The gift of letting go.

I went out on my porch this evening, it's been a long few weeks and I decided to sit out in the dark air. I've felt a great deal of ambivalence lately. Almost as if I have been waiting for something to happen, movement of sorts. I feel like life has been in a holding pattern, that some things needed to be sorted out.

I turned on the light, and sitting on the stone was a package. It was my birthday a few weeks ago, a time of end of summer celebration, and life has been quiet since then. But, now, in my solitude, was a gift within the brown box, bringing a sense of my own private celebration.

I recognized the envelope. My father's love before he passed away. A woman I admired deeply and have reconnected with after twenty two years. I knew the handwriting, I stared at it over and over. The same handwriting I had seen so many years ago. Notes I had seen her write, loving my father, me so intensely. Handwriting that was slightly flawed, like us. I ran my fingers, tracing the past. And, at that point I knew this gift was much much larger than a 6 x9 container.

My father believed, in some culmination of religious and/or philosophical beliefs, that he was going to be a hawk when he died. I have heard more versions of why, how and when he wanted to be a hawk post-life than I am able to count, including my own biased version. More important was this belief when he was alive. He was adamant about his passage. He wore a gold hawk around his neck. It symbolized his very passion for life and where his place was after. I have pictures. I have vivid memories of this very embodiment of him.

And when I opened the envelope, I knew what was in there. My hand instinctively reached in and fumbled for it. A card came, but I didn't need to open it at all. I knew that wrapped neatly inside white tissue was the sign I've been waiting for. The gift I had been hoping for the better portion of my life.

So, there I sat. Totally unprepared for what came next. I cried. Sitting on my farm with my unwrapped past in my hand. I bawled. Tears pouring down, as they do right now. Total and utter watershed. I missed my life as a child, my father, his loved one, my family. The time before I lost him. The time before we all lost him.

That's just it. We had all lost him. And here, I had suddenly found a piece of him in my hand. And that piece was given to me. She was letting go. And in that, she has given back a piece of me. A piece of my father. The very piece I had been waiting for. Her relationship with her past moves on. My life moves on. I have been giving the most amazing gift. She let go and knew that I needed this piece, this remembrance of passion and love and time where life was strong and good. And I knew it would come. I've waited. And around my neck was the missing piece to my past.

I cannot tell you the love that I feel in my heart right now. Overwhelming and beautiful. Sad and truly awe-inspiring at the same time. I swear, the wind kicked up as I sat there. I cried, but I smiled at the same time. I knew that this day would come. And I thank you so much for giving me the gift of letting go.

Lost My Way

The other day I was writing an e-mail to a friend of mine that has been long removed from my life, a friend that I went to high school with. In the e-mail I wrote, I said: "You know, somewhere between then and now, I lost my way". And that phrase has been stuck in my head ever since.

And it's true. Somewhere between the time I was young and a few years ago, I really did lose my way. I liken it to walking down this long long road that we call life. Throughout my journey, I've had this backpack attached to me with the weight of myself, my emotions, my grief. There have been times when I have stopped along the way and joined others, I married young and tried my hardest to live the picket fence dream with my backpack filling with my junk each step. I walked down big roads; divorce, sobriety, death. I walked along empty barren streets, peering into windows of others lives I wanted so desperately to live in, my backpack aching from the weight. It was like window shopping, seeing all the different lives I could be living. I just kept walking until I really just got lost.

Many times, I asked directions from those who didn't know the way either or others who tried to point me in the right direction but I just didn't know HOW to ask. I faltered from the weight of my own demons. A lot of stumbling, I was desperately looking for a way home or a diversion to just let the backpack fall for awhile. There were some lonely travels along dark paths. I was unclear. Heavy, unfocused.

And while I lost my way, I didn't stop. Every time I fell, I got up. I learned about the journey. I started looking to lighten my load of baggage to help move my life along. I paused briefly and began to examine those things. Trial and error, seeing what matter and what didn't. I dug deep until I finally pulled out the one thing I needed, a shiny compass buried at the bottom of my bulging sack of useless crap.

Today, I'm navigating. Perhaps I will always be a bit of a wanderer. A bit confused, but on my own road, with direction and purpose. I got lost, changed the way I traveled and now I am finding my way back. Walking through life with the shiny compass that I found in my soul. Stopping along the way to remember why I am walking along, the adventure, the love of traveling through. I am not lost, I'm on my way.

So, my next ponderance, my next life question will be, "Where the hell am I going?"

Let go.

Today I am just letting go for the next few hours. That's it. I'm not going to write about it, I'm just going to do it.

A gift for today.

Sober Balance

One of the toughest things that I face in recovery is how to balance my life as someone in recovery with what I perceive as my life as a "normal" person. When I sit and take inventory of both facets, I look at each separately; sobriety and life outside of sobriety, and then figure out how to balance the two together. It's a never ending tango, to be both sober and live in a non-sober world. In reality, however, it's our perception of ourselves and our recovery that lead to the most success.

For example, in early recovery, I had great difficulty imagining life outside of the drinking bubble I had lived in. My comfort level being sober was non-existent. I was so focused on what I was missing out on, what people would think, where to avoid life. It never occurred to me that people just don't care as much as you think. That most of the stress I felt about the image of recovery was coming from within myself. Ultimately, the driving factor that kept me sober at that point was that I likely would have either ended my own life or caused irreversible emotional damage. Somewhere, somehow I knew this and made this my biggest priority, knowing that I could deal with the other aspects later.

After almost seven years, this balancing has now become the focal point of my recovery. I am secure enough to know that I will not drink again, I have tools in place within my head and life that allow me to know that when I want to drink, I just need to do x,y,z to get the thought out of my head (mostly, I just think about how fast my life would go back to being entirely destructive and unhealthy and that usually does the trick).

