Diary:
I continue to cope with obsessive thoughts without turning to slots as an escape. Without the gambling layer with all of the financial fallout/drama I am able to see more clearly the source or maybe root cause of my addiction. Fear and anxiety. Take this morning for example; A typical Monday morning. P pops up at 6:30. The dogs are barking to get out and the lovebird is chirping at days first light. The house is abuzz with activity. Me? I have been up since 4 am reading about dysplastic nevi and melanoma. P offers me my first cup of coffee along with a cheerful "morning!". I smile back with my best fake smile and reply, "thanks!" Inside I'm a quivering mess. I finally get the words out, can you look at this? And, for the 20th time in maybe 3 days P looks and responds "looks the same to me". I'm a hypochondriac? I probably always was to some degree. My mom is. My youngest brother is too. My mom used to say the one thing she remembered most about her own mother was that she was very fearful. Fear sucks! Fear steals my attention. Fear fuels my addictions. My fears feel very real. P tells me that obsession and anxiety can often times be due to chemical imbalances in the brain. Maybe. I don't always obcess about health. Sometimes it's about P getting killed on the way into work by some drunk driver. Or, maybe she will come down with some fatal illness. Do I think life in general sucks? No. I don't. I hate being aware that it will end though. When I'm sitting in front of a slot machine completely absorbed in "the zone", I become blissfully unaware. The twenty dollar bills I feed into the game are not the twenty dollar bills I use for food and other needful things. The only time I am aware of "real" money being lost is when it's all gone. The gambling haze lifts and reality sets in. A psychiatrist? Maybe. I saw one several years back to talk about childhood "stuff". Recovering addicts? I know many. I attended AA back in the early 90s. I no longer drink. Cured? I don't know.. 12 steps? I found them very helpful. GA? Not in Massachusetts. Very few meetings even available because gambling has only been legal in this state for a few months. Besides, I'm not a big fan of "churches". Not looking for a debate. Just thinking out loud here. I'm an aging woman. Maybe nothing unique about the addict part. Maybe nothing unique about the menopausal part either. It's just that whoever I am; this is the first time I can remember being and feeling "old" at the same time. This is what it feels like to be in MY skin. Maybe I'm not special or unique. Maybe I'm just a run in the mill old lady. I believe I will find my way. The one one thing I have and have always had was a spark of hope. Funny thing this looooooong post took me away for awhile. When I was a kid I used to draw and paint and sing and write.. Maybe there is something to that. Maybe I need to get back and rediscover my personal zone. The place I used to go when I was a frightened or bored child. I didn't need gambling or a smoke or a drink back then.... Ramble over for now. I feel my mind resurfacing now. Back to reality.
Hi Sis,
Amazing post to read. Got my head nodding in agreement and shaking at the times seeing what you don't seem to see when in the cloud of "deep thought" ..
I guess we tend to miss the importance of life here and now..simple thought - tough to process huh.
Fear. We all have fears and not all of them has to be dealt with head on..some fears we don't even realise we have..and maybe never will. The ones we already come to terms with, we are trying to analyse deeply and make sense off. Therapies are helpful, they gives you insight on the subject and more ways to look at it. I have many fears...i dealt with many of them in my time on this earth. Some i will probably never get over with but strangely i don't even think about them now...not until i have to deal with them head on. Yesterday i must of dealt with 5 of my insecurities/fears...
Train journey
Massive crowds
Taking selfies (haha..yup..not a fan of my own mug)
Speaking up (always feel i am about to say something wrong or "don't understand", where i put extra pressure on myself)
Driving 100miles with flashing lights on dashboard giving me & my car warnings about packing up.
However...i dealt with them ALL one by one. I am still a little shocked but also v pleased i done it.
The other day i was driving back from my meeting..i had such a calm feeling that i thought about death/accident in other light. It was pouring down and the screen wipers hardly worked...lorries overtaking, going the extra "bath" for my lil car..i felt calm and thought "well, if it happens at least I'm gonna leave this place with smile on my face..not drunk, nor in a gambling mode, nor out of my face.". It was strange feeling..i felt peace from within.
Now..it all turned out about me lol...hey - i did marathon for you and every single person on this earth who fights or has fears of nasty disease - cancer. We all united for this cause, i had so many prayers in my head over night it kept me going & going..
