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This BLOG is duplicated from my website and can be pretty random. Philosophical. |
| I have found that the writing I initially did for therapy and catharsis has been of some interest to others so I started a blog on my personal website. I will be copying those here to get feedback as well as entertain. |
| I remember when I was first getting sober I told my sponsor that now that I was getting a handle on alcohol I guessed I would need to go to NA, SAA, and all the other A’s to get a handle on drug addiction, sex addiction, and all of my other addictions. He just laughed and told me to relax, stick around, and see what happens first. Of course, he was right because AA itself describes the disease of alcoholism as being one of obsession. Therefore, if I find a way to arrest the disease of alcoholism I would most likely arrest the bulk of my other obsessions. In reality, it is only partially true because while I have stopped drinking I have not stopped thinking and that is where my disease and obsession truly live. I also remember talking to Alan, the only real therapist I've ever worked with, and him telling me that most of the things I worried about, watching too much porn, driving too fast, telling white lies, etc. were not necessarily universally wrong. Much of what I have thought was wrong throughout most of my life was all in my head. Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet “There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so”. So, in reality, it boils down to harm. If no one is harmed, including myself, then there is no problem. I’m not talking about the bulls*** kind of harm concept that I used to spout like my drinking was only harming myself because that was crap and I did harm others by being absent, spending too much money, etc. My problem over the years has been that I used other people’s morality, judgment, or complaints to assess my behavior and ideas and then commenced to assimilate all of that crap into my values. I used to think that values were my beliefs but today I know that values are the actions to back up my beliefs. Once that process is complete, or at least well underway, then I can begin to figure out what my true beliefs are and begin to take the actions to bring it all current. Which brings us back to obsession. When assessing my behavior and whether it is wrong and aligns with my personal beliefs and morals today I have to let go of all of the guilt and shame I dragged with me from my childhood and relationships and think about what is real. That can be very difficult because some of this thinking has been with me for a very long time and has become very real in my mind. When I began working with Alan to clear out the debris from my past, his main test for everything was “Is it obsessive?”. Some things were very clearly harmful and didn’t need much evaluation to judge such as drinking or using drugs again, lying, manipulating, etc. I had to take a long hard look at some other things though and decide once and for all for myself if I thought they were wrong or not. Alcohol and drugs are a no-brainer for me because they immediately become obsessive. On that note what is obsession? I used to think of it in terms of thinking about something. If I was at work and my thoughts were preoccupied with my first drink after work that is a type of obsession but not the only type. Obsession of thought is easy enough to identify once I begin to get honest with myself. But, the type Alan was talking about is allowing some activity, thinking, or other behavior to take the place of something. Using that test, which I did not so much like at first, it was fairly easy to identify the things I was obsessively allowing to steal my serenity, peace, and eventually sobriety. It is interesting that once I began to use that test to look at myself everything seemed to do an about-face. The things that I thought were bad for me didn’t seem so bad and the innocuous-seeming things took on a more sinister look. A good example is a friendship I had allowed to become obsessive. While the connection with this person may have had many positive benefits, I was beginning to skip 12-step meetings and other commitments that were more than outweighing any benefit this relationship was bringing. On the other hand, I had a lot of guilt about my driving habits and was obsessively beating myself up over it all the time. This test helped me see that the obsessive self-guilt was worse than driving a few miles over the speed limit. Once I could take a step back and look at the big picture I was able to set realistic expectations for myself and my driving. I personally believe it is okay to drive a little over the limit and be exasperated over other drivers' obvious lack of skill. In this spirit, I can then look at the rest of my old driving habits and say that they are or could be harmful. I no longer drive excessively faster than traffic, and I no longer “brake check” or use other aggressive driving maneuvers but I no longer stress out about minor infractions either. Which brings me to other addictions. What I found was that the other addictions such as drugs and sex left with the alcohol. I think that is because all of those were used to alter or remove my feelings and the combination of therapy and the 12-step transformational process has made me okay with feeling. I was blessed to never have struggled much with shopping or gambling obsessions. Some would say I can be a bit of a hoarder but thanks to Alan’s test I know it is nowhere near obsessive. Using Alan’s obsession test has allowed me to finally put porn into perspective and get over my unhealthy guilt about it as well. So, in the end, it all comes down to harm and obsession. If no one is harmed and it is not obsessive, then it is ok in my book and I no longer care what anyone else thinks about it. But, the other side of the coin has to be true as well - If someone else’s behavior is not my cup of tea but it passes the test I have to let them be true to themselves. |
