Mental Health

Let’s Party

In the past year, as I’ve delved into the facebook world, I have been amazed at the achievements of my high school classmates. (BTW – if you haven’t liked me on facebook yet, you can do it here, or on the sidebar.)

Joe Weirzbecki is a tea-party guru.

Alex and Chelsea are the founders of BreezyMama.

I already told you about Ted Johnson.

Jeff Keirns is a producer in the world of Reality TV.

Ty Gurney runs a successful surf school in Hawaii.

But some of the achievements that I have been the most impressed with are the ones I won’t reveal. They are the few classmates who have confided in me about their sobriety. I am so proud of them for realizing that they had a problem, and doing something about it. I am so grateful for Alcoholics Anonymous that helps so many people realize their dreams. I am such a huge believer in the 12 steps and have found great happiness in my life by following its principles with my codependency. Sometimes just living a normal healthy life is the best accomplishment of all. And really, we all have addictions to overcome. It takes a lot of courage to admit that.

My high school is a party school. Party party party all the time.

It’s no wonder to me that as young as high school, many of my classmates were forming an addiction to alcohol and marijuana. Their influences were everywhere. Many parents encouraged the partying. They were the cool ones back in the day. Maybe they still are.

I am anxious to go back to my high school reunion as the party scene is something I haven’t done in a very long time. Being around people who are drunk or high was something my husband never experienced in his life, until he became a juvenile attorney and a lot of his clients were addicts. He never knew what they are going to say or do. Here is a hilarious news story that all nursing mothers should read and laugh. They will then instantly lay off the booze. Unless they want to risk using breast-milk as a their weapon of choice against the law enforcement.

At my reunion there will be party before the parties. Parties after the parties. And parties the next day. Did I tell you that I attended a party school? Well, apparently the parties are still in full force.I hope my partying classmates will be respectful of the non-par-tiers. I hope they will realize that even if alcohol isn’t a problem in their life, that it has indeed stolen years from some of our classmates. I hope that they will applaud those who aren’t drinking, instead of naively pressuring them to party on dude. Surely, we are all old enough now to acknowledge the ill effects of drinking, especially for addicts. For those of my classmates that are sober (or Mormon), I just read today about a specialty drink called The Utah Sunset you can order.

It is such a different world being a Mormon. We went to my sister in law Jill’s birthday party last night. In attendance were a bunch of 20 somethings. There was no alcohol, but much laughter. They played ninja and whole body twister. And they laughed all night long. I believe they all went home with no regrets.

Now onto me.

All you loyal readers know how hard I’ve been working at sprucing up the blog so that I could monetize.

I am proud to announce today that I have a new lucky number.

I guess it’s now seven.

Today marks the day that I’ve had

1007 posts

5370 comments.

This month I’ve had 6,701 hits.

And the best of all:

I have earned my first 2.74 cents.

My old lucky number was 11.

It is now retired.

I have 211 spam comments in my spam box.

For some reason most of those tried to post naked pictures on Donna’s Birthing Story. Go figure. Trust me when I tell you that you should be very happy that blogger has advanced enough to know how to block the spam from publishing.

So,

I’m partying today.

Like it’s 1997.

The year I got married.

Not like, 1991, the year I graduated high school.

I don’t need alcohol for my happiness.

In fact, I believe my happiness is better when it can be achieved without alcohol.

I Feel E Beautiful

When people search the lyrics to the song I’m So Pretty on google, they must be surprised when they are brought to this old post which was titled with the words to a great Broadway song I Feel Pretty. It’s one of my favorite songs of all time.

I thought that the words said “I’m so pretty and witty and wise”, but after listening to the above mash up, I realize that I was mistaken, it’s really “I’m so pretty and witty and bright.” I like wise better, but really isn’t it the same thing?

This song has a great message and I wish to share it. Everyone should feel pretty. They should always feel pretty. Even without make-up or the latest fashions or any admirers to tell them so. I think although sometimes I feel fat, I have always felt pretty. I am not saying this to brag, but it’s true, I’m pretty. I am not drop dead gorgeous, but I don’t think I am hard on the eyes. Do other people even think about stuff like this? Am I just sounding like a total freak right now?

