Wish Healing

This quote contains a lot of healing.

I have told this story before, but I'll tell it again because it is powerful.

It changed me.

Many years ago...

Probably 12 years ago, I had a conversation with my Becky Beck.

I'm telling you, this lady is going to be sent straight to the highest kingdom of glory automatically!

Anywho, I was talking to her about how I was constantly praying that my boys' father would be responsible and pay child support and spend consistent time with his children.

And, that was true.

I was pleading, no begging, God to instill in him these feelings.

Mind you, I am fully aware that everyone has agency and can make their own decisions, but I NEEDED God to step in here and just take that agency right away.

It doesn't work that way.

FYI.

Anywho again, Becky Beck said this:

"Heidi, instead of praying for that, why don't you pray that you will be able to forgive him and that God will make up the difference?"

Huh.

I had definitely never thought about taking that route.

Ever.

In the history of ever.

But, I agreed to do it.

Beginning that very day, I prayed that I would forgive him and I asked God to make up the difference.

I'm telling you that Jesus took the wheel!

From that day forward, my hatred (and it was legit hate) toward him went away.

In fact, I didn't feel anything but sorrow for him from that day on.

I felt sadness for him that he was missing out on the most amazing boys ever.

In the history of ever.

I felt sorry for him.

Sadness.

But never again did I feel anger or bitterness or betrayal or hatred.

And, there will never be enough time for me to list all of the thousands of ways that God has always made up the difference.

People donating clothes to my boys.

People leaving random gifts on our doorsteps.

People bringing food.

People giving us money for Christmas.

People buying school supplies for my boys.

People fixing our cars.

People watching my children.

People taking my children camping and hiking and doing amazing activities with them.

My children have had the most amazing male leaders in scouts and in church.

Family members have stepped in from day one to help financially, emotionally and physically with my children. 

My jobs have always had just the right people to love us in just the way we have needed to be loved.

By wishing others healing, we actually prevent pain for ourselves.

By wishing people goodness, rather than pain and karma, we bring peace to ourselves too.

People will cause us pain.

That's life.

By wishing them pain, we are doing exactly what they did to us.

And that's not who we want to be.

Learning & Growing

I absolutely LOVE these phrases!

I am practicing using them on the daily.

Not just for the events taking place in our world, but for regular and daily conversations.

It is SO validating to other people who we are communicating with to hear us say, "In light of what you just told me. I have changed my mind," OR "I didn't see it that way. I was wrong," OR "I never thought if it that way. Thank you so much for explaining that to me."

Everyone's opinion matters.

Everyone's feelings matter.

We don't have to agree.

We don't HAVE to change our mind.

But, we can listen and learn.

And grow.

Always.

Not one of us is above that.

You Won't Understand

Treatment hurdles:

Being aware of feelings, emotions, actions, etc. is exhausting!

NOT shoving all of those things into a closet as if to get rid of them is exhausting.

Learning to go through them and sort and experience and figure it all out is exhausting.

Here is what is most hard:

I try desperately to understand other people and why they do and say or don't do or don't say or the why's or the how's or all of it...

For instance:

When someone's goal is to make you feel uncomfortable...

Why?

Why would anyone do that?

For instance:

When someone discusses YOU with everyone BUT you...

Why?
What does that do for them?

My neuropsych has told me SO MANY TIMES:

Heidi, you have to stop trying to understand.

You're not going to understand.

Ever.

Because you don't think like that.

Truth.

If EVER I thought that someone was uncomfortable due to me, I would be horrified.

I would feel like I had to go and fix it right away.

Horrified.

The other thing that I learned in the past few days:

I am not the only person on this planet, Yo.

I am not the only person who might be uncomfortable in a situation.

Rather than focusing solely on how I'm feeling in an environment, I need to make sure that i understand how my loved ones are feeling as well.

Lessons.

And onward we go!

Let's Be Clear

Let's be clear about something.

Being in any type of relationship with me is DAMN HARD.

Hard. Hard. Hard.

It takes pretty much a modern day miracle for me to trust you with my feelings.

Let's be honest, I'm still (and probably will be for a long time) trying to figure out what feelings I am having and why and what to do with them!