| I am realizing I am quickly approaching “that age” where things begin to make more sense and I am seeing the wisdom in the things my parents and especially grandparents said. It is like so many other things in life that something sneaks up on you and you do not realize it is happening until it has happened. Part of it is realizing that my actions are falling more and more in line with my beliefs. For the longest time, I felt like many of my beliefs were outdated and old-fashioned. But, I am beginning to see more and more how much sense they make. Now I don’t know if this process has been the same for others or just for me. For, you see, my life has been a bit different than the average person. I grew up mostly in the streets surrounded by a mostly criminal element. We had different values and ideas than most folks. The idea of doing the right thing because it was the right thing just didn’t fit with our crowd. That was lame or uncool because everything we did was because it would benefit us somehow. The thought of helping someone else without the potential for gain was lost on us. Life on the streets and a criminal lifestyle are hard to describe to the uninitiated. I know this because every once in a while, I will be discussing something from my past or throwing out an idea and realize that the person I am talking to is shocked. They can’t grasp the ideals surrounding the events I am describing. I forget sometimes that I didn't grow up like most folks and that they can’t see things from my worldview. I guess that is one of the reasons I enjoy living in a sober living home because most of the people I interact with have a similar lived experience. Most of them have not gone to the depths that I did but we are still all in the same ballpark. There are a few, such as a dear friend I met when I first moved into sober living, that have enough similar lived experiences that we can be totally at peace and ease around each other. I guess that is part of being at “that age” because I am beginning to have that feeling about other more “normal” people my age. I used to think, and occasionally still do, that those people were naïve, square, or deluded and were missing out. Today I realize that I was the one who was delusional and missing out. By believing that the world was wrong, cold, and out to get me I avoided so much that would have been beneficial and rewarding. After moving to San Antonio in 1985 I consequentially left that life and friends behind. That was when I began to realize that I was not “normal” and that my values did not line up with society in general. I still harbored those same thoughts though and just “went along to get along” for the most part to try to get by as best as possible. I don’t know for sure what the people in my life saw and thought but I always felt like an imposter fearing that I would be exposed at any moment. Like most things in life, I didn’t realize how much that affected me until I began to shed that skin after getting sober. Getting sober and working a 12-step program let me see my fallacious thinking and how it had affected my life for all these years. It has still taken several years of living “as if” for the old thinking to fade away. That kind of thinking can still pop in from time to time and it seems to appear most when I am meeting new people that I will have to depend on or engage with. I still find myself sizing them up for what I can get out of them or what harm they could bring me. The good news is that my defects today pretty much stay in my head and don’t escape. I can still find myself acting upon those thoughts, but those days are far less common and the actions milder than they once were. I’m not sure where I thought I would wind up but all of the working on myself, disciplining my thoughts, and staying sober has resulted in simply becoming a worker among workers, a friend among friends, or in other words a decent human being. I remember when I was younger thinking decency was for suckers, that “nice guys finish last”, and that if anyone had described me as a decent human being I would’ve been insulted. I guess we all get here on different tracks and that most people have some degree of fallacious and errant thinking that keeps them from reaching self-actualization. To me, self-actualization is when my “go-to” thinking and beliefs are in alignment with my core beliefs and when those beliefs are in relative alignment with general society. I say relative because not all societal norms are good for all people and each person's morality is going to differ somewhat from their fellow. The key for me is when those differences bring harm to another. By harm, I mean true harm not perceived harm or ego bruising. For example, if my perceived morality causes me to try to remove a freedom or right from another because I think they are wrong then that is harmful. This brings me back to the topic at hand – “that age”. I remember there was a point in their lives when my grandfather, then my father, and now finally mine where the tone softened, the words came slower, and the judgment lessened. I remember when all the wisdom that poured out of the mouths of my grandfather and father seemed so silly and demeaning. Now those words pour out of my mouth and guess what? These darn kids aren’t listening any more than I did. I see now why they didn’t push too hard because they saw what I see today, and they knew that, if I lived long enough, I would come to the same conclusions. Things don’t change as much as we think they do. |
| I told my therapist at one point that I felt like I needed a month off just to remember stuff. Fortunately, I have been given that and more. It Is not a month off but instead a job and lifestyle that lets me have plenty of solitude. And boy have I been remembering. Let me back up here a minute and explain. Anyone who has been following my blog, story, and book knows that I have DID, Dissociative Identity Disorder. You will also know that we are now fully integrated, and all of the personalities and their memories are accessible to me. Since those memories were not available to me for much of my life I am now in the process of assimilating them and reprocessing my values, beliefs, and ideals. That is what I meant by needing time to remember. And that requires quality alone time in sufficient quantity to process a memory or group of memories. I use music, imagery, and reading over the narratives written by each personality to pull things to the surface. When I read one of the narratives for a few minutes that personality emerges more and pushes to the front. I then begin to get a feel for the attitudes, morals, and preferences of that personality and can kind of enter its world. Once I am in that mode I can relive the moments of those memories. It can be confusing and unsettling at times because I