Lost...

Not sure why, but I found myself on my own blog for the first time in years. Still encouraged by those around me to write a book, I kept this link around to access the many installations of my life over the last several years. Since the days of Facebook, blogs have become obsolete, though, I just realized that has nothing to do with my lack of posting.

I have just had a very unexpected, very unwelcomed "ah-ha moment". I lost myself. A while ago. Like, really, really lost myself.

I wrote that last essay about Ross very early into what would become the most corrosive, painful, and tumultuous period of my life, following which I have never fully recovered. That decision to leap into the unknown of sharing my life with a relapsing addict had consequences that I really didn't even conceive of. I never imagined that I was the sort of woman who would end up so hopelessly trapped in a blinding whirl of madness, control, and despair. And to NOT walk away! I never, ever thought that would be me. But it was. It is.

Now it's time to peel away the layers in my own true form; introspectively, creatively, fearlessly and with a dash of dark humor. Time to find me again. Time to come back.

Letter to a grieving friend...

Maile,
I wanted share something with you. On November 3, 2000, my fiance' Jimmy Van Denend, the love of my life, was killed instantly in a duck hunting accident. His death turned my world upside-down. My grief was unbearable. Every moment of every day was like a surreal nightmare that I thought would never end.

Two things I want to share with you about that experience. First I would like to give you a suggestion that our funeral director gave to me. He told me to forgive people in advance for what they were going to say. People, including me (right now) will grasp for words that will comfort you, even if just for a moment, as they are overwhelmed by a sense of powerlessness. A few of my friends, Jimmys friends, later told me that it was almost more difficult to watch me go through my grief than it was to have lost Jimmy in the first place. Some will succeed at giving you a shred of comfort, a spark of hope. But others may not only fail but may downright offend. Forgive them in advance. They just don't have any idea what to say or do to take your pain away.

Second, I remember so desperately wishing that I could come face to face with myself a year in the future. See, Maile, I could not wrap my mind around the concept that "it won't always feel like this". Time had stopped and each moment felt worse than the one before. Then there would be a minute or two here and there where I would find peace, somehow. I would be distracted or comforted just the right way. Whatever it was, I would get a moment of peace until cruel reality would, all too quickly and violently, come rushing back into my world.

Somehow, somewhere deep down, I believed that I might just survive this experience and I wanted to talk to that girl, myself, once I had survived it.

Maile I remember the day that I could breathe again. Literally breathe as though the suffocating,choking weight on my chest had lifted. I remember the first day that I noticed the sun in the sky. I remember the first time I managed a smile. A real smile. And then a laugh, and eventually a belly laugh. I remember the first time that I realized that I had gone a whole hour without wanting to cry. A whole hour not spinning in my head, replaying the whole thing over and over. And then two hours and then a whole day. I remember the first day that I felt like I might actually get through this pain.

I think about Jimmy all the time. I miss him every day and I talk about him often. My life has been forever separated into before he died and after. Knowing him, loving him, and then losing him has been weaved into a significant portion of the fabric of my being. And I am grateful to have been a part of his life, even though my time with him wasn't long enough.

When people told me that "he was in a better place", that I would get "over" it, and that it would get better with time, these words did not comfort me.

Maile, all I can tell you for sure is that I have no idea where Jimmy went when he left, but I feel him, tangibly feel him, to this day. I know that I am not, nor will I ever be "over it". It is neither possible to get "over" such a defining moment of my life nor is it possible to "get over" loving a man who was and will always be precious to me. I would never wish in a million years to get "over" it. And, for me, it has gotten different with time. I have a beautiful life today that is neither "better" nor "worse" than it was the day Jimmy died. It is what it is. I am a woman who was lucky enough to have had the opportunity to love a man like Jimmy, a woman who lost the man that she loved, a woman who survived that loss, a woman whose whole life was changed by that experience, and a woman who discovered a part of herself, deep down inside, that she never would have otherwise met. I am a woman who, at the lowest moment of her life, was showered with more love than she ever thought possible, and a woman who, today, can empathize with others who suffer a sudden, tragic and unimaginable loss the way only someone who has experienced such a personal loss can. Please know that I, in no way, think that my experience in any way amounts to losing a child. I absolutely cannot imagine what that feels like nor will I pretend like I do. All I have to offer you is my story in the hope that you can find in it some comfort, maybe some hope, or at the very least a moment or two of distraction.

I know it has been a million years since we have spoken but I absolutely mean it when I say that you can call on me day or night if you need someone to listen, someone to talk while you take a break and just listen, or someone to just be still on the other end while you cry and not pretend that she knows just the right thing to say. Soak up the love, you're gonna need it. Try to drink fluids, and if you can't eat, try to sip some Ensure. Stress Vitamin B complex is good for your body right now and try, just try, to be kind to yourself. Your physical body is in as much turmoil as your spirit.

Remember that your grief belongs to you and nobody else. As horrible as it is, it will one day be precious to you. Experience it in your own way, at your own pace.

I wish peace for you and believe that you will feel that peace again someday, somehow.

Your old friend, Liz

find and share recovery images at anonymousspace.com

Letting Go

Madly in love with him as ever, the red flags were a-flying. Never underestimate the power of denial in a situation like this. I didn’t want to admit or accept what was really going on, but the red-light indicators were all there. Sketchy meeting attendance at best, mood swings, late-night bike rides, small lies about certain things like who had called and when, etc…

I tried confronting him a few times, telling him what I was seeing, making suggestions that he find SOMEONE, ANYONE to talk to about what was going on in his head. I watched him show up at meetings and share that his head was all fucked up and that he didn’t understand it, nor did he know what to do with it, and that he needed help. I watched at those same meetings as nobody, not one person, reached out to him. I watched him call his sponsor three times…and receive no phone call back. Then, finally, his sponsor called him back to tell him that he didn’t have time to sponsor him anymore because of his busy work schedule. Add to this the fact that some kid in his aftercare group was offering him heroine on a weekly basis……..and you have the perfect storm. Really, it was only a matter of time before he was gonna use.

