Watch your intentions

Watch your intentions,
for they become your thoughts.
Watch your thoughts,
for they become your actions.
Watch your actions,
for they become your life.

Monday last week I was 23 months sober and I celebrated that by ordering very much needed sandals. I had worn out my last Teva’s, to the thread and am now skipping happily on my new ones. ❤  🙂 ❤ Yay! Yes, I wrote about that before but I am so happy with them! They are a sober gift to me which I can wear all day. 🙂

In those 23 months I have seen may sober bloggers close their blog or disappear for a while to resurface with a header saying ‘day 1’. I am always happy when people return. Day 1 is infinitely better than drinking. And then again: I would advise anybody to only start day 1 when they are ready. Unless not being ready is given in by the addict. I made sure I had my last drink and KNEW it. I sort of mind fully drowned myself in alcohol, taking such a ‘dose’ that I would be sure I had enough. I did. I have the feeling my last drink is more than 23 months behind me. I (mainly) do not feel like I have another drink in me. Which is very comforting. I knew it was essential for me to only quit after I had had my last drink so I went looking for that. Which, yes, might sound very much like an addict making an excuse to drink. Not sure, I decided I would quit by myself one day, and then within 2 weeks I found my last drink. I actually think I did not bullshit myself there. I worked towards that last drink and after that did not drink again. Yuck, even the thought repels me. Brrrrr.

But still….. I have been wondering about learing sobriety and I have through the months realised that it goes in layers. First layers I did on the excitement of the do or die choice, on the power that is in hitting rock bottom and knowing it. Then the pink cloud kicked in big time so I was even more excited. 🙂 Through the first few weeks, months there were tiny moments, mainly seconds, where cravings or drink think popped up. Already then I thought ‘This goes in waves.’ but now I realise that it is indeed a process of uncovering the drinking behaviour, the drink think and the intentions. Layer after layer, which might be why at some moments in life it feels like I have to start ‘all over again’. Like I am new to life and living.

Well, that is when I ran into this poem / tile / quote which I actually twisted a bit to fit the purpose:

Watch your intentions,
for they become your thoughts.
Watch your thoughts,
for they become your actions.
Watch your actions,
for they become your life.

When getting sober / not drinking I learned to mind all these 3 levels. My intention was to ‘get clear’. I did not want the addiction between me and the world anymore. I did not want to feel that I had to lie and drink to protect myself. That meant I had to change my thinking and my actions. 🙂 Well, I did. And yeah, that is when the transfer addictions came in but I now take these as a part of the process. Obviously I could not do it differently otherwise I would have done it differently.

That is all for today. Bedtime again. I am still not writing about the horrible week I had at work. I fell into every trap of self flagellation there is and my boss happily joined me to rub it all in. I almost gave up my job, realising that the environment had become even more hostile than I am towards me. That is not good. I work, well, for the money, but also to get myself out of the darkness I was in. Last week I walked into it. All about trusting me, well, not trusting me. No confidence, nowhere, nothing, gone. I have had a 2 day weekend so it the dust has settled a little and I, bhwahahaha, I thought I could say ‘I see now’. I don’t see now, people told me that I should see now that it is not all that bad what I do. I do not believe it for a sec. I need to be perfect, ‘otherwise they don’t love me and I have no right to exist’. It is life threatening to me not to be perfect. 😦 Well, I am at a good place to learn to deal with it and I need to do soon otherwise not the outside world will do me in, but I will. Well, not literally, but this is how it feels. Again: things come in layers. Obviously somewhere I am not doing something. With this job with this destructive management I never know if I should quit or learn to deal. I have asked a colleague of mine to remind me that it is an adult thing to do to get another job before I give up this one. Bwaaaahahahaa, that would be a first.

😦 / 🙂 Gosh…. black and white, impulsive, no emotional control, extremist in anything. 😀 Well, I’ll get there one day. :-).

I AM HAPPY THAT I QUIT. Ooh, imagine having to do this with alcohol. Nasty. Don’t imagine; it is not good. Not drinking = good. 🙂

Going to bed on time too. A woman who loves herself would go to bed now. But do the spellcheck too otherwise she fears that other people might think she is stupid. 😀 Which is actually a true thought. I also have this fear that people who do not know this is not my first language think I have been drinking when I make spelling mistakes. I throw that thought out of the window anytime it passes. It is good for the records to write it down thought. Get it out of my system. 🙂

So, a wwlh does spellcheck today! 🙂

Wishing you a nice beginning of the new week.

xx, Feeling

Slogans

Abbieinwonderland wrote a beautiful post on sober ‘slogans’ – those things which you repeat or tell yourself in order to either understand something, or motivate yourself. After replying to Abbie I found that I would like to save this text as a post on my own page too. So here it is!

