The Extraordinary Ordinary

Hurts so good

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 21:14:00 +0000

This really is a whole new life and it feels both wrong and right to write that.

It started with the quitting of the drinking and it just snowballs and snowballs and sometimes I feel like I'm just rolling downhill with it, completely out of control.

I'm gone five nights a week to learn how to get a handle on this sobriety thing and that's good and that's hard. It feels both wrong and right. It feels busy and overwhelming and yet I know it's right.

I'm reading little booklets given to me by my chemical dependency counselor with titles like, Intimacy and Understanding Emotions. Identity. Trust. Insecurity. When I'm reading, it all seems so obvious, but I've never really let the knowledge of how to live these things get from my head to my heart. It's overwhelming too, and you guessed it, it feels both wrong and right.

In her book Drinking: A Love Story, Caroline Knapp writes,

"When you quit drinking you stop waiting. You begin to let go of the wish, age-old and profound and essentially human, that someone will swoop down and do all that hard work, growing up, for you. You start living your own life."

That's exactly what's happening here. It's so impossible to describe and so I feel this rift with my friends and family. I feel somehow alien. Like I'm me, but not me, and I don't know exactly how to be. I make the same jokes and I listen to them and something is just so different. I'm different. Everything is different because everything looks different to me, and so I'm thinking and feeling differently. It feels so wrong and so right at the same time.

Not long after I quit drinking, maybe a week, I sat with one of my best friends at a coffee shop. She asked what this was like, how I was doing, and I just looked out the window. I said I just can't explain it, that everything is so different somehow and even though there's this new peace, it's just so much. I said that I feel like a new person and that scares me because starting over is hard.

She started to cry with me and she reached for my hand and said, we're going to be okay. And that was it, exactly what I needed to hear. I was scared that we wouldn't be...at all. That I had somehow irrevocably changed the we of our friendship by turning my half upside down and inside out in a way that maybe wouldn't fit the us of so many years.

I don't think I could walk around in life without knowing she's out there thinking of me and calling me friend. It's always been there, this comfort in a kindred replica of me, alive in her person, totally understanding who I am. A soul reflection, a heart monitor.

We're going to be okay.

My closest friends, the ones that will be with me and look at me and say we're going to be okay, are back in the place we just moved away from. They are still in my life through the phone, a call or text, an email or a short visit, but they feel really far away right now.

So I am grieving. I miss my friends and I miss a way of life that's gone. I am not alone but much of the time I feel alone here with sobriety. Shoving and pushing and pulling, moving all the things I thought I knew from my head to my heart.

All of it is working together, and as Caroline Knapp said, I'm starting to live my own life. I know this is really good, but this is really hard.

And it feels right.

~~~~~~

To my online friends who are on this sobriety road with me, please don't get all worried about the "alone in sobriety" thing. I'm working on that too. I'm going where I need to go to develop friendships with people in recovery. It just takes time, especially in a smallish town. So guess what? It makes me extra grateful for YOU.

I wore makeup - A picture story

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 15:51:00 +0000

I wore makeup yesterday. (And yes, the same sweater I wear all the time. I wore that too.)

(I asked google if makeup should be makeup or make-up or make up and google said, all of the above.) (All of the above makes me feel itchy. Any of them will be fine? Huh, I don't know. I like one right answer...I'm working on that.)

Ryan and I brought our beautiful boys-with streaks of makeup on their faces-to my Mom, and then we kissed them on their soft cheeks, goodbye we said, and then we drove to Minneapolis to see Ryan's brother perform at the Walker Art Center. You see, Ryan's exceptionally talented musician brother, Dave was being honored at a two day event...

The concert was a wordless kind of amazing.
(I would have taken pictures, but I was all worried that it was against the rules and that's another thing that makes me itchy, breaking the rules.)

I did take a picture in the lobby, of an artistic shell with Ryan and his Mom reflected in the background.

Dave is a part of about eleventy-seven bands. His gift reaches across genres and shakes drumming hands with excellence in whatever he touches. He's a creative soul of the genius variety, and I'm not just saying that because he's my husband's brother. (Although that helps.)

Other people say this stuff too: "One evening is not sufficient to showcase the varied talents, consummate showmanship, and genre-defying innovations of Dave King, one of the most prolific jazz/rock percussionists of his generation." - Walker Art Center

We sat and listened and ate candy and elbowed each other and looked at each other with awe over the songs. Then we sometimes laughed at Dave's jokes and switched positions in our seats to stay comfortable. You have to be comfortable when you hear one of Dave's bands play because you surely don't want to focus on anything but the transcending sounds.

The show finished and we were proud of Dave and filled up with tired and goodness. Then we drove through thick fog and belted out the lyrics to Sister Christian on the 80's station. It was very late and when we drove in the driveway I said, I love the bed five times fast. So Ryan laughed and then we slept.

This morning I woke up and thought, that was so good and then I thought, I love home and the people in it.

And then today I did not wear makeup. Or make-up. Or make up.

The End.

Before

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 14:31:00 +0000

I found the post below sitting quietly in my drafts. I had completely forgotten it. I wrote it before we moved and before I quit drinking. I came across it today and realized that I must have known then. I knew I was going to quit drinking. It was coming. I had no idea, really and I didn't believe that I could. But I knew.

Written on December 20th, 2010 - exactly one month before:

Maybe she's not even a version of me. It's more like there's a piling up of these things that I've practiced being until they've covered up the real me.

I still have a lot of rubble to rifle through, and yet, I'm finally hopeful. Maybe it's the new chapter in our lives opening up, a move to a new place, a fresh start. The things I still struggle with, like we all do, seem smaller. I'm threatening to eradicate those things I'm tired of living.

Anger is there in the pile, this irritable, frustrated and negative absolute boulder of a thing sitting on the real me.

A habit boulder.

A person can think a certain way until that thinking is real and true, even if it didn't start out that way. We can tell ourselves lies until we believe them with nearly our whole hearts. That's what I did, anyway. I thought and thought defeating thoughts until I didn't even know I was thinking them, and then they took root in my head and heart and that's a very dangerous thing to do. A person can waste their entire life trapped like that, thinking they aren't good enough or their marriage isn't good enough or their mothering isn't good enough...and then doing things to stay in the rubble of thoughts.

I can still remember sitting at our first tiny little table years ago, pregnant with Miles and mad at our house for being too small. Mad that we bought it without thinking. Mad that there was dust everywhere, piling up like this other version of me while an addition was added for more space. Disgusted and self-centered and so easily done with it all.

It was then, I think. Then that I actually decided to stop trying to be positive, claiming exhaustion and I just can't handle this. No, I was not suffering, and yet there I sat like a spoiled child, wishing we had done things differently, giving up on who knows what. Somewhere in me, I allowed those defeating and irrational thoughts to trump the positive ones. I had no idea the stress we were about to endure with Asher's colic and hydrocephalus and I set myself up, ruminating around the negative thoughts. I set myself up to cope rather than conquer.

Even if I have been through some awful and ugly things in my life, even those things are not excuses for what I'm doing. Because the truth is that we can even be freed from the most traumatic of things, but only if we seek hope and stop thinking about ourselves all the time.

Now, my boys are here and they pull joy from my rubble and show me how to see life. So I try. I claw and I pray and I reach out when I start to stumble toward a funk. I simply try.

Because of them, that version of me that is covering me, is being shed from my life. They are the catalyst, the reason for me to say, I'm leaving her.

