Recovery Blog

Did I make a mistake?

2012-01-14T00:18:00.000-06:00

Three weeks into a new job and relocation, I feel like I'm in a PTSD shellshock free-fire zone.

I'm making mistakes at work, and getting yelled at, and this past week, have made more. And, a couple of them have been kind of big. And have had domino effects.

I knew, when I was considering coming here, that my ambivalence was in part not due to fear of change but due to past perceptions of the place when I interviewed for anther job with this group of small papers in 2009 and for this job.

But, wanting to get near a big city, having fears of being "stuck" where I was and other things ... led me to think that some of my ambiguity was other things, like general fear of change.

And, some of it was fear of getting more and more stuck back in Odessa the longer I was there as I got ... older.

But, I'm awake, alive, reasonably sane ... and sober. And ... I still have a reasonable possibility of saving my hide, if I don't let the stress get to me any more, or the idea of stress.

Sometimes the 'trouble' does never happen

2012-01-04T22:20:00.000-06:00

Mark Twain has a famous quote, which has been botched a bit here and there, but which I believe is authoritatively rendered as, "I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them have never happened."

Well, I can personally relate to that.

I had a notice from the Postal Service in my box Tuesday night, to sign for a certified letter at the post office. My mind was racing.

Did my old apartment complex suddenly decide it wanted additional money from me somehow? (Even as I have two noncertified letters, one from the complex, one from the parent company, both of which came in the last week, on my table. But, I know what I signed, and signed for, when I moved.)

Did that traffic ticket I got lawyered out of two of three counts, but paid the remaining one, have the money order incorrect?

Something worse?

Well, it was from the Dallas County Sheriff's Office, which made me more nervous at first, since they're the folks who pulled me over in 2009.

What was it actually for?

I had a applied for a PR job, public information officer, with the office. I was being notified I didn't make the final cut - notified by certified letter.

I've played Twain's quote in my head many a time, but never before have I had this concrete of confirmation.

Poem: Too soon to tell

2012-01-03T22:52:00.000-06:00

TOO SOON TO TELL

A new job.

New bosses. New responsibilities.

Not-so-new computers.

Anger. Antsiness. Impatience. Control issues.

Was this the right decision?

Did I choose wisely in coming here?

Per Zhou Enlai,

When he was asked about the success

Of the French Revolution:

“It’s too soon to tell.”

It’s too soon to tell.

My mind will be a jumble

And even a bit shell-shocked

For more than a month.

Will weekend visits to Austin help?

To the degree they do,will they be worth the price?

It’s too soon to tell.

Was it just fear of change?

Or was my intuition correctly ringing out

A blaze of three alarms or more?

Should I have suffered

Through yet more feelings of being trapped,

Through low-grade ongoing anxieties,

Rather than the potential of high-voltage unknowns?

It’s too soon to tell.

When I left Dallas for Odessa,

The first domino of moving to fall in this chain,

After two months of unemployment,

Anxious over job hunting,

And recognizing the severity of the recession,

Yet loath to move

And depressed as I drove across the Permian,

Was it good or bad?

It’s too soon to tell.

Good and bad are relative, and utilitarian;

I did nothing “wrong” any of these times.

But I made decisions

In uncertainty, without knowing even

Rough percentages on outcomes.

And, so, in that utilitarian sense,

As to whether these choices were good or bad?

It’s too soon to tell.

December 26, 1963 – was it good or bad?

It’s too soon to tell.

Jan. 3,2012

The shells of PTSD

2011-12-03T00:59:00.001-06:00

I don’t trust me well.

Let alone you. Or others.

I’ve learned that well.

That’s one of the biggest takeaways about this move, andabout some of my personality in general. I don’t believe in my own skill set,let alone the rest of the haiku. Due to a variety of things, trust, including ideas of confidence, just isn't much of a part of my mental vocabulary. And so, more than being a “highly sensitiveperson,” I am “thin skinned,” but not in a “fly off the handle” way. Rather,it’s that I simply don’t seem to have a lot of emotional and psychological“insulation.”

When criticism arises,

I enter my PTSD shell,

A set of nestled Russian puzzle boxes.

Dissociating even deeper.

It doesn’t even have to be actual criticism, or conflict. Itcan be fear of possible or anticipated criticism or conflict that sets me off.Add in some physiological things like consecutive male births (the more consecutiveboys a mother bears, the more likely the latest boy is to be gay, and there maybe other effects from this “battle of the sexes,” too, for all we know, which is what I am getting at) and afamily anxiety heritage, it’s probably not a wonder I feel like I had thinner “emotionalinsulation” to deal with the events of childhood as they hit me. I don't mean this to be sounding like a pity party. It's simply to say this is part of my heritage as a "survivor." In light of the Penn State and Syracuse scandals, or the Catholic priest scandals, some "survivors" adaptations are even more "primitive" than mine.

Anyway, therefore, I adapted as I knew or learned how. When Isay dissociation, it’s literal, though not as severe as it once was, and it’smore conscious, at times, than in years past. I know that nobody likescriticism, and few people claim to deal with it well, though many probably dealwith it “OK.” People talk about letting criticism be like water off a duck’sback. Well, to me, this is criticism like a rain storm, not just water, butbeing blocked out by enough layers of shells (I hope).

It’s easier not to trust just one

Rather than another, too. So I live alone.

Occasionally infused from within with childlike wonder,

While desiring a thicker skin that no wizard has to offer.

Bunting vs. swinging away: A life in baseball cards

2011-09-13T17:46:00.001-05:00

I recently got done reading "Cardboard Gods" by Josh Wilker. He's about 4-5 years younger than me. He pens a memoir of childhood and early adulthood based on different baseball cards from his childhood. It's an interesting concept, though the book could be even more deeply biographical than it is.

Anyway, Wilker played Little League, albeit not very well by his own admission, through his childhood. In the last game of his last year, in Babe Ruth-level play, the manager on two separate at bats gave him a bunt sign. Wilker followed through the first time, and said he could accept it, but the second time, saw no strategic reason for it, and so he swung away.

An interesting thought. Bunting, even for a base hit rather than a sacrifice, is a "safe" move, versus swinging away. It's a metaphor for life that I'll hold on to for a bit longer. This is about "security."

I first thought of the jobs world, but, unless one is a deliberate risk-taker, "bunting" is wise right now. But, other issues? Hmmm ...

Passing down the anger, passing down the shame

2011-09-03T23:13:00.000-05:00

I recently finished reading a great book titled "Payback." The subtitle of "Why We Retaliate, Redirect Attention and Take Revenge" tells in detail what this book is about.

As I note, in a selection from my Amazon review:

Briefly, the authors note that many animals either retaliate against aggression or else redirect it lower down the food chain while we (and chimpanzees) are the only ones so far known to also use revenge. From there, they look at how this affects/relieves stress, in both humans and other animals....

Both in humans and animals, besides stress issues, the authors note aggression, and the various ways of dealing with it, relate closely to social status issues. they suggest this is part of why simple apologies often don't satisfy victims. Rather, whether consciously or not, victims are looking for a restoration of lost status, and perhaps a diminution of the aggressor's status. That doesn't happen after a few words.

If you are a survivor of sexual or physical child abuse, doesn't this all ring so true? And, while being abused does not an abuser make, for those abusers who were themselves abused, doesn't this ring true about abusers, too? That they "passed on the shit"?

And, for we the survivors, no matter whom our perpetrators, some of us may have been more affected than others because we had little to no outlet to pass things on further. Or, as the authors of the book note, already in childhood, we showed that we had personalities who didn't naturally do that, or often even think of that as a possibility true to our own natures.

Anyway, you may find this book well worth reading.

With 'help' like this, secular sobrietiests don't need AA stepper 'enemies'

2011-06-25T18:45:00.001-05:00

Skeptical blogger Ed Brayton, at the imploring of an anti-AA website, recently did a post on skepticism and the 12-step movement.

Of course, it was a dogwhistle for your usual assortment of steppers, who made the usual arguments:
1. Claims that, despite multiple federal court rulings to the contrary, AA and NA aren't religious, not even in the eye of the First Amendment.
2. Any 12-step "industry" is all Hazelden; AA has no blame, not even for getting in bed with Hazelden 50 years ago.
3. Steps, etc. are just "suggestions."
4. Nothing else that's wrong with AA is AA's fault.

Of course, steppers are immune to reason, but, it was good to refute them, anyway, for Ed's regular readers to learn more about AA. That includes learning that atheists in recovery can, will and do twist their reasoning enough not only to be involved with AA but to say it works.

Even that's not that unusual, nor is it new to me to run into them. (When you run into an atheist, or "atheist," philosophy professor who talks about praying, NOTHING a self-proclaimed atheist does is strange.)

But, then, a certain "Glenn" popped up about 3/4 the way through the discussion, with several bizarre comments.

First, he said alcoholism was a "moral issue." Now, he didn't explicitly say "just a moral issue," but it's clear that's what he meant. I tried to reason with him from several angles.

First, I pointed out what modern neuroscience is discovering about brain chemistry and addiction. He showed no interest in following up on that.

Second, I showed him that the "moral issue" was actually just what AA believed, when it claimed alcoholism was not just a "disease" but a "spiritual disease." That's why you have to admit powerlessness, ask a god to remove "defects," etc. Not only did he not "get it," he started, in essence, getting near ranting level about alcoholism being a moral issue.

Third, he then claimed that I supported courts "coercing" people into secular recovery groups like Lifering. He was totally ignorant of the fact that the issue isn't court power to "coerce" people into ANY sobriety support program, but rather, to unconstitutionally "coerce" people into a program that has been recognized as religious, in light of the First Amendment.

Nor did he get the idea that courts can and do "coerce" convicted criminals into all sorts of "conditions," like ankle bracelet monitors, community service, etc. Now, if a criminal doesn't like that coercion, he or she is free to take a spot in a county or state jail.

He then claims it's different, going on to talk about "abstinence coercion." Well, maybe you want it to be, Mr. Glenn, but, legally, it's not. And, what you want doesn't change law or the enforcement thereof.

Moral of the story?

If you don't know anything about addiction/alcoholism, then just don't talk about it. You do more harm than good, and, just like a zealous stepper, you're likely to make an individual alcoholic/addict less likely to get help.

Yes, we are heroes

2011-05-21T23:24:00.000-05:00

From a support group email list, as translated from the German by a friend:

When You Meet a Sober Alcoholic

When you meet a sober alcoholic
You meet a hero.
His mortal enemy slumbers within him;
He can never outrun his disability.
He makes his way through a world of alcohol abuse,
In an environment that does not understand him.
Society, puffed up with shameful ignorance,
Looks on him with contempt,
As if he were a second-class citizen
Because he dares to swim against the stream of alcohol.
But you must know:
No better people are made than this.

-- Friedrich von Bodelschwingh (1831-1910).

Maybe it's time to start being kinder to ourselves

2011-05-19T01:12:00.002-05:00

My first 18 months of sobriety, I was quiet active in AA. I was fairly active for the next 18 months after that.