And for the most part, today, I am comfortable in uncomfortable situations; ie, making people feel OK that I don't drink or declining that mojito that I missed experiencing without too much of a longing face. It's just easier to simplify the situation for others, less questions and more "normal" interactions.

The real balancing act is within myself. Do I really feel comfortable with myself as a sober person? Am I taking real emotionally responsibility every day of my life? Am I doing the things I need to do to create the most healthy environment to bring out the best things about me and my recovery? These are daily questions.

In all honesty, I would sometimes rather pretend that the world doesn't care that I drink or not drink as this is likely the case. We project that people want us to act the way we did when we were not sober. I personally think I was entirely more fun and free spirited when I drank, but I don't value that as much as I value the fact that I am so much more me now. That I am able to be coherent and responsible and loving towards myself. Because, that was not the cause back when. It's about changing our perceptions about ourselves and what we value in our core being. I used to value the fun. I used to value what people thought about me to such a degree that I let my personality be dictated by it.

Today, I value fun as well. There is no doubt that I am still a blast to hang out with. I just don't get belligerent or throw up. I don't take unnecessary risks beyond what I know I can be responsible for the consequences. If I put being sober and being drunk on a balance, I would find that drinking was so much heavier in my life, and not in a positive way. It's just a matter of what the balance is measuring that we need to keep defining. It's our choice and responsibility to change the thinking behind ourselves. And, once we can do that, what we choose to balance becomes evident.

There are many times in the last almost seven years that I find myself trying to define the word sober. Sober. Sobriety. Not drinking. Recovery. Change in life. T

he dictionary defines sober: * Habitually abstemious in the use of alcoholic liquors or drugs; temperate.* Not intoxicated or affected by the use of drugs.* Plain or subdued: sober attire.* Devoid of frivolity, excess, exaggeration, or speculative imagination; straightforward: gave a sober assessment of the situation.* Marked by seriousness, gravity, or solemnity of conduct or character. See Synonyms at serious.* Marked by circumspection and self-restraint.

Self restraint? Devoid of excess or speculative imagination? The question arises in my own head....have I become boring and morose in my sober life? Have I become plagued with seriousness because I have chosen this path?In the last three years, I have also found myself having to defend and define my sober life. "Why don't you drink?" "What happened to make you stop?" "Are you WEIRD?" "YOU DON'T GO OUT?" "Have you no fun in your life?" Well, I think to myself tirelessly, life is just different.What happened to make me cease drinking habitually for the majority of my young adult life? Well, I guess things were just not working the way I wanted. Nothing significant happened, per se. Yes, I hit bottom, but not in any spectacular fashion. I just got sober. I simply took out an element of my life that caused me pain. And now, I find that people have a difficult time grasping the concept.And when did I become so concerned about what people think? Years ago, I could get drunk, stand on a bar and proclaim my love for Jimmy Buffett in song without skipping a beat. I could fall down the stairs at a restaurant and simply smile and say, "oopsie". But, we live in a world surrounded by alcoholic intentions. It's part of our society and part of the way we chose to socialize. Not a day goes by that does not include a reference to alcohol. And I accept that with the grace of a woman who has made a choice. But, damn it, it's still frustrating as hell. I actually watch people watch me at parties. I see them double glancing at my martini glass making sure that there is nothing stronger than Diet Coke in my glass. And these people never knew me BEFORE! If they had, the would know that I rarely drank martinis. I play the part with little fanfare. I participate in the charade of the drinking world with my own sober theatrics. And when I arrive home to my bed, I collapse with the exhaustive sigh of someone in recovery. I have worked to make everyone feel comfortable for the choices I have made...and for a moment, I wish I could replace the word sober with some amazing adjective that would wipe away the stigma of my decisions. The stigma of all my past mistakes. . And yes, I wish I could replace sober with just about any other word in the English language. And in all of these quandries, I sometimes find myself questioning my motives. Why am I really doing this? Meeting people that I never knew existed. Constantly searching for my own soapbox to stand on. My purpose. My MO. When before I was simply a woman with a drinking problem. I did not publicize my life on such a vehement scale. I was never a hippie, cause- related type of woman. I drank. I got drunk. I caused some drama and then went home to pass out.Now, things are different. I have made a choice that has changed my life. I will not change the fact that I am sober, so sober it is. So, I have taken the liberty in redefining the word sober in my own glorified dicitonary: sober (adj.): respect for one's own self. Self assured, self-aware and unconcerned with those people who just don't get the reasons for this journey. And for those of you who drink, life on the other side is not bleak and weary. Blisters do not appear when in the presence of someone sober.

Glamour Magazine article, 2004

Many requests to post the article that ran in Glamour. Please e-mail me if you would like to view a copy.

Picking up the pieces

Over the course of my adult life, I have found that I am a sweeper of sorts. Frequently, I find that I am left to pick up pieces of many situations of my life. Many of these pieces that I pick up are either broken due to myself or the relationships I have with others. And for many many years, I've waited for someone else to come in and sweep up what's been broken.

Today, I know that no one carries the broom but me. It hit me the other day as I have finally started the book that needs to be written. I've been waiting for others to take responsibility for my feelings. In reality, the only person who can gain closure to any situation that has had an emotional impact is ourselves. We have to own it in order to let it go. Can I go back and ask my deceased father why he left me at such a young age? No. Can I keep wondering why such and such a relationship didn't work out? Not worth it.

All of the emotional pieces; anger, frustration, hurt, abandonment, joy, love. Those are mine to pick up and put back together the way that is the most healthy and constructive to my life.

And, I am ready to do this. I am absolutely resolved to not sweep my past under the rug. I am choosing those emotions I want to put into the larger puzzle of my life and discarding the ones that cause me the most grief.