~~~~~~~~~~
It kind of blows my mind that I was writing this and not thinking about drinking but kind of letting myself think about drinking but still not allowing myself to have this thought...

I wasn't just drinking to cope with anger and sadness...
anger and sadness were amplified because I was drinking.

Denial and rationalization are broken power tools.

This post is a part of Flashback Fridays over at Mylestones. Thank you, Jo.

Quiet

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:28:00 +0000

This is how Asher counts
while playing hide-n-seek.
He counts to five, very slowly
with his ears covered
and his eyes scrunched shut
and then he
ROARS.
After that, he's off to seek the hider,
as if his little routine was entirely necessary.

(The above photo
-with the nice view of brownies in and around his mouth-
was taken at The Point Of ROAR. You're welcome.)

His roar is not quiet at all,
but it's all he hears with his covered ears,
so to him?
Quiet.

Sometimes that's what we all need to do, huh?
Block out the world and let out a roar.
And then we're off to seek and find...

Go ahead,
ROAR
and then
Shhhhh....

Your insides will thank you.

P.S. I'm getting back into a more regular writing routine over at the Mama Manifesto. I have a post over there today about kids and how early in life they learn to hide their feelings. (I know, ACK!) Go on and check it out if you'd like. I promise it ends with hope. (Grandma, click on the bold words 'check it out' and you'll end up there. Love you!)

This post is a part of You Capture at I Should Be Folding Laundry.

Heat rises

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 21:55:00 +0000

I pass him on my way in and he's intent on his anger. He brushes by me repeating, I hate this I hate this I hate this. We share a moment of his pain on the sidewalk and I'm rattled by the heat of rage rising up the skin of his neck.

I come in to the warmth of the smell of coffee and sugar. I sit down and breathe and I think Oh humanity.

~~~

It's a blind date, I think. His leg pumps up and down with his nerves while he lifts his mug. He says something she seems to be confused by and so she says something about his priorities. It's a joke, but he swallows the lump in his throat while the heat rises to his face and his leg bounces faster with his fake laugh.

There's an awkward silence and then she asks how big his family is. They small talk.

Oh humanity.

A man tries to hand off his newspaper to someone walking by, he says I'm done, it's yours. She asks which paper it is and hands it back quickly when he answers. She says, I already read that one and walks away without a no thank you. He looks defeated, his kind gesture slighted, the heat in his cheeks.

Oh humanity.

He's trying to speak over the shrill sound of the steamer and right when the sound stops he says the word sobriety. His wife shushes him and looks around, checking for ears with the heat in her cheeks. I dart my eyes and inside I say, that's part of the problem.

Oh humanity.

A song plays,
And all we are, we are.
And every day is the start of something beautiful.
And in the end nothing stays the same.

She has folders and papers clipped together in piles and a large iced coffee. She looks worn, tired to the bone with her eyes on the words on her laptop, never looking up. She's think think thinking, unaware. Her phone rings and she makes it quick, eyes to the screen. She's driven with a passion for something, like emotion's heat to the cheeks.

Oh humanity.

~~~~~

I start to think about something from earlier in the day, about her, and I drink my tea. I think about the way she caught up with me in the parking lot. How she thanked me for some careful and unsure words I had spoken moments before, and then I thanked her for thanking me. I gave the credit to the teachers in my life for the words I shared because I can't claim them as mine. I shuffled, eyes darting, swallowing the lump in my throat, feeling the heat rising in my cheeks. She shoved something toward me and said here's an envelope. I looked down to see her name and number and felt the grace in the moment. She said she's been sober for 25 years and I answered with January 20th. We both stood there in the unity of it, and it was good.

Oh humanity.

His leg is still bouncing, but less and she's sitting on her hands. They smile a shy smile of new and she's looking right at him with a beam of light in her eyes. The heat rises to their cheeks and they glow.

A man and his grown son sit down at the table where the shushing woman and her husband once were. Dad says do you want some of this and they share a dessert. His son listens and listens while his Dad talks and talks about his health, his blood sugar, while eating dessert. The son tries gently to persuade his father to watch what he eats. I know, his Dad says while the heat rises to his cheeks and they laugh like they understand each other. A loud chuckle-soft chuckle-loud chuckle-sigh, the laugh that men share.

Two women sit together at a tall table, looking like they might tip over with intensity. They are telling their stories, the things that mean the most, and listening like women do. They are comfortable and understood and their cheeks stay the soft red warm of acceptance.

Oh humanity.
The heat rises and it reveals
and we are caught.
We're all the same.
Blushing with our pain and joy
and sharing it,
our hearts rising up and showing themselves
if not on our sleeves,
then in our faces.

Clue: It's the one about something heavy in my belly

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 13:46:00 +0000

It's time for The Saturday Evening Blog Post with Elizabeth Esther. This is an opportunity (the first Saturday of each month) for the Internets to share their best, favorite and/or most well-received post from the previous month. Head on over there to check out what post I chose (I know, pins and needles), and to read some of the best posts you can find around the web.

(The post I chose this month was also featured on Five Star Friday (Edition #93) yesterday. Nothing but an honor. Thank you, Schmutzie.)

Apparently the link I shared over on The Saturday Evening Blog Post was not the right one. (I blame my ADD.) I added another one, it's #40 over there. Sorry for the confusion!

COMMENTS ARE CLOSED ON THIS POST

The insecure blogger and her train of thought

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 19:28:00 +0000

The posts that write themselves, in a flourish of creativity where fingers pound the keyboard like they have a mind of their own, are the best. I'm often confident about them in a way that escapes me most of the time.

On the other hand, if I'm driving or taking a shower or making lunch for my boys and an idea strikes me, it rattles around in my mind and heart for too long. So when I sit down to reign it in, I'm lost, often pulling thoughts from a hundred light bulb moments that don't add up. I'm editing and editing and second-guessing and insecure. I work and work here and there, and still feel I come up short.

There needs to be a freedom in this, a gut level honesty of the moment, a kind of escape. That's when the words reach out to other hearts and shake hands in agreement.

It's rarely a reality, that a person (sorry guys, but especially a mother) has the time for the kind of writing that they dream of, the kind that demands hours. If I finish one more thing, answer to three more demands and succumb to the volume of my home, all while trying not to let the aha thoughts slip away, something is lost.

Is it strange that this makes me sad?

