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Healthy Relationships

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

From Healing Within Our Alcoholic Relationships, CAL, p. 16

“Building Healthy Connections

As the experience of our fellow Al-Anon members demonstrates, the more we practice Al-Anon’s spiritual principles in all of our relationships, the more those relationships change. More than that, we change. As we build trust in ourselves and others, we begin to move through our lives with more confidence and less fear. By learning healthy ways to express ourselves and developing the ability to listen, we build connections with others, ourselves, and our Higher Power. In taking responsibility for our own needs, we become better able to see that those needs are met. With a solid spiritual foundation and the loving support of the Al-Anon fellowship, we find ourselves better equipped to be more fully ourselves. We become able to live more fulfilling lives.”

I’ve heard it said that ours is a disease of relationships. And I believe that’s true. Not to oversimplify, but to me the 12 Steps are the key to my becoming a better, healthier person than I was before I discovered them. Just the amends steps, for example. Before recovery, I was often too proud to apologize for something. Now, nothing could keep me from making an amend when it’s called for. And how much healthier my relationships are as a result! Or just the first step, admitting my powerlessness over people, places and things. If, for example, my husband has severe OCD, I don’t have the power to change that. Maybe he can, but I can’t. Instead of endless snarky remarks and frustration, I’ve learned to accept his peculiarities with love and grace. Or the third step, my turning my problems over to my Higher Power. Stop trying to fix everything, Marilea! Ask Him to do what He can, and then let go. You’re not God; stop acting like you were.

My relationships are infinitely healthier now because I’ve incorporated the 12 Steps into my life and my behavior toward others. I always joke that it’s the best therapy around, and it’s free! Grateful I am, and always will be, for Al-Anon and my fellowship of friends. Have a beautiful day, everyone. God Bless!

Live And Learn

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

From Healing Within Our Alcoholic Relationships, CAL, p. 9-10

“Ceasing to Enable

Our constant protective watchfulness of the alcoholics in our lives makes it easy for them to continue drinking and delay getting help. As long as we convince ourselves that we are doing our very best for them, they may have no incentive to get sober. Until we learn, as we do in Al-Anon, that shielding alcoholics from the consequences of their drinking only prolongs the course of the disease, the situation isn’t likely to improve.”

It took me years to really believe this and stop “helping” my daughter. At the time, the consequences looked unbearable to me: living on the street, going to prison, etc.

Out of my own sense of guilt, since I’m a double winner, I felt that she got it from me, that it was my fault. Over time I finally accepted that my daughter’s illness was not my fault. Period. And any attempt to carry the responsibility for her disease was terribly misguided. When I brought this new attitude into my belief system, I felt free for the first time in years. I cannot save Annie from substance use disorder, but I gratefully and gracefully have learned to save myself.

Because I’m worth it.

Surviving The Slumps

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

Surviving The Slumps

From The Language of Letting Go, by Melody Beattie

“A slump can go on for days. We feel sluggish, unfocused, and sometimes overwhelmed with feelings we can’t sort out. We may not understand what is going on with us. Even our attempts to practice recovery behaviors may not appear to work. We still don’t feel emotionally, mentally, and spiritually as good as we would like.

In a slump, we may find ourselves reverting instinctively to old patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving, even when we know better. We may find ourselves obsessing, even when we know that what we’re doing is obsessing and that it doesn’t work.

We may find ourselves looking frantically for other people to make us feel better, the whole time knowing our happiness and well-being does not lay with others.

We may begin taking things personally that are not our issues, and reacting in ways we’ve learned all too well do not work.

We’re in a slump. It won’t last forever. These periods are normal, even necessary. These are the days to get through. These are the days to focus on recovery behaviors, whether or not the rewards occur immediately. These are sometimes the days to let ourselves be and love ourselves as much as we can.

We don’t have to be ashamed, no matter how long we’ve been recovering. We don’t have to unreasonably expect “more” from ourselves. We don’t ever have to expect ourselves to live life perfectly.

Get through the slump. It will end. Sometimes, a slump can go on for days and then, in the course of an hour, we see ourselves pull out of it and feel better. Sometimes it can last a little longer.

Practice one recovery behavior in one small area, and begin to climb uphill. Soon, the slump will disappear. We can never judge where we will be tomorrow by where we are today.

Today, I will focus on practicing one recovery behavior on one of my issues, trusting that this practice will move me forward. I will remember that acceptance, gratitude, and detachment are a good place to begin.”

Deep Water

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

From Each Day A New Beginning, August 6, CAL:

“‘They sicken of the calm, who knew the storm’ ~Dorothy Parker

Variety in experiences is necessary for our continued growth. We mistakenly think that the ‘untroubled’ life would be forever welcome. It’s the deep waves of life that teach us to be better swimmers.”

Ain’t that the truth? But who said I wanted to be a good swimmer?