“What is in the way, is The Way” – which is a recovery slogan from Mary O’Malley who has written a book about it. It sort of means; if you get stressed from not drinking; work on the stress.

“I am happy that I quit” – which, gheghe, is obviously ‘by me’. I found that being happy about quitting opens a whole different set of possibilities in life in comparison to thinking it is all shitty. If I sit down to moan about it the first thoughts which appear are ‘Ooh, I might as well drink.’ While when I am happy, I am proud of myself, and happy.. The practise of getting to the point of being happy about quitting every day taught me what I actually really felt about it. Which refers back to ‘What is in the way…’

By the way: I am convinced that the thought that alcohol makes us happy is put in our brains by the alcohol industry/society. It is the result of being brainwashed. I take the time to unbrainwash me so I do not have to white knuckle it. It is the difference between trying to stop an oncoming train by hand or just stepping off the rails and watching it pass by.

“What would a woman who loves herself do?” – Teal Swan.
Not sure if it is a slogan but I use it repeatedly to find out what is actually going on. I found, with getting sober, that there are so many energetic / feeling currents under the surface which influence me – and which, I think are the ones that would make me drink if I were to drink – that I think it is necessary to become aware of them and to take care of me with that. Asking this question really helps me making sound decisions. At first I thought I would turn to watching movies at night and fat with eating chocolate. It works out that I put chocolate down and go to bed on time.

“The longer I do not drink, the weaker the addict within becomes.”

“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off’ – Gloria Steinem
I use this insight / slogan to realise that I am not the only one whose process pisses them off.

“In nature, there are neither rewards nor punishments; there are consequences. – Robert Green Ingersoll.
I uses this insight / slogan to stabilize myself when I am hoping for rewards after having done something well or just to make me realise that this is how life works. THIS IS HOW LIFE WORKS. We have added all kinds of emotions and reward systems to this to guide kids in a ‘good’ direction but actually this is the only thing it comes down to.

“One moment at the time / The only thing I have to do is to not drink now in this moment.” On moment at the time is ‘my’ version of ‘one day at the time’. The second one comes from my therapist. (Hi :-)) These slogans helped me to go back to the moment I was living in, instead of looking forward, worrying about something in the future. Like the thought ‘Oooh, I can NEVER drink again!’ would sometimes get to me and then I would remember: No, I only do not have to drink right now. I can manage right now. I never liked ‘One day at the time, one day was way too long for me, that already stretches me into the future. When I do that I lose touch with my base and start to feel ‘out of it’ or unhappy or strange in many possible ways.

And there is: “Whatever it takes is what it takes.” I think I came up with that. Not sure. It is about thinking ‘Nah, I don’t really need ALL that self-care, nah, I don’t really, really need to eat healthy, I don’t really, really need to go to bed early because that would be ridiculous, if I were to need so much care…. pfff, that would be very ridiculous. Nobody else does it….’ I answer to myself: whatever it takes is what it takes.

I guess these are / have been the most important for me. Of which obviously the I am happy that I quit practise has helped me most in the beginning while now I start to feel that I need to take care of me on a deeper level and I continue with ‘What would a woman who loves herself do?’.

Well, I’m going to press the publish button now, but obviously not without saying “I am SOOOOO happy that I quit! 23 Months ago (plus some days) I decided to stop. Shit I was scared but it was a do or die situation to me so I did. And I lived :-). Which, I guess, is good. I bought myself a real real nice pair of Teva sandals because the other ones were worn out after 10 years :-). I actually walked through the sole. 🙂 Is that how you say it? Probably not. I am enjoying every step on the Teva’s :-). Love this brand. Really good collection build up in hardness of the soles and support and durability. Very well done. As a maker of stuff it makes me happy to see brands which actually really think their collection through.

Can’t stop repeating: I am so happy that I quit. It probably sounds cheesy to you all after having heard this so many times but I am. Again and again and again. Life is tough, has been these weeks, more to follow on daily life but I am so happy that I am here and sober and experiencing the ups and downs.

Hope you enjoyed!
xx, Feeling

When will somebody find me?

