When you love someone who is still in active addiction, it’s easy to become emotionally enmeshed in all of their ongoing chaos and drama. Here is a simple gauge you can use for your own self-assessment.
From Fantasy to Reality on Valentine’s Day: Loving Yourself with Healthy Self-Care
Ah, Valentine’s Day, the fantasy-filled holiday that comes right after we’ve managed to get ourselves through another year of Christmas and New Year’s Eve!
Have you ever wondered whose bright idea it was to have those three holidays in a row? For many people, the 3-month period of December through February can be the most difficult and depressing time of the year, and this is especially true for those whose significant relationships are problematic. For people with addictive behaviours, as well as those who love them, their most important relationships are also often the most troublesome and rocky.
THE TRILOGY
Think about it—first comes Christmas with all its potential addictive pitfalls. It begins right after Halloween when TV ads try to sell us the concept of the perfectly happy family, stores begin putting up their colourful Christmas displays, and we hear those bells start to jingle. Compulsive shoppers spend far over their budgets, people-pleasers agonize over the right gifts to get so that everyone will be happy with them, gamblers worry about that elusive big win that will allow them to provide the fantasy Christmas for their loved ones, to make up for the grief they may have caused them over the rest of the year. Food addictions run rampant as junk food becomes even more plentiful and overeating abounds. And people with substance abuse issues try to hide from it all by getting high or drunk.
[Read more…]Addicted to Christmas Chaos? Taming the Madness this Holiday Season
First published on December 14, 2012.
Has anyone else noticed how early the Christmas chaos began this year?
I recall a few years ago here in Vancouver, a number of people became so disgruntled by the early onset of Christmas music in some of the stores—in the middle of October—that they took to Facebook en masse and complained. One store in particular, Shoppers Drug Mart, appeased the naysayers by stopping that music, but only after they drew their line in the sand, assuring us that the carols would resume again at the end of October. And they did.
ANXIETY FOR ADDICTS
Even before Halloween came and went, I noticed that several of my clients were already becoming quite antsy about the upcoming holiday season—for a variety of reasons. People who struggle with addictive behaviours—anything from drugs and alcohol to eating disorders, gambling, sex addiction, or relationship addiction—wondered if they would be able to maintain their sobriety when they began to actually feel the loneliness, fear, and isolation that they had used these behaviours and substances to avoid experiencing.
Those who have problems with compulsive overspending worried that they would max out their credit cards in short order when they went online or to the mall to do their mandatory Christmas shopping, while anorexics and bulimics worried endlessly about the food they would be expected to consume during seasonal festivities.
[Read more…]Holistic Self-Care When Loving an Addict
Recently, while working with a client (I’ll call her Jane) who is the loved one of an addict, she made a significant discovery. We were talking about the importance of Jane’s self-care, an important subject I frequently discuss with all of my clients. She looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, “I don’t feel like I know how to take care of myself—I don’t know what I want or how to ask for it.”
“I don’t know how to set healthier boundaries because I don’t even know what those boundaries are,” Jane explained. “I’ve been steamrolled over for my whole life, mostly by family and friends who expect me to take care of them. No one takes care of ME! How would I know how to take care of myself? No one ever taught me that!”
I could appreciate Jane’s frustration. I was actually gladdened by her anger about this situation—because anger is a step up emotionally from the depression she’d been feeling. Many loved ones tell me they never get angry—or if they do, they don’t show that anger to anyone for fear of the rejection they’ll receive. Instead, they spend their time pleasing others, doing their bidding, squashing down their own feelings instead of sharing them—which often leads them to a place of anxiety, resentment and quiet despair. And because they don’t talk about these feelings, they’re unaware of how common they are among other loved ones who are caught in those same people-pleasing traps—often for their whole lives, remaining miserable and unhappy while those around them seem to benefit from the care being shown to them.
Something is very wrong with this picture! [Read more…]
When You’re Going Through Hell, Keep on Going: Having the Courage to Stay the Course
What I Know Today
After over 25 years of working with clients struggling with addiction—and those who so dearly love them—not too much surprises me anymore. Not only have I survived many of my own difficult past experiences, I’ve also heard about—and witnessed—a great many traumatic stories from both addicts and their loved ones. I’m constantly awed by the resilience of the human spirit, especially when people have the intention to rise above the tremendous grief that could otherwise totally take them out.
My work is most satisfying when I have the opportunity to watch people move from feeling victimized by their experiences, into a place of deep understanding of the choices they have in terms of responding to what has happened to them. I’ve gone through that myself, numerous times in my own journey of recovery—both from addiction and chronic illness—and each time I’ve come out the other end of that seemingly endless tunnel, I’ve seen that the light was there all along. Now, most days, I am able to trust my hindsight about this and remember that even when I don’t actually see the light in that moment, I believe the time will come when I will. Today I know that if I can stay the course, great learning will come to me. I trust now that I will be better off than I was before, if I just stay on the path.
What I absolutely know today is that when we’re going through hell, we need to keep on going—because if we stop at that point, we will undoubtedly get stuck—in hell! [Read more…]