now remove from me every single defect of character which stands in the way of my usefulness to you and my fellows. Grant me strength, as I go out from here, to do your bidding. Amen

Career

My mother’s career was the focal point of her entire life. She loved it, she nurtured it, she cherished it about everything else, including her children. And when it appeared that the career she had chosen forsook her, 30 years in, she was devastated and to this day grieves and mourns its loss and is, to this day, 10 years later, constantly grasping for those glory days.
I have never had a job like that. I worked in 1 industry for 12 years and changed to a different industry 3 years ago. Some jobs were better than others, I worked to support my family and as I changed jobs and get older, my income has increased at a moderate rate I am satisfied with. Am I missing something by not having the passion of my mother? I’m missing out on being a negligent mother, because my career always comes first, that’s for sure! J But am I missing out on having that all consuming passion for something I truly love?My entire adolescence revolved around music. Music theory, music performance, music history. My senior year of high school I was in three separate bands and my college degree is in music. But at the end of college, I had to face reality. I was not talented enough to perform and I did not wish to teach. That left me with a piece of paper and a chunk of life I could not build on.
Now, I’m getting ready to turn 40. This would be a great ending to the movie of the week about my life that is constantly replaying in my mind. In a world gone stagnant, she threw off the shackles of cubicledom! She broke out and blazed her own path to help the world and to do something she had always wanted to do…
But what is that? I have no idea. Every time I leave my therapist’s office or my child’s therapist’s office, I am consumed with this desire to become a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and parlay that into a career as a therapist. It seems noble, it seems interesting, it seems like something I might be good at.
I actually spent a period of time in Human Resources and enjoyed that. And if I were able to do that, I could even, possibly stay with the company I’m at now.
Both these ideas require returning to school, which requires money. These would also remind me that in 9 years, I have to start paying for a college education!
I have always loved to write and could pursue that, without giving up my current job of course. I have no illusions that I would become famous or anything, so that strikes me more as a hobby than an actual career path.
And the thing is, I don’t hate my job. In fact, since I’ve actually been doing what they pay me to do in the last 6 months, I find myself rather enjoying it. No, it’s not a life’s passion, but that’s because other things are more important. Like my child, my recovery, my friends. I can be happy in other areas (and I’m not Unhappy in the career area) and I can make a difference without a grand, life long commitment. I can accept that and be proud of what I do, which is helping people, albeit three or four times removed, all over the country. So maybe the Universe has me right where I need to be.
But damn, discovering the cure for something would have been a kick ass ending to the movie!!

Health

Someone I know had her husband die within the last few days. She and I aren’t particularly close. I would say we are acquaintances. I never met her husband. But he was in his mid-50’s and by all accounts in picture perfect health. He just keeled over and died and they aren’t sure why yet. He exercised and ate right and according to one person, was big into the whole holistic movement. (Whatever that means).
A co-worker who is in top physical form had a stroke right around Thanksgiving last year. He returned to work a week ago or so.
These things mess with my head, big time. The idea of Aneurysms terrifies me.
But all this makes me start wondering why I even bother eating what I think is good for me and exercising. These things especially hit me when I find out that no meat, no sugar, no fried foods, no caffeine, no sodas, reduced wheat still results in an elevated LDL level and a Vitamin D deficiency for me. I still believe my 40’s will be great, but being in my 40’s also means I’m not 22 anymore, as my sponsor keeps telling me!
Not being 22 means that my eyes are starting to slowly deteriorate, so that even moving into the light with some things still doesn’t guarantee I’ll be able to read them.
It means that a 7 mile walk may result in shin splints.
It means I can’t sit on the ground with my legs tucked under me after a period of time and expect to jump up and be on my merry way. I will get up rather quickly, but yes, there will be some moaning and groaning and the forward motion will come gradually.
It means that a simple, low impact Yoga class could render me completely unable to stand erect for 3 days.
It means more tests, more often. It means pills and eye drops and glasses that apparently need to be stronger than they were last year, when I first started wearing glasses.
It means that sitting at a computer typing for more than 10 minutes is going to cause a burning ache between my shoulder blades.
It means that 4 ½ hours of sleep isn’t going to make me tired yet functional
It means that losing more weight and further restricting the amount of food I eat and exercising may still result in keeling over at the age of 50 in the street.
It’s hard to reconcile that. And yes, I could live to be 95. I could be in the physical shape of an Olympic athlete and get hit by a car tomorrow. Or I could exercise and eat right and meditate and die in 12 years.
I want to say that I have come to the conclusion that I need to grab a hold of each day and live it as if it were my last because it truly could be. Typing those words helps, even if I don’t quite believe them. It also helps to type that lying face down in the food won’t help, because I don’t know that I believe that either right now.
Today I read Ask “What’s possible” not “What’s wrong”. Keep asking.
Maybe that’ll work…tomorrow. Yes, I’m thankful to be alive, yes I’m thankful for all that I have, including my health and yes, there are some things about my health that require my action and there are things about my health I am powerless over.

