a gift of desperation

image credit.. james porto

i went to an al-anon meeting with a friend last night for the 1st time in a coupla years. of course, they focus on the 12 steps around trying to "fix" or "take care" or "manage" their own lives and the lives of the loved ones who are entrenched in addiction.

it was a larger meeting with over 25 people sharing their experiences, strengths, and hope around their own insanity. and again i found these people telling my story. growing up around a family of self-medicating bi-polars taught me to look beyond my own intuition and consider keeping secrets, silencing angers, and troubleshooting potential eruptions.

so many of my family members used alcohol heavily. my mother seemed to be caught on a teeter-totter of self- destruction and secret sadness. i had an uncle that drank so heavily that he got into vehicular accidents more than once, including one that left many in our family with a belief in miracles. my grandfather had kept a bottle of whiskey hidden in the garage his whole life because he managed better with whiskey in him regularly. and my grandmother was always trotting down to the local bar to drag his ass home before she hit the sack.

these are simply the building blocks of my own brand of insanity. i was a survivor of sexual abuse at a very young age and became what could be perceived as a predator. being fatherless had created a void where this sexual interest by males seemed something to covet- and covet i did.  and the more men i snared, the more validation i got and with that came a warped sense of power. so it didn't matter that these guys didn't respect me, or betrayed me, laughed about me, told stories about me- or so i thought.

actually, all that public and private humiliation did take a toll. a great cost actually. i am still paying in many ways.  so as i read step one aloud last night in that room- 1) we admitted we were powerless over alcohol- that our lives had become unmanageable, i realized that i am  (and always have been) powerless over my reactions to my life and that although my life has changed over the years, my responses to these situations are instinctual and ancient.

one of the main gifts of sobriety for me is the ability and grace to recognize my instincts and refrain from indulging them. this is my understanding of the gift of desperation- that my reactions to life only cause me pain and grief and that i need to find to move beyond instinct and learn to ask for help and do things differently.

mea culpa

a quick note- i wanted to definitely thank readers for the comments on the nature's way post. i felt a little insane for a day or so after writing it, because i felt so exposed. but coming out of that, i have felt so incredibly relieved to get it all out. i have discussed most with my doctor, but i really haven't looked at the whole thing until i wrote it out. jeez, it felt great.

i find myself wanting to wonder what's next. but i know better. i would benefit so much by just staying on task and dealing with what's in front of me.

fom wikipedia

In the popular vernacular, the expression "mea culpa" has acquired a more direct meaning, in which, by doing or performing a "mea culpa", someone admits to having made a mistake by one's own fault (meaning that it could have been avoided if that person had been more diligent). It may be used even in trivial situations: if an American football player, for instance, admits that his team lost a game because he missed a field goal, this may be called a "mea culpa", meaning that he admitted his mistake, which he could have avoided (at least in theory), and that resulted in a subsequent evil. In today's American vernacular, people often say "my bad."


i stumbled upon this list of characteristics of adult children of alcoholics. i found it here

1. Adult children of alcoholics guess at what normal behavior is.

2. Adult children of alcoholics have difficulty following a project through from beginning to end.

3. Adult children of alcoholics lie when it would be just as easy to tell the truth.

4. Adult children of alcoholics judge themselves without mercy.

5. Adult children of alcoholics have difficulty having fun.

6. Adult children of alcoholics take themselves very seriously.

7. Adult children of alcoholics have difficulty with intimate relationships.

8. Adult children of alcoholics overreact to changes over which they have no control.

9. Adult children of alcoholics constantly seek approval and affirmation.

10. Adult children of alcoholics usually feel that they are different from other people.

11. Adult children of alcoholics are super responsible or super irresponsible.

12. Adult children of alcoholics are extremely loyal, even in the face of evidence that the loyalty is undeserved.

13. Adult children of alcoholics are impulsive. They tend to lock themselves into a course of action without giving serious consideration to alternative behaviors or possible consequences. This impulsively leads to confusion, self-loathing and loss of control over their environment. In addition, they spend an excessive amount of energy cleaning up the mess.

safe harbor

it was a full and interesting day for me in ptown. lots of activity and lots of lessons in humility and acceptance. it rained much of the day on and off, which i absolutely love sometimes. it causes me to look inward just because of the nature of drizzle.

i met the trash whisperer which was a great pleasure. he is an affirmation that i just might be okay, even though being sober has taken away my security blanket. friendly, smart, and goshdarned funny, i am glad to have moved this acquaintanceship into another level. and a bit relieved, too. i mean, the online-to-human encounters i had before getting clean were laughable most-times. and had pnp not been the prevailing agenda, they would never had lasted. and many times, they didn't last long anyway. that could just be the nature of these things, though.

Being reminded that the community of recovery is much more expansive than my circle of meetings and acquaintances back home is expansive. this is why roundups are compelling, i think. i feel that gay people have some wounds that they carry into adulthood and many of us medicate those wounds wth substances because it helps us feel better. but some of us lose ourselves in that process. overmedicating, i guess. so recovery for lgbt persons en masse sends a message of hope that is long overdue for my tribe. we can be healthy. we can be whole. we can have self-respect. we can be kind and loving to ourselves and each other because we deserve it.

i heard a message from a speaker with 20 years sobriety (10 of which is with al-anon). and it was a message that i needed to hear. " As a child I felt I could count on no one, and I was suspicious of asking others for help." working through this belief may be a message that changes my life.