So, I heard plenty of admonitions, chidings and warnings, rarely directed at me in person, usually as part of general meeting talk, about "pity parties" and "pity pots."

Even today, years later, I know what those phrases mean. And, I still hear on occasion the phrases, and more often the ideas, in Lifering meetings.

But, some new psychological research says that maybe we need to stop worrying so much about "pity parties" and instead have more concern about how kind we are to ourselves.

A LOT more concern, including learning it as a top-level life skill.

This is NOT the "give every kid an A to boost self esteem," the study makes clear. In fact, it notes that that technique often backfires, and can lead to neuroticism, emotional fragility and narcissism.

"It is not this nimby, bimby stuff," said Paul Gilbert, a researcher at Kingsway Hospital in the United Kingdom. "Compassion is sensitivity to the suffering of self and others and a commitment to do something about it."

Kristin Neff, an associate professor of psychology and the mother of an autistic child, writes about cultivating self-compassion from her own parenting experience as well as her professional background, in the just-published book, "Self-Compassion."

She lists three aspects to it: mindfulness, common humanity and kindness.

Mindfulness, whether done as a full meditative practice or not, is as Neff describes it, accepting emotions without either suppressing/blocking them OR fixating on/attaching to them.

Common humanity is, to riff on another old phrase from "the other folks," recognizing that our hurts and pains aren't "terminally unique" either.

And, kindness is kindness to ourselves as well as others.

The LiveScience authors go on to note that self-esteem of the type I stereotypically mentioned above still have a competitive and comparative element to it. Self-kindness does not.

And, speaking of competitiveness, other researchers, the story notes, believe that as the pace of modern Western life accelerates, self-punishment will likely increase.

But, won't being kind to ourselves a lot lead to a temptation to "let ourselves off the hook"? No, but that's been anticipated too:

(A)ccording to Neff, the most common fear about becoming self-compassionate is that it will lower performance standards and encourage laziness. But researchers have found that self-compassionate people are actually less likely to sit on the couch all day eating bonbons.

So, lighten up. Especially on yourself. And let's encourage each other on this.

Two new insights on PTSD

2011-05-11T20:58:00.000-05:00

The first relates to depression, and notes that people prone to either problem may overgeneralize their memory. This overgeneralization may allow for a version of catastrophic thinking, in which a person cannot recall specific good instances to overcome overgeneralizing about bad issues.

The second says that fear may lead to losing out on noticing nuances of sound, and in turn be connected to sound hypersensitivity in PTSD sufferers.

Anticipation, anger, anxiety and frustration-fear

2011-05-05T16:08:00.002-05:00

What a mix of emotions, eh? But, it's where I'm at right now. Hoping for something to change externally within 24 hour, or I'll likely be dropping an email hint to that end.

Yes, yes, CBD and Buddhism ... the emotional control is all within.

Nonetheless, it's easier with certain external circumstances in play.

More later.

That said, it's better than feeling nothing, or than not recognizing what I am feeling.

===

One day later, having sent my email hint, I've received a response that the process on which I am waiting is muddling along. Well, I can only wait and try to control my impatience, since I can't figure why the hell the process is taking this long.

Alcohol and anxiety

2011-03-26T00:42:00.000-06:00

Had an anxiety attack earlier this week, the first one in a few months.

Like most of them, the final relief from it came by throwing up.

Tonight, while taking a brief walk earlier, I got to thinking about anxiety and alcohol. Anxiety issues, in different ways, run on both my dad's and mom's side of the family. In a more clinical sense, they're much more serious on my dad's side.

And alcohol, and somewhat tobacco, I'll venture, was used as an attempt to control that anxiety by many of dad's side men.

I got to thinking about that in my own case as well. I realize that alcohol just masked anxiety, it didn't control it. And, by actually exacerbating one symptom of anxiety, the churning stomach — at least when I was drinking on an empty or near-empty stomach — it actually made it worse.

Here's to one more reason for staying sober.

2011-01-07T01:59:00.002-06:00

Here’s a good NYT story about how past adversities (if not overdone) can boost resilience in some ways, as far as ability to reframe adversity and more.

That said, I'd appreciate some positive life changes not too far down the road, rather than treading water after adversity, at least job-loss adversity and relocation adversity.

Welcome? to 2011

2011-01-03T02:33:00.002-06:00

It's a new year, and I turned a year older by the calendar last week.

I'm hoping to continue to improve in acceptance of the outside world, self-acceptance, resilience, and what I can learn about myself, among other things, in the months ahead.

I am hoping to learn more about self-awareness of others' critiques of aspects of me, to distinguish critiques from criticisms and more.

I am hoping to "move forward" in other ways in life too.

I am hoping to improve job-hunting/networking skills if I don't "land" something new relatively soon.

ANGER IN THE KEY OF C-SHARP MINOR

2010-12-15T02:08:00.000-06:00

Minor keys often have melancholy, plaintive laments,
More so than jarring stridency,
Unless a sudden dissonance intrudes;
And, so it is with my anger.
Slow to form, with an undercurrent of counterpoint,
Spoken and developed in individual voices,
Like a late Beethoven quartet,
Or, maybe, even more, one by Shostakovich.
I don’t even realize that I am angry until the score plays out,
Usually about halfway through the third movement.
Then, a diminished seventh lingers, a four-part pedal point, if you will,
Until the cello transitions out, into a growling presto ostinato,
And I can no longer deny to my conscious self that I am angered,
As my emotions now move attacca, without pause,
Into a final movement,
Where resolution is supposed to be found,
But, per the style of musica moderna,
Is not guaranteed.
— Dec. 14, 2010

Love after lovelessness

2010-08-31T02:46:00.000-05:00

LOVE AFTER LOVELESSNESS

Love
Was a word rarely heard
Rarely used, rarely spoken,
And certainly, rarely remembered
In one aching, yearning man’s
Childhood household.

Combine sexual abuse
And exhibitionism with twists;
Add in religious fundamentalism
About human sexuality
In this childless household.

Finally, take emotional coldness
Anger, controlling, and
Distancing both physical and emotional,
And you have a childhood household
That rarely modeled love
As well as rarely speaking of it.

Sex was seen as not just dirty
But also controlling and manipulative.
However, with love largely absent,
Sex filled a gap.

And the word ‘love,’
When spoken to me post-sobriety
On the phone by a once-raging father,
Seemed as manipulative as
A mom’s sexual exposure and spoken delusions
Had to a teenaged, hurting child.

I am more than my story.
I have grown beyond it, at least in bits,
But it would be a lie
To simply say, ‘I am not my story,’
Though I need to detach yet more.

If you know me well, as you do,
You know that. And I know you do.
Something can be both true and excuse-making.
I recognize more who and what I want,
If but in fits and spurts, too.

And I know that life isn’t always perfect,
Especially in its timing.

The Donner Party, struggle and motivation

2010-08-20T01:20:00.000-05:00

California was a land of lore and lure even before John Marshall found gold traces in 1848.

Farming, ranching, mild climate and vast unclaimed, untamed acres all called across the Sierras to Americans, even before the land had been wrested from Mexico.
Among those listening?

Jacob Breen and family. George Keseberg. And, the eponymous Donner family.

Unlike the Founding Fathers, these people had no fortunes to give. But they did give most of what money they had to make the trip. And, they certainly, in cases such as Jacob Breen, had honor, whether sacred or not, to pledge to their fellow travelers.
While on vacation recently, I visited some Donner Party sites. Though I had driven I-80 before through the area, I had never gotten off the freeway at the Donner State Party site. And, since I had come from the north, on a California state highway site, about 7-8 miles north of the interstate, I saw the Donner Meadows, where the Donners themselves wintered in 1846-47.

I asked myself, rhetorically, what would I be willing to do to get to California today? How much work would I be willing to expend? How much of my current “baggage” would I be willing to discard? What is my goal in getting to California — am I moving to something or just away from something?

I haven’t pondered those questions too much yet. Maybe I’m deliberately avoiding them a little bit. Maybe, like many other things in life, I want a surer goal before committing to them more.

That said, let me look at the Donners more. Yes, they knew about California the potential agricultural paradise. But, gold had not yet been discovered. They were simply looking for a better life, not to get rich.

Beyond that, how much am I willing to surrender of my old self for change today, in general? As I get older, do I get more attached to what I already have? Less willing to take risks?

How much is pain in my current life, combined with hope for the future, going to be a motivator?
And, by the time I had gotten back home, or soon afterward, I had at least one additional question for myself.

Is the desire to move to California a search for a “geographic cure” for issues that need help in other ways?

All good questions. To some of them, I don’t yet consciously know the answers, though I may have partial answers in my subconscious. Others I can answer more fully right now.

As for a geographic cure? No. I’ve been interested in moving to California for years.
As for pain as a motivator? It may continue to grow, and maybe I need that.

And, “surrender,” or another term? How much am I willing to let go of old attachments, such as what job or career path I should or should not follow, how much anxiety I can tolerate in daily life and more? At least at the conscious level, I don’t have answers here, though I suspect that I have more letting go to do — letting go of preconceptions about myself, letting go of attachments to old emotional patters, and things like that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donner_party

Boundaries and others, growth and relationships

2010-08-19T00:52:00.008-05:00

I've upset someone. I've more than just "upset" this person; they are angry/sad, and say they have lost trust in me.

Then, after being chewed out strongly, very strongly, over this ... I argued back.

I'll admit (as this person said) that I "fired back" in part out of defensiveness. Entirely so, though? No.

I raised some real issues, which I had been holding on to for a while, and said I had some real anger myself.

Relationships are real ... and I hate using the word "practice" as part of growth.

At the same time, this person knows I have trouble expressing anger, especially.

Anyway, I have apologized since then. And, said I'd like to talk more about the emotions I triggered, and some fears this person has related to that. Right now, though, I appear to be getting the cold shoulder.

At the same time, this person has heard me say, and I believe more than once, "I don't play games, and I don't chase." I have dropped a follow-up "Hi, how are you e-mail," but, am not sure how much more I should say, and with what timing, without risk of violating what is a major boundary issue for me. I'm not sure what I should say without risk of being thought a game-player myself.

Life hurts at times, it is true.

Obviously, some ongoing patience here is part of the situation. But, when does patience become "drift"?

That said, back to revealing boundaries.

I know I absolutely stunned my dad when, after I had a bit of sobriety time, I told him, albeit by mail, not on the phone, let alone in person, how much I feared him as a child, just what was happening under his roof and nose in terms of sexual abuse and other things, and more. "Passive, pliable Steve" suddenly had a bit of backbone and a bit of self.

Throwing out the defensiveness/attacking part of my response to my friend, I do wonder if there's a bit of shock with this person, too. And, beyond that, how much we may be able to talk about these issues without a fair amount of time-water under the bridge, for a number of reasons.