So, imagine being someone who loves and cares about me trying to figure it all out.

Damn. Hard.

Add to that a process addiction of validation.

So, I am trying to articulate what I am feeling and someone shares their own belief about how I should feel or how it "really is."

That is called hard shut-down.

Like, Control-Alt-Delete SHUT DOWN.

I immediately go into that closet that I've had for 42 years and shove all the feelings in there and lock it, for certain unwilling to share them ever again with anyone because not only was it brave of me to share them in the first place, but they weren't validated.

Damn. Hard.

The people who love me, and there aren't many!, don't ever TRY to invalidate me.

Or not take my feelings seriously.

That is NEVER their intention.

And I know that.

So, letting go of that closet and listening and understanding is all part of  recovery.

And recovery is never-ending.

Message from P

While working this morning, I glanced over to my left screen.

I have two monitors and was focused on the right monitor at the time.

When I glanced over, this is what I saw.

Just sitting there.

Of course, as I do, I started to cry.

X was like, "How is that even on there? It's almost been three years!"

Yeah, I know...

But P has a way of creeping in when I least expect it...

Just to say "hi."

The ironic thing is that he HATED when I would cry.

Like, he was a runner when I'd cry!
P OUT!

I can't believe it's almost been three years since he didn't listen to me!

Turd.

Committed

I was asked to come up with something for Green HoriZen.

This is what I came up with.

We have had several members of the community asking us to "take a stance."

I actually believe, personally, in the things that I put in this document.

As someone who grew up in a diverse atmosphere, who was taught to love everyone around me, I truly felt that I was anti-racist.

That I had zero issue with prejudice.

That I was WAY ahead of these "morons" who were doing and saying all of this horrible stuff.

I listened to a conversation that Matthew McConaughey.

This man is brilliant and real and humble.

He was speaking to a friend of his, a Black man.

He used the term White Allergies.

This.

This was eye opening.

ALL white people really do have some sort of thought process that goes on in our heads regarding Black people.

Period.

For instance:

A six year old black girl was marching in protest last week. (she was adorably fierce and passionate)

A white mother saw it and said that she has a daughter her age, who didn't even know that these protests were going on.

White Allergies.

Her daughter doesn't know about it because "it doesn't effect her."

"It will make her sad."

"It's scary."

The black girl doesn't have that option.

This IS her life.

The events of late have really opened my eyes to what I am missing in my own.

What can I do different?

I can LISTEN.

Not to respond, but to hear and to learn.

I can advocate.

I can engage.

I can be educated over and over and over again.

I can always do better.

Equal

Michael and I were having a conversation on the way home from the gym on Monday night. It was about "equality." I told him that I have never felt more equally yoked to anyone in my life, until now. I read this quote today: "Remember this when seeking relationships. You're looking for an equal, not a project. You're looking for someone who takes care of themselves AND has the capacity to take care of you too. Someone on your level who you can respect and vice versa."

Can I get an Amen all up in here?! Part of my process addiction is ALWAYS looking for projects. How can I make other people feel validated, the way I never felt? I will help those people to feel better than I was ever made to feel! I will fix those people who are broken, because I can't fix myself.

This was how I went through life - always looking for projects so that I could feel better somehow, some way. The problem is that I can't fix anyone but myself. The problem is that I had no idea how to do that until one year ago.

Mike and I have spoken often about how if we had tried dating all of those 27 times I ditched him, it would not have worked out because neither of us was ready. We were both on our own journeys through counseling and therapy and figuring out ourselves so that we could figure out life. Now, we are equals. We take care of ourselves AND each other. There is no project. There is just active love.

Addiction amazes me every single day. It is something that truly takes away agency. It absolutely changes your brain and the way that it works. It changes the way that a person operates on a daily basis. There is this strange cloud-like environment that an addict lives in - always trying to be okay. And never being okay because you ARE NOT okay until you do the work to be okay. And prior to doing the work, you actually have to know that you are not okay. Process addictions are no different than chemical addictions in this way.

How amazing it is to understand my addiction, to understand from where it came and to have the tools to actively work through that addiction every single day, with an equal partner.