My sister came to visit this past weekend and she complained that I have such great skin while she still struggles with acne. She also told me that I better hurry and dye my grey hair. To try and counteract the hair comment, she said, “Alice, I wish I had as pretty of a face that you do.” Funny, I just want her marathon running body to go with my already gorgeous face. I guess this stems from so many people telling me that it was o.k. that I was fat because I have such a beautiful face. Hate on me haters. Seriously, they started telling me that at a young age. I guess I am a living testament to the power of complimentary behavior. I have always felt beautiful. (I have also always felt fat)

When LG and I were engaged, we were encouraged to take the this compatibility test at BYU before getting married the ten days later that we did. It was the worst thing we ever did for our marriage. We were told that we were compatible. (Hello, we already knew that) But, one of the questions of the test has been detrimental to LG and I both for years. It was:

Rate your potential partner’s looks.
a)ugly
b)below average
c)average
d)above average
e)beautiful

I chose C. LG chose D. When going over our results, I was heartbroken. I wanted to be E beautiful and I let him have it. Every girl should feel that their spouse thinks they are E beautiful. It still comes up from time to time. LG always defends himself that D (pretty) is perfectly great and that I said he was only C (average) and no one ever hears him complain.

There is no moral to this post. It’s more of the rambling type. I do think that there is power in the mind and that we should all be kind to ourselves. I am glad that I feel pretty. Now I am just going to work on feeling happy with the body that I have or do something to change it. I think I never really worry about it because even though I feel fat, I think that fat can still be pretty. In fact, fat can be E beautiful. Just look at the link below.

Even though this blogger has never acknowledged my existence, I am still going to send you to yet another one of her posts. It’s about body image. It’s awesome. And the women of Ghana would probably never call themselves fat. Maybe I should start there.

And if the post above doesn’t make you ready for bathing suit season, try this old post of mine.

Yes, I am talking to you, young lady.

My Abigail is 12.

And she is loving it.

I never want her to be a mean girl.

I hope she will be friends with everyone.

I think I was guilty of being a mean girl

as a teenager,

and it’s one of my few life regrets.

I wish I would have not worried about my popularity status

but just loved everyone.

Go here for a good article about bullying.

I am gonna make Abigail read it.

Just in case she could use some help.

With being bullied.

Or bullying.

“Being nice” talks are very important

when a girl has three little sisters

who watch her every move.

Now on to other things I say to Abigail too often.

Did you finish your homework?

Who farted?

Go to your room.

No dating until you are 16.

If you don’t have anything nice to say,

don’t say anything at all.

Wash your face.

You’re so sexy.

Look me in the eye.

Quit primping already, it’s time to go.

You are so beautiful.

You don’t need make-up.

I love you and I’m proud of you.

C’mon, give me a hug. PLEASE!

How was your day?

You are so cool.

My Prayer of Conversion

Search me God.
Find the source of decay and heal it.
Find my broken heart and make it whole.
Make my brain without lesions.
Cure each sore muscle.
Fill the hole of lonliness.
The thoughts of negativity, pluck from me
and transform them into loveliness.

And when thou art done,
make me a tribute to thee,
a living monument to thy grace
and power and love.

And from me,
others will see beauty
and like I have,
they will stop in place and time
and know that thou art God.
And they will want
to be thy creation too.
And they will search for thee.

And they will know
that all they have to do
is let Thou search through them.
And do thy magic.
They will ask also.
And I will be but one flower
in a world full of breathtaking gardens.

Scientific Method

Abigail was quoted in the Knoxville Sentinel today. She was dressed like Galileo when talking to the reporter. She was so proud that the way the reporter started his article was Galileo was there. “Oh yeah, he’s talking about me,” bragged Abigail. The irony of her later quote is what is killing me. I must blog about it. Don’t mind me as I ramble on about the whole experience. Sometimes this blog acts as my personal journal and our family historian. If you want the abridged version just read the next paragraph and scroll to the end.