I still don't know that one, either. But, an intuitive suspicion says it could be some time ... and I'm talking months, not weeks. And, that assumes this person will want to talk to me on that level at that time.

Meanwhile, back on "my side of the street." Part of my is sad, part is lonely, part is anxious, part is frustrated, part is a bit apathetic or "drifting" already. Because I've been single all my life, and not just in the sense of "unmarried," but without much real, longer-term relationships, and careful with close friends of either sex, it's kind of "easy" for me to drift like that.

That said, is my not wanting to "chase," and not telling more about my feelings as part of that, itself a form of games-playing? It's complicated.

Loneliness, with a touch of anger

2010-07-14T02:12:00.004-05:00

Occasionally, I get pangs of loneliness. I realize now how much I hid my own loneliness from myself as a kid. In some cases, it's almost as if the whole emotion was suppressed in a quasi-Freudian way. In other cases, it's like it was nearer the surface of consciousness and I didn't quite beat it down without the help of alcohol or other things.

I don't know how much of this is natural avoidance due to gene-based anxiety tendencies, how much of it was lack of family emotional interaction (at least "good" emotions), how much of it was noncommittalness in attempts to avoid put-downs, let-downs and rejections both inside and outside of the family, how much of it was due to abuse, or what.

But, I walled off a lot, with a lot of layers. A few people recognize that; I've told more people. In any case, not just women are psychologically, or emotionally complex. And, at least in the U.S., men like me who can be that way at times are probably more puzzling than women.

I'm feeling both the loneliness and aloneness more at times now.

And, currently, feeling a touch of anger over issues partially related to that, and partially independent.

I care

2010-07-03T02:47:00.000-05:00

I CARE

I care;
I care when I say “I don’t care”;
I care that I say “I don’t care”;
I care when I think I actually mean that I don’t care;
I care that a defense mechanism may be too imbedded.

Why would I not care?
Lots of reasons.
Seeing other people not care about me.
Feeling other people not care about me.
Feeling powerless to care about myself.
Seeing no guarantees results when I tried to care about myself.
Feeling hopeless about the result of asking for care from others.

So, I didn’t care.
Or acted like I didn’t.
Meanwhile, buried with repressed anger
Against both myself and others,
Repressed anxiety, and other repressed emotions,
Was repressed care.
For myself, above all else.
But for other people, too.
I hope.

June 30, 2010

Envy, anger, and more

2010-06-27T02:48:00.005-05:00

I have been realizing in the past couple of weeks that I have a lot of repressed envy, not just repressed anger. My envy is more, but by no means entirely, on the nonmaterial side, i.e., of people's social skills, relationship skills, starting sexual relationship skills,job-hunting skills, etc.

That said, I do envy, to some degree, other people's material possessions. There, I envy them as much for the putative security of having a higher income than I do, having a house (especially if not overbuying a McMansion), etc. Some things, like the job skills, or job-hunting skills, are partially materialistic, in the degree that material means connect in part to immaterial ends.

And, I am beginning to wonder if repressed envy of others and repressed anger at myself don't go a bit hand in hand.

Road maps for life

2010-06-26T13:49:00.000-05:00

A COFFEE-STAINED ATLAS

Analogies. Metaphors. Deeper meanings.
My atlas is a road map in more ways than one.
Torn, tattered, browned pages of internal road trips;
Nostalgic for past journeys to American wonder,
Hopes for future getaways,
And the emotional escapes and release of both.
I haven’t opened my atlas so much recently,
Nor looked as much at old photo albums of past trips.
The nostalgic side of that atlas has little savor
At this moment, and its hint of future escapes
Is almost equally dry to my lips.
If life is an eternal now, a succession of present moments,
Then past and future gain flavor from the taste of today
And my reflecting on them.
I may need to break metaphorical bread together
And share an atlas printed for two.

Little round balls ... family of origin thoughts

2010-06-24T02:23:00.001-05:00

LITTLE BROWN BALLS

I told my sister once that we weren’t a family when we were growing up.
Nope. Not a family. Not at all.
If by family, we mean not just white picket fence stereotypes but also harmony, communication and caring.
Of, sure, we ate all our meals together, but that was a surface event.
Mom talked about her work, her coworkers — one in particular — and other minutia of that social circle.
Dad talked about church parishioners, sometimes things in town, and other minutia of his circle.
Neither made much effort to enter the other’s circle, with a husband-and-wife version of Alphonse and Gaston playing out every night at the dinner table.
And certainly, neither one reached out to any of five children-siblings at that dinner table, not like Ward or June Cleaver.
I will not offer a simile to soften a metaphor.
We were seven individual balls of shit,
Not behind a white picket fence of outward family nicety,
But inside a swirling white commode of separate lives,
Or so it seems to me.
Although I still have trouble with expressing my emotions
As an adult, with hindsight, I look back and see one of my childhood “roles” as the family emotional sponge.
Maybe that’s part of why I have trouble expressing my emotions today.
Shit stinks and disgusts.
And a self-conscious ball of shit that “knows” it — that believes it and feels it — is probably going to hurt a lot, even if not self-conscious of it.
But flushing the mental toilet doesn’t flush all the memories. Or beliefs. Or perceptions. Of what life seemed to be.

Impulse controls

2010-06-19T00:28:00.001-05:00

Saying NO and impulse control. They're connected. Maybe not exactly the same. "Just say no" is, not counting Nancy Reagan, a bit simplistic, or more than a bit. But, they're on the same continuum. And, whether over sex-related issues, especially while online, or some other things, I do have some issues with impulse control.

Not in all things, though. I quit smoking, and drinking.

That said, part of any impulse control issues I do have may be related to yearning for comfort against anxiety, even without any of my childhood abuse. And, so, "getting stuck" may be a flip side of impulse control.

Anger, anger, anger

2010-06-14T00:56:00.002-05:00

Just today, with about 20 minutes of journaling, after talking with a friend online on Yahoo Messenger and other things, I realized I have touched another layer of the onion in realizing I have serious anger repression.

That goes hand in hand with anger management, assertiveness management, working for my wants and desires and more.

The anger is at various other people, starting with parents. As an adult, it's also anger at me. The events are all passed, all water under the bridge. But, this river I call my life, a Humean stream, doesn't change, it is the same river, because I don't leave it. So, learning, learning, learning more about this anger is important.

Friends, online interaction and more

2010-06-11T03:33:00.003-05:00

I've had some more "learning experiences" recently. Without naming names, or other things, I've learned that:

1. At least one theoretically enlightened person from theoretically enlightened San Francisco is either clueless enough, or else morally repugnant enough while being hung up on herself enough, to either actually believe that sexual abuse makes boys become gay men, or else to want to believe that when a man doesn't come on to her. This woman never considered the fact that a man might see what seemed like clear "control" techniques coming out of her.

1A. She appears to be less than enlightened about gay issues in general. She says I might be gay, beyond her belief that her charms weren't enough to allegedly "convert" me, in a sense that being gay is "less than." Again, someone theoretically enlightened from a theoretically enlightened bastion of liberalism.

2. That even a few, or several, months of knowing someone purely from online interactions, is not to know too much.

I won't say more, though I could say a lot more.

I am keeping this person's e-mail, though. And, not even putting it in a separate folder. I'm keeping it in my inbox. Not to stew on it, but as a reminder.

Not just a reminder to be more careful about online trust, but, as a reminder to continue my personal growth, including to be even more aware of other people's personalities.

As for this person? Beyond anger, I felt disgust.

Beyond that, though?

Without wanting to sound condescending, I feel sad for her. In my honest opinion, every personality diagnosis she made of me in that e-mail could, in my opinion, be made of her. But, part of me doesn't even care. I am safe. What she said can't harm me.

As for the gay comments, ultimately, if I am correct about where they come from in her belief system, here, I'm back to disgust and anger, because that's insulting to countless thousands of gay men who were sexually abused as boys and who weren't "made" gay by the abuse.

I have seen grown men crying, accepting in their heads but not their hearts, that they are gay, and wondering if the abuse "made them that way." This woman's e-mail to me was not (just) an assault on me but on all these men and countless others.

And, as for control issues? Even after our friendship, or what had seemed friendship, had started drifting, for her to ask if I would visit her while on vacation in California this summer seems to me to show that she's lying even to herself.

Gratitude list, June 1, 2010

2010-06-02T01:03:00.000-05:00

1. I woke up sober today
2. I woke up and didn't see my name in the obituaries today. (Unless I'm REALLY depressed, that should feel like good news, right?)
3. I didn't die because I had trouble sleeping last night.
4. I didn't die because I didn't fight the sleep issue and I didn't stay in bed really, really late.
5. I didn't panic over my fears of being trapped.
6. I accept that life sucks, but it does for others, too.
7. I accept that it's not always a total tomb here.
8. I recognize group dynamics, and can figure more ways to work around them.
9. I may not be "thriving" right now, but I'm not dying on the vine.
10. I'm being prodded, and responding, even if oh so slowly, to expand my career focus and search.

When "I don't care" hides that I really do

2010-05-31T20:46:00.001-05:00

Often, "I don't care" hides that I DO care and am worried about emotional attachment.

I may say "I don't care" if supervisors are worried about my internet usage, but really I am worried about that, and trying to hide my worry, or control anxiety levels or something.

I may say "I don't care" about my current life feeling kind of boring, but really, I do care, but feel frustrated at not being able to do more about it, or at least thinking I can't.

I may say "I don't care" about another person liking me, but really, I do care, but am not sure how I want to respond, whether it's due to old trust issues or something else.

In short, "I don't care" is a defense mechanism.

It's old. It's learned from a childhood of seeing people often either not care, or pretend to care for ulterior motives.

Caring, even about my own inner emotions, is scary.

Cliques and claques in support

2010-05-26T13:16:00.000-05:00

I haven't written here for a while, but wanted to get some thoughts out.

My main sobriety support group is still going through some fallout over changes in the chat room, including more careful enforcement of previous chat guidelines, combined with further detailing of those guidelines in the more recent past.

Some people, a combination of a couple of people who got themselves banned for deliberately challenging the rules and others who stayed away more and more in sympathy, ultimately started their own blog and eventually embedded chat software in it. (It's not hard; heck, Yahoo Messenger lets you create temporary chat rooms.)

Since then, a few more people have been banned while some of those choosing to visit the Lifering chat have done so even less. That said, there's still sniping, and some "recruiting" by people who have left.

And, yes, that will get you banned.

It's still sad, though. And, the more this drags on, the sadder it gets.

If you've made your choice to leave Lifering, then accept it. The current convenor head and No. 2 aren't leaving any time soon.

At the same time, it's also sad to see that it still has a bit of effect on people still there. Like me. Like the No. 2, it appears. And perhaps others.

I had been thinking about writing here for a few days, but, with a new thread on Lifering's Ning page, which I decided to wade into for one, and only one, reply, I decided to go ahead here, too.

Sobriety groups are recovery groups, too

2010-04-21T03:24:00.000-05:00

Two things on my mind tonight.

