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.

Keep Calm and Carry On

I spent a good deal of my childhood in London, the capital of a country that bore much of the violence of World War II. Unlike American, many Brits remember their homeland being bombed, and experiencing the fear that Hitler's regime would invade. Americans lost loved ones, certainly, but the UK lost civilians, its mothers and children and grandparents.

During this time, the poster to the left appeared in the country's undergrounds and street corners, giving it's citizens wise advice that I use today.

Booze helped fuel my imminent sense of doom, usually over things that never actually came to pass. This anxiety spurred me to drink even more, and then I did things that really did cause me problems! It was a horrible way to live.

The first fruits of sobriety include knowing where I've been and who I've spoken to. I don't secretly wish I had an interlock device on my cell phone anymore (though I wish others did!).

Later, working the steps with a sponsor taught me discernment in my actions. If I feel stressed about something, I ask myself if it is real or imagined. I pray, turning the situation over to my Higher Power. Then I keep calm and carry on with the day set before me.

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.

Day 8

Over halfway through the Prayer Project. I have to admit, I think it's working. I can honestly say that I am willing to meet with her.

It reminds me of the feeling I had when I first got sober: lots of future-tripping (as BF calls it - that's freaking out over events that have not occurred yet). When I actually picture meeting with her, I can't even imagine what I would say.

I must discuss again w/my sponsor. At least now I can discuss it in a spirit of willingness now and not in a spirit of whining!

Day 5

Last night I was studying "More About Alcoholism" in the BB w/my sponsor when I had an epiphany about P.

It happened when I read this sentence: "In some circumstances we have gone out deliberately to get drunk, feeling ourselves justified by nervousness, anger, worry, depression, jealousy or the like." I immediately thought of her going back out over her breakup with my ex. Frankly, I empathized with her at that moment, not because I thought drinking was a good idea, but I have certainly done such things in the past myself.

So why haven't I had any compassion for her?

And I realized I haven't had an compassion for her because she hasn't asked for any. She has always come flouncing in to meetings like her drama just didn't happen. She has never once shared with anyone (to my knowledge) that she is in spiritual pain, and she needs help. If she expressed that, I would feel some sympathy for her.

So the question for me is, do I have to wait for her?

Praying For Someone I Can't F-ing Stand: Day 2

Two days of praying are behind me. I am praying that P gets everything I would want for myself and for the willingness to continue to do this, because it really isn't easy.

However, a strange thing has already happened. Yesterday P and my ex broke up, but P called Ex later on and asked him for a ride to that night's meeting. He declined and said he was taking someone else (okay, with her track record, probably not the best thing to tell her, but I digress).

P then calls the poor woman chairing this meeting, and asks her to call her when the meeting is over and tell her who Ex brought to the meeting. Chair told her she would do no such thing because it violates the Traditions (good for her!).

So P hung up on her mad as a wet hen, and then called her back and left her a snotty voice mail about whether she had the required amount of time to chair the meeting anyway. P then left me and BF each the same message.

I mention all this not because the drama itself it particularly weird (it's par for the course when P's around), but because of the effect it's had on my thinking about her.

I have been in recovery long enough to know what to do when I have a resentment. I could put all that BB stuff to music and dance to it. So why have I not wanted to forgive P for what she's done? What real harm have I suffered? BF and I are stronger than ever. I have lost no friends over this. I didn't get drunk.

I've been afraid to forgive P because I've feared that if I do forgive her, she will do all that crap again.

But she's still doing it! Yesterday proves it.

When I was little there was this cartoon about Ralph and Sam. They were wolf and sheepdog, and every morning, they punched in on a time clock and Sam went to guard the sheep and Ralph tried to steal them. Then the whistle would blow at the end of the day, and Ralph and Sam would say a cordial goodnight to each each other and go home. They each were who they were, and they did what they did, and it was nothing personal.

P and I are not so different from Ralph and Sam. We get up every morning, and we each do the best we know how to do. Neither of us gets up and says to ourselves "I'm really going to f--- things up today!" (regardless of what it may look like). One tries to steal, one tries to keep.

Just be glad you're not a sheep in this little town!

Forgiving Someone I Can't F-ing Stand: The Series

I'm embarking on a project in forgiving someone over the next 14 days, and I'll be chronicling it here. First, let's get the reader up to speed ....

I'm on a mission to forgive a woman in my home group whom I will refer to as P.

I have known P for almost a year, and during that time, she has

• Openly gone after BF
• Called BF's ex wife to report to her about us when he blew her off
• Started going out with my ex (admittedly, this is their prerogative since I have moved on)
• Once she felt my ex was paying too much attention to me, she called everyone on our group's phone list to tell them I was sleeping with him behind BF's back
• Then drunkenly threatened to kill me during a meeting I was chairing

Knowing her has been like having a season pass to the Museum of Crazy.

So yesterday she calls and leaves me a voice mail, asking to meet me for coffee so she can make an amends to me.

Ugh.

I would rather have a bikini wax and then wade in a pool of rubbing alcohol than do that!

So I called my sponsor. She instructed me to let P know that I would call her once I was ready. Then, I am to pray for her every day for two weeks as described in the BB on page 552 of the 4th edition. Then, barring any new and especially insane developments, I will meet with her.

Ugh.

Last night I prayed for her for the first time....

"No outside circumstances will offer us full time and forever the security we all long for. And in like manner, none will adversely interfere with our well being, except briefly and on occasion." - Each Day a New Beginning

I was sharing the other day in a meeting that I chose to drink at almost five years of sobriety several years ago.

