Trusting again.

Over the last little while, I have found myself in the perplexing place of not knowing how I was going to trust again. Do I take the risk again of becoming vulnerable to being hurt again? Eeek!

And yet, I know that part of the process of healing is learning to trust again: in myself and in those who have hurt me. And what do I do when trust is broken again, as I'm sure it will be--none of us is perfect.

Something inside me tells me that growing into being able to believe in myself again and trust in consistently living true principles will help me attain God's forgiveness for me. I have done much that I am not proud of, not to mention that lost belief in myself and God that I would conquer my adversities.

As I continue to take that leap of faith in trusting again, what had seemed like an impossibility is becoming believable and do-able.

I feel the peace and strength coming from Father in Heaven that He is there showing me how to trust again and believe in myself again.

Can I trust again?...

Trusting the process. I typed those words into the www.lds.org search engine and you'll never guess what came up? Yep. Addiction recovery. I am now totally convinced I am a recovering co-dependent.


Addiction recovery from www.lds.org
'Step 3 is the decision step. In the first two steps, we
awakened to what we could not do for ourselves
and what we needed God to do for us. Then in step 3
we were introduced to the only thing we could do for
God. We could make a decision to open ourselves to
Him and surrender our entire lives—past, present, and
future—and our will about our lives to Him. Step 3 was
an act of agency. It was the most important choice we
ever made.'

'When we took this step, we felt terrified of the
unknown..What would happen if we humbled ourselves
and surrendered our lives and wills completely to the
care of God? For many of us, childhood (and painful familial
relationships)had been very hard, and we were terrified
of becoming as vulnerable as little children again.'

'Eventually each of us realized that we not only had to
give up our addictions, but we also had to turn our
entire will and life over to God. As we did so, we
found Him patient and accepting of our faltering
efforts to surrender to Him in all things.'

'You can accept with serenity the current reality of
your condition when you trust in God’s ability to help
you. You can accept with serenity that although you
cannot control the choices and actions of others, you
can decide how you will act in each situation you face.'


This is where I am at. I do trust Him. And I find myself in His loving care.

Conversation with Joseph

Today I feel so grateful for the opportunity to show my repentance to God and the world. I choose not to dwell on others problems and embrace the right we each have been given by God to work out our own problems. I choose not to spend time or energy trying to solve others' problems for them.

Instead, I find myself cleaning my kitchen, advising my children in the way of truth and light, and executing tonight's family meal.

Conversation #1 * * *

Sarah says: "Joseph, it is time to get to our studies."

Joseph replies in anger: "Mom, I am so sick of you always telling me what to do!"

Sarah replies with authority: "Joseph, God told us in the scriptures to honor our parents. When you are a dad you will tell your children what to do. That is the way God made it, not me."

Joseph pretends not to hear me and says: "It's like I am your slave."

Vanessa intervenes after being on the scene: "Joseph, it's true, God said it in the Bible. Mom is in charge. God made it that way."

Joseph gets even angrier, says a few more choice words, and goes to his room and slams the door behind him. I let him without saying anything more. Five minutes goes by. The door opens and Joseph appears with a solemn look in his eyes to say, "Mom, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said those things to you. I'll do what you say."

I then say, "I love you Joseph. You are such a good boy."

Joseph worked it out on his own. Joseph is 7 years old, and turns 8 this July 31st.

Routine is key

The healing from co-dependency is continuing and progressive.

I am recognizing more each day how much wasted energy I put into thinking about other peoples' problems. I recognize I can do nothing to change their circumstances. I recognize I can change my own life. I am accepting this with gratefulness.

I am getting better and better everyday at getting to my routine. It takes so much energy to break from the old habit of waking up and instantly worrying about others' problems. Something that most likely comes with great ease to 'normal' people is incredibly difficult for me.

