The Door is Ajar

Remember  the 1980's when Chrysler introduced the talking car? If your door wasn't closed all the way it would say "The door is ajar". That innovative creation stirred up conversations and jokes that lasted a long time! 

A major life change has occurred in my home this past weekend. Cliff left for Florida to start a new life with the woman he loves, Miss E. They've known each other for only nine months or so, maybe a little longer, but have declared their love for each other and plan to make it a permanent promise. Having been through the trauma of divorce, and it is a trauma even in the most peaceful of ways, I pray that their declaration to each other is true and forever. 

There was a time that Cliff was not living with me. When I bought my little house I sent him packing, so to speak. Not in a bad way, but it was simply time.  Not too long after life threw a curve ball and the call came asking "would it be okay if I come and stay with you for just a short time till my friend S and I work out sharing a house? He's going to buy something and I'll be his roommate." Cliff was working at the time and had the best laid plans, and so I somewhat reluctantly said yes. I had just been in my little domicile for one year and longed for "my space" as we've come to love in this country.  As you may have guessed, a few months rolled into many more and just recently became 3 years.  Then Miss E came into the picture and life moved into a new direction.  

So, with a Toyota Camry packed to the gills, off they rode into the sunset in the direction of Florida and I'm alone again, naturally. =) 

Before Cliff left I had to have "the talk". That's the part of recovery that continues to be revisited with many an addict and their family. Boundaries are set once again because deep down we fear getting caught up in the landlord relationship one more time. Cliff was ready to go out on his own, there's no doubt of that. But where the doubt comes in it seems, is in Cliff's ability to see past looming obstacles. Putting down one step at a time in order to achieve a hard earned goal still requires some guidance and encouragement along with a push and a hug. So, in a much calmer demeanor and forthright tone than in years gone by, I simply stated that I wished Cliff the very best that God has planned for him and that moving back home was not an option.  The door will not swing back open, and please leave your key.  There's a sadness in my soul that I have to say that so clearly, yet it's a freedom that has to be laid out for both of us. I'm too old to be my sons housemate and he should have the confidence to enjoy life as it's meant to be.  So the door is ajar; it's open just enough to pay a visit but not open wide enough to let suitcases filled with life struggles that belong to another take up residence in my space.  

I'm grateful once again for working it out with my Higher Power, my Creator, who has walked the walk with me to show me how to live a better life that brings unspeakable peace to my heart.  My life is richer because of practicing the 12 Steps over and over.  

That peace of mind is not mine to own.  You can have it, too.  Ask and seek. You'll find it. 

Picture googled

One Day at A Time

The best thing about the future is that it comes one day at a time.

Abraham Lincoln

In the solitude of my car yesterday, I was going through the years of recovery for me and for Cliff.  I recalled how I felt when I first began attending meetings with regularity. I couldn't handle the pain well and that's when I began to write. I needed an outlet somewhere but didn't know what to do. 

At first, I went to meetings like most parents do, desperate for someone to tell me how to save my son. How to stop the madness and chaos and I was desperate to understand why anyone would put something into their bodies so seriously unhealthy and dangerous that each time they handled a needle it was like playing Russian roulette. What hurt my son so much that we couldn't talk about it and get to the bottom of it?  

I didn't believe that I had to go to these meetings for me. "Don't you get it??" I shouted silently "I don't have the addiction. My son is going to die in some house in Detroit or Highland Park and no one will be able to tell me. They don't know me, they don't know how to reach me!? He's only 18, he's only 19, he's only 23"....and so it went day after day, month after month, year after year.  After attending meetings weekly for several months, the scales on my eyes began to loosen and fall away, a little at a time.   And still, the boundaries and denial played tricks on me. I needed to face the facts in order for some of "it" to stick and stay and allow me to pick through it and digest what I could, when I could. Like a heaping Thanksgiving dinner plate while fighting off a flu bug, I worked through the steps of recovery. 

Finally, a year later when Cliff went to prison I had my respite. I could step back from the mental squalor that surrounded me and really work on myself and my understanding of this mess without an addict constantly coming at me like a whirling tornado.  I began to sift and sort. Cliff found recovery and so did I. He would, in his own way, sift and sort through his "stuff" and is now just beginning to see some of the fruits of living life differently, with a plan and not a substance.  To this day, I sift and sort and probably always will. 