First?

It hurts me, angers me and scares me when people "go back out," and it's because they've either not reached out, whether to other sober people, or to a counselor, especially if they have depression or other mental health needs, OR, it's because they've let an anger, a resentment, eat at them. And, I'll be selfish enough to say I want it to scare me.

Second, is that I'm a bit of a resentment mode myself, not about someone in a sobriety group, but, in another group. I know part of the anger is based on my perceptions, and part of it's based on my reactions to how this person reminds me of two males from my childhood. That said, I feel confident in saying that it's not "just" my perception, or my perception plus my personal history. I really think this person has a couple of issues. And, as part of my growth, rather than "detaching" in a way that feels like passivity to me, I need to do something else. I'm not sure what it is, but, I'm groping in that direction.

Online friends, complications, distancing and loss

2010-04-10T03:10:00.001-05:00

The last time I blogged here, it was about "fallout" from some changes in an online sobriety support chat room where I've had various degrees of activity for several years.

Looks like another friend may be lost due to that — although I had multiple observations about this person even before the dust-up, to be honest.

Anyway, it looks like a friendship with XXX really is on ice. Friday morning, I noticed AAA and BBB had both friended XXX on Facebook, even though heshe had said in the past s/he didn’t do that. So, I sent himer a friend request query, noting himer's former policy and asking if s/he had possibly changed it, especially not being in the chat so much now, without saying I had noticed s/he had friended others.

The answer would appear to be a definite no. First, XXX appears in chat Friday night with a bit of “sniping,” and, while none of it was directly focused at me, heshe didn’t go out of her way to be friendly, either.

Then, looking at FB later, I noticed that, while in chat or about that time, s/he friended Kathy B. But not me.

Some part of me WANTS revenge, or grudge-holding. Another part says, detach. A third part (that’s why there’s never just two sides to anything) says I want confrontation, but not (necessarily) grudge-holding. I’m a bit sad. I’m a bit angry.

I don’t want to be too much more of either. Well, even that isn’t entirely true. Some part of me wants to wallow. But not a lot. Some part of me wants to blow up. Some part of me wants to be snide, or "sniping," back.

Update, April 13: Call it a bit of spite, a bit of revenge, a bit of righteous and/or non-righteous anger, a bit of pride, or a mix of several or all of the above...

But, I found out today, after checking (and it makes sense) that one can withdraw, retract Facebook friending requests. And I have done so.

Sobriety groups, friends, friends possibly lost, and more

2010-03-29T15:05:00.000-06:00

A "dust-up" has occurred in the last 4-5 days in the chat room for my primary source of sobriety support. At least one person has been banned, for good reason, one for a reason I'm not sure about but I don't have time to track down every bit of information myself, and a couple of others are staying away most of the time now.

One person that was banned could relatively easily get back in, but the more this person rages against the machine, the more crow there is that will eventually need to be eaten for re-admission.

The sad part is that I considered this person, and one person who is staying away, to be online friends, not just acquaintances, and was hoping to meet in person the one who is staying away, the next time I vacationed in California.

But, both of them are likely lessened in their friendship for me. And, since friendship is a two-way street, my friendship for them will probably lessen, too. I don't actively want it to, but if I have less contact with them, that will be the result.

The others that I know have been banned? One, sadly, needed it, and probably needs some sort of professional help. The second? Someone who could be a nice guy, and a friend to people, even, but often chose to be an instigator of unnecessarily attacking people. And, if he had any "issues" behind that, he wouldn't talk.

Contra Rodney King, no we can't all get along.

And, as I told one of the people above, "I don't 'chase.'"

Life is short; and fear?

2010-03-18T23:31:00.000-06:00

LIFE IS SHORT 2

Ars longa, vita brevis.
So goes the ancient Latin saying —
“Art is long but life is short.”
I would like to amend that:
Ars longa, timor longior.
“Art is long, but fear is even longer.”
Choices we want to make, we fear making —
Fearing rejection, failure or other results.
And, it’s not just fear.
Let me include frustration,
Disappointment, and more,
Under the rubric of timor.
Missed chances, rejected chances and rejected choices
Have left me often alone,
Even when my desire was clearly otherwise.
I don’t fully understand myself,
But I wish I had a daily mirror to reflect me,
And let me reflect her,
To see what love can be,
While yet retaining some of my skepticism
About what it is not.
But I am afraid my skepticism,
Part natural, part protective, part timorous,
Will remain an albatross,
Even when I am ready for a mirror,
And ready to swim against the tides of chance
To be with one.

— March 18, 2010

Empathy for a person who claims to have none?

2010-02-24T02:33:00.002-06:00

Yes, it's possible. The person isn't capital-E evil; just damaged by life. That said, part of the damage appears to be a lack of empathy for others, without even trying to learn whether their own backgrounds are as damaged/damaging as his/hers. In other words, not wanting to try to be empathetic.

It would be easy to be unempathetic for this person; besides her/his own lack of outreach, is a sometimes brusque personality, that is itself part of the larger picture.

But, this person isn't capital-E evil and has redeeming qualities, in potential as well as actuality, of emotion, intellect and psyche.

That also said, this person is a full decade older than me. How "reachable" he/she is, even by mental health professionals, I have no idea.

Dreaming of various things...

2010-02-17T14:01:00.005-06:00

I don't know whether I'm having more memorable dreams recently because the mix of a mini-dose of Celexa plus OTC amino acids is kicking in enough now, whether it's mental on my side without the help, a bit of both, or what. I do think my anxiety at my current job and location in O-dessa, Texas, have peaked.

That said, I had a pretty memorable dream about running up and down various floors in the inside of an older New York City skyscraper, like the Empire State Building or maybe the Chrysler Building. At the very end of the dream, I ran into my dad, who did not come off as accusatory or judgmental.

I think this is about general life worries. Am I chasing up and down blind alleys, like I ran into on some stairwells inside the bowls of the building? Does my life in general seem bland or blank? Am I wanting dad to make a decision for me? Give me guidance he never really did?

A day of AR at the office

2010-01-30T17:44:00.004-06:00

OK, at the copy desk here at my current daily newspaper, another copy editor does initial proofreading of a page, then, after we make corrections, we print a second copy and the news editor or assistant reads that. If he or she really don't like the page, they'll make us do a third proof.

But, a third proof after marking just one change on the second proof? That's anally retentive, from where I am.

It's easy to see how playing lotteries becomes tempting.

Thoughts on self-wisdom

2010-01-25T22:19:00.000-06:00

You know more than you think you know.

The shortcomings of cognitive behavioral therapy

2010-01-24T02:04:00.000-06:00

A chapter in Jonah Lehrer's book, "How We Decide," along with a famous quote by David Hume, brought the title of this post to stark light.

Don't get me wrong. CBT is good to very good for mild, moderate and medium depressions. It's the bee's knees for panic attacks. In combination with densensitization therapy, it's very good for a lot of phobias.

But other neuroses, it might not help so much.

Lehrer talks about psychopathy in the latter portion of his book, and how psychopaths can read the emotions of others so well, but have no emotional connectivity to their own minds, so can rationalize, in a confabulating fashion, any decisions they may choose to take.

Autistic people, on the other hand, are just the reverse. They have an emotional life of their own, but simply cannot read other people's emotions.

Combine this with Hume's famous, and somewhat deliberately contrarian, observation that "reason is the slave of the passions," and you see CBT's shortcomings.

CBT says we can think our way through emotions.

Well, psychopaths can't. To the degree we can talk about a lesser version of them, and call that group "neuropaths" by analogy, they can't think their way through emotions very well. And, in a sense, autistic people can't think their way into emotions, if you will.

So, on counseling for emotional-based mental health issues where the emotions aren't irrational, or transcend the rational/irrational in some sense, being deeply rooted in the limbic brain (think PTSD), CBT really just can't cut the mustard.

Unfortunately, some CBT, or RBT (forgetting the "E") aficionados think it's almost a cure-all, or at the least, that it can do more than it can.

Thoughts on lemons and lemonade

2010-01-21T01:19:00.002-06:00

If life gives you lemons, take a pitcher off your shelf, take a pee in it, and tell people you've made lemonade out of the lemons.

Sarcasm aside, if you don't feel like trying to handle adversity with perky positivity, a little humorous sarcasm may work better.

Through a bit of an emotional wringer

2010-01-06T01:25:00.003-06:00

I should put "bit" in scare quotes. Already anxiety-festooned over my current newspaper job here in Odessa, Texas, I got offered a job, then had it pulled back away, all in just six hours.

I had a phone interview to be named the editor, and general manager in training, at a weekly paper near Dallas. Ideal!

Was tentatively offered the job over the phone, then the publisher said he'd like to meet in person just to give himself final assurance.

No problem, I said. I'll drive to Dallas this weekend.

Well, less than five hours later, I get this message in an e-mail:

The powers that be with the chain have decided to move things in a different direction.

Sheiss!

That said, it's the second time in 10 months I've had an "interesting" interview situation with this newspaper chain.

I'll be very gun-shy in the future.

Right now, I'm pretty drained.

But sober.

A bit of rational reaction at work

2009-12-18T00:34:00.004-06:00

OK, it's near the end of the work shift tonight, and, the one other copy editor there has spit out all four pages for Saturday's religion section, working in advance. I had proofread them, marked up corrections, and stapled a little corrections check list sheet to each one.

He made the corrections, printed out another copy of the pages for a second reading by either the news editor or assistant news editor, the person off whose personality my anxiety level, already on high, has been feeding since being here, and stapled those second pages on top of the first ones, then placed them on the table for "advance" pages. All by the book.

She, the assistant news editor, picked up these pages, noticed the checklist sheet at the back of each "first" page, looked at the un-proofed "second" page on top of each group of three sheets of paper, and asked me where my correction marks were on each page.

When I first started to answer, I could feel the anxiety in my voice, and in my self. I said that I thought I had proofread the pages, then I remembered that I had seen him print out second copies of a couple of the pages, and with a bit more calm in both my voice and my body, said so.

I don't even need an "I'm sorry, I didn't see that." A semi-legitimate, "oh, OK," or even a halfway legitimate "oh," would have been nice.

She didn't say a word, though. She just put the pages back down.

I understand more all the time the managing editor's comment on the phone, when I was considering accepting this job, and he said, "If you're here a year, I'll help you look for other jobs within our company." Maybe that's not at all behind his "if," but it feels that way.

That said, both he and the executive editor commented on my openness at the time. I'll say no more.

Anxiety rears its head at work again

2009-12-17T00:18:00.002-06:00

OK, a work in a bit of slow time, I click a link on one of the politics blogs I read regularly. Te actual link is a PDF, not a webpage. The Acrobat window opens, then my mouse freezes. I thought, "shit," what did I do?" Especially since I had just had replaced what had appeared to be a crappy mouse a week ago.I do several restarts, and full shutdowns-cold starts. Nothing. Mouse still frozen.