am often seeing things through two lenses. One lens is the lens that the memory was formed with, i.e. the personality fronting, or present, at the time. The other lens of course is my current lens. And through this process, the current lens is constantly changing and updating. One of the results of this process is that I need to go back and reprocess certain things all over again. One of the reasons is that as I process things my values and morals update and something I found offensive, or not, in a previous remembering is now viewed quite differently. A good example is my religious leanings and beliefs. Something that I at one time would have considered wrong or “sinful” today I view differently and mostly look at the intent vs the action. Throughout much of my life, I felt like my actions were not in alignment with my beliefs, or as Alan used to put it my values were not in a current status. Today as a result of this process I believe I have become pretty open-minded. Therefore, when I look back at events and actions from my life much of what I condemned myself for I see today was not out of line with my current values. The other stuff I can forgive myself for pretty easily now that it is viewed in context. When I used to vaguely remember an event out of my past without the context provided by the personality fronting things would appear to be evil or out of proportion. A good example is when I assaulted my mother. Now that I have the whole picture of what she did to me for all those years my actions no longer feel out of proportion or evil. I am not saying that my actions were justified only that they are more understandable. It is like standing on top of a forested mountain looking back down at my journey to the top. While I was on the path I could not see the rest of the path it was confusing, and I made a lot of decisions without having all the information needed to make a healthy decision. Also, as my personalities switched out I often would not even realize I was on a journey and just thought I was lost in a forest. This was most evident when my core personality would push through to the front and find us in some awkward or confusing situation that the alter had gotten us into. Today when reprocessing I have the whole picture and see events in the context of the whole journey. As I go through this process of unwrapping compartmentalized memories I wonder how similar or dissimilar it is to how people with relatively normal recall process memories. One of the cool parts of the human experience is that we all have variations of the mind's eye and internal monologue. For the most part, whenever I remember something from my past there are two mind’s eyes and two internal monologues present. Over time the second set is slowly becoming weaker but is still there. This gives me the chance to look at things, I would think, very differently than most people. What I used to think of as a curse I now view as a superpower because there are two, or more, of us looking at the same thing from different contexts. I would liken the process to trying to make a bed with multiple cats in the room so that every time I almost have it another cat jumps on the bed and tries to get under the sheets. What I do today is take the high road, look at the journey, and try not to focus on the destination. It can become tiring and tedious at times and like any task, my motivation waxes and wanes at times but the improvement in my mental health and contentment I have gained so far always keep me coming back. I try to remember that I am going down roads that few have journeyed and remember to enjoy the process along the way. I often stop and ask myself, “How the hell did we get here?”, and to be honest I have no real answer. That is the main reason that I have researched and written about Dissociative Identity Disorder so much, to try to answer that question. So, I do not write about DID from a scholarly or authoritative viewpoint, I instead write about it from an experiential viewpoint. I feel like that has more benefit to many others on this same path than a bunch of scientific explanations because so far, those explanations have not helped me all that much. Once the diagnosis is made and accepted by the person with DID I feel the rest is relatively uncharted, so I write about my journey to help start to build a chart. If not for the many, then at least for me. In the meantime, I will keep remembering, processing, and taking the high road! |
| I have heard it said that grief is love with nowhere to go. I’m not sure I believe that, but I guess it is about as good an explanation as any. What I believe today is that grief is a complex of feelings and comes in many varieties. I can grieve someone else’s loss and that is not the same as grieving my loss. I can grieve for someone lost long ago or I can grieve for a new and especially painful loss. So, it would seem that grief does come in many shapes and sizes. I am by no means a stranger to grief, but I don’t think you could call me an expert either. Since grief comes to us all differently I don’t think there is a proper way to define or quantify grief. My journey through life and grief is quite complex and has taken many paths over the years. For much of my life, I was probably unable to have any real grief because I didn’t give a crap about anybody. Pretty hard to grieve someone you felt nothing for. On the other hand, I spent most of my life either dissociated into oblivion or intoxicated into numbness, and usually both. Again, pretty hard to grieve without access to feelings. The funny thing is that the grieves I remember the most from those days were all for animals. I was torn up over the loss of tigers and other large animals at a sanctuary where I volunteered. Reba, Tripoli, Lenny, Raja, and so many others. I think that I actually connected with them better than people back then. Also, they were all coming out of abuse as was I. So, it was the actual connection I grieved. Therefore, it would seem to me that I was grieving the loss of the connection more than the loss of the object. That makes a lot of sense to me because I have eventually grieved all the grief I never felt during the years I was distracted by mental illness and addiction. The key to that was that as I have healed mentally and stayed sober my mind has rebuilt those connections and I now can grieve the loss thereof. Again, I say that grief is very complex because of the way