This week I found a lost girl, 6 years old, she had ran away. Guess I also need to say that I brought her back where she belonged :-D. Today I spotted the 5th (?) lost cat since I came to live here 12 years ago. I took my own cat in from the street here. The cat is also happy that I quit :-). Sitting in the communal (is that the word?) garden trying to connect to the stray cat: ‘When will somebody find me?’ Think I have done too much bonding to the stray already since I am sad and lost and lonely. I would really like somebody to put me together again when I fall apart. Not sure if that is a good relationship description though…

Worked today, working 5 days a week fulltime due to other peoples holidays. I’m in a different position now, I need to do a lot of counting and calculating of the top of my head. I am pretty good at that, or must say: I am pretty good at that when I am not under pressure. This job IS under pressure. I screwed up big time today. My boss says she will replace me tomorrow afternoon “Not because I think you do a bad job, but because I can not afford to have things turn to shit when I am not here.” Which I understand. But it feels not good. I think she meant it.

I did such stupid things today. And when I said “Sorry for botching up you going home early” He said: “I do not mind, you are new at this.” I could not believe his words! Ever since the last post I have been struggling with the concept of doing things wrong and NOT beating myself up for it. I NEED that because the beating myself up actually takes energy I do not have with the lingering concussion and the not so lingering  but very present: “I do not want to be alive because I am scared to do this wrong.” The stupid thing is: I am well educated, this is an un schooled job. I have difficulty doing it. Not because I can’t, but because I am afraid I can’t. So, I have good practise every day to ‘be in the moment’ otherwise I screw up. Every so many minutes I have to fight the urge to run away. I guess this is how I have learned to deal in life, I guess this is what I need to change. My head keeps singing “I don’t want to be here.” That is not only about the work I fantasise I do wrong but it is also about life. I go through life while not wanting to be here. I think that is my biggest karma issue. All the first chakra things I botch up.

And I can write about this on end but I need to get to bed if I want to be performing tomorrow. 🙂 And I want to. I want to learn to do this right because it is practise in wanting to be here, in this life, and to keep my head clear, not zone out, not fade out, not well, not that. I want to be clear. Oooh, I so do not want to be clear. Well, that. CONTINUOUSLY. :-D. Again I am exactly where I need to be.

I am happy that I quit. Damn I would have eeeeeew, drank a lot today if I had not. Brrrrrrr, nasty. I’m off to bed. And no chocolate btw for today! By the time I was done with the stray cat it was too close to bed time to have any. I checked with the woman who loves herself and she says that going to bed is more important than the spell check and editing. Hope it is not too horrible.

I hope you are happy that you quit too. 🙂

xx, Feeling

Chocolate does not equal taking care

Hi!

Wanting to say thank you to you all who have supported me in that dark period last week. I have learned a lot:

• What other people say and do belongs to them. I do not have to take it in. I can listen and then decide wether or not to do something with it.
• My boss is manipulative, mean and destructive. That is what she is. I need to take that seriously and not ‘hope’ that it may be different. Next to that she is also very nice, when it suits her. I do not have to change her. I do not have to take care of others. I only have to take care of myself.
• Asking for help when in trouble is a good thing.
• I need to remember my tools when I’m in a shitty situation. That is when I feel I don’t have a right to take care of me.
• I have a pattern of beating myself up when I do something not to my liking. Beating myself up is not useful. I NEED to learn to also ask WWAWWLHD when in trouble.
• There is a difference between pampering and taking care of myself. Chocolate does not equal care.
• I have, in the last months, I guess ever since I quit seeing the bookstore man, stopped with ‘being aware’. I have been eating chocolate and dates, Facebooking, WordPressing and Netflixing. All to be ‘not aware’ of what I feel, of what is going on. I fear that being aware will kill me. But like alcohol, I realise now it is the not being aware that will get to me in the end. I obviously do not lack a sense of drama so to me thinking about changing this attitude feels as big as quitting alcohol. But my goal with quitting beer was to become clear. That includes quitting the other addictive behaviours.

Sometimes it feels like I am so close and other times I drown myself in stupidity. Today I was SO fed up with the dirty state of my house that I cleaned. Wow, that took a long, long time and I am not totally done yet. Every time I wanted to quit and eat chocolate I asked myself WWAWWLHD? And she would clean because she felt bad about an unclean house. 🙂 The whole ‘WWAWWLHD’ is such an eye opener! And ooh yeah, off topic: Teal Swan, the woman who introduced me to the question and who used it for herself for a year, is getting married today. 🙂

I think it has to do with allowing myself to choose for myself. Allowing myself to close off the rest of the world and take care of me. Allowing myself to take care of me. Period. Because I used to think that I was not worth taking care of. I still do, sometimes. But I am starting to realise that taking care of me is the ‘only way out’. 🙂 (Once an addict, always an addict, always wanting ‘out’.) But I guess this is the good way out, because it goes in.

I need to remember: pampering and selfsedating with chocolate and Netflix does not equal caring. I find it hard to step out of (old) patterns. It seems to me that only setting the egg-timer to check up on me works and hanging these ’tiles’ – post-its with questions on my screen and in the toilet helps. How do you do that?