Fear is absolutely normal emotion. We don't have to try and escape it..why should we? Why don't we just look at it as the way of life and universe? I am also confused...but i am looking ahead more than behind. Maybe that's the key..dunno.
Finding your own personal zone is really commandable..drawing, meditating, watching the nature come alive, listening to the music, ..etc. we all have our places where mind gets a little calmer and daily things we see as disaster comes under different...not so harming light..not so important light because we are here and living that feeling..it passes...without escaping away to make that feeling come back 10Г— worse that it orriginally started.
I am proud of you! You are very brave lady & even if fear is a feeling of being out of control, you have more than plenty logical points in you to concur it in the best way - head on.
Wishing you a good day..love & peace and many many calm thoughts..you have it in you...let them.shine the light for the journey ahead вє
Hugs hun
S x
Good to see you here and getting it all out on your diary..."I continue to cope with obsessive thoughts without turning to slots as an escape"...that's got to be a good thing. So, I'm going to fight my own tendencies to step in and try to offer solutions and to rescue you...that's not my place (see, I am learning!) and you don't need rescuing 🙂 You and I both know that it doesn't feel possible to simply turn off those obsessive thoughts (it is possible...it just doesn't feel it), so I'm not even going to go there. So instead, a few random thoughts of mine...
You've probably been over this ground many times before. Lumps and bumps, worrying pains, possible cancers...given that you're still here I'm assuming that they've all come to nothing in the end. So it's very likely that this will be the case again. But, let's assume that your worst fears are realised. That spot does turn out to be a malignant melanoma. Even then, it's not game over...there's treatment and a good chance you'll be ok. And if you're not...do you want to have spent your last days, weeks, months, in a gambling haze? Is that how you want it to end, in self inflicted misery?...what a sad end to such an amazing person. I'm glad you've got your appointment booked and that you're taking steps to address this. This obsessive thinking can be changed (you know that) or you could look at ACT and see if there's anything for you in that concept...acceptance of it rather than trying to change it. If you haven't seen a psychiatrist for years, maybe now might be a good time to see one again. It sounds as though you've lived with fear breathing down your neck for many years.There was a time when you had good reason to be fearful...but not anymore. Fear is uncomfortable, but perhapes it's comforting at the same time. I know that sounds perverse, but why else, when you really don't have anything to fear, does your mind conjure up things to frighten yourself with?
I also have to say...come on girl...seriously, how old are you? I don't think there's a huge number of years between us (I'm 50 this year). Unless you are actually 105, then "I'm just a run in the mill old lady" are not phrases that need to be coming out of your mouth. You've got years of life left. They can (and will) be great years. You've got a settled life with someone who loves you.You know yourself better now than you ever have done and you have an awful lot to offer the world. A wizened old bat sitting at a slot machine is not the image I have of you 🙂
LifeBegins x
Good to see you getting it out Joan...Ramble don't gamble! I wish I knew how to chase away your fears but apart from the breathe in for 6, out for 8 to reset the fight/flight reflexes in your brain I have nothing much than to say try not to fear the paper tigers! Myself & Sandra spent weeks obsessing about yomping the streets of London in just our bras (MoonWalk) only to discover that the strict rules weren't adhered to! You may feel old but that's because you are a survivor & you have found a way to deal with life & the hand it has dealt up til now just as I am sure you will continue to fight for your future!
May sound like a daft question but have you thought about colouring in? They do adult books now with crazy patterns/thick line drawings to suit my moods & not that I need to but I can lose hours between the pages! Crank the music up & for an added challenge, sing along whilst sticking strictly between the lines, that should keep your brain busy in the now.
Laughing through tears because between LB's remark about " wizened old bat" and the visual of ODAAT and Sandra running thru the streets of London in their bras.. Ha ha ha .. Thank you, you two "nutters". We don't say that in the US but, I love the term. I have just turned 56 this past April and have come to realize that I will not live forever. That time is passing and I can no longer afford to throw it away like twenty dollar bills that were somehow not real until they were gone.. Probably not making sense but, I remember how raw I felt when newly sober. I have decided to stop gambling. I have decided to let it go for real and I feel like my skin has been turned inside out. I feel like I'm driving with a blindfold on. I'm just really f*****g scared.