I have grieved the loss of my mother. For much of my life, I compartmentalized and buried her memories and death. After many years of therapy, the whole picture is clear to me today. Of course, I grieve her physical loss, but I also grieve the loss of a mother, a writer, a friend, and even a lover in my experience of her. Once again, there is a connection to be seen in each of those roles she played that I lost the day she died. If I am grieving the loss of a connection I don’t think I ever truly get over that. The very word connection implies that it is not casual or superficial but intentional and complex. It is like the fibers of their being have woven and dug into me and there is no way to remove that. I think that is why every once in a while when I think I am done grieving something like a sound, a song, a smell, or even a situation will cause those remaining connection fibers to vibrate and reignite my grief. In the end, I see that grief is not love with nowhere to go but a connection with nowhere to go. That can explain a lot because I will grieve the loss of a connection when it tries to reach out, like when I get the urge to call someone only to remember they are gone. And that does not always mean they are dead just that the connection is gone. I grieve over the loss of friendship or love as much or more than death. Death is easy enough because it is final but the loss of connection to a former friend or lover is worse because the bargaining phase of grief never really ends in those cases. If connection is the key to grief, then it would be easy enough to just not make any more connections. The problem with that is that being human one of my drives is to connect. We are socially programmed creatures, so it would seem it is impossible to live life and not make any meaningful connections. Of course, I cannot avoid grief for the rest of my life because it seems to me it is part of the human condition. Therefore, I need to be very careful with my connections moving forward. I do not always realize the depth of a connection until it is broken, and the grief comes. The flipside of that is if I am careful to only make high-quality connections then the grief is of a higher quality as well. With all of this in mind, I can look at grief in a different light and see it as more of a celebration than pain. I have come to embrace and at times almost welcome the feelings of grief. Strangely it is like having the connection back for a minute because at least for me grief always comes with memories. Memories that may have otherwise been left buried away or at least ignored. Today I try to take the high road of grief and celebrate the connection that once was and not just cry over it. In a way that makes the connection more important than its loss. And that is beautiful. |
| As I reach this stage of my journey of healing and self-reflection I have begun to realize that my perception is changing. For most of my life, I have felt like I was on the outside looking in. In other words, for me, that means I was not a part of my life but an observer. This caused me to have a lot of problems trying to remember things. I would see or feel something I wanted to remember but it could not be internalized and the next time I saw or experienced the same thing it would still feel unfamiliar. I have begun to realize that recently those very same things are a part of me and not external. It is a subtle shift and very difficult to put into words, but it is more than fleeting. I guess it is like the difference between experiencing something in real life and a movie. It is like I would experience or see something, and it was somewhat familiar but did not feel like I had experienced it. I am sure that much of this can be explained by the diminishing influence of my multiple personalities over the main mechanics of my mind. When one personality experiences something and stores the memory, it is complete with feelings and intensity to that personality. When that memory is available to the host, me, or another personality it is flat and like something previously seen on a screen or heard secondhand through speakers. The memories, feelings, and experiences previously recorded in my collective mind are still flat like that but recently I have noticed a difference in that the memories that have been stored in the last few months are more vivid and finally feel real. The coolest part is that if I had not experienced my life and memories as flat I would not know how cool and precious my memories truly are. I do not know, although I doubt, if the old memories stored by my alternate personalities will ever take on a more realistic feel, but I am very pleased with this new state. Again, this brings up many questions such as is this new state of processing due to the alternate personalities losing power or simply from having a healthier mind. I think that if it was generally improved mental health then all of my memories would have improved quality as well. It seems to me to be similar to when you upgrade a computer system, processor, or application. The information stored under to old system is usually set aside and is still available but is not the same quality as the new stuff. If this is true of my situation, and I think it is, then it is like trying to enhance an old image stored with an older system that has less quality. When I do that the new image usually looks worse than it did before trying to enhance it. It is kind of like when an old black-and-white movie is colorized. Some of the basic colors like a blue sky are fairly accurate but after that much of it is up to the artist performing the colorization. In some cases, they have documentation that would describe a dress worn by an actress as blue or the color of a house or other item. But in the end, they are guessing. In the same way, many of my vaguer memories have been made clearer with anecdotal stories that I have read or that have been told to me but again it is subjective to the memory of the other party. I have been very careful to make sure I did not over-colorize my past by trying to over-enhance my recollections. In the early stages of my healing, it would have been easy to do that but the therapist I was working with at the time was very careful to not force anything and would tell me to “give it time and it will come”. He was right because over the next few years as the personalities have revealed themselves and their memories