I can only blog about this because Abigail is usually a great student. She always scores in advanced on her T-Caps. She is in all Honors classes. She got straight A’s her first quarter of middle school. So you can imagine our dismay when a few days ago, Abigail came home with her report card and there was a big fat F in Science. We were appalled.

My friend Rita said that when she saw Abigail at the school it
reminded her of how they always depict God in the movies.
It wasn’t until I took this picture and added it to my blog
that I realized what she was talking about.

We have come to the conclusion that the grade is the fault of three bad combinations: 1- Our neglect due to the move. 2- Abigail’s complacency and 3 – We are pretty sure Abigail will eventually be diagnosed as ADHD.

What most people don’t understand about ADHD kids is that a lot of them are extremely bright. There is an ADHD subset that usually gets overlooked. They are the ones that do very well in school because they are so bright.

My husband was a kid like that. He was just recently diagnosed with ADHD as a 35 year old adult. Ritalin has been an eye-opening experience for LG. The first time he took the drug, he said to me, “Oh my gosh Alice, my mind is so clear. It’s crazy. Just imagine what I could have done if I had some Ritalin while in law school.”

Anyhow, back to the story. Abigail brought home this F. It was horrifying. I immediately e-mailed her teacher and talked to her principal on the phone. I am a little worried how this will effect Abigail’s placement at her new school after we move. The timing is awful, but hopefully we can get her new school to understand the extreme abnormality of this grade. The good news is that maybe now we can get her doctor and school to understand our concern for her ADHD. They wouldn’t agree to look into the possibility when she had straight A’s, but now they will hopefully be able to see a little window into what we are dealing with on a larger scale.

When LG sat down with Abigail last night to review her individual assignment grades it was no surprise to us that Abigail said that on each low grade she had forgot to either turn it in, complete it, or study. She has science first period and even if she does pay close enough attention to instructions, which she often considers non-essential information, it’s gone by the end of the day. She is just not engaged by things that don’t require real thinking and she is simultaneously totally overwhelmed by the structure in this class. Her teacher has about ten things going on at once and it’s just too much for an ADD brain. Her teacher is great and really makes science come to life, but for an ADD kid, the way that she structures her class is brutal. It’s been an awesome on-going science project. Who knew that they actually do science projects in a middle school science class?

Let’s see. The Scientific Method at work:

1 Ask a question – Does Abigail have ADHD?
2 Do background research – Abigail is normally a straight A student.
3 Construct a Hypothesis – It would be unlikely that Abigail has ADHD given the facts.
4 Test your hypothesis by doing an experiment – Give Abigail a Science Teacher who assigns 6 projects per nine weeks and does very little to communicate with the parents or make sure that Abigail stays on task. See how she does.
5 Analyze your data and draw a conclusion – Abigail failed science yet still received either A’s or B’s in all of her more structured classes, therefore she probably does have ADHD or just hates science.
6 Communicate your results – That would be this blog post. Do you think I should e-mail it to the teacher? She would be so proud that real science was actually taking place. She might even use it for future class projects.

So, imagine our surprise when Abigail came home the same day as receiving her F all excited about her Galileo project. She was so excited to not just research Galileo but to dress up like him. She did awesome, huh? She got really creative and insisted on dragging out the Santa costume box. Of course it was at the bottom of the stack of moving boxes, but at her stubborn request we re-shifted the whole room to discover the needed beard and wig. Then she told us not to come to her presentation. I think she was trying to keep us away from her science teacher.

Well imagine our surprise when reading this in the newspaper article this afternoon: (Amongst our first failing grade ever, the irony is just a little too much)

Sixth-grader Abigail Gold donned a white wig and beard as she depicted famed early astronomer Galileo for the Living Space History Museum exhibit.

She and other students selected a person in history who had an impact on the space program, designed posters, dressed in period and gave oral presentations on their historical figures.

