That Damned Onion

You can't be in recovery long without hearing about the Onion: the work we do refines us on the inside, going deeper and deeper, getting to parts of our psyche like layers of an onion. As sick as I am of this metaphor, I have once again come up against the layer in me that always leaves me stuck, and stuck is something I can't afford.

I am 39 years old, but you wouldn't know it in the way I respond to my parents. I do not have adequate boundaries with them. When they are unhappy with me, I make myself physically sick with worry and anxiety. I'm a black-belt al-anon with everyone but them.

It ebbs and flows, and it is making me sick again. Whenever I tell them something I know will make them unhappy (mostly things beyond my control), the cycle begins: they go into a rant and I try to disappear inside myself or block them out or reason with them (never works).

Last night, I got a new sponsor, and told her all about it, that it was making me sick and I don't want to participate in the vicious cycle any more

So The Trudge Report is taking a bit of a turn, growing with my program. There's going to be a lot going on here about dealing with my parents. I'm finally sick of the onion making me cry.

Giving Freely

"We make a living from what we get. We make a life from what we give." - Sir Winston Churchill

At my home group, we have a woman who brings a homemade lunch for the entire group almost every Tuesday. No one has asked her to do this, but everyone heartily digs in and lavishes her with thanks.

She is also a raging Al-Anon. Her husband still drinks heartily, and most weeks her catering is attached to sharing about how much people love what she does for them.

She has taken a job that requires her to be out-of-town for two weeks at a time. Yesterday she was back from her first tour of duty, and since she had been working, did not bring food. No one expressed any dismay.

The chairperson of the meeting called on folks to share, instead of having people just jump in. He did not call on her until the end of the meeting. She said this (loudly):

"I haven't been at a meeting for two weeks! I didn't come to have the chairperson call on people! I wanted to pick the topic of the meeting, something that's upsetting me! This wouldn't have happened if I'd brought food!"

And with that, she stormed out.

My immediate reaction to this mini-rant was that this meeting is not about her, but about a disease everyone in this room shares. As I thought about it though, I realized she might suffer from something a little deeper: giving of herself, but not freely. I suspect she feels entitled to select the topic of the meeting because she feeds people.

My old thinking told me that if I did something for you, bought you something or provided any other service, you owed me. I gave, and so should I get. You can bet that if you did not reciprocate in the manner I felt was appropriate, I got a resentment. I quit doing things for you, and more that likely you appeared somewhere on my list.

Sobriety doesn't hold up to scorekeeping or the anger, self-pity and resentment that follows it. Now, I give things without expecting anything in return. If I bring donuts to a meeting and you eat one, you don't owe me anything.

Nor do I owe you anything if I eat the donuts you bring, either. I assume that your motives for providing something to us are pure.

I will find out soon enough if they aren't.

Keep Others Simple ... For Yourself

I hear and read a lot about "change" that will now sweep over our nation. Apparently we have all been living in downtrodden misery, and a new president is going to fix Everything (he could start over here by taking a look at my bathtub plumbing, but somehow I doubt he's got me on his book).

When I was drinking, I blamed everyone and everything else for my problems. My blurry bottom line was that life just wasn't treating me right. If life treated me right, I wouldn't drink!

The amazing thing was that I developed peace with life once I stopped drinking and learned through a program of recovery that life treats me the way it treats everyone else: if I'm a jerk, people retaliate.

I once heard this in a meeting, "If in the course of a day, I meet one person that I suspect is an ***hole, there is a chance that I am right about that person. But when everyone I meet is an ***hole, then I am actually the ***hole."

I thought life was about being happy. I was wrong. Life is about taking the personal responsibility to contribute to the world. Once I become a giving member of society, I stand a greater chance of personal satisfaction and sobriety.

That's the change I believe in.

Powerless, The Sequel

Step One is “We admitted we were powerless over alcohol - that our lives had become unmanageable.”

But I am learning that "drinking is but a symptom" of my disease. Once I subtract the booze, I am left with my brain, and I've been pouring booze on that since I was an adolescent!

Today, Step One reads for me "I admit that I am powerless over others, that my life has become unmanagable."