I did that because I secretly viewed the program as a game show: surely for having given up the love of my life (booze), there will be cash and prizes: perfect man, perfect children, perfect lifestyle, perfect finances. I mean what the heck do we read those promises for anyway?

But when I read the Promises closely, they actually do not describe the acquisition of things, but of feelings: feelings of courage, optimism and usefulness. They do not promise me money, but losing my fear of financial insecurity.

I am not enjoying this season of sobriety: a job I was so excited about has melted down before my eyes. I am seeking something just to keep the rent paid and food on the table. More than likely it will involve less money, a more strenuous schedule and the public perception that my life is going backwards, not forwards.

But what other people think of me is none of my business.

Most of the world has not had to give up the substance they love the most in order to survive, so most of the world doesn't understand that I would really like a nice round of applause at the end of the day for not drowning my sorrows in a swimming pool of margaritas. But that applause is not coming.

I need to find the reason to keep doing this inside myself, every day. I need to keep my daily reprieve.

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.

Normal People

"Opinions vary considerably as to why the alcoholic reacts differently from normal people. We are not sure why, once a certain point is reached, little can be done for him. We cannot answer the riddle." ~Alcoholics Anonymous, 4th Edition, There Is A Solution, pg. 22~

There was a point in my life at which I was so far-removed from the concept of "normal" drinking that a doctor actually had to explain it to me. After I had honestly told him about the volume of alcohol I typically consumed every day (well, more honestly than I ever had before - I'm sure I was still rounding down to the nearest quart), he told me that there were people in the world who might have one or two alcoholic beverages in an evening and call it a night. I couldn't picture it! Frankly, I still can't.

Last night I met with my sponsor and told her all about my fears in dealing with a workplace bully. It occurred to me as we talked that WB is not talking over her issues with me with anyone right now; she has no sponsor, she has no program. Statistically speaking, she's probably not got any issues with alcohol (Little Debbies, maybe, but I am not to diagnose another individual).

It's true what I hear in meetings so often (damn it): the person I resent probably doesn't give a flip about me - I am only harming myself. WB gets up in the morning and does what she feels is her best every day. She was a WB before I got here and she'll be one when I leave.

My son is going through the "why" phase of life - his response to everything is "why?" When I don't know the answer, I tell him that God made it that way.

Ironically, being normal prevents her from experiencing the fellowship of this program. Last night in the midst of my anxiety crisis, I felt very loved by the people in the program I have come to respect and trust.

I do not need to drink over this, over though I don't know why this is happening.

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."

My Search for Meaning

Hazelden's recovery thought for today from The Language of Letting Go reads, in part "Too often, we try to gain a clear perspective before it is time.That will make us crazy.We do not always know why things are happening the way they are.... In hindsight, we will know. It will become clear. For today, being is enough. We have been told that all things shall work out for good in our life. We can trust that to happen, even if we cannot see the place today's events will hold in the larger picture."

Life often makes no sense to me from the seat I'm assigned in the present. For example, I am now a couple of months into a job that more than likely is not going to work out, and that has been a great disappointment to me. I have no idea how many times I have thought to myself, "Why is this happening to me?" or second-guessed myself for taking this job in the first place.

If I'm not vigilant, I will get into woe-is-me, and that's not good for my sobriety. The Big Book tells me that "anger is the dubious luxury of normal men" and depression, as many professionals will tell you, is anger turned inward.

I come into this place each day, and I remind myself that I am here to be of service. I do what I know is the right thing at each moment, trying not to worry about what the future holds. This place was not built to fill me emotionally, so to expect emotional fulfillment here is irrational.

My favorite story in the book of my faith is the book of Job. Job is this all-around success story: well-to-do, great family, and respect in his community. One day, God and Satan are talking, and God says, "Hey Jerkalope! Check out Job! He is one of my biggest fans!"

The devil says, "Well sure he is - you've given him everything. Take away his stuff and then see how much he loves you - I dare you!"

And God does, and Job, though miserable in his new, cruddy phase of life does not lose his faith that God sits supreme in the universe, doing everything for everyone's greater good.

The best part of the story for me is that Job specifically asks God why He took everything, and God doesn't ever tell him why. I love that because it tells me that it is not my job to know why things happen. It is only my job to respond properly.

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!

Weary

CAUTION: WHINING FOLLOWS

It's called "trudging" for a reason ...

From 24 Hours a Day:

"Never yield to weariness of the spirit. At times, the world’s cares and distractions will intrude and the spirit will become weak. At times like this, carry on and soon the spirit will become strong again. God’s spirit is always with you, to replenish and renew. None ever sincerely sought God’s help in vain. Physical weariness and exhaustion make a time of rest and communion with God more necessary. When you are overcome by temporary conditions which you cannot control, keep quiet and wait for the power of the spirit to flow back."

May God forgive me, I would like a day off from my life today. I would like to be in one of those sappy movies where I wake up in someone else's life and learn to appreciate my own. I am tired of potty training. I am tired of setting up the new place. I am tired of worrying about money. I am tired of dealing with my soon-to-be-ex husband. I am tired of reporting to this new job and sitting over here in Storage Room B having no one talk to me or give me any direction. I am tired of not getting BF's just-about-total attention. I am tired of being exhausted all day and not sleeping at night. I am tired of having hideously chapped lips from this stupid Accutane (which I might have to discontinue if I keep feeling this way).

A few days ago I called my parents to tell them (prematurely) that I thought we were making some real potty training progress. My mother said to me, "That's great news honey! When I saw you were calling I just assumed something was wrong - I thought 'Uh oh'".

Wow - that's nice. Thanks for the vote of confidence.

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.