I am HAPPY that I quit in a tired way but realising I would probably not be alive if I had kept drinking. So I guess that is good because I was/am not ready to die yet. 🙂

WWAWWLHD? She would go to bed. Again, no spell check. And yes that might mean that there are strange sentences too, but if I go reading back I will spend another half an hour explaining, thinking, writing. Don’t want that.

Thank you all for reading 🙂 Love to hear how you deal with changing (old) patterns.

xx, Feeling

 

Turning destructive on me

Got turned down for a job interview which I screwed up totally. It was so bad that I actually apologised for wasting their time and the guy, a person I know from earlier on, did not even refute that but sort of agreed to it with mild but clear remarks.

So, how do I feel? (asks the post-it on my screen). I feel lousy. I feel like I suck at being me and on top of that my boss came down on me with her stupid remarks.

“Hey, you! Feeling! You are going to wear other pants tomorrow, not?!”

“No, these are my favorite shorts.” (besides I don’t have another summer pant)

“The are stupid!”

“Pffff, I think my ass looks very nice in these! Guys: what about my ass, looks good not?” (Yes from all sides at which I wiggle it. Did I really do that? Yes I did.)

“But you have been wearing them for 2 days now! That is not hygienic!”

“Not sure what you do in your pants but these are hygenic enough.” (I was so tired I did not even realise what I was saying. At which all the guys went like “Whoooooo, cat fight!!!!”) “Besides, I only wear them like 5 minutes to get here and then 5 minutes to bike home so what is your worry?” (apart from her not having to worry because I wear a totally different uniform for work which gets washed every day)

“Those shorts are hideous, just like the other one you had!” (just normal jeans which I cut off above the knee, the other one was hideous because 1 size too big, true, who cares? And this one fits perfectly. After having worn made to measure suits for years I am perfectly fine with a pair of selfmade short from a 2nd hand jeans.)

I was hoping I would get the other job so I could leave this jungle where I work now. I get (body) shamed every day by a person who, I guess this is relevant in this story, is 1,5 times my size AND has a bad figure but everything about me is ‘wrong’; “Dye your hair! I need a hot woman at the workplace!” “What you eat is GROSS!!!” (oatmeal porrigde) Her skirts are so short that you can actually see her crotch and half of her buttocks when she bends over. And she knows everything is visible. Because of her forcing her crotch on peoples retina the guys have made a ‘no bending over rule’ in the workplace. Gheghegheghe… Her (beautiful) decoltage is so deep that even the guys find it offensive. 😦 She actually pushed peoples heads in her bossom and then mentions that they have their head in her bossom.

Sooooo, I’m 46 years old. I think I should be dealing with this in a more adult way than shaming her back anonymously on a recovery blog. Or?

What would a woman who loves herself do? She would cry. She would admit that she is powerless of what the other person says. She would, in this case, admit that she is in no emotional state to actually confront her boss on this because she feels that the boss is somewhere right about all her shaming. That is why I am here not? Because I am a loser. 😦 And because I am that I resort to saying nasty things and shaming back. Where is the adult response to situations like this? It is not there. I am tired. Angry. Frustrated. Hungry. Lost and lonely but I feel I am not worth being in contact with people. Who would like me anyway now I screwed up so big and have these stupid pants. I feel locked up in a situation where there seems to be no escape. She will only respect me if I fight back. Why is that? She is continuously gaslighting me?

I don’t know what to do. I feel I should get out of this toxic situation immediately. That I have a right to not be attacked and continously walking on egg shells but I there is no base on what to do it. I am in no state yet to find work which is at my level because my brains don’t function. They just don’t. I can not handle any intellectual pressure, counting is difficult, I have come to a place where again I feel I don’t want to be in this body, in this world. That’s where I do this black and white addict thing: if not all is good, all must be bad. I feel I have no right to stand up for myself anyhow. That all of me what is and was is fake. That I have been found out as a loser.

When leaving I asked the guys what was wrong with my pants. Even one guy, who does not specifically like me, and who is in fashion on his days off said: “Nothing, do not let her get to you.” But even 4 guys saying so can not change my mind back to ‘normal’ because I don’t believe it. And yes, part of me is writing this very uncomfortable story down because I this underdog in me is begging for sympathy.