I eventually mention this out loud, and the assistant news editor on whose less-than-the best side over her personality my anxiety has fed voraciously since I've been here asks, "Is it loose"?

Well,. it being a PC, I bend down, sin the tower, reach behind, jiggle the cable end, which seems secure in there, but the actual USB port seems a bit loose. Whatever, it did thetrick. So, was that the problem with the previous mouse? And, was I too anxiety-constrained to think of that with it? Or to try the jiggling with this mouse, without outside prompting? Possibly.

A little assertiveness with a search firm executive

2009-12-14T19:05:00.002-06:00

Via e-mail, I told the journalism search firm guy that he could, in sales terms, make job hunting for me more a "win-win" if he would take into account my geographic, political and demographic considerations.

===

XXX, I wanted to touch base with you on a couple of things, in hopes that we can see this from a win-win perspective for both today and tomorrow.

First, I should have done more inner due diligence on whether I really could pull the trigger on Buffalo, Wyo., based on my priorities, earlier in the process. I’m sorry I didn’t.

Second, and starting to get at the “win-win” idea, and I know you’re a good enough salesperson to be familiar with that concept, and to even believe in it, I think, if I were going up there, and got mad, or sad, or depressed, or some combination of the above, within six months, you have a publisher not just mad at me, but mad at you as well. Ditto if, before I got that frustrated or otherwise emotionally knotted up, I left in six months at the first available opportunity.

Third, and related to that, none of the three dailies the company owns would jump off the list at me either.

Fourth, and along that line, I would prefer jobs south of XXX. Throwing out the more conservative, more “insular” and more remote parts of those territories, and looking at a minimum for a place within 90 miles or so of a town of 200,000, at a bare minimum, that still leaves half the country as possibilities of reasonable interest. And, I’m sure I’m not the only candidate in the world who has said he or she has “preferences,” and that this influences their job hunting.

Fifth, I know jobs are tight, and you probably don’t have a lot in your hopper right now. Still, though, even if it doesn’t offer as much of a salary bump as Buffalo would have done, if it’s a job that better meets my other priorities, then you have a happier camper, and a happier person that hired him, too.

I know my parent company is in Chapter 11; that’s another reason I’d like out. But, I came here in the first place because I “had” to more than wanted to. I don’t want to leave here primarily because I’m running away from something.

I appreciate you listening to this.

Steve

2009-12-14T12:23:00.002-06:00

A bit of regret? Sure. But only a small bit. The search firm head tried to lay it on me about the money I would be missing, how my priorities were wrong, how that had influenced his company's attempts to help me in the past, etc. (I have no idea if that last part is true; the last time I had an initial interview with one of his clients, I thought it went well, and that he then tried to "force" them on their decision-making process. But, that's another story.)

He knows that, in general, I'm more OK with a smaller town, especially a more remote one, if it's either in a more liberal part of the country, or maybe, a warmer-weather one, if it's not quite so isolated. I've specifically asked him, before, if he had California jobs.

He then asked "where my aggressiveness was." I'll admit, I'm not "Mr. Type A. May never be. I'll admit I could maybe have a bit more at times.

But, overall, I don't like being guilt-tripped, OR anxiety-tripped about how the city/newspaper/company where I work now isn't so good. I don't like that and not being listened to. Especially when I don't always even listen to myself perfectly.

Jobs, anxiety, PTSD and more

2009-12-13T20:54:00.002-06:00

Between my "fear of getting trapped" (which is itself a part of what CBT talks about as awfulizing or generalizing), and my not liking some particular things here in O-dessa, I looked at a job in Buffalo, Wyoming! A place where a fully rational me would never even think of living, and never acted to live there.

Fortunately, a nearly fully rational me, at least, is saying no to that. And, I hope, taking a few steps to boost my sanity and emotional well-being here, while working with renewed vigor on getting out of here.

The yelling? It's not quite yelling, but a certain person who has one personality when dealing with underlings and another otherwise, literally to having MPD-like multiple voices.

But, without taking this the wrong way, I have an opportunity to work on working with other ppl while still here, and either work with this person a bit more/better, or work around her more or better.

Anti-depressants beat CBT on personality change

2009-12-10T15:41:00.001-06:00

I'm not a fan or touter of Big Pharma, nor do I denigrate talk therapy.

But, it seems that SSRI antidepressants are better than cognitive therapy in lowering neuroticism and raising extraversion in depressed people. CBT helps make changes there, too, but the changes are neither as profound nor as lasting as with medication.

This somewhat lonely, somewhat vacuous feelings

2009-12-05T00:47:00.001-06:00

Earlier tonight, a portion of myself from within said that, in part, I haven't felt this bad since the year after I graduated divinity school rejecting following in my dad's footsteps. I lived in an old, kind of barren studio apartment.

Well, "lived" might not be the right word. "Existed" might have more accuracy. Damn, I want out of here.

Holidays not so helpful

2009-11-30T18:36:00.000-06:00

I came (to Big Bend National Park to get out of the apartment in Odessa I still refuse to call home, since I had belated Thanksgiving holiday days to burn).

I saw (I was more burned out on Big Bend than before, in particular, and on desert hiking in general, for whatever reasons).

I conquered (nothing, even with primal screaming f-bombs to echo off canyon walls, and even briefly entertaining thoughts of throwing my cell phone against one of those walls, or my camera bag off a bridge, since I couldn’t or wouldn’t let go of my anxieties and other issues enough.)

'Picking' as 'cutting lite'

2009-11-28T19:53:00.002-06:00

I've never been a "cutter," but I have been a "picker" in the past. Picking at scabs. Picking at fingernails, or biting, until I strip them down into the quick and they start bleeding.

I've gotten kind of bad at it since my recent move. I have a spot on top of my balded pate that got a bit sunburned this summer, and I've been picking at it a lot. I want help!

Rabbi offered cocaine for sex

2009-11-19T18:32:00.001-06:00

This news of the weird story is certainly more proof of the power of, ultimately, multiple addictions, not just one.

Work co-dependency?

2009-11-18T02:16:00.003-06:00

I saw this phrase on a recovery blog today, namely from someone responding to a post of mine about my frustration with my new job, job hours, one supervisor and more here in Odessa, Texas.

For people like me who, by nature, nurture or some combination thereof, are somewhat loners in general, and/or who focus either on the world of ideas or the world of things rather than the world of people, our jobs often give us a fair amount of person-to-person interaction.

So, his phrase was eye-catching indeed. But, when you are more of a loner, is something like that possible of happening?

A stressful last couple of days

2009-11-02T23:41:00.001-06:00

Free-flating anxiety still running in my head.

Did some fairly serious "picking" this afternoon.

(I never did "cutting," but, picking at my fingernails down to the quick, then, picking at the skin until it bleeds, or a hangnail bleeds? Yes.)

Here’s a couple of great asexuality resources

2009-11-01T00:56:00.000-06:00

New Scientist has a very friendly article on asexuality. From it, I found this informative forum.

A dysfunctional marriage, in poetry

2009-10-27T21:35:00.000-06:00

Influenced by Charles Bukowski....

MOM AND DAD AND MARRIAGE AND KIDS

A marriage — a painful silence.
An isolated, somewhat schizoid mom,
And an angry, temperamental dad,
Who married each other trying to solve some old psychological puzzle,
But stopped trying after very long,
Perhaps not even conscious of the puzzle at hand, or in mind.
Instead, they burrowed into and intensified
Their old psychological roles and stances,
Topping that
With old conservative Midwestern religious values and stereotypes
About sexuality and gender roles.
After three boys and a miscarriage
They took a child-raising break.
(Not that either was doing much to raise those they already had.)
Then, after a move
With an attempted geographic cure for their unconscious puzzles perhaps not enough,
They started on baby-making again,
Or at least did nothing to prevent it.
Nine months later, without any choice in the matter,
Out I popped.
I want my money back.

— Oct. 27, 2009

Junk food equals heroin in addiction

2009-10-22T15:20:00.001-05:00

At least it does for lab rats. The more they consumed, the more they needed to consume to get the same pleasure feeling.

After just five days on the junk food diet, rats showed “profound reductions” in the sensitivity of their brains’ pleasure centers, suggesting that the animals quickly became habituated to the food. As a result, the rats ate more food to get the same amount of pleasure. Just as heroin addicts require more and more of the drug to feel good, rats needed more and more of the junk food. “They lose control,” Kenny says. “This is the hallmark of addiction.”

The effects lasted for days afterward.

Solitary, secretive, scared and shabby

2009-10-19T23:37:00.001-05:00

I substitute "scared," for alliteration, for the "Solitary, secretive, timid & shabby" I heard earlier today in an online chatroom. Great description, sadly, of an end-state alcoholic drinker or addicted drug user.

Some more thoughts on sex and Internet pornography

2009-10-19T20:48:00.002-05:00

This is not just about sexual acting out... i.e., inappropriately acting sexually on actual sexual feelings. That said, it's not just "acting out" as a process addiction, either, although it certainly is that in part.

Certainly, with a new job right now, it's in part about anxiety still here, anger still at losing my old job, anger at the way my old company was managed, anger about the state of the newspaper industry, anger about not being able to get a reasonable job back in Dallas and more.

But, there's one ogther factor involved.

Beyond Jung, there probably is some legitimate study of sexual splitting as part of our repressed selves, and I've started doing a bit of that with Nathaniel Branden.

And, I started realizing, or picking up on an old past thread, of how much I envied women being women. I don't think I'm a woman trapped in a male body, nor is the envy level high enough to want reassignment surgery.

But, in a number of ways, especially coming from a conservative family and religion background that "assigned" traditional, stereotyped roles to women, I recognized that I, as a person who feared the testosterone, anger and competition of stereotyped masculinity and felt beat down by it, that, I was jealous of the "passiveness" that stereotyped women could in some ways, seemingly enjoy, while working a backdoor, quasi-assertiveness angle as well.

And, short of male violence, nowhere did that seem more true than in sexual relations. And, now, part of me wonders if I'm not jealous of the pornstars and centerfolds, or the real women cammers, working that type of assertiveness.

A serious look at anxiety

2009-10-06T00:39:00.000-05:00

The NYTimes mag has a long story, focused on the work of Harvard psychologist Jerome Kagan, of much of our current knowledge about anxiety.

Moving, new job and other anxieties

2009-10-05T11:29:00.006-05:00

It's been a while since I wrote anything here.

Well, after two months of unemployment, I found a new job, and decided to take it. It's still in newspaper journalism, but I had to leave Dallas for Odessa, Texas. And, unlike three years ago, when I last lost my job, it (with the hindsight of that case) seems unlikely that I will get back to Dallas. (Yes, part of me has wanted to move on anyway, but I'd like somewhere further west yet, I think, if I'm going to sacrifice all the things I like[d] about Big D.)

I am also adjusting to night hours as a copy editor at an AM daily newspaper. That's been more difficult than straight job adjustment. I think I am fighting a low grade dysthymia as well as anxiety.

