In the Midst.

I was talking to my friend Lane'e the other day about a diet that I was starting.  It was the usual stuff back and forth, me being excited and gung-ho, Lane'e being her usual supportive and encouraging self.  In the midst of that conversation, I made a statement that seems to have lingered, like a bad dream or spicy food.
I stated that I couldn't expect my sister, who is an alcoholic, to control her alcoholism if I couldn't control what I ate.
It's sadly funny, then, that my sister lays in the Critical Care Unit at the hospital because of her inability to stop drinking.  That her body is shutting down or not working right because she has poisoned it.  What she is consuming is literally toxic to her system.

I find that funny because I am an addict.

The similarities cannot go unnoticed.  The hiding, the binging.  The excuses and lies. The cries for help, the
self  deprecation.
Food is my drug.  Not all food, just some types of food.  Wheat, sugar, processed, starches. And as I have just found out...sodium.
Fast food would be my poison of choice.  Hard to turn down.
Even when I realize I don't really like the taste.  Even when I am so full I could puke.  Even when...you get the picture.

Kerrie struggles through each day.  Feeling like a failure.  Trying to figure out why alcohol has such a hold over her.  Wanting desperately to walk away from what is killing her.  And I.  I pass judgement. I self righteously shake my head and wonder why she can't walk away.  "Who would want to feel that way?  Who would want to be in that much pain?"
I type this as I sit at the computer at the Coy's.  The empty Jack in the Box bag on the table.  The empty Taco Time bag sitting beside me. "No one will ever know" I tell myself.
I will get rid of the evidence, sure.  Just like my sister hid her Vodka bottles in the closet with the empty beer cans.
However, just as my sister's body is rejecting what she has done to it, so is mine.  I am bloated. My ankles are more that twice the size they should be.  My feet are so swollen I can't get my new shoes on and my knees have so much swelling, I can barely get up and down the stairs.  It's painful.

Why does she do that to herself?  I would ask, just as you would.
I wish I had an answer.  Chalk it up to being weak, feeling bad about oneself, stuffing emotions or just the substance being a "friend".  Whatever.  I don't know.

What I DO know is that in the midst of addiction, truth is better than a lie, being open is better than hiding, crying out shows strength, not weakness, and listening to positive reinforcement beats negative self talk.
And....that it's a long, winding road with a constant uphill battle.

I have faith in the friendships I have, and their support.
I pray that for my sister.

You're Going the Wrong Way?

Life just rolls along.

Have you ever been in a car and a vehicle in the on-coming lane of traffic flashes their brights at you?  Or been cruising along only to have someone drive up beside you motioning like mad men from their car window?

I was laughing about a scene in a movie with Dan the other day.  The movie is "Planes, Trains and Automobiles".  The scene entails John Candy driving a car on a freeway late on a winter's night.  Steve Martin is fast asleep in the passenger seat.
As John is driving, he looks over to see a car, across the median and driving in the same direcition as him.  They are frantically waving and yelling.  John rolls his window down and attempts to hear what the people in the other vehicle are trying so hard to tell him.  Finally he hears..."You're going the wrong way!" 
John Candy does what anyone in that situation would do....he laughs it off, chalks it up to the other driver having imbibed a little too much and says to himself, "How do THEY know which way I'm going"?

Obviously, JOHN is driving the wrong way on the freeway, only he finds out almost too late.

I sometimes feel like John Candy in that movie...and sometimes I feel like Steve Martin.

How often am I "driving along" thinking I am going the right way?  How often do others feel like they are yelling and waving and doing whatever they can to stop me?  How often am I the one "asleep" and not paying attention to those around me who may need a little direction?

I love that movie scene because it almost gleefully depicts our blatant shortcomings when it comes to paying attention to the road ahead of us. 

Which direction am I heading?  Am I paying attention?  Have I listened to those who have waved their arms, jumping up and down screaming, "You're going the wrong way"?

AM I going the right way?
I guess it's not the median, or the passengers, or the other vehicles on the road that need the attention.  My guess is that it's the markers, the telltale signs that let you know where you are, where to turn, and ultimately, in which direction you are heading.  On a highway, those consist of street signs and solid or broken colored lines.
Here's the question:

How does that look in my life?