I long for blocks of time to visit spaces, books and posts that bring me inspiration and then allow my reactions and feelings and thoughts to flow across the keyboard. But that time is not now and sometimes I grieve that. I then resent what is holding me back and then of course I feel guilty for the resentment. I think of Charrette's tag line, my children are not obstacles in my path, they ARE my path. And so often they ARE the inspiration for my heart's words, while they unintentionally create a dam to them.

The second part of that tag line is - Oh, but then there are all those other delightful paths.

This is why so many mothers often waffle between near constant attention to writing and reading (we bloggers, anyway) and then guilty angst that leaves us thinking of quitting completely, at least until...someday.

Then we feel like a hateful martyr and we kick ourselves for wanting anything other than this gift of time with our children. We also know time away is healthy, but it's also terribly unreachable almost always. We steal ten minutes here, thirty seconds there and sometimes even two full hours in a coffee shop. But it doesn't feel like enough, and so begin the thoughts - the fantasizing of time off, whether we work at home or not, and we once again come up against walls, no options for the kind of help we need, no money for the kind of help we need. So our time, like a line of books with no bookends leans and falls flat. Again.

That's me anyway. The irony is that I'm secretly relieved when I realize it won't work out. There will be no large blocks of time that beg me to give my all, to set down my insecurities and truly write. No pressure. I love no pressure. So I throw out what I can here and there, into the universe, and watch it float for a while, sometimes gobbled and praised and sometimes misunderstood and simply gazed. Either way, what I have to give always disappears into the archives with a shhhhh. That's how it seems to me, in my ruminating mind, my always questioning and comparing, hesitant to confidence, mind.

I did a little Twitter poll on the subject of blogging zen. Do you have it, I asked. Do you hit publish and feel nothing but good about what you wrote? Even before that first comment comes in that assures you that you were understood?

Almost everyone said no. And if they said yes, they followed that with rarely.

We humans are such an insecure bunch, aren't we? At our core, we're always wondering...Does my voice count? Here is my heart in words, now don't stomp on it, please. And since many a blogger wants to write beyond blogging, that can be hard. People pleasing rears it's ugly head nearly every time.

--------

The last part of Charrette's tag line says - Fortunately - eventually - all roads lead to Home.

I find comfort in that. I'll certainly have more time in my future, and I hope that time is met with more confidence in both my mothering and my writing.

Perhaps the writing time I long for now is elusive and slippery because I'm not ready for it.

I can't imagine a better place for stretching and warming up than here in my home with these boys, and here in this space, with you.

----------

Just so you know, I just did exactly what my very own tag line says - I wrote to find out what I'm thinking. I answered the following questions of myself- Why the blogging angst? Why am I not confident in my writing? And I found out I'm practicing, and somehow, that makes me care less about people pleasing in this space and in my life. Seems so obvious, but sometimes a girl's gotta blog to find out what she already knows.

When she knocks

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 15:08:00 +0000

A person in love with wine like me asked how I'm doing this,
this not drinking,
HOW?

How did you break up with her?

How do you hit 3 o'clock in your day and not have 5 o'clock to look forward to?
HOW?

The truth is, most of the time
I have no idea.
Yes, I talk about a new calm
peace
surrender
being present,

and that's all true.

But that peace and calm comes without getting to take the edge off
and that is hard work, yes.
My life, like anyone's life
is filled with angst and questions
and hurt and
yesterday was filled with
poop and barf
and whining
and disappointments
and sadness
and snotty noses
and we need groceries
and there's always someone climbing on me.

But I don't know. I guess sobriety teaches you that you have no other choice. I guess it's like anything else you have to do. You just do it.

You simply don't go to the liquor store. When thoughts, when wine knocks on the door, you ignore her while you plug your ears and say la la la...

~~~~~~~

I guess this much self-discovery and feeling while getting help forces you to take a look at your attitude, the very thing that makes or breaks you. That's easier for me to do when I'm not drinking. My mind and body are not so overcome with the obsession to make it to 5 o'clock, thoughts of whether or not there's enough in the house, or when I can get more. And my mind is less occupied by headaches and the guilt of not being able to hold back. There's room in there now to see other things, to make a decision to calm down and see beauty, more often.

And when I can't calm down and I'm obsessing about wine, all I can do is think,

Just for today
for this painful moment
I will make it without wine
because there's community and fellowship in recovery
so I have to make a call,
and there is comfort in a begging kind of prayer
and so I have to beg,
while I grieve my old back-stabbing friend wine.

I will allow myself to know that I want to sip wine while making dinner
so so so badly
but I can't
so I won't,
I'll just breathe
and sometimes pace
and get mad at it all
and find a quiet place or ask to leave
and I grieve
and surrender
because there's no other choice.

I'm new at this and I'm learning and I think knowing that I will learn things I never would have, I will overcome things I never could have, if I would have continued drinking...well, that's what brings the peace and fight in me to the surface. I would rather live free of the demons, my ways of thinking and not feeling that left me scared and lonely. They can't stay now, and that's what makes me want to dance. I'll deal with them one at a time and it will be painful and better than letting them sit on my shoulders, hissing.

Right now I can't be everything to everyone like I've always been,
until I'm spread so thin that I'm no one to anybody,
especially me.
Because we're all only one
and we need many
to be able to be anything to anybody at all. (say that three times fast.)

So I guess that's how I'm doing it. I'm struggling and finally asking for the help of many,
and I'm finding it's not such a bad idea.

In a safe place

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 01:00:00 +0000

"We do not remember days, we remember moments." -Cesare Pavese

I had some time alone at home and was spending it catching up. I hurried through Miles' room with an empty laundry basket bumping my leg as I walked. I bent to throw the dirty clothes from the floor to the basket and was hit with his smell like a bump to the head. It stunned me with its goodness and I was surprised to miss him even though he'd just left. I was there with his smell, one that's all boy and just this boy, my boy, all heavy with earth and fresh air and his hair. Oh, that hair that grows to a thick and careless mop and then transforms to a short faux hawk per his request because it looks cool, he says.

Either way is fine with me, I think, as long as it keeps its smell.

And then I'm hit with the next waft of him, something dirty and messy but mixing itself up to not stink. Like life.

Later, on his small bed, I hold the boy with his smells across my lap like a baby. With my back to the wall and not a sip of wine in me, I rock him back and forth and make up a story about a superhero boy just like him. No jumbled words and fuzzy mind make it messy, it's just Mama and Miles on the bed at night. His big blue eyes with brows like his Daddy look up at me with the intensity of listening for the part about a resuce, and with a lump in my throat I think, I want him to remember this moment.

Me, being a safe place.

~~~~~~~

Because of sobriety, more than ever before, life is about these moments and not days or weeks or months and especially not years. There is no other choice but moment by moment or the heaviness is crazy-making. Some of these moments are terribly hard, full of craving and regret, and they are merely survived and slowly felt, but no longer skipped or numbed. This way, they can be healed.