When I came into the program, I had a string of booze-related traffic accidents that each should have resulted in a DUI, but for some reason, they didn't. Maybe because I didn't need them to: once I wrecked a rental car with scant knowledge of what I'd done the next day, I knew I had a problem, and I wasn't going out in some blaze of glory. Jails and institutions didn't sound like anything I wanted to experience.

Lately with my anxiety running amok, I am missing out on my life to agonize over things that haven't happened. I am not sleeping, and I am almost constantly tormented by "what if?"

Unmanagability!

I am powerless over the behavior of others in my life. If people are acting out in my life, that's their choice: I can't hit some mute button and silence them (trust me, I'd have done it by now).

Step One freed me from the moment I walked into the program to get better. I have the relief of my problem having a name. I have a Big Book that tells my life story. I have people around me that understand.

Now I need to keep working, to get more relief.

Fear vs. Faith

"You can rest in the faith that God will take care of you." - 24 Hours a Day

I am struggling with my anxiety in ways I haven't had to since my custody battle over a year ago. I am freaked out about my job, my son's father, and my bio-family. I'm distraught with worry to the point that I have physical symptoms.

Today's Language of Letting Go devotional reads, in part "The choice is ours. Will we let ourselves feel? Will we take a spiritual approach, including gratitude, toward the event? Will we question life and our Higher Power by asking what we're supposed to be learning and doing? Or will we use the incident to prove old, negative beliefs? Will we say, 'Nothing good ever happens to me... I'm just a victim... People can't be trusted... Life isn't worth living'?"

That's the way I used to handle this, along with lots of booze. If mounting the pity pot worked for me, I would probably go back to that pattern, because it's easy - it's what I know.

But it doesn't work. Pitypotism has gotten me nowhere in life.

Gratitude towards the events is tough. I know I am grateful for income coming in. I know I would not miss knowing my wonderful little boy even knowing what I know now about his father. I am grateful for HP making me able to do my best with him, and people tell me that my best with him is pretty darn good. I am grateful for my non-biological family in the program.

A Dozen Steps has a great post today about the importance of accepting responsibility for our own behavior. I especially enjoyed it because this matter came up among some of my homegroup's members this week.

Story as old as A.A. time: newcomer has a little time, and the persistant folks in the warrants division of the county she used to live in located her to discuss with her a rubber check she wrote that she hadn't amended. She doesn't want to go to jail.

So a member called BF and me, asking if we would like to contribute to the cause of keeping her out of the pokey. We said collectively something along the lines of "Not just 'no', but 'hell, no'."

I do not bail people out of jail, ever. You are incarcerated because there is reasonable cause to believe that you have broken the law. Your name wasn't drawn out of a hat for random, causeless arrest.

We put people in jail for breaking the law because a) we as a society would like you to stop harming others and b) imprisonment may teach you not to pull that stuff again. The longer you cool off in there, the less likely you are to repeat your offense.

One of the cases in our courtroom yesterday was a young man, barely over 18, with a file an inch thick. This particular day he was pleaing on 8 different counts. His mother had already posted a $600 bond, and then paid an additional $400 as a result of his remaining issues.

Think he learned not to break the law yesterday? No way! What he learned yesterday is that mom will bail him out. Mom won't have any money saved for her own security in life, but I can assure you he doesn't care about that.

The best thing his mother could have done for him and for herself yesterday was say, "Well son, I hope you can come up with $400 this afternoon," and gone home to mind her own business. An al-anon working a program would call this "helping someone find bottom".

But our newcomer's story has an encouraging ending: instead of taking others' money, she went with her sponsor and turned herself in to the county jail. She was arrested and detained for 90 minutes, and paid what fines remained after her jail credit was applied.

Now, she need not fear this issue ever again: she's paid her debt. She doesn't owe anyone for bailing her out. She has a new degree of respect and encouragement from folks in the meetings. Fear of people in that county has left her!

"They always materialize if we work for them."

Suicide

I've said before that we are often not seated in a vast hotbed of mental health when we go to meetings. The Big Book tells us that there are times when medical attention is necessary to help us sort out our thinking.