made available to the whole I have been surprised many times and am glad I didn’t try to make something up to fill the gaps. So that brings me to why I say today I am on the inside looking out and not on the outside looking in. After the personalities of Danny and Tina emerged I thought we had discovered them all and was ready to start the next phase of my healing journey. It is only in hindsight that I see that I was still not processing the way I am today because those memories are also flat. As I began writing more and the manuscript for my book took shape one last personality, Sally, emerged and, again in hindsight, I know that after she emerged the memories I created are full. One of my theories as to how and why that happened is that as long as I had a personality still outside the whole then the system was still stuck on an older version of the memory-storing application software. We were still incomplete and in conflict as well. No matter what the explanation I know that since Sally came along my memories are more complete and I can tell the difference. As I have expressed many times before, here I have choices. I can whine about how unfair my life has been and how much it screwed me up. Or, I can take the high road and appreciate the unique perspectives I have on so many things. I would not appreciate the completeness of my memories and experiences today if I had not experienced them in another state. So today I again take the high road and look at life - From the Inside Looking Out. |
| I do not know for sure when we had the first fracture, but I can guess because of the memories gained as each personality felt safe enough to begin delivering memories. It is really hard to describe how that happens. For the most part, when I concentrate on some feeling from a picture, song, movie, etc. memories begin to flow in and assimilate into my core of memories. This can be very distracting at times. It used to be very intrusive and I think it is just getting used to it happening that makes it easier to process. Depending on the content and timing of memories flowing in it can be anywhere from warm and fuzzy to downright terrifying. Occasionally as new memories regarding the early sexual abuse or the violence of the early eighties and such it can still be paralyzing for a few minutes. Other times I get this feeling and know one of the alters is trying to say something or take over. I first felt this during a session with my therapist and she noticed it as well. I just told her I was trying to stay present, and she helped me re-ground myself. I do not think that any of the other alters could ever actually take full control today. It is still a scary thought though because I can remember what it was like to regain the controls while an alter had been fronting and being so confused and scared. I also remember what it was like to know I was not in control and feeling like I was watching my life on a screen. In hindsight, I know that I, Wanda, did not know what was going on until that fateful day in another therapist’s office when he walked me into making my own diagnosis of DID. It seems plausible that Robbie is really the host and lost control so long ago that he is incapable of running the show now. The thought that I may be another alter as well is very scary. I know that Robbie, and he agrees, is too young and immature to be in charge of the whole show anyway. It seems I am the only one who ages and matures with time, so I am effectively the host. The oldest memories like living with my grandparents and the move to a few apartments and then Roslyn Street have always been available to me as far as I can tell so they must belong to Wanda, me, and be from before the fracturing. There are still holes in those memories but that is probably explainable by age since I was under seven. I think most people my age have only limited recall from seven years old and earlier as well anyway. As I write things seem to become clearer and the thoughts of temporariness and not being real slowly fade. As I go back over the things that are written by my various parts, the alters, so much continues to make more and more sense. I can look back on things and see the source of an action, thought, or feeling. I was thinking today about a guy in prison I was fascinated by and was always a bit confused about my awkwardness with him. After meeting Sally, I knew it was her and she wanted him badly. I do not know where the varying control and loss of control come from. For instance, I know in that case it was me or possibly Tina that prevented Sally from screwing that guy because it would have resulted in us getting hurt, in trouble, or God knows what. It is very enlightening as this process of discovery, remembering, and assimilating happens. Seeing things through various lenses helps everything make sense. I know from what Tina has said that the many, many times in my life I felt as if I awakened in the middle of a nightmare was when I was able to push through whoever was fronting and suddenly was confronted with the situation they had placed us in. I obviously do not know if it would have been better if they had continued or not. I wonder if sometimes it was not divine intervention that I regained awareness when I did and most likely prevented a disaster or worse. Ironically, I always had this vague notion that I was crazy and so finding out that I am crazy kind of makes me not crazy. I do know that as this process plays out, and it seems to be accelerating, life gets better and better as my life finally makes sense. It is like a campfire that slowly ignites the first twig and it seems to take forever for the one next to it to catch. And then as more twigs ignite they have more and more next to them and then enough energy to ignite the logs. I am very grateful to my creator that the process has come along as it has. Today I am strong enough, I think, to handle large chunks of memories at once. I do know for sure that if what I know today had been thrust into my consciousness at the start I would have imploded. I still get suicidal under the strain so cannot imagine surviving a more intense awakening. Some of the memories are horrific and traumatic. Once they have emerged I can tell they are accurate by numerous criteria including but not limited to smells, feelings, and volume. By volume I mean multiple memories of the same era or from one alter all come packaged together. I can tell if one