So now I'm standing around with laundry baskets and thinking, what would we do without these brilliant moments of respite, of stillness piled high with good things like birds or scents or humor? What would we do?

In the middle of this thing called recovery, while I'm facing thoughts that bring feelings that bring pain, these moments kick up joy and they are like a superhero story complete with rescuing. These moments are the reason I will look back on this part of my life and see that somehow, I was safe.

7 Quick-ish Takes

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 13:17:00 +0000

1. True confession: I haven't been watching the Olympics OR American Idol and I rarely have time to read blogs and rarely comment these days. I know, what kind of American am I? (The blogging part doesn't have anything to do with being American, I just threw that in because I've been wanting to explain my absence to my blog friends because that's what bloggers do. We feel guilty if we once read and commented like mad and then don't for a while and we have to explain it because we fear that people might start writing us off or something that's mostly irrational.) (Ahem.) (I'm getting over it.) (Promise.) Let's just say there's been much going on in my life and my head and heart. (Oh look, I'm explaining.) (I can't stop.) (It's just that I have such faithful readers and I appreciate you all so much and I don't like it when I can't visit you as much.) I know this is understandable considering my other recent true confession and how it takes time to work hard on recovery, but I still struggle with...I don't even know what...people pleasing, I suppose. (Which is part of my problem.) (I'm working on it.)

WOW. Aren't my 7 Quick-ish Takes FUN?

2. I don't know how much longer I can take winter. (Oh no. There goes the fun again.) I'm usually somewhat of a trooper with this whole cold thing, but this year it's been WORSE. Bitingly, achingly, viciously WORSE. I saw a family of robins yesterday and I asked them what in the world they're doing back. Poor little guys were all shivery, trying to eat frozen berries off the tree outside my kitchen window. peck peck peck...no reward. Heart-breaking, really. I'm so glad spring is coming. Soon. RIGHT? RIGHT???

3. Speaking of Minnesota winter. Quite a few days ago, I posted a picture of a snow blower on our roof. I didn't do a very good job of answering questions about WHY or HOW we were snow-blowing our roof. Well, it's a flat roof and it's going to be replaced soonly. It had a lot of snow on it, so my Dad brought up the need to get the snow off at the local lumber yard and one of his friends (my Dad is a contractor) offered to bring a snow blower and a fork lift over. Yes. He drove the fork lift to our house in the freezing cold with a snow blower on it and lifted it up to the roof. Then my Dad and Ryan blew the snow off the roof. Without falling off even once.

(Oh look! We're having more fun now!)

4. While surviving winter, I have much to look forward to, including a few blogging events! (There's an exclamation point there because I'm excited!!!) The first of which is taking place in May in Utah, the Casual Blogger Conference. I'm honored to be speaking on a couple of panels on topics that I'm keeping top secret so that you'll come and listen to me out of sheer curiosity. Or maybe I'll just tell you what the topics are closer to May. If you're nice. You can click the button in my sidebar that says "I'm Speaking!" to learn more about the conference. I've been seriously impressed with the plans for this gig, I just know it's going to be good. So take a moment or twelve to consider joining us, mkay?

5. THEN I'm going to BlogHer '10 in New York City in August and I really can't even believe it. Yet. I will when I'm there. Maybe. There are many reasons I'm over the moon about planning to go, but more than anything, I'm looking forward to seeing so many lovely people I haven't had the chance to meet yet and so many others I've had the honor to meet and can't wait to see again. And yes, I communicate in run-on sentences in person too. Also, there's something exciting in the works regarding BlogHer too, but I'll tell you about that later as well. (I know. I'm just killing you with my mysteriousness.)

6. I had an appointment yesterday (It's like I'm addicted to appointments lately) and my Mom took the boys to get their haircut. My heart nearly exploded when they got home. Isn't it crazy, how BIG kids look after a fresh haircut? I mean, they grew four inches while they were gone, I'm sure of it. And so their whole childhood just flashed before my eyes...how fast it's going to go and then I felt that pressure. Like, oh dear Lord I have so little time to teach them. But instead of panicking or getting sad, my heart lifted a little and I thought that is the best kind of pressure ever. It's an honor.

7. Lastly, I'll share some links you really don't want to miss. Lately, during my scattered online time, I've been catching the BEST links to amazing blog posts via Twitter. (That made no sense to my Grandma or my Dad or a number of other people, but just trust me, these are good reads. It doesn't really actually even matter how I found them.) -

This post at Enjoying the Small Things had me weeping. Kelle writes with such raw honesty and grace, it's simply powerful. Click on that link and feel the story of the day her Nella was born, about the moments that she realized her baby girl has Down Syndrome and how that shook her world and changed everything in the hardest and best possible way. (hat tip to my friend, Allison-who I'm crazy about-for leading me to this post.)

we won't come back here by Lindsey at A Design So Vast. This post did something to me I can't explain. It was the way Lindsey's words mixed with the words from the video she shares. It's about a mother's love, really. And the way we want to keep our kids right here, just as they are, and also expectantly wait to watch them unfold at the very same time. Then today, Lindsey writes about judgment and links to some other excellent posts on the subject. Again, you don't want to miss it. (or um...them.)

Sweating The Small Stuff at Her Bad Mother. You know it's going to be good.

Tell me, have I missed any other must-reads? Have you written something you'd like to share? Or have you read a post that rocked your socks? Do share if something comes to mind.

This post is a part of 7 Quick Takes at Conversion Diary. Thank you, Jennifer.

(And yes, I do realize there was nothing quick about my takes.)

The Wait Staff

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 19:54:00 +0000

We must be willing to let go of the life we have planned,
so as to have the life that is waiting for us.
E. M. Forster

~~~~~~~~~~

Watcha guys doin'?

Just waitin' for Daddy...

It sure can be hard to wait.

So you might as well come up with something to do.

And have a little fun while you're at it.

Brothers are good for that.

Whatever we are waiting for - peace of mind, contentment, grace, the inner awareness of simple abundance - it will surely come to us, but only when we are ready to receive it with an open and grateful heart.
Sarah Ban Breathnach

The stone

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 11:31:00 +0000

I was thinking about everything, the fact that I found myself in the vice grip of alcoholism, and the fact that quitting is good and hard at the same time. I was thinking about remorse and regret and redemption.

It is all so big.

And then I just set it down. All the thinking, like a stone I'd been lugging around.

kerplunk.

There is no figuring it all out in one day, I said to me.

So I played myself a song and I sat with it. Just sat with it.

The next thing I knew my arms were above my head and I was dancing a bad 80's dance right here all by myself, stomping and even spinning. I shook it and I sang louder and louder and I didn't care about anything.

It wasn't until the song was done that I thought even one insecure thought like, This must look ridiculous, what if the neighbors see me through the window? I just didn't. I was feeling too light for that. Like when you slip or trip on the sidewalk and all you can think about is catching yourself. And it isn't until the moment passes and you've found your balance that you have the wits to look behind you, sheepishly checking to see if anyone was there.

The dancing was like that, my body too busy to pay time or fear any kind of attention.

Here I am, this girl. One who believes with all of her soul but sometimes not her mind and heart that God is really actually totally and completely who He says He is. That He is all things love and that He's here despite the mess and because of it.

Here I am this girl, but I've never in my life felt freedom void of insecurity like that. Sure, I've danced a thousand times, at school dances and bars and weddings and in the kitchen with my boys. But this just felt different, more joyful, and maybe even holy.