The first week here, I had no problems with acting out. I was too emotionally and physically tired. Since then, I am at about the level I was before I moved, though no worse.

On the plus side, though at times it may have added to short-term anxiety or dysthymia, I have increased my journaling, especially my structured journaling from Nathaniel Branden. And, I've learned more about just how much buried anger I have, and where some of it hides.

Conditional-love parenting doesn’t work, Dr. Phil

2009-09-19T12:48:00.000-05:00

Showing Dr. Phil and others, who oppose Carl Rogers’ ideas, quite wrong, studies show that conditional-love parenting produces, in essence, conditional self-esteem in children.

I think there’s a lot to this story.

This ties directly to some of the work of Nathaniel Branden, father of the self-esteem movement. (The movement behind things like Character Counts, ultimately, and NOT the father of the false self-esteem movement of never confronting a child and giving everybody in class an A.)

This should also have implications for teachers, especially in younger grades.

And, to the degree support on the job, etc., can be more unconditional vs. less unconditional, I daresay it has connections to management, etc.

Emotional dissonance

2009-09-19T12:43:00.000-05:00

We hear so much talk in the modern world about "cognitive dissonance," where you're sure such-and-such is the case/fact/answer but society/peer group/family or whomever work to change mind.

Well, why don't we hear more about the parallel, "emotional dissonance"?

Especially in families, how often is the phrase, "You wouldn't really feel that way if..." - or something similar - used?

And, how often have people been tempted to drink/use, or actually did so in the past, over such "emotional dissonance"?

I may throw out more thoughts on this in days and weeks ahead; I'd like to hear from others.

For some of us, emotional dissonance, perhaps along with cognitive dissonance, may have begun in childhood. (Tim, the dissonance comes from analogy with music; the "outside" will "tell" you or me to think or feel one way when you know that's not what you actually think or feel; two different beliefs feelings, in dissonance.)

Personal experience: Being upset, and dad saying, "I'll give you something to cry about." Or, on both cognitive and emotional sides, the minister father telling me (pre-teen, still very "concrete" thinker) to lie for him on the phone, even if an adult lie.

Then, particularly here in America, you have a society that strives for forced happy endings, and sweeps unhappy ones under the rug, like the high school football player paralyzed in practice who does NOT walk again.

And, perhaps that's another deal with "the other sobriety guys": their "promises" of things such as the claim that fear of economic uncertainly will leave us. Like other such emotionally-pushed belief systems, it sets one up for dissonance. What if I still have that fear? Then, can I no longer be "happy, joyous and free"? Beyond still being fearful, should I be guilt-tripping?

Frankly, beyond addiction and sobriety, I wonder if this isn't part of the reason for the increase of depression and anxiety in the modern world.

The placebo effect strengthens

2009-09-17T11:12:00.001-05:00

Some would-be new antidepressants can't get to market because they can't pass
clinical trials. They can't pass clinical trials because the placebo effect is
getting stronger.

No, it's not less effective drugs, and it's not just anti-Ds or anxiety drugs,
either. Non-psychotropics are having the same problem in a few instances, and
it's clear that, yes, the placebo effect is getting stronger.

And, that it varies in different parts of the U.S., and in different parts of
the world. And, that beyond just being given a pill, things like pill dosage
frequency and even COLOR of the pill are causative factors.

The full story is here.

Resilience vs (?) dissociation

2009-09-14T22:56:00.004-05:00

Well, it is now two weeks since I moved to Odessa, Texas, 350 miles west from Dallas, to take a job on the copy desk of the Odessa American, a seven-day daily.

The political atmosphere here is not my cup of tea, and, if I had had to move out here, I wish at least it would be on the Midland side, with a touch more in the way of culture, shopping, etc. But, it's not.

I got a congratulations today on my one sobriety e-mail list about my resilience.

Is it resilience, or a side effect/flip side of the coin "gift" of dissociation, at least in part? I think it's the latter, as I still feel like I sleepwalk through life at times, and this is one of them.

Yes, this "resilience" by another name may be helping me right now. But, its original cause wasn't worth the price; even without that original cause, being this dissociative probably isn't worth it, overall.

That said, at least it's not the dissociation level of a decade ago.

The little boxes of life

2009-08-28T13:18:00.002-05:00

Thinking about moving, going to a new job, but within the same career path, my post on David Brooks’ new column about America’s “advantages” over other Western countries having its price, and, lo and behold, an e-mail from a friend sums this up well. From that e-mail …

Not my poem, but the song that used to intro the HBO series “Weeds.” Malvina Reynolds wrote it in 1962:

Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky,1
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

And the people in the houses
All went to the university,
Where they were put in boxes
And they came out all the same,
And there's doctors and lawyers,
And business executives,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

And they all play on the golf course
And drink their martinis dry,
And they all have pretty children
And the children go to school,
And the children go to summer camp
And then to the university,
Where they are put in boxes
And they come out all the same.

And the boys go into business
And marry and raise a family
In boxes made of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one,
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

YouTube link here.

The paradox of emotional awareness

2009-08-01T19:02:00.000-05:00

THE PARADOX OF EMOTIONAL AWARENESS

I became the emotional sponge of sorts
As mom and dad drifted, even careened, toward divorce,
Whether or not they were at all conscious
Of their emotional dumping
Through surrogate spousehoods, pedestal-placing, or other tricks.
And yet, though an emotional sponge,
I was often poor at reading people’s faces, actions and moods.
Why?
I think I had nearly fully despaired, by that time,
Of any control over other people’s emotions.
I had learned to “freeze” quickly, already, for Dad’s anger,
So I had no need to react any quicker to advance signs of it.
Parental dismissal, of various sorts, if only on the minor or modest levels
(Though it was sometimes major, sometimes huge),
Had become the norm, and so, didn’t need to be “read.”
And love and hope?
The reality of them, beyond any words, was so unlikely,
Especially on a deep or ongoing basis,
That I couldn’t have “read” them anyway; they were too unfamiliar.
And, if attention can be called an emotion, it was rarer yet;
The flip side of dismissal, it rarely came up heads.
Those emotions were shut books, and so I was illiterate.
Beyond that, though, the dismissal, the passive dismissal,
The simple non-interest, was the worst.
How could they not know the even darker secrets of our household,
Beyond even some sexual issues they themselves projected?
How could they not ask why I was afraid to sleep,
And still be awake at 2 a.m., beyond a thirst for late-night reading?
How could they not know, I used to wonder.
Today, as I stumble toward more emotional, and psychological,
Awareness of both past and present,
I wonder no longer.
They knew. Maybe not everything, but something.
And did nothing.
NOTHING!
Did they even care nothing?
My mom saw my first suicide attempt, as a child;
My dad heard me tell of my second, at the end of college.
Does an emotional sponge even suck up nothingness?
Well, I ate, had clothes, and a roof over my head.
So, on a surface, and material, level, they did.
Beyond that?
I, as an adult, don’t have to read Sartre to know existential nothingness;
I just look inside, for the face and voice of a numbed-out child.

Poetry: THE COMPUTER TURNS THE MAN INTO A BOY

2009-07-19T02:37:00.000-05:00

THE COMPUTER TURNS THE MAN INTO A BOY

The Firefox window freezes again
Or, it’s my e-mail doing that.
And, even without my fear and anger at unemployment piling on,
Suddenly, I am 8 years old again.
“Stop it,” I half-yell through gritted teeth.
It’s not Flash, it’s not Java, it’s not connection speed.
It’s me. The 8-year-old me,
Frustrated at a childhood world
That will not listen to me,
Will not respond to me the way I want,
And generally has no special regard for me.
It’s me, at age 5, or 7 or 8,
But trapped in an adult body,
With adult responsibilities,
Forced to act like an adult,
Or pretend being one.
And the little old ladies,
Who bought the 5-year-old me
Sherbet at the ice cream parlor,
Before we moved,
And the world turned far worse,
Are all dead and gone, dried up and blown away.
Sometimes, I hurt.

— July 18, 2009

Complex PTSD – and alcoholism and addiction

2009-07-06T22:44:00.001-05:00

As some psychological research estimates as many as 15 percent of alcoholics and 30 percent of addicts may have PTSD, and it’s often undiagnosed, more light is needed, especially on the little-understood complex PRSD.

Here’s a longer definition from Wiki and here
That “explanation” she holds on to is a shorter one.

Some good resources are here.

Anxiety and panic relief without the addiction

2009-06-18T19:47:00.000-05:00

German researchers believe they have discovered an anxiolytic drug without addictive qualities of benzodiazepines such as Valium.

Now, anti-depressants can help a chronic tendency toward anxiety, but, for a person with new, and acute, anxiety symptoms, their four-six week latency period rules them out. XBD173, though worked within one hour of administration, in tests

Not so fast on ‘alcohol is good for you’

2009-06-16T09:26:00.001-05:00

Most those highly hyped studies that claim that? They don’t meat the scientific smell test, and, shades of Big Tobacco, they’re financed by the alcohol industry. That’s complete with paid-off scientists denying the research subsidies had any effect.

George Vaillant 42 years later

2009-05-12T18:00:00.001-05:00

George Vaillant, a psychology professor at Harvard, inherited what was then the Grant Project. Under Vaillant’s hands, it became the largest- and longest-ever longitudinal study of human psychology.

Atlantic Monthly has an update on Vaillant’s work after 42 years.

Although not planned as such, the survey has many invaluable spinoffs, including seeing how manic-depressive or bipolar illness was eventually distinguished from schizophrenia, the state of development in psychology in general, information on human happiness and its whys, and more.

The more includes it becoming an invaluable longitudinal source on drug and alcohol addiction and recovery.

Apropos of that and other things, the Atlantic story has a couple of good rhetorical questions:

Can the good life be accounted for with a set of rules? Can we even say who has a “good life” in any broad way?

Probably not, unless, riffing on Thomas Szasz, we rely on groupthink societal definitions of what the “good life” is. Or, what “happiness” is, for that matter.

That said, Vaillant himself developed some intriguing findings about “positive” emotions:

In fact, Vaillant went on, positive emotions make us more vulnerable than negative ones. One reason is that they’re future-oriented. Fear and sadness have immediate payoffs—protecting us from attack or attracting resources at times of distress. Gratitude and joy, over time, will yield better health and deeper connections—but in the short term actually put us at risk. That’s because, while negative emotions tend to be insulating, positive emotions expose us to the common elements of rejection and heartbreak.

To illustrate his point, he told a story about one of his “prize” Grant Study men, a doctor and well-loved husband. “On his 70th birthday,” Vaillant said, “when he retired from the faculty of medicine, his wife got hold of his patient list and secretly wrote to many of his longest-running patients, ‘Would you write a letter of appreciation?’ And back came 100 single-spaced, desperately loving letters—often with pictures attached. And she put them in a lovely presentation box covered with Thai silk, and gave it to him.” Eight years later, Vaillant interviewed the man, who proudly pulled the box down from his shelf. “George, I don’t know what you’re going to make of this,” the man said, as he began to cry, “but I’ve never read it.” “It’s very hard,” Vaillant said, “for most of us to tolerate being loved.”