Abigail said Thursday’s event shows science and math can be fun.

“I’ve always wanted to be a scientist,” she said. “A lot (of kids) think it’s boring, but it’s my favorite subject.”

When Abigail got done reading aloud about herself in the article, Sophia quickly chimed in:

“Abigail what it really should have said is ‘but it’s my favorite subject’, even if I did fail the last nine weeks.”

What I was thinking was that it’s a good thing that God gave Abigail such a bright mind because if anyone is ever gonna figure out how to beat ADHD permanently, it’s her. She has a love for science that I have rarely seen, even if it’s a failing kind of love.

The Power of the Atonement

One thing I have come to understand in the past few years is that we each have addictions.

Some are addicted to alcohol, drugs, or sex. Some to pornography, coffee, tobacco. Many others have the socially acceptable if not revered addictions like exercise, house cleaning, make-up application, shoe collecting, or shopping. Some are hoarders. Some have eating disorders. Some struggle with same sex attraction. Some pedophilia. Others with having children (hello octomom) or stockpiling stocks.

I personally struggle as a co-dependent. I am also addicted to baked goods, and I am not saying that as a joke. Like so many others, in the closet and out, I have an obsession with being loved. I will do anything to be loved including but not limited to letting other people treat me like crap, excessively rescuing and controlling, crying for days when someone reprimands me, and being overly responsible. I am grateful that I am married to the man that I am, who understands my struggle. Many other codependents have to go through many relationships to be satisfied. Many other addictions can be traced back to original codependency; in fact many addicts have to come to terms with their codependency to successfully overcome their other temptations.

Just watch this Pink video for the song Please Don’t Leave Me and tell me she doesn’t get the need to be loved. Or how about this one called I Can’t Make You Love Me by Bonnie Rait, one of my personal favorites. We sang the song Give Me the Gift of Love by Bette Midler at my Grandma’s funeral. I have come to believe that my Grandma understood the excessive need I feel to be loved. My mom has it too. No brainer really. Where do you think I learned it?

Anyhow, it’s Sunday. If I post on Sunday, it is going to be something that honors God. This video honors my God. It does a great job of explaining there is one place where we can get the strength to overcome addiction. I know this place to be my friend and Savior Jesus Christ. He strengthens me every day and I am so very grateful.

So, go ahead, say something mean. I am recovered enough I can take it. I no longer need you to love me. I have learned that getting love from one person is plenty satisfying. That person isn’t my husband; LG’s love is just icing on the cake. Your love for me is like daffodils in bloom, but God’s love: God’s love is as big as this whole magnificent earth. Actually it’s bigger than I understand. I can’t measure infinity.

Thank you to my God who frees me from my bondage. Next focus: milkshakes. I am not planning on taking that one too fast.

Two-Fers

Did you know that the toothbrush was invented in Tennessee?

Yes it was. I know it seems odd after all those Tennessee teeth jokes.

“How do I know this”, you ask?

If it was invented anywhere else it would have been named the teeth-brush.

For the past several years I have been having a reoccurring dream that all my teeth are falling out. Or sometimes I have a bunch of junk stuck in my teeth and I am trying to in·con·spic·u·ous-ly (yes, I had to look that one up in the dictionary) rid my mouth of the sticky gum-like substance without anyone noticing. Of course in my dreams everyone is always looking at me and I can’t do anything inconspicuously. (Wow, I got the word all by myself the second time around.)

Well, my curiosity got the better of me. I finally googled the meaning of my dream. And, oh my goodness, it’s spot on.

My dreams have been trying to tell me that:

1- I have anxiety about my appearance.

2- I fear rejection, especially regarding my sex appeal and femininity.

3- I am worried about making a fool of myself.

4- I have a sense of powerlessness.

5- I have malnutrition and a poor diet.

6- I have a family member or close friend who is very sick or near death.

7- I am putting my faith and trust in what man thinks instead of God.

8- I am lying according to the Chinese.