~~~~~~~

It's as if there's always been a stone in my belly, churning me up and pulling me down. A thing that had me standing in church and everywhere else my entire life, looking out of the corner of my eyes with my arms crossed, afraid to trust the love that gently walked circles around my heart. That was me, always standing there, scared that I was somehow more irrevocably flawed than the next person. You know, so unique with all my faults and fears and mistakes that I would worry, at least at some very deep level, that I was the only person on the planet undeserving of unconditional love. And then the stone would grow in the pit of my stomach.

I was scared of freedom, comfortable in my uncomfortable skin. Addicted to the familiar trappings of my ruminating mind.

I quit drinking and then I saw it was all still there, that fear of never being good enough, that stone. But I can dance with it now because I finally know this stone is not stuck in my belly for good, and even if parts of it will always be here, I'm finally realizing that even that is okay.

Just own it and let it teach me something, you know?

~~~~~~~

That first night without wine, I did something that finally triggered a true commitment to really working at something, for the first time in my life, honestly.

When I kissed my sleeping boys, I whispered I promise you while tears dropped to their pillows. I've done that same thing again, every night since the first, smelling their hair while whispering those same words. I promise you. I am saying it even though that stone in my belly throws itself around when I do, and I start to doubt that I can really do it.

I'm saying it anyway.

For me, faith in God or myself or anything else takes a kind of getting lost, while I still don't understand it. Like those unsure and sacred whispered promises in the dark, sometimes my head and heart aren't certain and yet I say it, I believe. It starts something miraculous when I do that, like the joy in terrible and holy dancing.

A month ago, I was tripping around and fumbling for balance, my arms out, my knees bent. Then I slowly and sheepishly turned around and there He was, standing on the sidewalk like the old friend that He is. And that belly stone, it sat still and quiet, afraid of that kind of love.

In that moment, my head and my heart ran to do some catching up with my soul, tripping and sliding and fumbling and caught.

"So Heaven meets Earth like a sloppy wet kiss
and my heart turns violently inside of my chest.
I don't have time to maintain these regrets
when I think about how He loves us..."

"If grace is an ocean, we're all sinking."

-John Mark McMillian

How Rachael Ray's tongue changed my thinking

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 16:05:00 +0000

You can end up liking pretty much anyone,
if you set aside your self-righteousness for a bit.

I said that (or rather, I typed it) on Twitter the other day. Usually I tweet riveting stuff like I want tacos, so it felt a little strange to randomly say such a thing. I wasn't trying to be profound or intense or philosophical or anything. Or maybe I was, but I didn't think it would be taken that way. And then it was. It was re-tweeted over and over and I was a bit stunned.

Little did anyone who read that tweet know that I said it because of Rachael Ray.

It's not that I dislike her, I obviously don't know her personally, but I was disliking watching her that day. I was home alone, eating lunch, and I turned the TV on and there she was, constantly sticking her tongue out of the side of her mouth while interviewing someone I wanted to learn more about. I almost started counting the number of times that little tongue flicked out. It was distracting, at least to an overly observant person like me, so I put on my judgy hat and fumed, stop sticking your tongue out, while eating my salad followed by a dilly bar.

Then a thought struck me, one that I needed. Her seemingly constant licking of her lips was annoying me, yes, but I wondered how annoying it is to watch ME pick at my lip. Yes, I pick at the skin on my lip. So much so, that I do it without thinking, like nail biting or lip chewing. I'd probably even do it on TV (if I happened to have my own show because of being an excellent cook or something that I'm not).

So I shook my head at me and continued to watch the interview.

Thinking about myself and what I do that's annoying instantly made me like Rachael Ray more. An immediate acceptance of her lip-licking ways hit me and I had to think about all the bigger things I naturally judge before looking at me. How I do the exact same thing that's bothering me in one way or another. About how damaging that is and how it sucks the life out of relationships.

I shut off the TV and started vacuuming and thinking of things that have bothered me or even hurt me, things I have blamed or judged people for, big or small. I realized that pretty much everything dulls in comparison with what I do in the same or a slightly different way. Self-righteousness is such an ugly thing. I've known that, but it's good to know it more.

I love that a shift in thinking, a change of heart, can occur in and because of the most simple and mundane things. Like daytime television and vacuuming. Even those things. We just have to be open to them. The strange and beautiful lessons are there, every day.

So there you have it. My "profound" tweet had people saying AMEN! and WHOA! and it was triggered by Rachael Ray's tongue.

You just never know.

Kisses and an interview (not at the same time)

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 04:03:00 +0000

Yeah, um...just ignore the peeking and the food...

And the peeking and the food.

These boys, they have my heart.

And Miles has Olivia's.
Check it...

Olivia spent her time in Sunday school making this
puffy heart creation for my boy.
I adore her.

You remember Olivia, right? The daughter of one of my best friends?

Seriously.

Also, I've been interviewed. You can click on the picture below to check that out.
My answers are riveting, so you probably shouldn't miss it.

Thank you, Joanne!

Peace.

This post is a part of You Capture at I Should Be Folding Laundry

Happy Birthday

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 18:08:00 +0000

There is something that happens
when people come together
for the same reason,
to speak over something until they are
walking over it instead of under it.

Nothing gives me
that skin raising feeling
like taking back the power,
together.

So go with me, to Violence Unsilenced
and celebrate one year
of truths told
and voices
unleashed.

Of redemption and bravery
and the telling and the hearing,
all in one safe place.
where people have taken their day
to stand over it,
Unsilenced.

------

Really, you aren't going to want to miss this VU anniversary video. I mean, Maggie does the best little head-bobbing dance at the beginning. You don't want to miss that, now do you?

COMMENTS ARE CLOSED ON THIS POST.

Stories

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 16:23:00 +0000

At a time when my life is
less about me
but more about me
blogging can be confusing.

The ego
bad selfish

The healing
good selfish

The blogging
both
if I'm not careful.

For now I think I'm doing alright.
I'm not sitting here thinking that people who read my blog are dying to know what I'm doing
how I am
their world revolving around my every word.

I'm not.

I just love to write
and my journey into recovery is the
inevitable story I have to tell
now.

But not the only story.

Sometimes my stories are just about
fur and feet...

I've been looking closely at these little feet,

They are Asher's feet
and they are long with many lines
just like mine.

And then down here,
that's Tia in the sun.
She drives me crazy
but I still love her
and she photographs well,

And as I look over that picture I remember
how Tia is largely the reason I quit drinking that night
but that's yet another story about addiction and sobriety
for another day.
I guess I'm just really glad she's here
because of that story
with all her shedding hair and begging.

See? Usually all of my stories
come back to recovery.

But not all of them,

Sometimes they're just about a snow blower on a roof.
Because that's just funny
and living in Minnesota is sometimes
really weird.

Another story is the one about
how Ryan and I got to go away for the day on
Valentine's Day
thanks to my parents
and we went out for Mexican
and there was so much alcohol around
but it didn't bother me in the way
I tried to predict.

Predicting is silly.

And look at how I did it again...
back to sobriety I go
with a husband that tells me
he's proud and I'm OK and we'll get through this
and then takes me to The Blind Side
even if I'm the only one who really wants to see it
and then listens to me talk about taking people in
all the way home.

He's so good.

The End.

I want to stop erasing

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 23:19:00 +0000

Ellie said something recently about addiction and motherhood that I'd like to share because it helped me so much:

"I look at it this way, now: I didn't know how to love that fiercely. It made me so afraid ... afraid I would screw it up, afraid something would happen to them, afraid I could never measure up enough for these two beautiful souls. And for so long, what did I do when I was afraid? I drank. So I was hiding from the fear. I heard, over and over, when I was first getting sober: How could you do that? Don't you love your kids enough to NOT do that? The answer was that I loved them so much I didn't know what to do.

I thought, perversely, I was doing them a favor by erasing myself from the picture a little at a time.

Only in sobriety can I accept myself and all my flaws, and know that the only perfect Mom for them is me. Some days I remember that easily, some days not so much." But at least I know it, now.
~Ellie - One Crafty Mother