Driving to my meeting yesterday I remembered that one of the things I used to say and wrote about early in the beginning of this blog, was "if you had a child with a terminal illness you would do anything you could to save his life." So that's what I did.  But the difference is that a terminal illness randomly comes onto someone unexpectedly and they are then dependent upon the medical field and a miracle from God in heaven, to be healed. They are subject to this test and that exam to figure out the best way to treat their invasive life-robbing disease and sadly, sometimes there isn't any cure. The terminally ill person is facing a giant to which they no longer have the slingshot and stone that will take it down. 

Now the addict may also randomly find himself addicted when they take that first step to try something risky.  Suddenly their illness takes hold and directs their life choices.  They too, can put themselves into the medical fields hands for healing but the difference is they can be healed if they simply take a step to help themselves.  They do not have to face a death sentence unless they choose to.  It's a simple change that they have to choose for themselves. No one can hand it to them. They have to pick it up and walk to the next step, inch by inch, but they can be healed.  The key is in their hands. 

So all this to say, it's taken me a long time in these meetings to come to this "aha" moment of letting this part go.  Life choices for someone at 18 are different than someone at 25 and then again at 30. Cliff is now 7 years clean, and I am 8 years on a path of life-changing choices for me that free from all the garbage that I simply used to kick from room to room and try to make sense in my thinking.    

Hang in there. Your "aha" will come to you at sometime in your recovery walk as well. And then another "aha" will come along when you are ready for the next bite.   

Just keep taking life one day at a time. God will guide you. He promised. 

A Promise is A Promise

Tis' the season following Christmas when many folks are struggling with one heartbreak after another. I'm not typically affected by an event or calendar date once a trauma has passed me by. I know many folks who almost seem to plan that once something has affected a holiday, that forevermore that same holiday is tainted. I think perhaps a person is pre-planning their mindset and scheduling the affect as a bondage or being held hostage by the thing they cannot change.   

I must admit however that this year, right now,  I've been struggling with the loss of my mom 10 years ago this June and during a mid-day snooze the other day I had a disturbing dream. My healthy mother was in it.  She visits me now and again in dreams and mostly never says anything or comes near, but often is just smiling at me.  This time though I was feeling so saddened by her absence that when she suddenly appeared I was sobbing and telling her how much I've missed her. My mother was hugging me so tightly that I'm sure I sensed her spirit with me.  It brought me peace yet I awoke with tears still brimming in my eyes and running down my cheeks. Ah, mom some days I want you here so badly, but believing what I do, you're not really longing to be here. Why would she long to leave a perfect place with the loving presence of her Savior to come back to a world wrought with pain, suffering and sorrow?  I don't think she is. 

Today would have been my parents 63rd anniversary had it not been for the dreaded PSP or at least that's what  I'd like to believe. Very possibly something else could have occurred but we hang our hats on the disease that took our lovely mother prematurely away. Can you imagine being married sixty-three years to the same person?  It's a remarkable journey and I applaud any couple that lands on each marking point still standing together by choice.  I remember so many little tidbits of Mom and Dad's marriage and in the last 3 years of their life together I was privileged to be there daily. While I've mentioned it before in my writings, one of my fondest memories is my dad feeding the first line of a song that he and my mother knew from their era of music, and my mom would dutifully sing the next line. A pattern that was put in place long before mom was ill carried into a time when they longed for some routine and normalcy.  I loved hearing mom sing when I was younger and now waited with bated breath to hear her utter her part loud and clear.  This went on day after day and it was one of the little ways that dad kept mom engaged in life when she might rather have been left quietly alone. It was a complete effort for mom to put together any sentence let alone sing a line of a song, but she would muster up all the energy she could and take her part, delighting us each time.  It was my parents love language and I was a voyeur in their inner sanctum. 

As mom's disease progressed she needed help with absolutely everything and so at bedtime we developed a routine together.  Dad was tired by the end of the day and on the nights I was available I would walk mom back to the bedroom and help her do all the things necessary to tuck her in at night. On one occasion we began our two-step when suddenly 85 pounds of nothingness stopped dead in her tracks ~ Mom may as well have been 1000 lbs.  I said "Mom, whats up?"  She had paused next to my father's chair and he answered, "Oh, I almost forgot. Earlier today your mother threatened to kiss me goodnight".  Mom giggled and bent over as best she could to kiss my dad and when she stood up again he said "I want you to know that you are the finest person I have ever known in my life and you have done far more for me than I could have ever done for you."   I was frozen in place as I heard this intimate exchange of love so unexpected, even by my mother.  Not to be anything other than a human male, the next phrase from my dad was "now, why are you crying?" :)

I tucked my mom in bed that night, put her eye drops in and kissed her on the cheek. An action with my mom that I never imagined I would be doing but cherished as each day went by. Sometimes I went right back to what I was doing before I walked her to bed, and other nights I went to my room and sobbed. 