of the alters or myself is trying to invent something by the hollowness and flat feel of it. Also like a parent, I am getting to know each of the alters like a mother gets to know her children. I know how to make them come to the surface with a phrase or thought as well as knowing when they are lying or manipulating me by their nervousness. They still pull s*** over on me once in a while though. Today we really are a family of sorts and all of us get along for the most part. Now that Tina has emerged and somewhat explained herself she is no longer feared by the others, especially “the littles”. As each alter becomes comfortable they talk and contribute feelings, thoughts, and ideas more and more. As Danny and Tina have pointed out it would seem that the emotionless alters have emotions through me now and have lost their ability to be quite as vicious and cold. Even Tina is fun now in a caricatured kind of way. Trying to figure out “who I am” or what my true personality and beliefs are is also very frustrating. I am just slowly going from event to event and day to day gauging the reactions of the alters and my own emotions and assimilating everything into a new core. I do not know if there is enough time left in my life to accomplish this task but for the most part, I try to take the high road and enjoy the ride and not concentrate on the negatives. Since, as far as I know, very few people with DID survive this long and become integrated so I do not have much to go on for reference. I guess that one of my main goals in writing the book is to help others when they find themselves in the same situation that I find myself in. |
| Ethics is, by nature, a complicated subject of thought or study. My personal view of ethics, or morality, has changed throughout my lifetime. I can see that much of what I thought was right or wrong over the years was based mostly on my needs and much less on societal or personal morality. In other words, if I wanted something or wanted to use something to make myself feel differently I would irrationally justify it based more on my perceived need than whether it was right or wrong. This brings up numerous questions I have asked myself over the last few years on my journey of self-discovery. Probably the hardest and most important part of the journey was to admit to myself that I had made conscious decisions to act immorally. I had never been able to look at any of my behavior or consequences with any real degree of honesty until I worked the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. The 12 steps were a wonderful tool to look at myself with. The only real ingredient needed was rigorous honesty. I found the honesty out of desperation because I did not want to drink again, and the steps seemed the only way to stop. All I wanted at the time was the magical removal of the obsession to drink that was promised if I worked the steps. What I found was a set of tools to deconstruct my past life and past behavior objectively. It was by no means easy, but I feel that I got a lot more out of it than I put in. Throughout my life, I had known, mostly through religious teachings and research, that if I could take an honest look at myself and make amends things would be ok. I always heard in the church that I should repent, and I knew that was a good and sound idea I just did not know how, and the church never seemed to have any answers on that part. At least none that I could understand or follow. I thought that many of my fellow churchgoers were putting on a good act and had no more of a clue of what it was all about than I did. Either way, the church never did all that much for me. What I have found in recovery is that I never put the action behind my assumed morals. As I worked through the steps in recovery I began, mostly through steps 9 and 12, to put action behind my words and intentions. The simple act of telling someone I knew I had harmed them and making a meager start at amends, step 9, suddenly relieved me of my self-imposed mental prison. Then when I was willing to help others through step 12 by sponsoring, telling my story, and showing up at meetings I began to feel that power that the Big Book and the Christians had talked about. With that power at my disposal, I was able to begin to look at my decisions and behavior through a moral lens and see myself for who I really am. What I have found also is that through the power of the steps I was able to put my past to bed and not continue to let it run my current life. With that settled I can generate more ethical thoughts and behavior based on a better, to me, moral code. I think I have always had an innate sense of right and wrong but that never seemed to stop me much and I just did what I wanted. At first, I saw that behavior causing me more trouble and harm than good. So initially I was going along with and imitating the people that I felt were good or moral such as my sponsor. As I began to get better results and rewards with this new behavior it started to become my new normal. Now that I was beginning to conform my behavior to a more societal and personal moral code I started to evaluate my reasons for doing the things I did. This is where I was able to look at my true values and beliefs. My friend and therapist Alan always used to say that I needed to bring my values to a current status and I could not figure out what that meant, and he would not spell it out for me. Today I understand what he meant. To bring my values to a current status means to bring my actions in line with my beliefs. When I was acting against my beliefs I was always in conflict with myself. Much like a couple that is fighting and bickering they are therefore not effective and make poor decisions. In the same manner, when I am in conflict with myself, I am not effective and make poor decisions. When I begin to act in a manner consistent with my beliefs I am no longer in conflict and that harmony continues to expand and my behavior and decisions continue to align with my true nature. As Shakespeare wrote the lines for Polonius in Hamlet, “This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man” if I am true to myself I cannot be false to others because I would no longer be true to myself. Now this is all well and good if I only look at my personal ethics and ignore societal ethics. From where I am looking today my personal ethics seem to line up pretty well with most of society's more generic moral code. As for the rest of society’s morals, my personal morals are a bit at odds with some of them, but then again I do not agree or conform to all of society's norms anyway. |