Bad things happen to us, even when we're sober: relationships end, jobs are lost, loved ones die. This is part of life, and we're learning to live it on life's terms. Many of us then find that once we remove the alcohol from our brains, we see depression, anxiety, and other related mental conditions.

So it's not uncommon to encounter someone talking about suicide as we trudge this road to happy destiny. These are the common signs of potentially suicidal behavior, provided by the United States Army (and they would know!)

• Talking or hinting about suicide
• Formulating a plan to include acquiring the means to kill oneself
• Having a desire to die
• Obsession with death (music, poetry, artwork)
• Themes of death in letters and notes
• Finalizing personal affairs
• Giving away personal possessions

Suicidal ideations are most common is those who are experiencing life changes that they perceive as totally negative, such as:

• Relationship problems (loss of girlfriend/boyfriend,divorce, etc.)
  • Substance abuse issues/relapse
  • Work related problems
  • Transitions (retirement, adult children leaving home, etc.)
  • Serious medical problems
  • Significant loss (death of loved one, loss due to natural disasters, etc.)
  • Current/pending legal action
  • Setbacks (academic, career, or personal)
  • Severe, prolonged, and/or perceived unmanageable stress.
  • A sense of powerlessness, helplessness, and/or hopelessness

When someone we know talks about suicide or displays these nonverbal signs listed, it should always be taken seriously. Loved ones of those with these issues should immedaitely get some mental health services for these folks - as much as the depressed individual might not want you to, it could very well save their lives.

Sponsor vs. Friend

In my opinion, getting a sponsor and then actually calling her is one of the most important things we can do to stay sober. Sponsors are there to guide us through the 12 Steps, assist us in studying the Big Book, and understanding recovery culture. My sponsor knows things about me that no one else on this planet earth knows, and shows me how to deal with that Deep Dark Stuff without taking it to Happy Hour.

However, it's important to understand that this relationship is meant to go one way only: I am not to counsel my sponsor on things. My sponsor has a sponsor she does her work with. While my sponsor knows everything about me, she is not my "buddy". Why not? Thanks for asking!

1) A friend is someone who wants me to like her. My sponsor tells me the cold, hard truth as I need to hear it, and that has repeatedly saved my ass. Her delivery is not clouded by whether or not I will still like her after she tells me what she knows I need to hear.

2) I know where my friends' "buttons" are. We know most of our friends well enough to know their emotional weaknesses, and, let's face it, we sometimes exploit them when it serves our purposes. Example: if I'm doing something that I know my sponsor-who's-become-my-buddy doesn't approve of, I start "earning" her approval with things that will shift her focus off of my (probably sick) behavior, such as giving gifts, loaning money, and generally kissing ass. My buddy now feels all warm and gushy about me, while I continue to engage in wrong stuff.

3) My friends don't have any formal authority over me. Because I am careful to recognize my sponsor as my sponsor, I have a respect for her that I might not show my friends. For example, if she tells me something that rubs me the wrong way, I pretty much sit there and take it because I know I need to hear it. I don't argue with my sponsor, because I have too much respect for her to disagree. If I'm arguing with my sponsor, I do not have the kind of respect for those that have figured this thing out that will help me stay sober.

4) My friends might develop a resentment towards me, but my sponsor won't. Doctors aren't allowed to operate on members of their immediate family for a reason: their judgement will be too clouded to award the family member their best ability. Sponsors know how to react to sponsees: with (tough) love and tolerance, and that's about it. They should not become so emotionally involved with sponsees that they develop resentments.

5) My sponsor will not violate my trust. Friends sometimes blab, especially when they feel that blabbing may help you (and it typically doesn't). Sponsors understand the grave importance of their relationships with sponsees, and that complete confidentiality is to maintained at just about any cost. Note: I tell women I work with that I will get them the appriate help if they tell me that they are thinking about harming themselves or someone else.

What "if"?

So it's the end of August, and being month number 8 going into month number 9, many around here are gearing up to do their amends, or at least to brag about doing them in meetings. It's a heavy subject going in and a freeing experience going out, Here's what I've learned about the process along my way ...