Fifty-three years didn't come easy, I'm sure.  But as my dad said at a memorial luncheon for mom, "Everyone keeps saying to me what an honorable man I've been, but in my day when you said I do, that meant for better or worse. A promise is a promise." Thank you mom and dad, for the memory and the legacy. 

A Promise Kept

 

In 2003 Mom's life was cut short by one of the many dreaded brain diseases popping up daily. Yesterday my parents would have celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary and I'm sure Dad raised a glass in Mom's honor. The following piece was written in 2002 for another posting and I share it with you now.

A Promise Kept

"Love is said to evaporate if it's not mutual, if the other person doesn't communicate, if they don't carry their share of the load, if it's not physical. When I hear the litany of essentials for a happy marriage, I count off what my beloved can no longer contribute and contemplate how truly mysterious love is. I was preparing dinner recently when the voice of a renowned radio preacher announced something that startled me. He said an authoritative study indicated that when terminal illness strikes a mate, seven out of ten American spouses split. And since husbands leave home far more frequently than wives do in such circumstances, what must the numbers be for them? Nine out of ten? Just when they're needed most...I thought to myself, How could they do such a thing? Maybe they're having a love affair. With themselves. Indeed, love is a mysterious thing."

From: A Promise Kept
The Story of an Unforgettable Love
by Robertson McQuilkin
**************************

If you haven't heard of the above book, please allow me to tell you about it. Dr. Robertson McQuilkin was a professor at Columbia Bible College and Seminary. His wife, Muriel, was diagnosed with Alzheimer's at age 55, and Dr. McQuilkin has written several books detailing that journey. This book is about keeping that promise during sickness and health.

How rare! My generation is missing the boat. Many people my age don't know what it is to serve others or to think of someone else's needs above their own. Our children will not have the benefit of watching their parents grow older and deeper together. They are robbed of knowing what it means to be committed through thick and thin, for better or worse.

For Christmas, I purchased Dr. McQuilkin's book for my Dad in hopes that he will find encouragement there. As the days go by, my mom looks more frail than the month before. Some days her speech is so poor that we have to ask her to repeat several times over, what she is trying to say. It frustrates her and it frustrates my Dad. Not always and not everyday. But some days are really difficult.

Mom wears a referee whistle around her neck 24 hours a day. Since her falling is more frequent now and and we don't always hear her cries for help, we have devised a way that she can alert us in an emergency. I know this will only be temporary, but for as long as is possible, we want to give her the dignity of her last shred of independence, which is confined to the bathroom.

Her disease is progressing, which is indicative by its name (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy). My Dad speaks to her in positive ways, making positive plans, and positive dreams. But at night, when Mom has gone off to get ready for bed, Dad thinks out loud and I hear the sadness in his voice..and the wondering of what step is next in this maze of "she might experience this...or that could happen."

Today, January 14, 2002, Mom and Dad have been married 18,980 days! That breaks down to 52 years. Through 52 years my mother bore ten children, they lost one child in infancy and raised nine. They have been on the roller coaster and merry-go-round of parenting for many years. My parents have married off most their children and gained as many more. A son-in-laws untimely death at 36 shook them to the core. An infant grandchild's death, seven months later was almost more than they could bear. Their retirement years consisted of traveling and simply enjoying all the things they could not afford or time didn't allow doing in their earlier years together. Now, in the prime of their golden years, my mom is greatly impaired and those options have ended abruptly.

Yet, Dad is singing and Mom is smiling. He still takes her on a date now and then, and I see an extra sparkle in her eye on those little outings. Dad buys Mom pretty things for Christmas and she cries. A sweet tooth runs through our family and occasionally they'll share a special something just for them.

I work in a local restaurant where many customers know my folks. Many of the women near my parent’s ages come to me and tell me how good my father is to my mother. They fear that if the same happened to them, their husbands couldn't or wouldn't handle it well at all, or be so kind. Do you know that I have been hearing these kinds of stories about my father all my life?