~~~~~~~

That same day, I tried reading Ellie's comment to a friend over the phone, as we talked about our own sobriety. I couldn't stop the crying. That's what happens when something you're trying to say is the truth.

When you are doing something so damaging to yourself and your family, when you are trying to erase yourself from the picture, you are so alone and so scared. I was, anyway.

Recently, someone in recovery said I don't know how this is my life. I don't know why I'm at this meeting. I don't know what I'm doing here. I'm just so confused.

Yeah, I get that. But I guess confused is better than numb...or erased.

For me, the beauty of sobriety lies in the fact that I'm seeing through the fog and toward myself now. I'm not numbing the confusion anymore, and although that can be terribly overwhelming and there is so much work to be done, I'm not wandering aimlessly. I'm no longer blinded and hurting in the way that I was because of drinking, so focused on the drink and missing what mattered.

When you quit, the fog doesn't lift up and away easily, but it does settle. So the murky things are still there, around your feet, all the isms of alcoholism. But they are settled. In the quitting it is done. That is not to say there is no work, that would just be a ridiculous thing to say. But the fog, it is below, waiting to be trampled by your very own feet because of the clearing, the ability to see where you're headed.

This settling of my spirit is almost too much for me. Foreign. It's as if the letting go of alcohol flipped a mercy switch, chains and chains and layers and layers poof! gone, just in the quitting itself. Truth! Freedom! Even if I have no idea what I'm doing. Even if right now, I feel like a dry drunk so much of the time.

I can surrender now. I could never truly surrender before.

I have uncomfortable realizations around every corner, every hour. These are the thoughts I used to push away, erasing them frantically glass by glass...

I don't know who I am. Really. I've been 16 different people, depending on who I'm around. Are they all me? Which one is most of me? I don't know....I even do it in the blog world, I'm a part of so many circles. I like to think this is because I truly love all kinds of people and I know that's true, but it's also because I'm a chameleon. Who am I?A people-pleaser at the core so I don't even know what my favorite color is. It's probably my best friend's favorite color. I want to find my own favorite color...

I had an alcoholic personality before I ever even took a drink-fear of intimacy, trust issues... keep it all easy, give it to me now now now, angry, oh so angry, keep everyone happy, go numb...

I was erasing myself a little at a time because of all of those things, the way they were stored at the back of my heart and mind, pressed back, put away. That's why I could only really begin to see them after I quit erasing myself. And you know what? Those things are not that horrible, that impossible, or that painful after all. I was fighting them back with alcohol. And now I see that facing my deeply rooted issues is definitely not as painful as erasing myself from my own family.

Ellie is right. What my boys need and want is me. Even with all of my disheartening realizations, I am their perfect mother, just as I am, sober.

Oh, the grace.

Work (In which I'm terribly random and weird)

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 14:29:00 +0000

This week's You Capture assignment was Work.

I do so much work, there are just simply an endless amount of pictures to choose from-me scrubbing the kitchen floor, me shoveling the driveway, me lugging laundry baskets...
but I think I'll go with this one, for Beth...

OK fine. I don't actually have any pictures of that other stuff.

Now back to the weird picture...

First of all, it is a whole lot of work getting your mouth puckered like that. Just enough to look very serious about cleaning the bathroom, which is what I was about to do. (Which is the epitome of work, is it not? The bathroom? Gross.) Also, it's kind of a work of art, getting the pucker to create jowls like that.

(I even edited some of the jowl/wrinkles, no lie.)

Let me guess what your questions are.

Heather, how do we know you were working in this picture? Why are you always wearing that sweater? Why are you crazy?

Well, those are good questions, friends. First of all, I think it's pretty obvious that I was working, look at that ~~sweater tie~~ sweat band on my head. Cleaning the bathroom is terribly sweat-producing with all that scrubbing and of course, being timed.

Yes. I said being timed. You don't time yourself while cleaning the bathroom? Well, I suggest you try it. You see, Beth and I have been doing this thing on Twitter in which we give each other a certain amount of time to get something done, a Beat The Clock sort of game.

And it works! We get stuff done! (But this isn't Works-For-Me Wednesday, so who cares.)

Nextly, I'm always wearing that sweater because my husband shrinks the delicates all the time, so it's pretty much the only one I have left. I'm not saying that behind his back, I say it to his face, too. I still love him, at least he attempts the laundry. (But I kinda wish he'd stop and I think that was his plan all along, to wreck stuff so I'd tell him to quit helping.) (Don't worry, I've accused him of that, too. Right to his face. It's good to just get it out, rather than being passive-aggressive.) (But sometimes I'm passive-aggressive, too. Just ask him. Or my dog.) (What?)

As for your last question, about when I totally lost it, I don't know. I just did. Perhaps it was that time when I was a child and I was running in my sleeping bag and fell and hit my head on the corner of the TV? That could have been it because WOW was that ever messy. I would point out the scar on my forehead in the picture, but it's covered by my ~~sweater tie~~ sweatband.

Is sweatband/sweat band one word or two?

I have so many grammar questions, but that's work for another day.