Sometimes, worrying actually feels like less work!

Forgetting to Remember

Things get busy. Things get hectic. Things get frustrating. Relationships get ugly or heartbreaking. Money gets tight. Cars break down. Pets get sick. Children get into trouble. People die. Jobs get lost. Health goes downhill. Friends get hurt. So with all these things going on, its so easy to forget. Easy to forget that I am a good person. Easy to forget that I am a kind person. That I care for people to the best of my ability. That I have been blessed with physical health. That I have been blessed with not living in true poverty (poverty being a relative term at times!). That I have skills and talents. That I took a life that was so much less than what it could be and turned it over and accepted the miracles and today find myself in some kind of dream world where it feels there are no limits to what I can do. It's easy to forget that I have heard the words, "You are a good daughter" and "You are the best mother anyone could ever have" and "You are a good friend" and while the sentiment behind these words is certainly a work in progress and I know better than to take a daily poll, those words mean something to me. It's easy to forget that I can be fun, that I love to flirt and have a good time. Easy to forget that there have been people who enjoy being around me. Easy to forget that struggling with an addiction and knowing I didn't fall back in yesterday is huge. And that it takes a lot from a person to wake up fighting that every day. Every day forever. It's easy to forget that there are people who love me. Truly love me for exactly who I am. And that some of the people who might be critical (as I see it) or may have a million and one suggestions for how I could change, if I truly look into their hearts, they still love me the way I am too. That's something I've never been able to remember. It's easy to forget that there are people that aren't going to like me or love me and that I can't waste my energy trying to change their mind. It's easy to forget that I have a place in a Universe that wants me to succeed and be happy and tries its best to back me up on that. It's really easy to forget that things that are hard to take usually happen for a reason and that with distance and a spirit of acceptance, I may get the miracle of a drop of insight into what that reason is. And if I don't get that, then I wasn't meant to have it.
That's a lot to remember when I struggle to remember to send in lunch money some days! But truly, they aren't things I guess or things I remember. They are things I know. Things I know deep down. Things I can use to anchor me in the middle of a storm of life that is whipping me around from one end of the boat to another. The things I can hold onto when its dark and I feel lonely. The light at the end of the tunnel. Last night, at my meeting I read the words "Sunshine of the spirit" and "The Road of Happy Destiny" and all these things are included in that Sunshine and on that Road and every day, I thank the Universe for allowing me a moment of clarity to recognize, to participate, to love myself and always remember what I know.

Insane - Step 2

But the devil when he purports any evil against man, first perverts his mind - Euripides

Utterly senseless. This is the definition for insane in the dictionary. Insanity yields the following results: Extreme folly, foolhardiness. All these seem to point to people not with affected brains who have no control, but just with people who are too lazy to exert any common sense.

Step 2: Came to believe that a Power greater than Ourselves could restore us to sanity.