My Dad is not a super-hero. He doesn't always do it well. He loses his patience and sometimes gets short with Mom. But Dad loves Mom and Mom loves Dad and they both know it. They are committed to each other. They still share the same bedroom and the same bed. They converse and they laugh. This commitment is more than just staying in the marriage. It's choosing to show love daily even after all these years. I'm sure Dad doesn't always feel like doing the things he does. Even yesterday when I came in from work Dad was on his knees, cutting Mom's toenails. Other days begin with Dad helping Mom with the most private hygiene of all. That's not the way we really want to start our day, is it? But that's marriage. That's 52 years of love proving itself.

October 2001, I came back to Michigan to help my Dad keep some form of his active life going. He knows he can go out now to play bridge or golf, and that someone is here with Mom in the event she needs help. At times though, I wonder what I'm doing. I am 47 years old and living back with my parents, whom I haven't lived with for 28 years. No sooner had my sons grown up and now I'm sort of "parenting" again. Then I remind myself that I came to serve my parents, and share Jesus' love with them.

Six months ago, I never imagined that I would be living back at home assisting my father, "the caregiver." Now, I can't imagine being anywhere else. I am blessed. I have been given the privilege of being placed in the most intimate part of my parent's life...their day-to-day love affair with each other.

A Promise Kept.

JOY!

Still floating on the words that were written in the letter from Cliff, I wanted to share something more with you.

By now, many of you have read the letter from my prior post and are encouraged as I am of the words he wrote. My little sister and I caught up by phone last night (an hour and 10 minutes worth!). She lives in WY and has been very active in recovery for about six years, I think (I'm so proud of you!). When we were yakking last night, I read her Cliff's letter. She said, "that's a letter from a MAN." Wow. I can hardly choke back my emotions when I re-read the letter and hear those words.

That brings me to this. Yesterday at a small, intimate study I go to, one of the questions we were discussing was "What circumstances in your life are not working out, or didn't work out as you thought God would work them out?"

My mentor shared of a very difficult time when she was involved in a ministry that God removed her from. As she shared her heartache the other participant and I agreed that we were so blessed to have her now in our lives as a result of the change that occurred in hers. I had a moment to reflect again on the question and looked at the second part of it; What circumstances didn't work out as you thought God would work them out.

One year ago, when I started recovery meetings and attending church regularly again, I couldn't have imagined that I would be this healthy person looking forward to my son coming out of prison. All I could do then was beg God for relief for myself and intervention in Cliff's life. This relationship was so close to being severed forever in my way of thinking. I never, ever imagined receiving letters like I have the past few months, or having conversations with my son who is clearly maturing and becoming healthy in mind, body and soul.

"We will heal and learn together instead of against one another."

That fills me with so much joy! My God is working this out in a much greater way than I ever would have believed would be done for me. I said I believed it but my heart wouldn't wrap around it.

Oh me, of little faith!

"God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us." Eph 3:20,21 The Message

Letters

Cliff has been comfortable calling me on a fairly regular basis. I'm always glad to talk with him, especially this time around. He's really been different and I have to believe that even if Cliff doesn't realize it, God is working in his heart and life. It's throughout his conversation. This past week when he called and we were talking in general, Cliff said he wanted to tell me something. We had been talking of my letters and about some of the copies of this blog I've sent to him. He said he thought of writing me a letter but since we were talking he may as well just tell me.

I said "no, don't! I'd much rather get a letter!" So, I got my letter.

Well it's Wednesday, just another day to me. I talked to you a good bit yesterday so I don't have much to write.

I'll start by commenting on your writings. You may or may not have thought that some of them might be hurtful. But if you have thought it, don't worry. It's a little hard to read sometimes because of the shame, but it's not hurtful. I think your writing is healthy for you and me. It's good for me to hear about this stuff from your perspective. You've told me how you felt before but it has sunk in more reading it. You've already heard my apologies, but they will mean nothing until I change, which I have. But you won't be able to see it until I'm on your side of the fence again. Thank you again for the chance to show it. We will heal and learn together instead of against one another. I love you Mom.

This letter will go with the few other keepsakes I've saved over the years from people I love. It assures me that God is hearing my prayers, and the prayers of others for Cliff and giving me a peace that passes all understanding. It brings me peace not just because Cliff wrote down some nice words, but because Cliff's words have been consistently the same this year. No wavering from day to day or week to week. No more blaming. I'm not naive enough to think that we won't let each other down or that there won't be a relapse. But overriding the typical thoughts of possible results, is faith in God's touch on Cliff's life and mine. He is with us, no matter what.

Staying in the present and looking forward to the future, no matter what the outcome.