Well, to follow this metaphor along, before I got into recovery, I was very good at dogpaddling. When I had to face a problem, I paddled around it or avoided the water altogether. I never learned to swim properly. And certainly not well. I lived on the fringes of what I recognize now to be a healthy life, a life filled with honesty, self-care, and love of and service to others. Before recovery, I used avoidance, hiding, dishonesty, and any substance I could get my hands on (food, drugs, alcohol) to numb me for a while so I wouldn’t have to face “life on life’s terms.”

I was so deeply unhappy from a very young age, and so terribly self-absorbed in my own sadness that I failed to recognize what a fortunate life I had had in so many ways. Attitude is everything, and I needed to do some serious work to adjust mine. Recovery has come to me in waves over the past twenty-plus years, and the one thing that grounds me to the core is a deep sense of gratitude.

All of us on this page have experienced the “deep waves” of life that they mention in the reading. I lost my daughter to substance use disorder twenty-three years ago. She may or may not be alive in San Francisco right now. But I haven’t seen her in thirteen years. On the rare occasions that I have heard from her in these lost years, she was not my daughter, not the one I raised. Her personality has completely changed, she has no moral compass, and I imagine that all the years of substance abuse have caused considerable brain damage.

That’s the “deep wave” that has caused me the most heartache. But there are others that I chose to focus on and be an excuse for my own unhappy life. An unhappy childhood, a divorce and three angry kids, estrangement  from my family of origin. Luckily I had found recovery before I got incurable blood cancer or that would have been another excuse to feel sorry for myself.

It’s these “deep waves” that have made me a better swimmer. Life’s challenges, some of them small, some of them overwhelming. I’ve learned to face them like an adult, not like a frightened child. And in doing so, I have given myself another chance at life. How lucky is that? To get a second chance, to make living amends to my remaining kids and grandkids, to try to heal the estrangement in my family, all these “waves” that might have drowned me before I decided to do life differently.

I am one lucky lady. I thank God and my recovery fellowship, all my friends here who I think of as family for the opportunity to live happy, joyous and free. God Bless!

Recovering From Fear

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

From The Forum, November, 2022:

“When I came into Al-Anon at the suggestion of a friend, my life was unmanageable in so many ways. I was unaware that living with alcoholism was involved in my broken relationships, divorce, several addictions, inability to be honest with myself, people pleasing, and other things I had not uncovered yet, either because of denial of lack of discovery.”

“lack of discovery…” Bingo! I feel as though I’d been living in a fog for most of my early life, only I didn’t know it. I didn’t know anything about the family disease that (I now know) was interfering with my well-being.

Where was this article—this enlightenment—when I needed it? As a younger woman I blamed myself and others for everything that was wrong in my life. I understood nothing about the complicated disease of substance use disorder. But twenty years of work in Al-Anon have opened my eyes. The fog has lifted and now I see more clearly. I understand why I internalized so much of the dysfunction that was happening in my family and carried the guilt myself from which there was no relief.

Not until I entered this compassionate fellowship. It is in these rooms that I found forgiveness for my parents and myself, along with critical tools to continue the healing work I was doing. The 12-Steps and the slogans, when practiced, have helped me navigate through my life. And life, itself, is a mixed bag. I’ve had joys, but also incredible sorrows. Using the teaching of Al-Anon as a guide, I’ve learned to be grateful for my blessings. And I’ve learned to accept my sorrows with grace without being destroyed by them. Learning how to put things into healthier perspective has been a gift of the program.

I have been given hope for a better life, and I’ll always be grateful that I opened my mind to some good advice: “Go to a meeting, Marilea. It might be the answer for you.”

It was. And my fears have been replaced by the certainty that all will be well, in God’s plan.

The Melting Away Of The Great White (Frozen) Wall Of Guilt

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

I have been in ongoing recovery for quite a few years, and I’ve  written this blog for over a decade. Yet it is utterly refreshing for me to see myself grow in real time and share it with you. Here is something I have realized recently as a result of my 12-Step work:

 I’ve often said here that guilt is a crippling emotion. How so? I had felt that when I let guilt overpower me, I would become vulnerable and lose my resolve when dealing with my daughter, and probably others as well. The boundaries I had set to protect me would fall away. So I would become crippled in my dealings with her.

That kind of thinking demonstrates how far I needed to grow in order to work with guilt differently so that it would become my teacher and not a means to punish myself. Now I see that the only thing that crippled me was me, and not the emotion behind it. The second promise of AA says that I will not regret the past nor wish to close a door on it. When I can truly not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it, I will be able to accept myself as an evolving woman just like so many of us in recovery.

I will see that my whole life—the good, the bad and the ugly—has been a series of lessons for me, one after the other. And that wishing away my past would be a form of self-annihilation. I will try to embrace my failures with my loved ones—not with angst and remorse—but with humility and. grace.

This is the power of my program at work.

