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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!

Death of a childhood dream...

So, if you read back on my diaries from high school, you will see me close with exactly the same thing in every entry.

"..and if I could only be thin, then I could get a boyfriend, and then I would be happy."

Now I'm thin, and, much to my dismay...all of my problems are not solved. Who knew? There has been no magic *poof* followed directly by the appearance of a bowl of golden cherries. Nothing like that whatsoever, as a matter of fact.

Hmmm...

In fact, I had to spend $150 at VS yesterday on new bras because my boobs are deflating.

Livin' the dream, y'all. Livin' the dream.

Heartache

It is amazing to me that no matter how well other areas of my life are going, a little heartache can throw everything off-kilter.

You see, there's something I want. Someone, to be more specific. Someone I have hurt. Someone I love.

My friend Rebecca recently put things into perspective for me. I have been bashing myself for my recent behavior concerning men in general, Committing to a year without a relationship, and beating myself up for not wanting to adhere to that commitment when it comes to a certain individual. Rebecca reminded me that it is human nature to want to be with someone. And my favorite poet, Hafiz, said that, "We are people who need love, because Love is the soul's life." *sigh*

I have blogged before about the relationship I have been for the last several months. That relationship ended a few weeks ago. Lots of things have happened over the last few weeks. Lots and lots. Most importantly, I have experienced a dramatic and intense period of spiritual growth rivaled only by the death of my Jimmy six years ago. On a side-note, these periods of spiritual growth are quite commonplace in recovery, usually directly preceded by an intensely painful experience. They are life-changing.

Anyway, back to my heartache...

So...how 'bout when you fall head-over-heels for someone within days of meeting them, go against your commitment not to get into a commitment, six weeks into the relationship you tell your mother that you have met the man you are going to marry, and then when hit the point where things get a little serious you decide that you are not deserving of the kind of love that you are being offered and begin to push that person away. As a result...the relationship falls apart.

Now, after the aforementioned spiritual awakening, you see clearly for the first time, and you have hurt the aforementioned person in such a way that it seems that it will be impossible for him to give you a second chance. And therein lies my dilemma.

I have told him that I want to be with him. I have told him that I can do things right this time. I have told him that I want to be the kind of girlfriend that I know I am capable of being. He just doesn't want to hear it.

And because of this, because of me, my heart aches. Badly.

mmm....cheeseburgers...

More thoughts on weight loss surgery...

Everybody has demons. Everybody has issues. Everyone has been scarred and broken and bruised emotionally if not physically. Everyone has addictive tendencies of one kind or another. People are a mess. They just are. Thing is, usually, people's private, intimate, secret skeletons are just that.

Private. Intimate. Secret.

We don't have that option. We wear our addiction on our sleeves. It is hard to be 305lbs and hide the fact that you have food issues. You can be a closet gambler, a closet drinker, a closet drugger, a closet abuser, a closet self-loather, a closet sex-addict...but it's tough to be a closet overeater.

Everybody knows. Everybody sees. Everywhere you go.

And then...when we've had enough...when we can't go on living like that anymore...we make one of the healthiest decisions we've ever made. We go to any lengths to salvage our lives. To get ourselves back. To mend our broken spirits and stop our destructive behavior.

Problem is, we can't hide that either. It is not normal to lose 160lbs in a year. It is not natural to have a scar from your sternum to your belly button. And when we go through these radical, drastic, almost unbelievable physical changes, our personal, private, intimate issues seem to be more obvious than ever.

I think it is because it is socially acceptable to comment on weight loss rather than weight gain. Nobody ever said to me, "Wow! you must have gained at least fifty pounds since the last time I saw you!" I have never heard, "My, your ass is awfully fat. Do you have trouble fitting in chairs?", or, "Boy oh boy, you are so big that you look like you could drop dead of a heart attack at any moment...how is your health?" (OK, so maybe my mother has come close to some of these comments, but with her food issues, she can be less than human at times.)

It is socially acceptable for our dramatic weight loss to be the topic of conversation at a party or a family gathering. People feel comfortable asking us personal questions about the process, about our diet and exercise, about our heath, about our clothing size.

I don't know about you, but I felt like a freak before I lost the weight. Now, on some days, I feel like a freak-show...on display for the world to gawk at.