I will vouch for that indeed.

Of course, so could Vaillant.

He got married three times, and after six years with Wife No. 3, went back to Wife No.

The frustrations

2009-04-22T23:27:00.001-05:00

I think the biggest recovery frustration is knowing that I lost a certain amount of both “self” and opportunities for career, relationship and other development in the real world, but …

Not knowing how much.

As I sit single (has some advantages), with a job paying less than $30K (Texas is a low cost-of-living state, but still), and in a career I drifted into after trying to walk in my dad’s footsteps all the way to graduate divinity school.

And, as Eliot said in Sweeney Agonisties, I do measure my life in coffee-spoons, often.

Take child sexual abuse and child PTSD seriously

2009-04-17T10:50:00.000-05:00

Let’s stop blaming priests, or dirty old men on park benches, and instead look inside the four walls of home, or relatives’ homes, a lot more. And, let’s recognize that this causes “PTSD on the home front” (now that, due to the Iraq War, we’re sadly aware of PTSD). That, and more, is in my annual April column.

I thought secular recovery groups were more scientific

2009-04-17T00:40:00.001-05:00

It’s all right and good for a group like Lifering Secular Recovery to bash Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous for their reliance on a higher power, confession of sins, etc.

But, for Lifering to have the founder of an acupuncture-based addiction clinic as a principal speaker at its annual convention is, at least least, a bit uninformed and at the most, a bit hypocritical.

For the real poop on acupuncture and acupressure, read the Skeptic’s Dictionary.

A reply to 'Invictus'

2009-04-02T14:08:00.000-06:00

Am I indeed the captain of my soul?
I find it hard to believe that is so.
Translating the individual “I”
To the global core of humanity
I think that it’s well-nigh impossible.
The individual human psyche,
Convoluted and self-referential,
Means the “I” is not quite that simple.
As for that “master” subroutine inside,
The one that supposedly masters “I”?
The king always faces peasant revolts.
If not that, a master can go haywire.
And, when that happens, then who masters it?
– April 2, 2009

INVICTUS, by William Ernest Henley

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate;
I am the captain of my soul.

"Process" addictions....

2009-03-29T22:56:00.002-06:00

Does giving them a name make them any easier to deal with? If I had had the same problems with drinking as I do with Internet p*n-surfing, I'd be drunk in a gutter and hoping for death right now. Being lonely, bored, fearful, anxious or whatever does NOT help.. and acting out just makes all of that worse.

Has anything changed in 11 years?

2009-03-19T21:55:00.000-06:00

SUNSET DRIFTING

The sunset this evening
Was like the one I saw
In Jacksboro eleven years ago.
Where have all those years gone?
Treading water?
I haven’t even done that, economically.
I have done that, and more, career-wise.
I have higher levels of confidence, dedication and skills
Than in Jacksboro.
All in the name of a career
In an apparently dying industry.
A non-Jungian symbol for my life?
I’m not quite dead yet, though.
And neither is my current job,
Nor my career hopes.
The sunset is long faded into night now,
As I try to reflect on what emotions it stimulated
Besides a bit of nostalgia
And a full measure of semi-poignant reflection.
No, my past eleven years don’t feel “wasted,”
But, whatever “better” means for me,
I wish I were “better” off than I am.
Whoever I am.

— March 18, 2009

Seeking entry to Middle-Earth

2009-02-22T23:43:00.000-06:00

My senior year in high school, I was surely battling some unrecognized depression. My dad was in graduate school; his divinity school had those “mushroom lights” around most of the sidewalks on campus.

Anyway, I had already read “Lord of the Rings” once, and was re-reading it. It prompted me to try to call out to Earendil one night while walking by the mushroom lights, as described by this extended-haiku poem.

A ELBERETH GITHONIEL

Earendil, hear;
A Elbereth Githoniel;
Elrond, set me free.

So said a young teen,
Depressed and seeking escape —
Frodo’s Middle Earth.

But nothing happened;
No transmogrification;
Mushroom lights stayed fixed.

Homeward back I trudged
Depressed and distressed yet more
With no one to hear.

Is this all Fourth Age?
Elbereth availed me not —
I still lack magic.

Want to quit drinking? Address quitting smoking, too

2009-01-07T15:30:00.002-06:00

New studies show a synergistic effect between the two addictions. They also show that cigarette-smoking alcoholics smoke more than non-alcoholic smokers. And, while I'm not in Big Pharma's pocket, and don't normally tout particular products, it appears Chantix can help on the smoking side.

Drug court – the saner alternative

2008-10-16T09:38:00.000-05:00

The saner alternative to locking up mild drug offenders, that is. And, drug courts work in at least some instances.

The biggest issue, it seems, is how knowledgeable a drug court judge is about addiction in general, and about the different behavioral specifics of alcoholics vs. crack cocaine users vs. powder snorters vs. meth users, etc.

Sex addiction about addiction, not beauty or sex

2008-08-29T09:07:00.000-05:00

Married to the beautiful Tea Leoni, who seems personally, not just physically, beautiful? Check.

Married for 10 years, with two children? Check.

Self-proclaimed sex addict needing help? Check.

Actress David Duchovny announce he is a sex addict and is entering a treatment program.

Good luck, David.

Mother’s day, no mom

2008-05-26T15:43:00.000-05:00

Two open eyesores
Pouring buckets of water
Which she called weeping.

Emotions flowing
Without consciousness behind.
A mom self-detached.

No apologies,
Whether her fault or more mine.
This IS what I felt.

Child abuse changes the brain

2008-05-07T08:51:00.001-05:00

Specifically, it changes RNA in an epigenetic process known as methylation.

Ketamine good for depression?

2008-05-03T18:31:00.000-05:00

Scientists aren’t horsing around when they claim the notorious horse drug and human drug of abuse ketamine can help depression.

It doesn’t work on levels of neutransmitters like norepinephrine, serotonin or dopamine, either. Instead, in some other way, it’s supposed to “reshape” the orbifrontal cortex of the brain, an area where dread and shame can arise.

AND, it starts to work in just 24 hours, far earlier than the month or so Prozac and other SSRIs can take.

Plus, in what is surely a disappointment for Big Pharma, ketamine is already generic. No high-priced gouging by the Eli Lillys of the world.

Prozac: No better than placebo?

2008-02-26T00:59:00.000-06:00

A major new meta-analysis, as reported in The Guardian, makes exactly that claim. The full study, published in the Public Library of Science, is here. And, it’s not just Prozac; another major selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor antidepressant, Paxil, get the same critical nyet, as do two serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitor antidepressant:

The review breaks new ground because Kirsch and his colleagues have obtained for the first time what they believe is a full set of trial data for four antidepressants.

They requested the full data under freedom of information rules from the Food and Drug Administration, which licenses medicines in the US and requires all data when it makes a decision.

The pattern they saw from the trial results of fluoxetine (Prozac), paroxetine (Seroxat) [Paxil in the U.S.], venlafaxine (Effexor) and nefazodone (Serzone) was consistent.

“Using complete data sets (including unpublished data) and a substantially larger data set of this type than has been previously reported, we find the overall effect of new-generation antidepressant medication is below recommended criteria for clinical significance,” they write.

I think the conclusion is somewhat overstated, and meta-analysis research in general is sometimes overhyped; nonetheless, is this anywhere near bogus? I think the research probably is pretty solid.

In any case, Big Pharma is HUGELY worried and wasted no time to attack.

In adults, however, the depression-beating benefits were thought to outweigh the risks. Since its launch in the US in 1988, some 40 million people have taken Prozac, earning tens of billions of dollars for the manufacturer, Eli Lilly. Although the patent lapsed in 2001, fluoxetine continues to make the company money — it is now the active ingredient in Sarafem, a pill sold by Lilly for premenstrual syndrome.

Eli Lilly was defiant last night. “Extensive scientific and medical experience has demonstrated that fluoxetine is an effective antidepressant,” it said in a statement. “Since its discovery in 1972, fluoxetine has become one of the world's most-studied medicines. Lilly is proud of the difference fluoxetine has made to millions of people living with depression.”

A spokesman for GlaxoSmithKline, which makes Seroxat, said the authors had failed to acknowledge the “very positive” benefits of the treatment and their conclusions were “at odds with what has been seen in actual clinical practice.”

Hey, if you can remarket an antidepressant as another drug, as Lilly did by rebranding Prozac as a pre-menstrual issues drug after its patent expired, you’re going to be dollar-sensitive.

That said, as someone currently on citalopram (generic Celexa), and having run through comments on a post on this on Political Animal, I have a few thoughts.

First, if antidepressants did work BECAUSE they were placebos, why wouldn’t the placebo effect work with the first antidepressant? Why do so many people, unfortunately, try three or four before finding the right one for them?

Second, claiming a “spontaneous remission” for depression, saying that means we can and should go back to pre-drug days, is not just naïve but dangerous. Like a physical illness such as MS that goes into “remission” but then flares up again, depression can do the same.

Finally, we know too little, still, about brain chemistry to know exactly how antidepressants work. Therefore, claiming we know they don’t work is premature, even if that does prove to be the case 20-30 years from now.

Death, death of relationship hopes mean lots of acting out the past week

2008-01-26T21:23:00.000-06:00

My mom died two weeks ago yesterday. Emotions over her seem to have punctured me deeply enough to force a more emotional, conscious awareness that a female friend of mine is, not now nor in the foreseeable future, going to be anything more than “just friends.” I like her enough, and she’s attractive enough, that I really want her, and I’m definitely kind of depressed it isn’t going to happen.

So, between the two, I’ve got a shitload of emotions I’ve been trying to stuff… and online porn surfing has been the method of stuffing.

Is lust an emotion?

2008-01-26T21:20:00.000-06:00

Would you call lust an “emotion” or a “drive”? In either case, would “revulsion” be its best opposite?

Gurus, authoritarianism and recovery groups — not just an AA phenomenon

2008-01-05T11:34:00.000-06:00

For years, beyond its religious emphasis, a major complaint many people have had about Alcoholics Anonymous (and NA), is the idea of “sponsorship.” While the idea of a mentor to help in one’s sobriety, especially if truly voluntarily chosen, may be an idea of worth, in reality, especially with it being a quasi-requirement of AA/NA, it is easily abused.

Predatory-minded sponsors can easily become controlling and manipulative to minds in the midst of trying to clear themselves of the fog of alcohol and/or drugs. Or, people who aren’t official sponsors can do some of this. The predatory nature can come in with sexual manipulation, establishing a power base in a local support group for the sponsor, and more.

Even outside the official sponsorship idea, gurus can set themselves up with new insights on the best way to get clean/sober, etc. And not just inside individual groups.

The name “Clancy” is well known for propagating an entire subset of groups within AA.

