Hi Friends,
Today is Thursday. It has been 3 weeks since that Thursday. It feels like it has been 100 weeks. It feels like it has been years since that Thursday, years counted in sleepless nights, restless nights, tears, no tears, sadness, and anger. When people ask me how I am doing I am not even sure what to say? I want to say I'm standing here aren't I? That about sums it up. I am standing. I am doing what I am supposed to. Getting thru it. Putting one foot in front of the other...moving...maybe moving slow but moving.
I have been going to a shit load of meetings. Tons of meetings. I realized that meetings are my church. Meetings are my sacred place. My place where everything around me stops and I can just be there with people who are also there. I feel very present in meetings and very grateful. Not just for the sacred place but for the fellowship, for the honesty, for the skills that I have learned from all of the people that surround me there. I spoke last night at a meeting and I told my story and included my most recent loss at the end. I wanted people to know me and who I am right now...I wanted them to know that it is because of the fellowship and the 12 Steps that I am sane at all in the last three weeks. It is because of the fellowship and my sponsor that I am at a job that I seem to love and that I can show up even when my heart is broken and be ok.
After the meeting last night a man approached me. Because I am getting used to people approaching me I just knew he was going to tell me that someone close to him had killed themselves. I could see it in his eyes, his kindness, his sympathy...he knew. I was right but what I didnt anticipate was that this man shared that this happened to him when he was young. I think he said his early twenties. His Dad was only 40. He said he drank for the next 20 years because of the pain, trauma,loss. He also said his father shared the BiPolar diagnosis and that he has come to see his father's death as a symptom of this mental illness. It struck me that this man appeared at peace. He didnot seem sad, angry, lost. He seemed to have acceptance.
Then it got strange because the man told me that he admired his Dad for having the courage to do it. I was totally speechless at this point not because what he said particularly surprised me but because I have gone over this point in my own head a good amount lately and it confuses me. Cowardice or Strength? Courage or Weakness? This man went on to tell me how he and his girlfriend argue over this. That she had been also close to someone who killed himself and that she saw at as cowardice, weakness, giving up. I finally stammered out that I just dont know. I dont. I dont know. I want to know but I guess this is one of those things you could debate indefinitely
Here is what I do know though. I know that my Dad saw suicide as courageous. He told me so. He told me that he viewed his own mother's suicide as courageous, he made it sound noble. I know that when he said this it terrified me. I know that when this man said it last night that it scared me too. What scared me? I am not totally sure. Black and white thinking scares me. Only seeing an act as how it affects me scares me. Not recognizing that our lives are connected to many many other lives really scares me. Isnt this just how we hurt and get hurt the most? When we fail to see how our behavior impacts others not just ourselves we fail. If I fail to see that my father's death though increadibly painful to me actually ended his own suffering than I am not seeing the whole picture. If he only sees his own peace and does not recognize my pain then he has failed me too. And so it goes.
We fail people that we love. The people that we love fail us. In a black and white world this would not happen. But I've always appreciated a nice gray myself. xxxK
Today is Thursday. It has been 3 weeks since that Thursday. It feels like it has been 100 weeks. It feels like it has been years since that Thursday, years counted in sleepless nights, restless nights, tears, no tears, sadness, and anger. When people ask me how I am doing I am not even sure what to say? I want to say I'm standing here aren't I? That about sums it up. I am standing. I am doing what I am supposed to. Getting thru it. Putting one foot in front of the other...moving...maybe moving slow but moving.
I have been going to a shit load of meetings. Tons of meetings. I realized that meetings are my church. Meetings are my sacred place. My place where everything around me stops and I can just be there with people who are also there. I feel very present in meetings and very grateful. Not just for the sacred place but for the fellowship, for the honesty, for the skills that I have learned from all of the people that surround me there. I spoke last night at a meeting and I told my story and included my most recent loss at the end. I wanted people to know me and who I am right now...I wanted them to know that it is because of the fellowship and the 12 Steps that I am sane at all in the last three weeks. It is because of the fellowship and my sponsor that I am at a job that I seem to love and that I can show up even when my heart is broken and be ok.
After the meeting last night a man approached me. Because I am getting used to people approaching me I just knew he was going to tell me that someone close to him had killed themselves. I could see it in his eyes, his kindness, his sympathy...he knew. I was right but what I didnt anticipate was that this man shared that this happened to him when he was young. I think he said his early twenties. His Dad was only 40. He said he drank for the next 20 years because of the pain, trauma,loss. He also said his father shared the BiPolar diagnosis and that he has come to see his father's death as a symptom of this mental illness. It struck me that this man appeared at peace. He didnot seem sad, angry, lost. He seemed to have acceptance.
Then it got strange because the man told me that he admired his Dad for having the courage to do it. I was totally speechless at this point not because what he said particularly surprised me but because I have gone over this point in my own head a good amount lately and it confuses me. Cowardice or Strength? Courage or Weakness? This man went on to tell me how he and his girlfriend argue over this. That she had been also close to someone who killed himself and that she saw at as cowardice, weakness, giving up. I finally stammered out that I just dont know. I dont. I dont know. I want to know but I guess this is one of those things you could debate indefinitely
Here is what I do know though. I know that my Dad saw suicide as courageous. He told me so. He told me that he viewed his own mother's suicide as courageous, he made it sound noble. I know that when he said this it terrified me. I know that when this man said it last night that it scared me too. What scared me? I am not totally sure. Black and white thinking scares me. Only seeing an act as how it affects me scares me. Not recognizing that our lives are connected to many many other lives really scares me. Isnt this just how we hurt and get hurt the most? When we fail to see how our behavior impacts others not just ourselves we fail. If I fail to see that my father's death though increadibly painful to me actually ended his own suffering than I am not seeing the whole picture. If he only sees his own peace and does not recognize my pain then he has failed me too. And so it goes.
We fail people that we love. The people that we love fail us. In a black and white world this would not happen. But I've always appreciated a nice gray myself. xxxK
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