I LOVE the OA 12 & 12 book's Step 2 because its one of the only Chapters on Step 2 I can find that focuses less on the God aspect and more on the insanity aspect. Many of the others deal with how you can come to believe if you are an Atheist or an Agnostic, how you can believe in a Power or God and turn everything over. I have almost always believed in a Higher Power or that the Universe is guiding me and that this HP/Universe is capable of miracles. But do I believe I'm insane?
It took me long enough to admit that I was Powerless (Step 1) and now I'm supposed to admit I'm insane? I've honestly never thought about that part of Step 2. I have a problem, I am powerless, but insane? Stealing food, stealing money to buy food, eating out of the garbage, lying, hiding food in places all over my house, driving around to fast food restaurants, one right after with an infant in the back of the car who just wants to sleep in her own bed? Resenting my toddler because she wants some of my food...MY food!! Eating off other people's plates after they've finished their meals and weren't looking? Deciding I'm stressed and that I want a granola bar and eating a dozen in 10 minutes? Planning exactly what I would eat on a binge a week in advance? When I was a teenager, I worked in a restaurant and the walk in cooler had these gallon or more vats of whipped cream and of cherry pie filling. They used them to make the cakes they sold. I would offer to help clean up every night so I could sneak in there and eat out of these vats...directly. I wasn't taking a spoon and a bowl, I was sticking my hands into these vats and desperately licking them before anyone else would come in and see. Thank God I didn't have Hepatitis! When I was in my 20's, I worked as a cook at a daycare center. Best job of my life. I was alone, I made lunch for the kids and then I had the entire pantry to myself. Lord only knows how much money I cost that business in food NOT eaten by a small child.
But no, I've never been insane. Insane people have no sense of reality and insane people can't manage their own affairs. I've never been insane. All these things I've listed are just small symptoms of a larger problem, they just point to my powerlessness. But insane? Come on!
If I honestly examine it, I was never insane. I was too sick and diseased and fucked up to even qualify for insane!
And the thing is, I get that I'm going to be an addict for the rest of my life, but am I going to be insane the rest of my life? Its kind of looking that way and accepting that is something that actually keeps me sane. I'm sure someone, somewhere (probably many) have done tests on the minds of addicts, MRIs, CT Scans, etc. and I have a hard time believing our brains looked exactly like those of the rest of the population. When I am talking about work or parenting or relationships or money my sponsor will almost always begin her sentences with "We addicts..." because we aren't like everyone else. My brain processes things so differently. Something I heard when I got in the rooms, that I had never heard before, was "A normal person's car won't start, they go inside and call AAA. An addicts car won't start, they go inside and call the suicide hotline..."
Exactly. The funniest thing about insanity is that old saying, "Insanity is doing the exact same thing, over and over and expecting different results".
I've started thinking about all the years I spent on my marriage, so much effort on something that proved futile. I think about all the books and magazines and Dr. Phil (idiot) and Oprah (don't get me started) and the entire marriage counseling industry. They all applauded me. You don't give up the first time something goes wrong. Marriage is hard work. Here are some more exercises to work on your communication. And I just knew if I tried a different therapist or a different book, that things would get better. I spent 14 years waiting for things to get better.
It was the 12 Step Program where I first heard and came to believe, "You can't change anyone..." and it was also where I first heard the words "Accept the thing I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference..." and where I heard that definition of insanity. I may have been going about it from different angles, but I was trying to do the exact same thing over and over. Change him. Now no one would fault me for what I was trying to change him into. A moderately decent human being who did NOT treat his wife like shit. I think that's an admirable goal. But I can't change anyone and I honestly have no right to try. And if it weren't for the Universe and God leading me to the 12 step program, I probably would still be in that marriage. My sponsor told me when I first came into program and she and I would talk, she never thought I would leave my marriage. But the insanity proved too much for me. And if I can just remember that I BELIEVE a power greater than myself can restore me to...well to as much sanity as I'm ever going to be capable of, then I know I can move forward not using because the car doesn't start or because my daughter has a bad report card or because work sucks or because something went wrong today like it will every single day for the rest of my life. From a broken fingernail to someone I love dying, I will never have a perfect day and Step 2 shows me that I can get through those...in a saneish manner...