| 7 years ago, I sat in the pharmacy parking lot looking at 2 little pills. They were the hormone replacement medications I had been prescribed earlier in the day. My mind raced over the possibilities and also the consequences. I had done a tremendous amount of research and thought I knew what I was getting into. I think back often to the scene from The Matrix where Neo chooses the red or blue pill. There is a running joke in the transgender community that we chose both pills and I guess in some ways that is true. I say that I thought I knew what I was getting into because the changes that have occurred in my body, mind, and emotions over the last 7 years have been dramatic, to say the least. The hormonal changes have altered my entire way of thinking and behaving. The changes to my mind and how I think were the most surprising and eventually the most rewarding. I figured I would grow some breasts, lose some hair, and soften up a bit and that was that. Was I in for a surprise! Over time, yes, I did grow breasts, change my body hair patterns, and soften my skin and muscles. The other changes are very difficult to describe because I cannot relate them to anything else. The changes I have gone through because of “taking the red pill” have happened mostly so slowly that only in hindsight and looking back at past pictures and writing can I see them. At the time I did not realize it but during the first few months, my brain structure changed so much that I had a lot of trouble with thinking and remembering during the process. In fact, according to the National Institutes of Health – “Taken together, the above six studies suggest that even relatively short-term administration of GAHT influences the gross morphology and white matter microstructure of the brain in such a manner that trans individuals become more like their identified gender with respect to these brain outcomes.” (Nguyen et al., 2019) Along with that, there has been a plethora of other changes. My skin has softened so much that I have to be more careful to avoid scratches and other injuries. My muscle structure has changed as well to the point I can no longer pick up objects that I once could have. Early on these changes took some getting used to because the mind takes a while to catch up. My brain still thought I could pick up an object and my body would try to respond only to fail or even pull a muscle. The mind is amazing though and has caught up now with the changes and I know my limits as far as strength and skin toughness. One of the most astounding things that happened was realizing how much the fat distribution changes altered my buoyancy in water. Women’s bodies have a much higher fat-to-weight ratio, so we float better. Not having ever encountered this the first time I got into a pool after transitioning I was shocked at how I floated. I could not get to the bottom of the pool! I had been on hormones for probably about 3 years at that point and had not been in a pool since I started. By far the coolest part of transitioning genders is the opportunity to see both sides of the coin. I had guessed but had no real idea of how different men’s and women’s breasts are. Other than the obvious size difference women’s breasts are not only much more sensitive the sensitivity is of a different nature as well. IYKYK! Also, I now know the difference in strength, softness, and sensations that our bodies have. The list could go on and on but I have knowledge and experiences that very few have been given. It is kind of funny that now as I sit here years later thinking about it, the changes are all just natural and assimilated. I do not think about the changes anymore and am just at peace. Much like any young girl going through puberty, I remember wondering how everything would turn out. I remember trying to force things and would wear lots of makeup, get my nails done, and color my hair. Like any little girl, I was trying to force and speed up nature. What I realize today is that I have become like any other woman as far as preferences and style go. I rarely wear makeup, have not gotten my nails done in quite a while, but I do still color my hair just not as often. In other words, I have nothing left to prove. I just exist. On the other hand, you will rarely see me in pants and there is usually a reason like working outside or something. I just prefer skirts and dresses because they make me feel free. Finally, I do not know what I thought I would find at the end of this journey. I just knew that I had to face my truth, or I was going to drink again and that would have been fatal. Even if I had stayed sober I would probably have taken my own life because of the pain and confusion of gender dysphoria, as so many of us do. What I did find at the end of this journey is just me, a little freer, a little prettier, a little softer, but still just me. Gender Dysphoria - Gender dysphoria is a term that describes a sense of unease that a person may have because of a mismatch between their biological sex and their gender identity. This sense of unease or dissatisfaction may be so intense it can lead to depression and anxiety and have a harmful impact on daily life. GAHT - gender-affirming hormone therapy. References: Nguyen, H. B., Loughead, J., Lipner, E., Hantsoo, L., Kornfield, S. L., & Epperson, C. N. (2019, January). What has sex got to do with it? the role of hormones in the transgender brain. Neuropsychopharmacology : official publication of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6235900/#:~:text=Taken%20together%2... |