Many critics of AA have observed that, sociologically, it’s a place of redemption for people who washed out of their local Lions Club, or something similar.

But, it would seem the problem is related to recovery groups and personalities susceptible to addictions, and not 12-Step models of recovery.

Several examples from the world of “secular recovery” will suffice.

One is Jack Trimpey, founder of Rational Recovery. Trimpey, as though he were the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Recovery, has, in essence, declared recovery groups null and void. He has said alcoholics/addicts who continue to go to such groups are, in essence, still weak.

Then, you have Marty Nicolaus, founder of Lifering Secular Recovery, an offshoot of Secular Organizations for Sobriety. LSR ostensibly was founded as a separate recovery organization after a Nicolaus-led lawsuit against SOS over some serious recovery issues, such as “single-substance sobriety,” failed in court.

I’ve talked to enough people in LSR besides Nicolaus to not doubt that SOS needed a fire under it (to which its founder, Jim Christopher didn’t repond), and there were grounds for the lawsuit. However, I’ve also talked enough to people in SOS, and done enough analysis on my own, to know that personality issues, including Nicolaus’ personality, were involved.

And, at the individual meeting level, “control freaks” and other types have popped up in my LSR experience too. This is true for online meetings as well as face-to-face ones.

That said, I reject the idea of “the addictive personality” as many people (often not really addicts) use it. But, to the degree addiction exacerbates personality traits, and less desirable ones in some people, and recovery groups give them a platform to spew this out, this is a worrisome phenomenon.

Binge drinking — long-term aftereffects worse with start at younger ages

2007-12-29T11:06:00.000-06:00

A new study shows that binge drinking affects ability to relearn tasks that have to be adjusted; what’s more, it shows that this difficulty, as well as long-term loss of impulse control and related issues, is worse for people who start binging at a younger age.

I AM HUMAN, HEAR ME FEEL

2007-12-06T19:57:00.000-06:00

A feeling human,
No emotional cripple;
How could I be that?

If I really were
I couldn’t feel so anxious
Of lacking feeling.

Expressions crippled?
Perhaps; I’ll not deny it.
But feelings still whole.

Yes, my mind emotes;
I am human hear me feel.
I need to believe.

Believe I deserve
To feel the love and anger
And everything else.

Anxiety calls

2007-12-03T11:16:00.000-06:00

For the first time in a while, and the first time since moving back to Dallas, I felt like throwing up from anxiety this morning. And, although I did not feel that tired, I definitely did not feel like getting out of bed this morning. I do wonder if I tapered back too much on antidepressants.

I have a couple of emotional issues on my plate, no, ONE emotional issue on my plate, that I'm not dealing with well right now, either.

PLATONISM AS PSYCHOLOGICAL BALM

2007-11-15T21:20:00.000-06:00

When I was younger,
I believed in the Platonic ideal.
I especially believed in the ideal of myself;
Perfect, and so, incorporeal.
The Platonic equivalent
Of the Pauline spiritual body.
Why?
Was it a love of Platonic philosophy,
Or rather a Pauline loathing of the physical?
I believe the latter.
Not only had I internalized
Augustinian angst about concupiscence,
I also had been buffeted by childhood slings and arrows.
Bullying by neighborhood acquaintances,
Abuse of various types at home,
Asthma, allergies and other breathing problems,
A bit of a lisp,
Late growth and skinniness.
What shy, quiet, lonely, hurting boy
Wouldn’t harbor Platonic thoughts
As a secret dream of salvation
From the curse and burden of the physical,
Deliverance from a body
That brought nothing but pain?

SSRI Depravity

2007-10-06T20:53:00.002-05:00

SSRI deprivation,
Or depravity,
Stabs at my head,
An ice pick to my temple,
Mocking my claims to wholeness.
Modern medicine
Isn’t always so modern.
At times, it seems mental health care
Has advanced but little,
From Paleolithic
To Neolithic,
Maybe Chalcolithic.
The equivalent of Bronze or Iran Age uses
Of tailored treatment
Remain far away,
A PR strategy
From Big Pharma,
A sop to regulators,
To justify
Ever-lessened oversight.

Feeling better

2007-09-30T23:09:00.000-05:00

My sister and my best friend both tell me I sound better, on the phone at least, since moving back to Dallas. Another person said the same about me just by sobriety chat room observations online.

I guess I’m more transparent than I might want to admit; sometimes, that’s pretty good. I have cut one of my two antidepressants in half, as I felt lethargic in the mornings, not antsy and sleep-deprived. That was shortly after accepting the job offer to move back here, which I figured had something to do with it.

When my tricyclic runs out, I’ll cut the Celexa in half again a month or so later.

SSRI “brain zaps” — they are for real

2007-09-10T10:21:00.000-05:00

Technically, your brain itself doesn’t feel anything; it has no sensory nerves. But, trust me, an electrochemical overstimulation of nerves, whether in the head or elsewhere, DOES happen when you’re trying to get off an selective serotonin reuptake antidepressant, even if you’re tapering and not quitting cold turkey.

I had “zaps” on my left temple as I cut back from 20mg/day to 10 mg/day of generic Celexa. I had one, just one, about a week after starting to cut down. Two days later, I had two, within about half an hour later. That was last Tuesday and Thursday. Saturday, I had one Saturday afternoon. Then another. Then another.

Soon, it was a new “zap” every 10 minutes. Needless to say, what passed for sleep Saturday night wasn’t very long, nor was it very refreshing.

So, if you are on an SSRI, or even an older tricyclic antidepressant — follow doctor’s orders, especially when it comes to tapering off and how to do it.

Anxiety — anger turned sideways

2007-09-02T22:58:00.000-05:00

If the old cliché about depression being anger turned inward has any degree of truth, then anxiety can certainly be seen as anger turned sideways, at least to a degree.

Anxiety is, at bottom, far of the future. To the degree this fear is based on anger at my present state, status or condition, or the environment in which I am making my future look iffy to me, then anxiety is anger turned sideways.

R(E)BT?

2007-09-02T22:57:00.000-05:00

To me, rational(-emotive) behavioral therapy is often, as avidly espoused by people who also, unsurprisingly, seem to be libertarian in their politics. And, from their lips, the “E,” the emotive content of this therapy, seems often missing. Not surprising, again, as these are the same people who would have us all believe that economics is a totally rational game.

Well, neither it nor psychology are.

A wild, wacky week

2007-07-24T23:32:00.000-05:00

What a weird, wild and wacky week since my last entry.

The sobriety chat room acquaintance I mentioned there apparently faked her own suicide, for whatever reasons. I made an error in judgment over running a story, or not, and had the news manager of the local radio station question my journalistic integrity the week after someone from the other side of this hot button story did, as if it's the radio station's business what the newspaper writes in the first place. The radio station guy's angry yelling at me provided a stiff test of the anti-anxiety property of my antidepressants. They worked, but it’s like I was drained enough to slide a step or two backwards on the brain/hormonal growth they had provided. Then, I had to call the family of Grimes County’s first Iraq death today.

In between, saw my college and graduate school best friend when he was at a convention in Houston.

Suicide is NOT painless

2007-07-16T22:49:00.000-05:00

An online sobriety chatroom friend of mine relapsed with an old crack supplier last week. I had e-mailed her the day after she hooked up with this guy because I hadn't seen her in chats for a while.

Well, she came back to the chat room, and sounded OK.

But she wasn't.

Last night, she slit her wrists and killed herself.

Do not drink or drug no matter what.

NIAAA: Child abuse-alcoholism link

2007-07-02T23:12:00.000-05:00

And, this research points up alleys I have wondered about, such as why different people react differently to child abuse, sexual especially. Read the details on this study:

Girls who suffered childhood sexual abuse are more likely to develop alcoholism later in life if they possess a particular variant of a gene involved in the body's response to stress, according to a new study led by researchers at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The new finding could help explain why some individuals are more resilient to profound childhood trauma than others.

"With this study we see yet again that nature and nurture often work together, not independently, to influence our overall health and well-being," says NIH Director Elias A. Zerhouni, M.D.

"This finding underscores the central role that gene-environment interactions play in the pathogenesis of complex diseases such as alcoholism," adds NIAAA Director Ting-Kai Li, M.D. A report of the study appears in the June 26, 2007 advance online publication of
Molecular Psychiatry.

Previous studies have shown that childhood sexual abuse increases the risk for numerous mental health problems in adulthood. However not all abused children develop such problems, a likely indication that genetic factors also play a role. Recent studies have linked the monoamine oxidase A (MAOA) gene with adverse behavioral outcomes stemming from childhood mistreatment.

"MAOA is an enzyme that metabolizes various neurotransmitters that regulate the body's response to stress," explains first author Francesca Ducci, M.D., a visiting fellow in NIAAA's Laboratory of Neurogenetics in Bethesda, Maryland. DNA variations occur within a regulatory area - the MAOA-linked polymorphic region (MAOA-LPR) — of
the MAOA gene. Two such MAOA-LPR variants occur most frequently and result in high or low MAOA enzyme activity. In a recent study, researchers found that maltreated boys who possessed the low activity MAOA-LPR variant were more likely to develop behavior problems than boys with the high activity variant.

"Our aim was to test whether this low activity variant influences the impact of childhood sexual abuse on alcoholism and antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) in women," says Dr. Ducci.

She and her colleagues analyzed DNA samples from a group of American Indian women living in a community in which rates of alcoholism and ASPD are about six times higher than the average rates among all U.S. women. Childhood sexual abuse is also prevalent in this population, reported by about half of the women in the community, compared with a
U.S. average of 13 percent.

Analyses of MAOA-LPR genotypes in this study revealed that women who had been sexually abused in childhood were much more likely to develop alcoholism and antisocial behavior if they had the low activity variant whereas the high activity variant was protective. In contrast, there was no relationship between alcoholism, antisocial behavior and MAOA-LPR genotype among non-abused women.

"Our findings show that MAOA seems to moderate the impact of childhood trauma on adult psychopathology in females in the same way as previously shown among males," says Dr. Ducci. "The MAOA-LPR low activity allele appears to confer increased vulnerability to the adverse psychosocial consequences of childhood sexual abuse."

Dr. Ducci and her colleagues suggest that the effect of MAOA on the hippocampus, a brain region which is involved in the processing of emotional experience, may underlie the interaction between MAOA and childhood trauma. They note that previous research showed that people with the low activity variant at the MAOA-LPR locus have hyperactivation of the hippocampus when retrieving negative emotional information.

Now, the $64 question is, what medical benefits will result from this? Will we fine-tune new anti-PTSD medications?

Recovery phrases I despise

2007-07-01T00:04:00.000-05:00

“That which doesn’t kill you will make you stronger.”

How do you know in advance whether it falls into one camp or another?

“Life is suffering.”

If you’re a good Buddhist, life CAN’T be suffering, because you’re supposed to be in a state of satori. Rather, if the Buddha himself had actually obtained Buddhahood, he would have said, “Life appears to be suffering.”