You can find more civilized You Capture posts at I Should Be Folding Laundry (Folding laundry is work, so that's why it's a should.) (And also, I should be folding laundry too, but I don't have to because my husband shrunk it all.)

(I don't know why I'm suddenly using so many parentheses for no reason.)

~~~~~

OH! And did you enter my giveaway of the coolest jewelry you've ever seen? There's still time!

Teaser:

Shining Stones

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 12:33:00 +0000

I've been doing a handful of things I haven't done in a long time since I quit drinking. Like thinking straight after 8pm. (I know, hilarious.) I've been doing jigsaw puzzles, as nerdy as that may sound, they help me think about shapes and colors and how things fit together rather than how they don't. They keep me from ruminating on the fact that all of this is happening, that it happened.

Instead of hiding in another room, apart from my husband (like I would before so he wouldn't know how much I was drinking), we work on the puzzle together or continue our Friday Night Lights marathon. (The best show on TV if you ask me. No, it is not just about football, it's about community and relationships and mistakes and redemption. You should totally get it on Netflix or watch it online and get addicted...er I mean, into it.)

The rough part of the day for me starts around 3 or 4 pm and hits a true funky slump around 5 or 6. I struggle during that time, sometimes walking in circles and sometimes crying. At this point, I simply need distraction. I need to not think that drinking would be the best cure for what ails me, because it's not.

That brings me to Ellie...

Ellie is an online friend, one of the lovely women who has stepped forward in this dark time and shed some light on me by saying I am you and you are me and we're going to make it.

Last night, I couldn't handle the noise in my head and my home, the shrieking and the demands. I looked at Ryan and because he rocks, he gave a nod that said go somewhere and shut the door. So I hid in the den/office/guest room and looked at Ellie's Etsy shop.

Four months into sobriety, Ellie discovered what she calls her "latent creative love," making jewelry. (She's also an excellent writer. Reading her blog moved me closer to sobriety. I'm forever thankful for her words.)

I'm so glad Ellie discovered this jewelry-making gift of hers because she's really really good at it, and I know it helps her like writing does for both of us, or a jigsaw puzzle does for me. Something to get lost in, something feeding us grace while our hearts and minds slowly whir to a stop...resting.

Would you like to win something from Ellie's shop?

Thought so...

Here's what you can do. Browse the images below. Click on an image at some point, and that will take you to Ellie's Etsy shop, Shining Stones. There are over 160 items in the shop, so browse around a bit and then come back and tell me what one of your favorite items is. That's all you have to do! (I'm planning on getting something for myself, what I call a sobriety ring, actually. Perhaps you could help me narrow it down. I love everything.)

You could win the item of your choice, $40 or under (the majority of the items are under $40) if the number of your comment is chosen by a random number generator when the giveaway closes!

Ellie gives away an item every two weeks through her blog, One Crafty Mother. So head on over there often, for many chances to win.

This giveaway is open to U.S. residents only.
The giveaway will end on Friday, February 12th, 2010 at 5pm central and the winner will be announced here that evening.
Don't forget to be sure to include a way to contact you (such as an email address) in your comment so I can let you know if you win.

What are you still doing here? Go Go GO. And then come back and tell me what you want for Valentine's Day.

Peace out.

THE GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED.
THANK YOU!

5 Gifts

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 14:14:00 +0000

"Sometimes grace works like water wings when you feel you are sinking." - Anne Lamott

Reflection

Support

Wisdom

Surrender

Humor

"It's incredibly touching when someone who seems so hopeless finds a few inches of light to stand in and makes everything work as well as possible. All of us lurch and fall, sit in the dirt, are helped to our feet, keep moving, feel like idiots, lose our balance, gain it, help others get back on their feet, and keep going...

These are the words I want on my gravestone: that I was a helper, and that I danced."

- from Grace(Eventually) by Anne Lamott

Faces

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 14:00:00 +0000

He is feisty
and he's thoughtful
and he's stubborn
and he's my helper
and he laughs at my jokes and
I laugh at his

He's my big boy
who just had tiny newborn feet ten minutes ago
it seems...

he's my Miles
and I'm crazy about him.

He even loves my stories
about a little boy named Jiles
who loves
pickles
and turns green
and grows wings
and flies over the backyard fence...

He's got many faces
and I'm the one who
gets to see them,
really see them.

~~~~~~~

Let's not forget this face,
my Asher

Seriously.

~~~~~~~

This post is a part of You Capture~Faces, at I Should Be Folding Laundry
Thank you, Beth.

Motherhood did not change me for the better

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 13:49:00 +0000

I was thinking about me and the way I've been living
and I was struck with this awful thought.

Motherhood did not change me for the better.

Yeah, maybe not. Maybe motherhood
and it's repetitive sameness and overwhelming emotions
sent me spinning and I chose
to cope with that in damaging ways...

That may be the hard truth
but there's another one,
a truth in the moments I have been clinging to all along.

No. Motherhood didn't change me
in the ways that I hoped it would,

but...

my boys sure are.

They are my teachers of joy and kindness,
my little mentors on how to love.

And that, is what I'm going to choose to think about.
These beautiful boys are changing me with who they are,
even when motherhood is not and until it does.

~~~~~~~

Mothers are coping everywhere and not talking about it.

What I wrote above is not implying that my boys are the reason I drank, but my mothering days played their part indeed. I've recognized that my drinking took a turn, spiraled to a deeper dependency, when I became a mother. Like I said, that's a hard reality, but a reality all the same.

The truth remains that my boys are the best thing that has ever happened to me. The daily grind is not. Learning to find time for ourselves that is healthy is at the core of the mystery that is finding the balance in motherhood. I don't know that this mystery can ever actually be solved, but there's some freedom in accepting its imbalance. In the daily grind, we handle that imbalance with care or we don't, those are the only two options. When we don't handle it with care, we end up simply coping. I'm on a new journey toward handling this inevitable imbalance with more care.

I don't know exactly how to do that, it's foreign to me, but I'm going to try.

Courage me

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 13:20:00 +0000

Courage me.

I say that like I'm at the bar, beer me!

What is it, this courage? Maybe if it's been given to me, I should know. But I don't. Am I called courageous because I quit drinking?

Let me be honest. I don't feel very courageous. I feel foreign, like I'm learning the customs of a new culture.

I'm swinging up here in the corner of the room, watching myself walk around in a fog, not drinking. I said that in an email to someone still stuck in her web of addiction and feeling so ashamed in comparison to those of us who have quit. I told her that I've only gotten as far from the middle as to dangle from my corner perch, watching myself, this strange person who can't figure out how to be. That's where I am, just hanging there like a spider needing her prey, wanting it, poised and ready to feed her need.

So please don't think I have more courage than you do, friend.

Sure, I'm not stuck in that middle anymore, trapped. I did quit. But I'm still here in this web of me, good ol' addicted me. It's like a friend said, he may have removed the alcohol from his alcoholism, but he's still got a whole lot of the ism to deal with. Me too.

