Living with the death of a parent!

Most of you have probably experienced living with the death of a parent. I recently, November 14, 2011 at 11:11pm had my father leave his body. The Dr. reports his death as November 15, 2011, because that is when the Dr. arrived. It seems to me this is the beginning of the surreal journey. He left his body on the 14th and the Dr arrived on the 15th…Hello! Tom and I had just arrived in Palm Springs to visit our special friends, Ted and Brie. We left their home after a beautiful visit to find my cell phone in the car with messages from my sister, Mary, that my father had been released and passed over to the other side. I knew the time was near yet nothing could have prepared me for the feelings I felt. At the beautiful visit we had with Ted and Brie, we discussed God, dying, living knowing we are dying etc. I saw so much peace with the acceptance of death. Kubler-Ross speaks of the stages of death and dying. Don’t know that they are orderly steps or stages, however I do know that denial,anger,bargaining,depression and acceptance are all part of negotiating through life as it is. Tom and I arrived at my parents home the evening of the 15th….VP Biden fund raiser. It was close to impossible to get near my parents home without a great deal of delay, traffic jams and Police..We finally arrived at their home and my Mother is grief stricken. She can not as yet come to grips with the fact my Father is no longer with her physically. They have been married for 60 Years. I can’t imagine. The family began to arrive from Tennessee, Montana, Australia, London and Virginia. My father had been sick for many years with Parkinson’s disease. However nothing prepared us for death as death. The void, the doubt ,the love ,the faith ,the knowing ,the anger , the hurt, the denial and all of the many defenses that each of us use to not feel. I would say we did pretty well for a family. We are able to share with each other , what a blessing. There were hurt and angry feelings and we shared when the time was right and stayed connected. The wake and funeral brought issues up for each of us. I secretly wanted to make believe I was most special to my Father. What is that? Each of us playing out our insecurities and doubts. Did he love me? Should I have gone to Nj sooner to be there at the time of passing? Will he forgive me? Will I forgive me? In reviewing my fathers life, my own life was reviewed, oh my..Annie do you remember? Some beautiful and some not so much..I am blessed with a husband, Tom who was so supportive of me and my family. I am blessed with two beautiful sisters, Mary and Joanie who have been helping my mother handle all of the paper work and forms , changes and grief and loneliness. I sit in Montana on our beautiful ranch with three dogs and four horses and wonder? What happened ? Is he really here? Is my mother going to chose life? Should I be back in NJ? I do not know right now so I will be here in the moment with God and in my heart in the knowing that the question is the answer.

The Power of the disease of ALCOHOLISM/DRUG ADDICTION.

Special Blessings to all of the families who have been effected by the disease and particularly to those who have lost someone due to the disease. My family recently lost a friend due to alcoholism/drug addiction. The many different forms this disease takes. First it says,” all is ok “, it says to the addict,” I am in control” and it says to the family and friends, “he/she is ok, it is really all the circumstances that are creating the problems. Life, work, relationship and health. These are the problems not the fact the addict has started dabbling in mood altering chemicals again.”

So often the addict gets sober and may be sober for years and then….lessening of 12 step meetings, relationship issues, health issues, sleep issues, pain issues, work issues, financial issues,weight/food issues. All the many masks this disease has to call us back to active addiction. Now this is not to say these issues are not very real, painful and serious. The idea we present, is as we begin to deal with these issues, the addict must keep the ever-present disease a priority. Treating the disease daily.

I have been in the place many times in my 27years of sobriety where Tom, work, health issues, depression, finances, money, weight/food,sex, family and/or relationship issues creep in and tell me, ” Ann you must deal with this and put your sobriety on hold”. Now obviously it is never quite as clear as that. The disease subtly seduces me into believing the priorities are these issues and not me and the maintenance of my own sobriety, as don’t you know,I have been sober for years……oh my…danger zone.

To all alcoholics and addicts and our special family members, do not ever forget that each and every one of us is totally and completely responsible for ourselves and whatever our baggage and gifts are. Do not forget who you are and do not enable each other to be anything less than all of who we are with that bright light shining within, celebrating life and living. We are the light when treating the disease first. Prayers to those we have lost and their friends and families.

What is your relationship with food?

Food is all around us, all of the time. Being thin is all around us, all of the time. Those of us who are recovering from drug addiction and alcoholism often hear ourselves say, “I have given up so much, not food.” So we look at the relationship we have with food. We use food to feel better. We use food to not feel. We use food to nurture ourselves. What are we really doing? Food is no longer the fuel for my body. Food is all about feeling better/ feeling worse. The never ending cycle.
Then recovery, maybe a first step on food, admitting powerlessness over food/ certain foods, ie. Sugar. Our lives are unmanageable. Then coming to believe that a power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity? Normal eating? I can get better, then making a decision to turn our food over to another and ultimately a Higher Power. Ok..so we begin with a food plan, never a diet, because diets set us up for relapse. You tell me the difference between a diet and a food plan? My food plan needs to be less rigid than a diet and healthy. My food plan is no white flour or sugar. I move along, feeling better, gaining self esteem as I am doing what I say, I am following a plan. I have had years being sugar free.

Something shifts, I think I should be able to integrate other foods without problem. I go along for awhile and then it stops working. Back to the beginning. We admitted we are powerless over sugar that our lives have become unmanageable. I know how the 12 steps have worked for me with alcohol, drugs and relationship. Is food bigger than God? Is my fear bigger than God? I let it be sometimes, what’s up with that?  Soooooo, hello 12 steps, here I come….