One Path To Recovery

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

“We rise by lifting others.” Robert Ingersoll

I grew up in an alcoholic family. There was a lot of dysfunction around me and, to make a long story short, I was severely depressed. That led to a number of other problems, of course, and so my mother got me into volunteer work when I was thirteen, hoping it would relieve my anxiety and sadness. It wasn’t the immediate panacea that we’d hoped it would be, but it was a step in the right direction. And it brought me out of my isolation.

Life unfolded for me in a dizzyingly assortment of ways: there were three children including my substance user Annie and all the heartache that goes with her illness; a lot of travel; and a fulfilling teaching career. I’m also a recovering alcoholic. But I’ve had a great life and I am very grateful for my blessings. And through it all, thanks to my mother, I’ve been a volunteer in various different organizations. The work has kept my perspective healthy and made me feel better about myself, something I sorely needed. And it’s taken me most of my life and much 12-Step recovery work to truly celebrate myself fully. Helping others always helps me more.

Seedlings Require Sunlight

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

Substance use disorder doesn’t discriminate. Before my daughter was swallowed up in it, she was a successful ten-year-old gymnast, competing in England while we were traveling in the Foreign Service and living in Greece. She was a gifted artist. And she graduated from college with a B.A. in Journalism. When she was twenty-one, it all fell apart.

I no longer speculate on “Why Annie?” Rich, poor, educated or not, substance use disorder can strike anywhere. And sometimes there is a gene component—four generations in my family—but not always.

The particular poignancy of this mother’s story is that Annie and I mirror each other: we both suffer from substance use disorder. So my story has a bit of a spin to it. It’s all graphically portrayed in my books. I’m not as detached as many parents without such baggage. My guilt and overinflated sense of responsibility consistently prevented me from being objective or from acting intelligently. I had to let go of my remorse before I could be helpful to her. And I had to learn to value myself enough to do that.

That came from working the steps of my recovery program. Self-forgiveness is critical to my ability to move on. Mine has been a classic redemption story.

I have learned to live well, despite the fact that my daughter is estranged from me. Many fellow parents, myself included, are primarily interested in the magic bullet that will save our children. But I’m glad I stayed in recovery long enough to learn that even though I’m powerless to save my daughter, I can still save myself. There are other voices in my world who call me: other children, grandchildren, family and many friends. I want to listen and live well for them. That is the message of my story and many others’: that even though I’m weathering one of a parent’s worst nightmares, I’ve learned that there’s no glory in martyrdom, and that I’ve earned the right to live happily, whether Annie recovers or not. Life goes on, and we with it. I’ve lived a blessed life, and only through my work in recovery have I found the good sense to recognize and be grateful for that.

As I’ve watched Annie slipping away all these years, I’ve learned to view my life through a different lens. The tools of recovery have taught me how to be grateful for what I have, how to let go of people and situations that I cannot change, and to have faith in something greater, wiser, and more powerful than I am.

Losing my child to substance use disorder did break me a few years ago, and in my brokenness and despair I turned toward the light that had always been there. I’m so grateful that I still had the eyes to see it.

Accept The New Me

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

My work in my recovery program has helped me to minimize my defects, to grow and change into a better person, easier to like and to live with. The people in my life have been familiar with one person, and now they are confronted with someone different, someone better: perhaps nicer, kinder, more anything that we couldn’t muster before. This can be disorienting. And it may be difficult to trust the change they see.

Please—trust it. Give us a chance to change into better people. We will all benefit from this, won’t we?

“Thoughts Become Things, Choose Wisely”

Marilea C. RabasaLeave a comment

A simple mantra, but very true. We’ve all heard about “self-talk,” both positive and negative. Negative self-talk is common for those of us who struggle with self-esteem. “Oh I’ll never win that contest, so I’m not gonna bother trying.” It’s not just laziness that forms such an attitude. It’s also the absolute certainty that I’m not gonna win. And to avoid the disappointment of losing, I feel it’s better to not even try. How many times have I been there? Too many to count.

Positive self-talk, on the other hand, says: “What have I got to lose? Nothing! And maybe, just maybe, I’ll be good enough to win.” I guess a healthier perspective would be something like: “Look, winning or losing a contest isn’t everything. If I win, that means my work was better than the other contestants’ entries. And if I lose it means that other entries were better than mine. But it doesn’t mean that mine was bad, It’s important to really believe that. There was just stiff competition.”

In my recovery program, making comparisons is discouraged. We are operating on a level playing field. We learn to accept ourselves as we are, warts and all. Unlike the contest above, we recognize that we are all equals. And when we tell ourselves that, we cease feeling inferior to anyone else. We all have defects and strengths. We work on our defects in the program, to minimize them, and to build on our strengths.

As we learn to do that, to make these self-affirmations, we are building up our self-confidence, and positive self-talk comes to us more frequently. These thoughts become part of our makeup. They solidify and become things we can rely on. So since thoughts can become real things in our lives, we learn to choose the good ones.