So yes, I'm holding on to my addiction even while abstaining. I'm holding on to it at least by a thread, not finding myself able to fully let go. After all, the addiction web is sticky and I've been in it for a very long time. If I do let go, I'm terrified this last string I'm connected to will break and send me crashing to the rock bottom I've narrowly avoided by quitting. So I'm allowing myself to miss the booze, to grieve it even. To think about it way too much just like I used to, until my mind and body are a little stronger and can figure out what else to do. I'm hanging here until I'm more prepared to say goodbye, and more able to see the good things in me. The good things that aren't of my ism. The things that are waiting to be lived out more fully and have been there all along.

The dictionary describes courage like this: the quality of mind or spirit that enables a person to face difficulty, danger, pain, etc., without fear; bravery.

quality of mind or spirit

without fear

That kind of courage takes a long time to find, to learn. I don't have it yet. This whole sobriety thing demands it, but it's not there at first, at least not for me. To refrain from drinking is hard, yes. But once I voiced my need for help it was as if the option was taken away. No choice. Frozen. Stuck. Foreign.

Now what?

I was thinking about this on the way home from an AA meeting yesterday. About all of it, and I started to feel the mind and soul numbing exhaustion of this experience. I came through the door and kicked off my shoes. There was my family, on the couch, content and shiny beautiful to me. I watched Miles carefully oh so carefully construct his latest Lego creation. It amazes me, the time that boy can spend on these elaborate buildings and airplanes and ships, not following any kind of pattern or picture, just creating to the beat of his own drum. The patience he has for it and the work he's willing to put forth are simply astounding. The effort of his tiny fingers on tiny plastic pieces, matching colors, undoing and redoing until he's satisfied and content, until his masterpiece is just as it should be as he sees it. That's what he was doing, yet again, when I took off my coat and looked up, my heart hurting and my head pounding.

Daddy asked him, Oh are you rebuilding that?

He said, I'm not just rebuilding it, I'm renewing it.

And I thought, me too.

That is being done for me too, not by me. With even more careful care and determination than that of a child, and with a fierce love for a masterpiece creation. That's what I have to believe. That is what is being done here. Not just rebuilding, but renewing. And that will happen even if I'm still and cold like a small piece of plastic. And it will happen even if I'm just watching from the corner of the room, because that's all I can do right now. It will happen in this slow surrender.

The road from here is the place that I'll need that elusive courage from the dictionary. It is in the trip down from the web even after the drinking is done. Right now I can't muster the strength for that kind of courage. So I beg for it, courage me, and I know it will come. I will finish the descent from this web and join in, with time.

On both sides

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 15:11:00 +0000

I sat in the waiting room and looked around. I can't describe the emotions of waiting your turn to see the chemical dependency counselor. I can't find words to explain how I felt ridiculous. How I nearly burst out laughing because for eight years before I was a mom, I sat in chairs just like the one I was sitting on, but I was on the other side of it. I was a social worker, accompanying my clients to appointments just like this one. I was just like that put-together young lady across from me, reading her Twilight book and waiting for her client to come out of her meeting with the psychiatrist.

I was her, standing up to meet and encourage my client, making sure we got a prescription refill, thoughts of what was next in my day planner on my mind. And then I watched as she, me, carefully helped this seemingly helpless person navigate the steps to the parking lot.

That was me. And this is me.

I texted Ryan and I said, "I'm watching case managers wait with their clients. I was them before. Now I'm on the other side of this, how did that happen? I guess we're all always on both sides."

That's just it. We are both the one in need of help and the one helping, all of us. It's just that most of the time, we're leaning far too heavily on one side of that or the other.

This all still feels really strange for me, after all, I've been the helper my entire life.

~~~~~~~

Today my friend Maggie wrote her truth. In her very own Maggie Dammit way, she poured her heart and soul into the keyboard despite her nerves and fears. Of course I recognized myself in every sentence, because that's just how it is for Maggie and I, even before we both admitted we are powerless over alcohol.
The day I wrote my truth we started talking on the phone. Hours have passed over telephone lines and we are in this recovery thing together, to the day, what a comfort. It just happened that way, as all good things do, in a surprising kind of magical way.
So even if our words met months ago right here online, the depth to our friendship is something new, just in time. This friendship is not only a life vest, it is the icing to the messy cake of my sobriety. I love you, Maggie. We will do this. I am helping you and you are helping me with a balance both our hearts have been seeking. Thank you.

Riding the wind

fullcircle_doula@yahoo.com (Heather of the EO) — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 13:52:00 +0000

Seven days ago, these glasses meant only one thing.

Wine.

Today they still mean wine.

But they also simply look like really cool empty glasses.
Shapes and colors.

These small shifts happen, they say, with time. Sooner or later these glasses will not trigger a craving. With time. One day at a time.

My feelings are shifting like wind, moment by moment some days, hour by hour other days.

I've never been good with waiting. I like to skip ahead, pass up the hard part, let's move along now. Stop feeling stop feeling stop feeling...

That just can't be the case this time. This is just too big.

So looking at those glasses today gave me hope, the way they were so kindly showing me that they look a little like something other than wine, even though they still mean wine, for now.

And strangely, yesterday's blustery wind also came bringing me hope. It was a completely nasty day, the kind of Minnesota day that causes most of us to duck indoors and stay there, looking out the window and muttering things like, why do I live here and, would you believe that wind....uff da.

The wind got me thinking about seven days ago, how I woke up in the night, sobbing. Because it was like a blustery wind coming in. I reached for my husband and spoke my secrets like gusts, catching his breath and mine. I did it like I had no control over it because I didn't, in that very moment, for no definable reason, I didn't.

It just happened and I felt like I was floating on the wind and watching, helpless.

I am so helpless right now, riding that wind. That's why I know I haven't done even one part of this whole quitting thing on my own. (Step 2, anyone? Step 2?)

The dark of winter was blasting through with that wind that night seven days ago, with those words spoken in the dark. It was pushing us toward Spring. It was there, with such a strength we couldn't help but be pushed toward light.

An email I got yesterday said, shame is like mold, it grows in the dark, but withers in the light.

That's what we were doing, we were moving the mold to the light.

I didn't plan it. I didn't even want it, but Spring came anyway. Before it could bring its light though, I had needed to feel that wind, to duck inside a while, shifting in the dark, tossing and turning and crying out.

We Minnesotans know full well we have no control over the weather, the shifting of seasons. We wait and we watch, we're surprised and we're not. We long for Spring. And it comes, it always comes, even when we least expect it.

Even when we don't reach out and ask for it or choose it. It comes.

Even when we've become comfortable in our misery, hunched over, backs aching and tight in the cold and the dark.

Even then, Spring always comes. And it leaves no other choice but to surrender to its beauty.

And then we begin to till the soil, and friends, that's hard work. Good, but hard.