What I really need is to quit eating sugar. I still hide in sugar which makes me feel like I am dry, but not sober. I use is as an addiction. It is a transfer addiction. And I despise myself for it. Sometimes I don’t mind but every time I have a moment of real clarity, say once every two weeks, I realise that I NEED TO QUIT. But I don’t because I drown the clear voice in sugar. Clarity is hauntingly beautiful and overwhelmingly scary. When I am clear for a split second or a few minutes it is so obvious that what my boss does to me, and others, is not ok. And at that moment I have a polite request for her to change her behaviour. At moments like that I can choose what to let in and what to leave out, which I guess is the key to sobriety. I guess that is another wish for control. But I am thinking it is a healthy one. So why don’t I go there? Why is this blog one of many ‘I shoulds’ and very few ‘I do’s?’

Not connected but somehow I feel it is connected: lately I have begun to count the days till the 25th at which I always celebrate another month of sobriety. I have never done that. I do not believe in looking forward to sobriety dates because it is not an event, it is a process. Sobriety is not a counting thing, it is a feeling, selecting, acting thing. I feel, well, no pun intended but I feel I still don’t get past the feeling stage. I do not WANT the awareness that I need for selecting. I do not want to adult. I do not want to grow up. I do not want to be aware. Feeling thing in reality is tough enough for me as it is. I guess there are ways of not being thrown about by everything but I do not know the ways. Yes I do, but I don’t want them because that needs awareness. And ooh yes, when being aware I might realise that I am not totally awesome.

That is such a funny, funny psychological funny trick. Not sure how it works but I feel totally bad and a loser, than I start writing and bam! the mood changes and I am afraid to wake up because I might not be totally awesome. Fucking addict mentality. I feel I have to do SO MUCH and I don’t do any of it. I am just trying to survive instead of living. I guess that is what my boss is also doing: trying to make us walk on eggshells. At least 3 times a day I hear “Sssssht! She is coming.” I guess that is a quite a clear sign. 😦 Why TF am I writing all this? I am angry, angry that she makes me feel this way. But it is not her who makes me feel this way. It is I who responds to her insults by taking them in and owning them big time. True, her intention is sick. But that does not have to mean I buy it.

That realisation gave me 3 seconds time to step out of this mode and start to take care of myself. Burn some sage to get rid of the darkness. I am tired. I did not eat. I go juice some veggies now and go to bed. Tomorrow is another day and after that it is WEEKEND!

Sorry for boring you with this underdog moaning. I guess it is what I need to deal with big time. This is where this blog comes in ‘handy’: I don’t want to contact people in real life because I am so disturbed energetically that I can not deal. But I do want to feel, imagine (?) somebody reading this and, well, I don’t know, reading it and knowing about it. I can’t sleep now it is in my system. I am also happy that I am anonymous here so I can actually write about other people without feeling burdened with invasion of their privacy.

I AM HAPPY THAT I QUIT in a tired and ungrateful not so happy way ;-). I realise that I would have been drinking a whole lot this evening if I had not been dry. Eeeehks! Sickening. This part of my life is tough because I have never learnt to deal with destruction. I have internalised it. Now I need to learn to separate this too. Like I separated from booze I guess. Aah, now THERE is an entry. 🙂 New practise: block the destructive thoughts even when I think I deserve them.

I wish you a good day/evening. 🙂 Thank you for getting this far in this nasty nasty post which I feel must make people uncomfortable. Sigh. If so: sorry. This is on my path currently. I need to learn to deal with it. No spell check, off to bed.

xx, Feeling

Who Says Our Dysfunctional Parents “Did the Best They Could?” — Score Addicaid

The below post is written by Amy Ellen Jollymore and gives the reader her view on her parents. I find it a big relieve to read this. People have always been telling me ‘your parents did the best they could’ but I have never experienced that. I experienced the same dislike kids can show eachother at kindergarten, at elementary school, at high school, well at any school or in any group, workplace, neighborhood: people are people and some do not get along and most of these don’t care because ‘the other’…..

I did not care to be polite to my parents because I felt they disregarded anything I said. They probably felt the same. It was not ‘their best’, it was powerplay all along. This in a family is dysfunctional. Not saying I would have done better, not saying I could have done better. Ghegheghe, I did the best I could and it was lousy. But I prefer to hear the truth about it: it was lousy. No need to cover up with sentences which try to hide what it was. Lousy.
Read and I actually hope it does not ring true for you, but if it does: it is very freeing. :-)xx, Feeling

Addicaid – Addiction Recovery Support Writer and speaker Amy Eden Jollymore is the author of The Kind Self-Healing Book: Raise Yourself Up with Curiosity and Compassion. She founded the self-help blog guesswhatnormalis.com for adult children of alcoholics in 2005 and recently launched The Kind Self-Healing Project, dedicated to the soul and spirit of lifelong recovery…

via Who Says Our Dysfunctional Parents “Did the Best They Could?” — Score Addicaid

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