CODEPENDENCE AND MOTHERHOOD

It's not that I don't want to look at codependency and its implications.  It just gives me a headache.  When I was in a terrible codependent marriage, I knew how unhealthy it was.  I was so isolated and in denial about the psychological abuse that I was allowing to happen to me.   And now I have to take a serious look at codependency in regards to being a supportive MOM or being an enabler to my daughter's addiction.

I am beginning to see that as her gambling addiction got worse, my enabling also became worse.  I just didn't want to see her in pain or getting herself into legal problems.  Or even worse, I couldn't imagine my child homeless and living out of her car.  This was my daughter who always had well paying jobs and money to burn.  And now I see that I was just prolonging the inevitable of her hitting bottom.  I just had such a difficult time watching her falling farther and farther into the depths of addiction.

In the final few months we really didn't have contact except when she would phone and say that she didn't know where she was, but knew she didn't have enough gas money to get her home from where she was.   As a mother it seemed impossible for me to abandon her.  And yet it didn't seem like she was doing anything to help herself.  Then the phone calls just stopped.  I had no idea if she was dead or alive.  The only place I could find any evidence that she was still on this earth was an updated posting on Facebook. Then the call came begging to come home.  How could I say no?

I guess if I hadn't just come to the realization that she was not going to get well without getting into inpatient rehab, she would still be acting out her addiction.  She would have found a friend to help her get a job, give her a place to live, and for a few months she would have pulled herself together.  Gosh who is to say that once she gets out of rehab, this won't be what happens.  I know that all I can do now is stand firm and not help her out anymore.  As I say this I just realized that once again I was allowing myself to be victim to my daughter's addictive behaviors.

Codependency is like a slithering slug that slinks in to your life and before you know it your whole life is covered with its horrible sticky slime.

FAREWELL MY DEAR FRIEND

She wasn't known by many and yet everyone who met her loved her infectious energy.  On Thursday during the night the universe called my darling friend home. She was only 48 years young.  And she spent many of those years in a struggle to maintain sobriety.  Thankfully the past year of her life she was winning the war against the demons that she lived with.

There are so many things that are sad about a vibrant life cut short too soon. She had so many plans of how she wanted to raise her daughters.  We would talk endlessly about the books we were going to write together, plans of trips we were going to take, and even conversations that we didn't have time to exchange. Donna, I am so sad to say goodbye, and at the same time I know that your suffering on this earthly plane is finished.

We always joked that when our time here was over we would meet again in that other dimension.  We would recognize each other, standing waiting at a bus stop, and we would say to each other - "Do you believe what just happened!"   Of course every time she said that to me, I never believed that she would get to the bus stop before me.

Baruch dayan ha'emet-----Blessed be the Judge of Truth