1) I can owe amends to people even if they do not appear on my 4th step list. I have found this to be especially true for those newer in sobriety. The 4th step list is my list of resentments/fears/generally nasty feelings. However, I can harm people without even knowing it. This is why the twelve steps differentiate between a "fearless moral inventory" and "a list of all persons we had harmed". These can be two separate and different lists.

2) I should not attempt to make an amends if I'm not really sorry. Having a resentment is like active alcoholism: everyone can see it, regardless of how I think I'm covering it up. If you know deep down that you're not a bit sorry for what you did, you will almost always make the situation worse with a new act of dishonesty. The Big Book says that in this case we should pray for the willingness to make amends in these cases.

3) I should not make a direct amends to someone in order to manipulate them. When I did my first amends list, I couldn't wait to go to an old flame an apologize for the way I would sometimes speak to him when I had been drinking. I was genuinely sorry about that, but what I truly wanted deep down was to show him that I had sobered up and that now he should give our relationship another chance. Selfishness and self-centeredness was about to become the root of yet another problem! If I am still trying to control others' behavior, I am going to drink again, and luckily my sponsor saw through my sanctimonious b******t and forbade me from contacting him in any way.

4) I should remember that Internet is usually the easier, softer way. If my sponsor authorizes me to make a direct amends to someone, I need to see that individual in person. Anything else is cutting corners, with a couple of exceptions:

• You physically can't appear before them - you are a soldier deployed to a combat zone, you are incarcerated, etc. If someone has a protective order against you, DO NOT VIOLATE THE ORDER.


• They refuse to see you - this is their right, and we respect that, no questions asked.


• The expense of travel will be a financial hardship on you or your family - if you need to make amends to someone who is now a missionary in Pongo Pongo, airfare would certainly bite into the budget of the average family. We are responsible for our family's food, basic clothing or shelter in all stages of our recovery.

So, with this said, have a happy amends list! If I've left anything out here ... I apologize!

Replacing fear with faith

I am a world-class worrier - if worry were an Olympic sport, I'd have been on a Wheaties box years ago. I have spent many years worrying about things that have never happened. I justified my drinking with the release from worry that it gave me for many years.

Now that I am sober, I have to deal with the same brain. As the country song goes, "I've got this thinkin' problem ...". This is why I need to read each day something out of Dale Carnegie's book Stop Worrying and Start Living. This book's techniques have helped me immensely with my weird need to freak out.

Here's an example: yesterday was the first day of school for my son. This is his second year in the public school system. Just like the first day of last year, my son's father called the school and told them I have enrolled my son under false pretenses (I don't know what that means), threatening to sue the school, the principal, and the district.

Last year, I got really upset about the scene he made - I envisioned him dragging me back into court, giving a judge another chance to take my son away from me. I literally began plotting strategy for a hearing that never took place.

I didn't enjoy it any more this year: I apologized to the school administration and filed his bizarre e-mails in the stack I've had for years now. What's different is that I recognize that he is the same size as me in the eyes of God. The same laws of nature apply to him - if they didn't, they would be called The Laws of Nature Except for Evan J. So this year I'll do some things differently:

I won't throw gas on grill when there's nothing to cook. Because we both answer to Nature's Law, I do not need to get drawn into a verbal pissing match with him. It does no good and wastes precious moments from my life - I didn't divorce him to keep fighting with him!

Get correct perspective. Most human behavior has a pattern, and he is no exception. He sends all parties involved ugly threatening e-mails and letters, demanding that everyone do his bizarre bidding. No one responds, and then one day, it stops like a hurricane losing steam. There will be another soon, but they always pass without any real incident.

Adjust my expectations. I have a court order directing my legal obligations in raising my son, and I obey that court order. He has not. Therefore, it is a reasonable assumption that he will continue to disobey. It is unreasonable to think that one day after 45 years of societal narcissism, he will say to himself, "Hmmm... maybe I should be of service to others, rather than a blight on my community? I'll start by ceasing to harass my ex-wife."

Embrace the worst-case scenario. The worst-case scenario is that Evan and I will end up before the original judge again over less than a year's worth of custody, and I can show that I have obeyed every letter of his order, and then show him the stack of e-mailed rants (which I affectionately call the Book of Crazy) and his failure to pay child support. Unpleasant? Yes. But nothing I couldn't handle.