For me, all of the above are true, except for the lying. Unless we count lying to myself, which I try not to do, but I believe we are all guilty of it.

I wonder if when I quit residing in this great state of Tennessee if my nightmare will finally go away. And I think the answer may be yes. Why, you ask?

Well, it’s a simple answer really:

For the first time in 8 years I am going to have dental insurance.

I am so totally lucky that I have only lost one tooth while living here, and even for that one a permanent cap fixed me right up, but, oh how I felt old. I have worried ever since about having to get dentures. I think I have done well since only having one casualty while residing in the land of famous hillbilly teeth. I wonder if my new dentist will be able to do anything with this mouthful of plaque? I really don’t want to look like this photo for the rest of my life.

Oh yeah, that’s not me.

Tennessee may have some ugly teeth, but usually the women with the ugly teeth don’t also have a 5 o’clock shadow. And I am really not lyin’ when I say that it’s true that there are a lot of people here with some jacked up teeth. You’d think that I would at least be able to overcome #1 and #2 for the simple fact that I still have a full set.

I think you all should google your reoccurring dream and blog about it. I will do a post linking to you all with your story and we will see if Freud knew what he was talking about. Whose in?

The Garbage

While in marriage counseling a while back the subject of garbage became a stumbling block. I complained that he knew it was his job and that he never did it. This was my complaint in general. I was begging for my husband to do his part.

Imagine my surprise when LG answered the counselor’s question of why he didn’t take the garbage out if he knew it was his job. “She always does it first. She never gives me a chance.” What?? I felt betrayed. How many times had I run out to the meet the garbage man in my underwear, like my newest favorite blogger? Yes, there were many times that I just went ahead and did it after school the day before so that I wouldn’t forget, but there were also many more that I didn’t do it all because I hoped he would, and he didn’t. In fact, he may have done it once without my reminder. Once in 12 years.

So, marriage counseling became our tool to reveal the truth. The truth was somewhere in the middle. I took the garbage out too much and he didn’t enough. Wow. What a revelation.

The real work came when we had to decide what to do about it. For my husband it meant getting in touch with his ADD and making a reminder and system that would help him out.

For me it was a little more difficult. It was called some serious character changing. When the marriage counselor told me to let the garbage pile up if needed I about died. Seriously, it was like he told me to give up my first born.

Looking back it made perfect sense. How was the guy ever gonna learn unless I was willing to let him take full responsibility? I had to be willing to let him succeed or fail with the garbage. The only way he would be forced to admit to not doing the job was when he had to go out after three weeks and physically handle the maggot infested bags. To which afterwards while jumping in the shower he proclaimed, “O.k. the problem just became greater than the solution.”

The next time that reminder came up on his phone’s screen, it became a whole lot more relevant.

It is hard for self proclaimed perfect people like me to give grace to others’ weaknesses. It is even harder to give that grace to myself. I had to get in touch with the fact that I am OK and of worth with imperfections. I can let myself and my family members have imperfections too. Just because we aren’t perfect it doesn’t mean that I am worthless. This may sound like selfworth 101 for some of you, but trust me when I say that this concept was a huge deal to me.

So the moral of the story. Let the garbage pile up. Let your spouse take full responsibility. Let people fail because it’s only in the failing that people learn to succeed. It’s also only in the accepting the failure that we truly learn to love ourselves and others.

Oh, and if I am gonna be fair, I would like to make a public apology to my husband for being mad at him for 11 years over the garbage. I admit that I wasn’t really fair that I was resentful at him for not doing a job that I was all too willing to do for him.

I would also like to make an announcement. I think it has been a whole two months since the last time he forgot, and that is really really impressive. And I think I am equally impressive as the one time I watched it piling up tall and wide…like almost to the fence-line, I believed myself that the garbage really had nothing to do with my selfworth.

Loving me

I have learned something about myself.

Most people may have the same problem.

I am a lifelong sufferer of not loving myself.

For many reasons I have never felt worthy of true love.

Lately, I have been getting in touch with the reasons.

Many have validity and many don’t.