"I have decided to let it go for real"...and there it is. Really, truely making that decision and meaning it. No doors left open, no going back... but instead a commitment to live this life without gambling. Of course you're scared...it's f*****g scarey out there with nothing to fall back on when things get tough. That's how it feels right now, but it won't always feel this way. And of course, it's not really true is it? You have things to fall back on. You have here, you have friends, you have P. You've learnt a lot along the way to put yourself in the very best position to really embrace recovery. You've done it with alcohol and you'll do it with slots. You will feel raw. You may be scared. It might be hard. And that's ok. You're strong enough to deal with all the emotions that come up. Now that you've made the decision, I think you're going to follow it through. You'll be ok, I'm sure of it. LB x
What you said is true LB. I have already come through a lot. I had a huge mass in my abdomen that turned out to be an enormous benign fibroid. I had some spot on my intestine that turned out to be nothing. I had a wonky ovary and that turned out to be nothing more than a benign chocolate cyst. Sounds like candy but not at all. I had an embedded kidney stone and never thought I'd live through the pain but I did. The last adventure was a benign tumor in my parathyroid gland. Maybe I'm worried that my luck is running out. Maybe it is me as you said looking for comfort from fear itself. Wrapping myself up in it like an itchy old blanket. It might suck but it's what I know and knowing has got to be better than not knowing. What I know - I can hold onto. Better than free falling. Better than feeling groundless. We simply can't know the future. Worrying about it is a useless waste of time. What will be will be. No, I will not waste another moment in a slots haze. I just thought about that Friday night in the emergency room at Children's Memorial hospital. My little 7 year old niece was there with her stunned parents waiting for the test results that would later reveal leukemia. When her parents stepped out to speak with the oncologist on call I sat beside Madison who was laying on a hospital gurny. Not sure how it all got started but she and I were singing This Land is Your Land on the top of our lungs. It was at about "as I was walking that ribbon of highway" when maddy's other auntie came in looking as pale as a candle. I knew then what the doctors must have told her. I never stopped singing and I can remember just nodding at auntie Betty and thru held back tears she began singing right along. I think I might have been brave in that moment. I wanted to scream and kick something and cry but looking at maddy lying there so little and helpless I knew I needed to be brave for her. To show her how. I know I have it in me. Just gotta reach in and find it. Like you said LB so what if it's worst case. f*****g bring it on then! I can't change what's gonna happen but I can be brave.
Diary:
Learning how to accept the things I can't do a d**n thing about and change the things I can. I cannot go back and change the past. I cannot stop time - make the best vacation ever last for all eternity. I cannot predict the future. I can try to be calmer. Start taking those breaths. I can learn to BE more in each moment that I do have ( mindfulness). I can choose to cry because it's over, or smile because it happened. I can learn to accept what comes my way without judgement. Maybe what happens is what is supposed to happen. Trust Life. Believe like I once did that it is wiser than I am. I can be fearful or courageous it's a choice. I can be filled with dread or boundless curiosity. Amazing grace does have the sweetest sound. Time should never be taken for granted but, we all have to figure that out in our own time whatever that time might be. We can love eachother cherish moments and make memories but we can't hold onto eachother. We can despair or we can hope. Hope is something I can hold onto. Every new day comes with boundless opportunity. I have to choose Life and hold onto hope. "Get busy living or get busy dyin". Its a choice.
Your words about your niece bought tears to my eyes. Thank you for sharing that with us.
You've survived a lot of things in your life, both personally and as a family...I knew you were strong. I think your last post just emphasises that. And you're absolutely right...you do have to choose life and hold onto hope. It's funny really, because all of these thoughts that we torment ourselves with aren't real. They're just things that we tell ourselves or things we want to believe. Kelly has told me that the big man won't take any one he's not ready for. Personally, me and the man upstairs aren't on the best of terms so I don't buy into what she's saying. However, I was told by a psychic that I was going to live until I was 85 and I just decided to go with that idea. Mad really. I'm a sane, analytical, sensible woman normally and here I am taking the word of someone who was probably just fleecing me for money (she told me lots of very credible things about my lost loved ones, so that probably swayed it for me). But it helped me, and I went with it. The point I guess I'm making is that it's all just nonsense that we tell ourselves. So we can tell ourselves scary stuff and live fearfully, or tell ourselves good stuff and live sanely.