I didn’t know what someone on heroine looked or acted like. I’ve never been around it. So, I didn’t know it was happening…right under my nose. I know now that he got high about five times in a two week period, scoring the dope from this kid in Holland. And then he graduated to contacting an old friend and getting good dope from Grand Rapids. He’s lucky to be alive, and he’s lucky all of this only lasted a month.

One day, as I was getting ready to take him to his work for a dinner shift, I noticed a mark on his arm. “What’s that?” I asked. “Don’t know.” He said, “Must be a bug bite or something.” I made jokes on the way to work that he had better hope that his boss didn’t notice the “track marks” on his arms….hahaha. Again, never underestimate the power of denial.

After work that night, he was undressing to get in the shower. I asked to see his arm again. And then I asked to see his other arm. “Oh my fucking God.” I said, “You have track marks.”

My heart broke.

I couldn’t move.

I couldn’t breathe.

It took him a little while to actually admit that he had, in fact, used. At that point, I really believed that it was the first time and that it would be the last.

In true addict form, I took the initiative to educate myself on heroine, it’s chemical make-up, and the symptoms of opiate use. I also proceeded to obsess over every moment that had passed over the previous couple of weeks in a desperate attempt to put the pieces together and figure out what was really going on. This is where the insanity really began.

The month of June was a “fuck-show” of insanity, attempted but failed control, desperation, despair, broken hearts (mine and his), obsession, depression, isolation and withdrawal, confusion, frustration, powerlessness and unmanageability. As it turns out, I am, in fact, powerless over people, places, and things. Not just dope. And most of all I am powerless over someone else’s disease. All of this affected me physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually….also affecting my friendships (ultimately costing me one of my best friends), my sponsorship relationships (both with my sponsor and with my sponsees, and also ultimately costing me my former sponsor), the serenity of my household; including that of my roommates, my parents, my work, my finances.....the list included everything and everyone connected to me in anyway. I was in full blown addiction.

Addicted to him. Addicted to love. Addicted to trying to save him, to stop him, to teach him, to break him, to love him clean. None of it worked..

I tried ultimatums, crocodile tears, boundaries, rules, desperate pleas, threats. In the end, I begged him. “If you love me like you say you do, and you can’t stop using….please let me go. 'Cause I can’t let you go and this is killing me.”

Looking back on the experience from this side of it, I have immense gratitude. Gratitude for the learning experience, the spiritual brokenness and subsequent growth, the further insight into the cunning, baffling and destructive nature of my disease, the strength I have gained from the struggle, and the empathy I am now capable of…..but is it really over? Will it ever be over?

To my knowledge, he’s been clean for a few months now. Ultimately, he came to his own conclusion that he didn’t want to continue getting high. Go figure. He says he hit a spiritual bottom that he had never hit while dealing with the consequences of jails and institutions. For a while there, he was the one dragging ME to meetings, forcing ME to get outside of myself, to participate in my own recovery.

Today, I am more in love with him than ever. We have been through hell and back, and the insanity still slips in every now and again. My stomach turns when his phone vibrates. I find myself asking, “Who’s that?” I get a little nauseous when he leaves the house and I can’t be sure where he’s going or with whom. I think that, in the interest of my disease, I would be quite content keeping him in a glass box on a shelf in my home, in constant view, or implanting a GPS/camera device under his skin to record his every move…..His eyes sometimes look funny to me, and I get a little pang of discomfort when he itches any part of his body, or stays up too late, or goes to bed too early, or is too flirty, or too despondent, or too hyper or too calm…OK, so I’m still insane. But I am progressing in the right direction.

In light of all this, incredibly enough, the more I let go of control, the more I pretend to trust him, the more I have faith and hope that God has both of us firmly in His grasp, the easier it gets to accept. To trust. To love. And to let go.

And, that catch phrase that I heard at a meeting so many years ago holds true now more than ever… “If you think letting go is hard, try holding on….”

it's been a long, strange, trip...

Whew...what a trip. To hell and back.

So, first, a girl falls madly in love with the last human being on earth that she should logically fall in love with. How does that work? What kind of sick, twisted destiny bullshit is that?

They say don't fall for newcomers. Okay. They say it doesn't end well. Sure. They say to just walk away. No problem.

Unfortunately, these suggestions are easier said than done. Yeah, I know. I used to say the same thing. I used to be the anti-13-stepping nazi of all anti-13-stepping nazis. Then it happened to me. Funny how different things can be when the shoe is on the other foot. Talk about humility....

Anyway...the last 6 months have been a roller coaster. Up, down. Upside-down. Loop-de-loop. De-loop, de-loop. Fuck. *sigh*

Am I still madly in love? Absolutely.
Has it all been worth it? Ask me in a year. If I'm not committed by then.

In other news...

I absolutely do not recommend allowing a surgeon to lop off six pounds of excess skin from one's body. Though it has increased my hotness exponentially...it was the worst experience of my life. Pain = beauty? Fuck that.

Trip to Cali...

Just returned home from a superb trip to cali... Had a most unexpected but blessed reunion with an old kindred spirit. Enjoy the snapshots!