But, you know what? Fuck 'em. All of 'em. I can crawl through the window of my house when I lock myself out today. I can walk the beach for hours. I can turn heads everywhere I go. I am not a slave to food anymore. I am not obsessed with it. Controlled by it. In love with it. I am free.

And sooner or later, people will get over it. They'll go about their daily business. They won't point or gawk or comment anymore. I'll finally be free to just be me. No more, no less. And my issues, my skeletons, my new ones, will be safely tucked away in my own closet...where they belong.

And I'll probably be thinking, "What is wrong with these people? don't they realize that I have climbed mountains? Slayed dragons? Defeated demons? I wish someone would say something."

Alone...

Ok, so I have come to the conclusion that I am utterly incapable of being alone.

This is a new revelation for me, as I was never "that girl" who bounced from one relationship to the next. I was usually the single one. As a matter of fact, this past Sunday, I was asked out on a date for the very first time in my life. But I digress...

I decided to make the commitment to myself to abstain from dating for a year. I know that the healthy course of action here is for me to spend this year working my steps, gaining a better understanding of my higher power, revealing who I am; assets and liabilities, and, just overall making an effort to remove my head from my ass where intimacy is concerned.

It is not going well.

I broke off the relationship that I was in, but have not successfully stayed away from him. I am obsessed with my ex-fiance' and his new stupid girlfriend (ok, so she may not ACTUALLY be stupid, but for all intent and purposes...). I have at least five poor souls in my pocket at any given time because, as it turns out, being a hot little ticket affords me this sick-ass luxury.

*sigh*

And here's the bitch of it all....I promise you that I am NOT "THAT GIRL"! I swear to you! At least I never was.

I am educated, intelligent, fiscally responsible (much of the time), financially independent, searching, intuitive and deep.....what the fuck am I thinking? Since when have I reduced myself to existing as that woman who thinks that she cannot be without a man? Since when is my self-worth directly proportionate to the number of men who want to date me? What the fuck happened to me? How did I get here????

Alas, all I can do is continue to attempt to make healthy decisions. I suppose when the pain gets great enough...

In the mean time, I will continue focusing on my writing, my recovery, helping other addicts, my work, learning how to play my new purple guitar (which is super-rad, by the way), taking care of my babies (my animals) and enjoying life. (When I'm not obsessing about one fucking man or another.)

I am REALLY disappointed in myself. Really. I am. But, I'll keep coming back.

Serious weight loss complications...

I knew going into this thing that there would be a risk of serious complications. I was informed that this surgery could result in medical complications ranging from blockages to vitamin deficiencies to death. I knew that there were risks. Serious risks. I knew that everything would change. They told me that things would be different, better. I prepared myself for a "new life". I wasn't confused about the fact that I was entering uncharted territory. What I didn't know... What I couldn't know... What I never prepared for... Was the fact that I feel as if I am walking around in someone else's body. On a different planet, even. I didn't know that one potential complication of this surgery was that it would not only change my body, mind and spirit, but that it would change the way the girl in the check-out lane acknowledged me. I didn't know that a stranger's glance and even mannerisms would be different. That men look at me in a manner strange to me, speak to me in a way I've never been spoken to. That women would place me in a new category, and treat me in a different way. That when children who I don't even know approached me, they would have a different look in their eyes, say things I'm not used to hearing. How I'm treated by my friends, by my family, by people who knew me then and people who are just meeting me now....that none of it would be the same. None of it would be comfortable. None of it would feel safe. I didn't know what it feels like to be objectified. To be treated as a thing rather than as a human being. To be treated as a potential sex partner instead of a friend. To be looked at instead of looked around or through. I had no idea that there would be expectations. That people would expect me to say or do or act a certain way just because of what I look like on the outside. Somehow, I thought that for the first time in my life, I could be freed from the bondage of always being aware of what I "look like". I could not have been more wrong. A serious complication of my weight loss surgery has been that one minute I was morbidly obese and the next minute I am what society deems as "attractive". And everything has changed. You see, society doesn't treat the former the same as the latter. And what it seems that everyone is missing...the part that they just don't get...is that it's just me in here. And it always was.