| Sober living has saved my life to be sure, but it definitely is not for everyone. I have lived in some type of communal living for most of my life, so it was probably easier for me to adjust than most. My first experience with communal living was when I was 11 and went into an orphanage because my mother abandoned me. I was young enough and already a chameleon, so I seemed to take to it pretty easily. I would go back to my mother for a year and a half and then was placed at a “Children’s Home” in Denver after she called the cops to tell them she still could not handle me. They still did not have anything they could arrest or incarcerate me for, so they placed me in a institutional type children’s home. There we were subjected to all types of abuse. From beatings from the staff to the staff ignoring actions by other inmates. I say inmates because we were treated as such. I would go on to be placed back with my mother or grandparents many times but always wind up being placed in another institution, group home, foster home, or other communal type environment. I never had the experience of living a normal home life and had no siblings, so I was always a loner in a crowd. I learned to not trust and be ready to fight anybody. Eventually I wound up in a psychiatric hospital for about 18 months and then broke out of there and hurt my mother. I was then placed in youth corrections for 2 years for that. The youth corrections facility was the final straw and capstone to a life of powerlessness and violence. But, unlike the other places I had been at Lookout Mountain School for Boys was a whole new experience. In reality it was a prison and several inmates were killed or severely beaten while I was there. After I survived all of that, anytime I have lived alone has been disastrous. After a few years of living alone I got married and at least had my spouse and later on children. I also became a firefighter and later paramedic and those jobs also came with communal living at work because we worked 24 hour shifts. I think I was able to adapt to that easier than most as well due to my previous experiences living with others. Fast forward to getting sober, divorcing, and eventually moving into an Oxford House sober living home. I have really thrived there and again my past comes in handy to allow me to adjust quickly to the trials and tribulations that can come living with others. When you add in the fact that we are all addicts and alcoholics it can become very complicated. The biggest problem I have encountered with living in sober living is that we are all relatively unstable and can be very manipulative. With that comes cliques and schemes from many different angles. From trying to get the house to purchase self-serving unnecessary items to evicting someone you are beefing with, to contagious negative addict type behavior. To do well in sober living takes a tremendous balance of common sense, patience, and selflessness. If you are particular and always want things a certain way you will most certainly fail. You will either get evicted or corrupt the house. When houses fall away from the original model and become corrupted then the eventual end is almost always the same. It very quickly becomes a trap house instead of a sober house. All of this may sound very negative but my experience with sober living has been very good overall. I am one of those people that can initially have a negative reaction or opinion of something and then change my mind after some reflection so many people that have been around me may think I dislike Oxford House. As I said earlier I do owe sober living my life and do not see leaving without a compelling reason. |
| You know, I have been in and out of therapy my whole life. I can remember my mother dragging me to counseling as young as 12 years old. The counselors I saw in the 70s were all women, dressed very provocatively, and were very progressive. Psychotherapy was still in its infancy for the common folk like us and it showed. I remember they were always “going to try something” and when there was no change try something else. I remember they did stuff like recording me speaking on these tapes and disks and then listening to it back. I am not sure what we were supposed to get out of it, but I never had any improvement. I guess the crux of the problem was no one ever told me why I was in therapy or what we were trying to accomplish. My mother would take us down to this building behind one of the big hospitals in Denver and I am pretty sure she saw someone as well when we were there. She most definitely needed to. Years later after having an education in counseling and counseling theories, I can see some of the stuff they were trying but they were way off the mark. It was all new and I think they figured if they did the stuff they were taught it would all work out. The thing is, they had no idea what was really wrong with me and never asked the right questions. They came from this place where counseling knowledge and theories of the day based everything on the patient being flawed in some way or having fallacious thinking and could be fixed. What I know today is that I was damaged and needed repair not reprogramming. They tried though. My mother was desperate to find something to fix one or both of us. She had to know the stuff she was doing with me at home, physical and sexual abuse, was the root cause. I think she was hoping these counselors could fix her or repair me. In the end, I just had a lot of weird talks and experiences with all these nice yet presumptuous ladies. I saw a handful of therapists over the years in attempts to fix myself but in the end, none of them truly did any good. Probably because I was never honest with them and did not understand the problem myself. Fast forward to me getting sober and beginning to understand the problem and actually wanting to get better. I had to want to get better enough to finally be unconditionally honest with my therapist. The only therapist to really help me was Alan. I think a good part of it was his empathy and giving of himself as well because he would be exhausted by the end of most of our sessions. When Alan died suddenly from Covid I was again adrift and left halfway through our work. A local mental health clearing house helped a bit, but they just want to throw meds at everything and make monetizing diagnoses. The therapist there also abandoned me with only two weeks’ notice. Abandonment and betrayal are my worst triggers to boot. I finally found another therapist who could handle my complicated situation and she did help me a lot but, in the end, she was worse than all the rest because she abandoned our therapeutic relationship without notice. I do not think I have another trust in me at this point, so I have been going it alone for now. I am writing an autobiography and that seems to be the best therapy for me right now. I am not wanting to discourage anyone from seeking therapy because I do firmly believe in it. I am saying to make sure you get a trustworthy counselor and get a commitment to not abandon your case without at least a separation plan. |
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