Taking Care of Self

When you love someone with an addiction, regardless of what that addiction may be, we seem to begin to neglect ourselves. Maybe its because we spend so much time taking care of others, or perhaps it is because we believe to need help may be a weakness. We learn to keep pushing in life no matter if we are sick, or tired or emotinally drained without stopping to perform any kind of self care.

I read about this in my Courage To Change book today -the funny part is after a morning of trying to talk myself out of it I called out of work today because I have come down with the flu. For many people this is a no brainer- for me to stop and take a day to nuture and care for myself is a huge step.

What I realized is that we spend so much time making sure others are okay and have what they need to be successful that we allow ourselves to fall to the wayside, our needs become less important to the point that we learn to ignore them all together. We may even get to the place where we feel guilty doing something for ourselves or taking time to nuture ourselves. Now when in a relationship with an active (and sometimes even recovering addict) this behavior combined with the self centeredness the addict acquires during their addiction is a great fit. Everything is about them!!! However when we are working towards healing ourselves we find out that we have to put the same amount of care we would into supporting them into supporting ourselves. We deserve it...

Given that I have given myself and you a challenge- do soemthing nice for yourself today- anything it can be as small or large as you like- block out some time just for you- take a bath, read a book, apply some makeup, buy yourself something anything just take a minute and take care of you-

And that moment where you second guess yourself because you feel a twang of guilt- remind yourself that you deserve it!

Holding It Together

Anyone Can Give Up-
It's the easiest thing to do.
But to hold it together

When everyone would understand if you fell apart

Now that's true strength.



This quote means a lot to me because I am often asked how I keep going. I am a survivor-I have learned that addiction is not my fault and I make sure to find time everyday to take care of myself. Somewhere along this journey I found an inner strength that helps me to prevail no matter what comes my way. Now I am not superwoman and there are times that I break down-the difference is I allow myself a short time to feel bad and even sorry for myself -and then pick myself up and find the solution with my head held high and shoulders square-because what does not kill me makes me stronger!

I Can Control Every One- Can't I??

I have been called controlling- more than a few times. And as much as I have heard the term used I never was really able to grasp my head around it. It was almost as though I thought these people were really insane- I was not controlling at all- I was just trying to make sure things went the right way in order to save them from themselves. I was thoroughly convinced that if people just did things my way -everything would turn out alright. And if they decided against doing things my way- well it would all just fall apart. And I was very angry when it was not done my way.

Somewhere along the way I found out how to get out of the way. I'm not sure if I matured or if my hard head realized that it was not working for me. That no matter what I thought to be the way things should be -they just did not turn out like that. I learned that the only actions that I could control were my own and when I started to focus on me life was much easier. I no longer was angry all the time because things did not go my way.

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One Day At A Time In Al-Anon

This was my first book ever used. It was actually my mother's and I found it one day as a teenager. Even though I never thought of myself as having any issues from my father's drug use-it spoke to me. Maybe it even made me realize how upside doen his using had made me.  I recommend this book for anyone loving an addict. It is a compilation of daily meditations andcan be used over and over for years. I sometimes make notes in the margins- and it is cool to see the progress (or lck of progress) I made when returning to the page. 

It is a must have!!

Welcome!!!

Welcome!

hope you find this to be a place of serenity. the purpose of this blog is to assist myself back into sanity as well as help others along the way:) I plan to post daily on meditations as well as tidbits to assist in regaining peace in oneself. 

We plan to have a rant section as well as a literature review area. The hope is that this will become a safe haven for all of us who have ever felt the pain and the joy of loving an addict.