This process is called 'detachment.' The definition given by Al-Anon is: Detachment is releasing, or detaching from, a person or problem in love. We mentally, emotionally, and sometimes physically disengage ourselves from unhealthy (and frequently painful) entanglements with another person's life and responsibilities, and from problems we cannot solve.

Detachment is based on the premises that each person is responsible for himself, and that we cannot solve their problems, and that worrying doesn't help.

We've had a lot going on.

We cleaned out the food pantry in the kitchen. Actually, Jared and the kids did it! They did an amazing job!

Rex fell into the couch and ripped open his inner lip and had to have 11 stitches. Ouch!

Vanessa had her Dance Review. She did great!

Bruce has started crawling. He is everywhere! Such a doll!

And Jared helped the boys make their Pinewood Derbies. They had a blast! More pics to come with that!

Who is your Counselor?

With all of the voices in this world that tell us this and that should fix our hurts, problems, and challenges, which ones lure you in and deceive you?

Recently, I have been pondering at what lures me in. Cookies have done it too many times. It goes like this...

As I've said before, I wake up angry. The familiar thoughts start running through my head of all of the hurtful things in my life. Feeling feelings and trying to discuss them has gotten me the accusation of having PMS, and resentment has grown inside of me for that. I often heard, "You have PMS, Sarah." Really, what I was being told was, 'go away.'

I 'try' to run away from it all. I don't want to feel. What do I do with all of these feelings?

So, I run to buy cookies.

I run to buy clothing or shoes.

I run to the phone to talk to a friend.

I run to 'give to others' endlessly, when I am an empty vessel myself. This causes me to have feelings of more anger at my pretended'kindnesses.' Guilt, anger, and shame fill me because the cookies, shopping and endless service isn't working to 'fix' me.

At the end of the day, I run to have a one-sided communication with Heavenly Father, telling Him how sorry I am for being such a horrible person. And before He can say anything back to me, my head hits the pillow, and I'm asleep. The night is filled with awful dreams of re-enactments of my hurts.

I can't get away from it. So, more shopping hits my routine of daily tasks for the next day.

Where can I turn for peace? Where is my solace when other sources cease to make me whole?
When with a wounded heart, anger, or malice, I draw myself apart, searching my soul.
Where when my aching grows, where when I languish, where in my need to know, where can I run?
Where is the quiet hand to calm my anguish? Who, who can I understand, He, only One.
He answers privately. Reaches my reaching, in my Gethsemane, Savior and Friend.
Gentle the peace he finds for my beseeching. Constant He is and kind, love without end.

He is the answer. He is our Counselor. He is the way out of our problems. My routine is changing. I stop running.

I begin to see the first step

I awoke today with familiar feelings. The familiar feelings of shame for who I am and the unworthiness to exist. They threaten to take my soul into a dark place that I am even more familiar with. As I let the feelings wash over me, I decide to allow myself to be the human I was meant to be and I go to that dark place. I have learned that forcing myself not to go to that place is only illusionary. I end up in the dark place whether I want to admit it or not.

It's dark here. It's lonely here. It's sad here. So many wrong decisions have been made. So many hard feelings towards others have been felt. Deeds done that I wish I could take back.

After a couple of minutes of just feeling whatever feeling comes into my heart, I lay in my bed, still.

Then I hear little Bruce is awake and wanting me. I retrieve him from his crib and lay him next to me in my bed. As I begin to nurse him, I look into his little eyes which are gazing into mine. I feel such love for this little man. His innocence and purity warms my heart. He doesn't take his eyes off of me, and I don't take my eyes off of him. I soak in the moments with this little one. I begin dreaming of the life this little guy will live. I wonder at the choices he'll make and the journey that will be his here on this earth. I begin planning all the lessons he'll need in order to make a safe journey.

It is at this moment that I begin to see the first step I need to make to the hard climb of finding the healing that Gethsemane offers. I find peace and strength in the thought that I can get out of this darkness and that Jesus Christ came for this very reason.