Along with the food plan, we attend meetings, talk about what is really going on, have special women in our lives who listen and don’t try to fix us or anyone else for that matter, exercise to get the endorphins going and of course yoga for overall health.  Is this such a tall order  Yes it is sometimes and when it is the goal needs to be gentleness with myself or I shame myself and perpetuate addiction.  Oh my!  Oh my!

Couples and Fear

It continues to amaze me how as couples we deal with fear. I remember years ago Tom and I had a 40 foot sailboat. Tom was the captain and I was the crew. We were both ok with our roles until the wind came up suddenly and Tom yelled, “reef”. His yelling was his fear. My fear took the form of slowing down and becoming more methodical about reefing. As I slowed down to try to calm myself and not make a fatal mistake, Tom saw what I was doing as passive aggressive and became more angry (scared). The power struggle begins with fast and furious passion. His form of dealing with fear vs. my form of dealing with fear. We know as a couple we will have survival methods that trigger our partner to escalate their survival methods. What a mess. Well for years we have taught and worked on sharing our fears and becoming more conscious about each others survival rules. This has helped and…

Tom and I have been recovering from the trauma of throat cancer, radiation and chemotherapy for the past two years.  We were told about two years ago to make sure that we watch Tom’s psa count because it was higher than the Dr. thought it should be.  Tom’s Prostate was put on the back burner because so much else was happening with his health. Tom and I have both been aware that another biopsy was needed due to increasing psa numbers and the fears have been simmering for a long time.  About one year ago a biopsy was done on 12 samples of the p prostate and all were benign.  Thank God. Within this past year the psa count doubled and another biopsy was preemenint.   He had the second biopsy last Wednesday and we got the results Friday.  All good, 14 samples taken and all benign. Thank you God.  Well what I want to share is whether on the back burner or not fears sizzle and I am aware that I have not had one day since the initial cancer that I have not prayed for Tom’s health and to be cancer free. It is always present. Tom and I have struggled with our fears in ways that have triggered more fears and pain and ultimately joy in our relationship.  Tom is the avoider and I am the pursuer.  I process low levels of fear by externally expelling my anxiety, chatting, eating, cleaning, getting busy.  Tom processes his low level of fear by going within and not talking, getting serious and working on the ranch. So again the way I process triggers Tom and the way he processes triggers me.  Oh my.  I continue to learn in our marriage that the solution lies in the  “spiritual axiom” Me looking at me and changing me even at those times when I want to change, shame or blame Tom.  When all I want is acceptance from Tom I need to accept Tom completely and totally.  This is hard.  Life is hard.  The joy is in getting through it all without to much collateral damage.  Oh my!

What is normal?

Tom and I were blessed to have two of our grandchildren here from London to visit. We played with our horses, rode horses, went fly fishing, rafting on the river, swimming in a friends lake, mining for sapphires, they drove our jeep and truck and drove the mini tractor. All was fun. My granddaughter and I did a bit of research on the amount of caffeine in drinks. We were amazed at the levels of caffeine and sugar in drinks and foods the children eat regularly. I want to return to this subject at a later date.

Normal?

So, I want to take a minute to talk about our experience as a couple, recovering from throat cancer. As most of you know Tom now has a voice that sounds scratchy compared to the smooth tone he had prior to cancer and the cutting of his right vocal cord. Tom and I went to celebrate our son’s one year sober birthday in San Diego. We felt so honored and blessed. As a side bar, we were in the gym working out and a woman with bleached white hair, tiny waist and large chest seemed to be saying something to Tom, I took off my earphones, I was blasting Janis Joplin into my ears to motivate me to workout hard!!! And I hear her saying to Tom, ” The sounds you are making are gross!”. I couldn’t quite believe my ears and then Tom responded with, ” You know what is really gross, throat cancer”. She responded with, ” I just didn’t want to catch anything.”. The woman next to Tom said to him” You are amazing.”. I was still shocked. With all I think I know I wanted to say something really nasty to her. I made some karma comments under my breath….she wanted to buy us a drink at the pool. We said no and left.

We are here at he airport to pick up our grandson and the flight attendant checking us in said, ” I hope you do something with your voice or you will not be much fun!”. Again I go into shock. Tom handles it quite well. I say, ” He had throat cancer and a vocal cord was cut”. I wanted to say what does his voice have to do with him being fun? Oh my, oh my..

I guess all of these comments we continue to get are teachers for us to honor and respect the slightest difference in whatever form it may take. Love to you all and by the way Tom is more fun than ever.

Tribute to Betty Ford. Welcome to our new website.

This is all new, so here goes. Welcome, we are so excited to be able to communicate with all of our viewers and special friends over the 25 years of our practice with recovering individuals and couples.

Betty Ford, we miss you and thank you, your family and The Betty Ford Center for all of the many gifts and sacrifices to and for service to the alcoholic/addict and cancer survivors. As a woman I am particularly grateful as you served as a role model to reduce the shame that women carry about being addicted. Your sense of humor always helped to soften painful issues too. As a recovering woman who is also recovering from family cancer trauma, I thank you. The family gets through it too. Amazing the same principals apply to recover. Each individual must take care of self first then be there for the other. Challenging when in the crisis of addiction, cancer or couples strife. I remember years ago when Tom and I were working at The Betty Ford Center, Tom got a call to go to Firestone Hall to see you. You sat and talked to him about his son who was in the Marines and in Kuwait. You and President Ford had found out about his son and gave Tom incredible personal support, love and information regarding his son. Tom returned very grateful, emotional and relieved. You always went above and beyond. Thank you, Mrs. Ford and we will miss you. May God bless you and your legacy.