I have taken these things to my God.

I have come to peace with them.

And I have felt God’s loving arms around me.

And He says he loves me.

And now I can say I love me too.

I hope I can love me more.

Three-stepping

As many of you know, I have been in an intensive 12 step study.

My class has been specifically for codependence.

Through this class and working the 12 steps, I have personally experienced God’s healing hand.

I wish everyone could feel the peace and power that I have.

It has been hard work, but worth every step and every tear.

I wanted to share the first three steps in abbreviation.

1-I can’t do this anymore.

2- God can.

3- I think I will let Him.

I have learned that I will be “three-stepping” for the rest of my life. It can be a one step occurrence, but in that one step, we figure out that we can hand ourselves over to God’s care. And when we do it, it feels so good that we want to keep doing it. This simple concept actually works. It works miracles.

LG asked me last week how I had become the zen master. He wanted to know what I had done with his wife. I am living in a state of peace. And that’s not like me. Not like me at all.

How did I do it? I let God do it for me! For the first time in my life, I learned how to hand my whole self over. The 12 steps taught me how to get past myself. I literally had to take myself out as the boundary between God and me. Taking out the unhealthy Alice gave God the power to emerge a whole new creature. My new creature knows how to trust. And she places her trust in God. Because why place my trust in anything else? God is the one who is all powerful. Before I thought I could pretend to be Him; I tried to control the universe. And all I was doing was getting in God’s way.

I can’t believe my mouth. It is constantly saying things like this:

God’s got my back.

God knows what’s best.

God can deal with that.

God won’t let me suffer anything that isn’t absolutely necessary.

God loves me.

God will bless me.

And I believe all of these things with all my heart. Because God showed me how to trust.

So when you see a US coin, and it has a simple little message in it. “In God we trust.” Know that those four words really do hold all power to your happiness.

You probably think that you already trust God. I sure didn’t think that I wasn’t trusting God adequately. At 21, I turned my whole life over to be a full-time missionary. Hadn’t I got married to who He told me to marry? I had kids way earlier than I wanted to because He told me to. I kept the commandments to the best of my ability. I went to church every Sunday. I paid a full tithe. I prayed and studied scripture.

But it was all mechanical. And I was a mess. Because when the mortgage wasn’t going to get paid, I fretted. When the kids fought, I felt like a failure. When I couldn’t really be there for people like I thought I should, I couldn’t deal with it. When people were unkind to me, I fell apart. When I didn’t get my way, I would be angry.

And now, you can slap me in my face, and I will praise my God for giving me a face and you a hand. And I will know that if you walk away from me forever I can stand on my own two feet because God will hold them in place.

And that is the power of three stepping. In God I trust. And you just can’t believe how good God really is. He wants to hold me and comfort me and make me happy. He doesn’t want to tell me what I am doing wrong. He wants me to know how everything He created in me, was by His hand and for His purposes.

I have learned this concept of trusting in the Lord my whole life. It had specific relativity in 1994 when I met my husband while we were both missionaries, yet he had a girlfriend waiting for him at home. I knew he was my husband yet there was nothing I could do but keep serving my mission and hope for the best. I couldn’t even talk to LG about it because missionaries don’t date. I read this message over and over. You would think I would have gotten the hang of trusting then, but I didn’t completely.

It wasn’t until I went back to the little girl Alice and convinced her that trusting was the right thing to do, that I could give my whole self over. Somehow the little girl Alice who had been disappointed or neglected or let down wouldn’t let the grown up Alice let go.

But the little girl Alice and her 37 year old counterpart have finally come together because of God’s power. And the only way I could make it happen was by letting God do it for me.

Can you tell I am in a really good place right now?

Trusting is phenomenal. And I just learned how to spell that word this morning. It took me 15 minutes of searching online. Phenomenal is a great way to feel.

Trust = phenomenal.

If you aren’t feeling phenomenal, then ask yourself what is keeping you from trusting? And go back to that time and place and tell yourself to trust in God. He’s got your back. Really.