Use same mental energy for something constructive. I turn the mental power I would have misused worrying to keeping documentation of all of this, while working on my ability to stay calm and nonplussed by these outbursts (which isn't easy). Keeping my side of the street clean isn't always easy, but it always rewards us.

Sometimes I think Dale Carnegie might have been one of us!

Detatchment

Even though I am no longer drinking, I still have situations and people I would like to control. Actually, I probably have more desire for control since I got sober because I now know what's going on around me! But sobriety got a lot easier when I truly realized that I do not control anyone.

Now my issue is worry - if I don't control anyone, how the hell are things going to turn out "my way"?

At the beginning of every meeting, I am reminded that the BB does not cover getting my way, "We will lose interest in selfish things and gain interest in our fellows. Self-seeking will slip away. Our whole attitude and outlook upon life will change. Fear of people and of economic insecurity will leave us....We cease fighting everyone and everything."

Melodie Beattie writes in The Language of Letting Go, "We may believe that controlling, worrying, and forcing will somehow affect the outcome we desire. Controlling, worrying, and forcing don't work. Even when we're right, controlling doesn't work. In some cases, controlling may prevent the outcome we want from happening."

A couple of months ago, I had a routine medical test come back with murky results. The doctors wanted much more detailed x-rays to see if I had the disease my aunt died from a few years ago. My family worried about it, asking me daily whether I'd gotten the results back yet and glancing at each other nervously when I replied "not yet".

Luckily, I consulted God on this one, asking Him to take this issue, because I just didn't have the energy to worry about it. This is not like me, to be rigorously honest: typically I worry myself into a sleepless fit. But sure enough, the second round of tests eventually came back showing a perfectly healthy body.

My family's worry, though well-intentioned, did not change my test results. It's not like I had cancer until the fifth straight day my mother went without sleep (in fact, medical professionals will tell you that worry can worsen patient's health - none of them will advise you to worry like hell and then whatever it is will go away).

I need to train myself to view the things I worry about today as false-positive test results - they only look scary on the surface, but deeper investigation reveals nothing HP & I can't handle.

Honesty in relationships

My program is a HUGE part of my life, and therefore my best friends, known associates, BF and xBFs are in the program too. These are the people who "get" me.

So this BF and xBF issue rears its ugly head sometimes, which is why I adore today's Language of Letting Go selection at Hazelden online, which includes this passage:

"But relationships equal two people who have equal rights. The other person needs to be able to define the relationship too. We have a right to know, and ask. So do they. Honesty is the best policy.We can set boundaries. If someone wants a more intense relationship than we do, we can be clear and honest about what we want, about our intended level of participation. We can tell the person what to reasonably expect from us, because that is what we want to give. How the person deals with that is his or her issue. Whether or not we tell the person is ours."

Relationships within the program are sticky, oftentimes because the parties often know each other, and on a more intense level than we "know" the so-called-normal people out in the world. In case you haven't noticed, meetings aren't always a hotbed of mental health.

To further complicate this, our little subculture has traditions and rituals meant to include all people, regardless of how our individual behavior rates on the Bullshit Meter. This is not the way the Outside World works, which is how we end up with folks who don't do so well out there (I work for the court system, and our Twelve Concepts include arrest, arraignment, extradition, plea deal, conviction, corrections, probation, parole ... you get the point).

Because of all this, it's easy for me to start thinking that I have to be equally "nice" to everyone in that room, regardless of the dynamics, because I want everyone to approve of me. I want everyone to hold hands and sing "Coom Bye Yah" (I'm pretty sure that's not how that's spelled).

But if I'm going to stay sober, I need to live in reality and honesty. You may not like hearing that what I can give in my relationship with you has changed, but it's true. I am responsible for being honest with you, and I'm powerless over your reaction to it.

Do I fear the disapproval your reaction might bring? Come on now, I'm a upper-middle-class girl from a southern gated community who was raised to be sweet and polite and popular - of course I do! But as I learned in my 4th step, my emotional security can't come from others, not if I'm going to stay sober.