It's funny how you live in Massachusettes. We went there to a training programme with my son when he was little and first dignosed with autism. The founding principle of the programme was "Happiness Is A Choice". We had a choice to be happy about the diagnosis, about our future, about his abilities...about everything in our lives. It was a really hard concept to wrap my head around at first (my son has a life long disability and I can choose to be happy about it? Yeah, right) but actually it turned out to be the basis of everything I've done since. It's not easy...it's downright f*****g hard a lot of the time...but it is a choice.
Just like the choices you're making.
In AA they called it having or undergoing a spiritual awakening. When I am thinking with my addict brain my mind is closed. When I am thinking with a recovering addicts brain my mind is open. Great things happen when I receive the day with an open mind. I can always tell when I'm functioning with my addict brain. I read posts like the one I'm about to write and want to throw up in my mouth. Lol. There's a scene at the end of the film Thelma and Louise where Thelma says, " you know what Louise I feel awake, really awake." Up to that point Thelma had let herself be run around by her husband. She let him treat her like a child. She was a victim. In that moment she had a spiritual awakening of sorts. She realized for the first time that she was in charge. She would be a victim no more. She would take her life into her own hands and the choices she made and would make going forward would be her her own. I'm certain now, that Ed's death threw me for a loop. I think I'm ready to let it go now. I will always remember him. I will choose to keep the very best of him with me and as for all of the rest? The parts I had no control over. The parts I can never understand. I will leave to evaporate into the thin air or be carried off by the breeze. We collected baseball cards. We made up silly songs and laughed our butts off. We shared a love for music and sentimental things. We cried together. We celebrated together. So many great memories start to surface now that I have let the pain just go. Now, that I have made room. Now that I have decided to be a victim no more. Now it's baby steps going forward. One foot in front of the other. One step at a time.
What a great post Joan & not a hint of puke 🙂
You know this is what he would have wanted...RIP Ed!
Definitely K. It would kill him all over again if he knew how much pain I was causing myself ruminating over details that had nothing to do with me or us as sibs. He made his own choices. He lived and died on his own terms and it's not mine to judge. All I have to do is what comes most natural and easy and that's to remember him and always love him. And, in honor of his memory live to the fullest whatever time I have left. I was gonna apologizebfornthe frequent ramblings but, agree that rambling and not gambling is the way forward for now at least..
Diary :
Sitting in my backyard in a hand crafted Adirondack chair that P got me for my Birthday and looking out over the expanse of our freshly mowed lawn makes me realize how lucky I am. P sitting in the chair beside me. I really do have everything already. All I have to do is embrace it. I have a much better handle today on why I gambled. I don't need to go back there. Open mind. Open heart. Time to get my life back. Not really getting it back but for me, more like waking up and wrapping my arms around it.
and, accepting that; que sera sera...
Hi Joan , I'd just posted to LB earlier saying amongst other things, how I'd been gratefull to witness the love and empathy going back and forth regarding your recent post's concerning your health . I really wanted to say something to offer a little comfort to you but just didn't have the words ( if that makes sense ? ) . Were not far apart in age terms and can fully understand where your coming from when you speak of being frightened of what life may throw at us next in terms of our health , we do have to accept our bodies are getting older now and at times things can go wrong , I'm now at peace with myself over that issue , my Dad died at 47 and my mum at 77, so I figure I'm going to fall somewhere inbetween those numbers ? I'm 55 now so I'm sure as hell not going to sit around for 22 years worrying what if , so your absoulutely right Que sera , sera , what will be will be ( I had a secret crush on Doris Day as a kid ) :)).
We need to embrace every day in every way , I will and I hope your going to join me ? .
Let life in and enjoy all it has to offer !
Glad youv'e had a better day Joan .
Love and best wishes for tommorow Alan x
Never feel the need to apologise for the "frequent ramblings". It's been a priviledge to observe you working things out for yourself, and sharing your thoughts openly and honestly helps those who get to read them. Of course Ed's death threw you for a loop...really, how could it not? It takes time to heal from an expericence like that but it seems as though that healing has truely begun. Embracing life...open mind, open heart. I like that. It reminds me of the poem I read at my sister's funeral. The last verse said "You can cry and close your mind, Be empty and turn your back. Or you can do what she'd have wanted...Smile, open your eyes, love and go on"
Here's to living life x
We are available 24 hours a day, every day of the year. You can also contact us for free on 0808 80 20 133. If you would like to find out more about the service before you start, including information on confidentiality, please click below. Call recordings and chat transcripts are saved for 28 days for quality assurance.
