Music: "Broken", by Tracy Chapman. An ode to unreal, perfectionist and self-wounding expectations of yourself and others. Ways we all set ourselves up for falls. Doom ourselves to failure. She has a way with words to describe feelings of rejection and loneliness.
Garden: Under snow. Yes, snow! A freaky little storm that is already melting off as I write. I fear for my flowers and flowering trees. Is this normal? I hope they will be OK, and Spring can resume it's work of warming things up and leafing things out.
Step 1 - Day 16
"We admitted we were powerless over___(alcohol)-that our lives had become unmanageable"
This day started out on a sour note. Waking from the dream, which I mentioned, of my old High School friend stirred up already inflamed sentiments about myself. I feel I am being made more clearly aware of these self-concepts, since yesterday. I want to run and hide. I want to squirm out of it, but I will try to keep looking, as my stomach turns and my heart burns and I feel like my legs are dragging behind me. It is like Crytonite to my mind and body. It feels like the heaviest burden, and yet it is invisible, weightless. It feels like it has the power to destroy me, ruin everything good in my life. It could swallow me up in it's black holeness. It's negative gravity, till I am consumed. Gone. I am only as good as my son is healthy and happy. I am responsible for all that. I am to blame for all that too. It's crazy, but that is how I feel, right now.
I opened my Al-Anon reader, as I lay in bed, feeling pinned by this weight, unable to do much else and this is what I read. "Sometimes the things we consider our greatest weaknesses prove to be our greatest strengths. They provide us opportunities for growth that we would never have had otherwise." And today's reminder: " Anything and everything about me can be used for my own good. If I feel insecure or frightened today, I will remember that my fear is a signal that there is something for me to learn". Another bulls eye. It is staggering to read these passages and find so much of myself mirrored back at me. It gives me comfort, but I also want the hope and serenity that is also mentioned, when we consider the truths presented in them. What is my fear for my son teaching me at this time? Can I really trust his Higher Power to take care of him, like I hope it is taking care of me?
Wrestling with this "demon", this mental poison, that seems to be at my core, deep within me feels epic. I keep trying to name it, get a handle on it, understand it. I can feel it's weight. That tells me it is there, lurking. But what is it really? I can say this "demon" has been at the heart of all the times I felt most lost, most frightened, most at the mercy of life without armor, paralyzed with fear and vulnerable. I can say this much: I know it is a indictment against myself, a weighing of my worth, with the scale coming up short. It is a nod of confirmation, that all the bleakest and most uncharitable things I have ever felt or thought about myself, are in-fact, true. It is my well of self-disgust, self-rejection and self-condemnation. It is the pit of my despair. Pure self-hate. Never does it rear it's ugly head more, than when it has to do with my son.
But, can I know where this "demon" came from, and what is responsible for it? Does it even matter? What is the antidote, if any? It has deeply wounded, and affected my relationship with my son, all relationships actually. It is like the ax waiting to fall, the truth waiting to be revealed. If they really knew me, knew this about me, then I would be abandoned, left alone, despised and rejected. I would be seen for what I really was. I would be unlovable and unloved. Deep, dark, painful beyond words. Crushing. Silencing. Bruising and battering to the psyche and the soul. Consuming and choking. Suffocating, in-fact. There is no air and life there. Nothing can grow. It is a barren wasteland of horrifying shapes and shadows, on the periphery of perception, by ever present. It is my personal internal hell.
Seeing this hell, for what it is, is the start of something now. I am trying to just be with it, see it, find it's shape and boundaries. I met with my therapist and told her of the fight with my co-worker, the dream, what it brought up for me and how it seems to relate to things going way back, back to my childhood. I read the readings that I've mentioned the last few days, from the reader to her, and what they meant to me. I started to cry when I read the part from the second reading, the part about , " I will remember that my fear is a signal...." I feel as though I am being asked to learn from this fear, from this pain, from this blackness. Right now I am learning that it is there, and trying to acknowledge it. What will come from that I do not know.
My counselor suggested that it could be "reframed", that my old way of seeing myself as a damaged child, whom no one loved and protected can be changed. I said to her I have carried this burden around deep inside, that what happened to me was a indication of my worth. That someone lovable would not have had these things happen. I also told her I am tired of carrying this burden, this identification, that I want to see myself in a new way. My spiritual teacher said almost the same thing Sunday night at a teaching I attended. She said people get stuck on the path because they cling to these identifications, that it becomes a part of who they are, and they do not find the truth of who they really are because of it. I feel I cling to this identification of myself as a terrible mother. That is suffering is, in reality, my fault.
I do not want to hide from my feelings anymore, but I also do not want to dwell in them too long. I want to find a way to allow them to be, allow them to arise, but not be attached to them, not to be lost in them. I have always been afraid of my feelings. They were not to be trusted. They betrayed me. When I was afraid, there was no one there to comfort me, so the solution was to not be afraid. I couldn't afford to. But that kind of thinking ends-up carrying over into everything. It becomes a way of dealing with everything, and then you become a bottled up mess, in denial of ALL your feelings. Then you become numb. Dead inside. I do not want to be dead inside, but I also do not want to wear my hurts, my wounds like badges. Is that possible? Is it possible to live with where my son is at, at this time, and not let it crush me?
I also went to the weekly Al-Anon meeting I have been attending in my area. The meeting was a topic meeting. The moderator decided to present the topic of "acceptance" Most people talked about acceptance of the alcoholic in their lives. I felt as though acceptance, for me, meant acceptance of who I am. Particularly, who I am right now. Acceptance that I am what I am, and where I am, and that that is OK. I also need to accept my emotions, my fear and suffering. I cannot understand it, and hopefully transcend it, if I am not willing to see and feel it. Simple, I know, but profound to me. I do not do my emotions well. I do not think they have a place in my life. I think they make me weaker. I have been very wrong. I can feel them, but they do not have to rule me. Particularly, in the case of my relating to my son, at this time. I hope.
So where am I right now? What is the next step, as in my personal steps, not The Steps. My next step is to just keep allowing myself to be. I need to know it is OK to feel afraid and someone will care. I need to know that admitting I am scared and unsure is not a failing. I am not a failure. I am told that only Higher Power has the power to change me, and anyone else. I need to know this and understand it. I need to accept where I and my son are, right now, and not try to control him or change him. There are many things I have wanted to change about myself, but I am being told maybe it is not in my power to change them either. I may just need to accept them. I am still not sure I agree with this, but I am entertaining it. I guess I've said this before, but it's still true. I also need to accept this in relationship to my son. I cannot rescue him. Only Higher Power can.
So, again, what does it mean in the serenity prayer, " God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change"....which is what? "Courage to change the things I can"...which is also what? "And the wisdom to know the difference".....so there is a difference? Hmmm...."Help me Higher Power, to understand this. Help me to CLEARLY know what I can and what I cannot change, in myself and in my son, and grant me the wisdom to know this difference". And, "If I can change something, please show me how I can change it. Don't keep me guessing. I really want to know how, if I can. I really want to be able to make my life better, be a better, happier, healthier and saner person. For myself and for my son. If it is your will, that is. " :)
Thanks for listening!
Keep coming back :)
Things to look forward to: My NAMI group tomorrow evening.
Challenges: My boss returns tomorrow. He takes things over again and I have to report to him how things went, and how I dealt with them.
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