--------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00005 Date: 12/26/95 From: PSAPPHO Time: 05:27pm \/To: JUDITH LABONTE (Read 1 times) Subj: FOR YOUR INFO... JL> I just wanted to apologize as soon as I sent it. JL> Just because I am fed up with AA as a whole and some of the OTHER JL> echoes, doesn't give me the right to take it out on you. JL> This is not an excuse, but I have been fighting a severe depression of JL> almost suicidal implications. I have managed to keep it at bay so far, JL> but I know I am in trouble. I just don't know what to do with it JL> because I feel like I have nowhere to turn. My local AA group is being JL> run by a couple of guys acting like they're from the Gestapo or JL> something. Some of the moderators I've encountered on the other echoes JL> creamed me for sharing stuff that wasn't SPECIFICALLY on topic, JL> although I know that a lot of my chemical and co- dependencies are a JL> direct result of the childhood abuse I suffered - including the sexual JL> abuse. But I don't feel comfortable or safe sharing on those echoes JL> because they want me to fragment myself in ways I don't even JL> understand, much less know how to do. I had a sponsor, but I fired JL> her when she only called when SHE was in trouble, but when I was in JL> trouble blew me off with some cliche or another - didn't really listen. JL> My "visiting teacher" and "home teacher" in my church were supposed to JL> visit me today and didn't show up - nor did they call to tell me why. JL> And my therapist has had to cancel every appointment I've had with her JL> for several weeks now due to snow - and now she is on vacation. My JL> husband is too busy to talk to me. And the one 12 step program I JL> usually attend - Survivors of Incest Anonymous - had the only meeting JL> in this county cancelled this week due to snow. today is Yule, JL> Chanukah is ongoing and Xmas is coming monday and I am about as JL> depressed as I can be because it seems to me that I have nobody I can JL> turn to and all my sources of support have abandoned me. JL> I apologize if you got the short end of the stick. This is NOT your JL> fault. But it is a pretty miserable space to be in. JL> Again, I hope you will accept my apology and I mean it - if you want me JL> to leave the recovery echo too, I will. Greetings. WOW ! You sound like ME ! I got thrown out of Sip-AA for religious stuff. I refused to stop signing my messages Blessed BE as long as others signed theirs God Bless and boom I got axed for religious discussions. That was a few years ago but the hurt is still here with me. THEN I got all kinds of hell in Pagan Recovery for not towing the line over there as well. My local groups turned out to be a real mess. I lost several sponsors..ended up doing it by myself. One of my sponsors got really upset when she found out I was not interested in her sexually, another dumped me because her husband didn't want her dealing with "my kind". I stopped going to one meeting because I found out the main person who would chair the meetins was dealing drugs. I stopped going to another meeting because everything you said during the meeting was the topic of discussion at the local bar later that night. I stopped going to another meeting because they asked me to leave because I was not christian. I could go on and on and on.... I will not because that is not the point. The point is YOU. Your not doing your program for others and you can't depend on others. Your doing it for you and you have to do it your way... to hell with everyone! You have to determine that your path is your path and noone can walk it for you. Let me give you a quote that has helped me... "Life is series of moments all strung together in random order. To survive we must remember the good moments." Slaughter house 5 (a movie) So thats it. You decide how your going to view life. Its that old glass of water, is it half full or empty. You make the choice how your going to see it. To survive you must learn to see it half full. ...esp when it feels half empty. Sure I have bad days and good days. A good day is like the other day. I wrote a play and a short story and finished up some research and started the work necessary to establish another business all in the same day. A bad day is like just 6 months ago when some friends pulled the shotgun out of my mouth! What is important? RIGHT NOW. This moment. This second. My daughter who is the most wonderful 9 month old in the world. I find it all starts to fall apart when I take temporary situations and make them perminate. So if I stay focused on NOW and not the past or the future life is good. Look.. if I can help I am here.. Jeanne' Re Montandon 13595 Henry Dr. Denham Springs La. 70726 --- Maximus 2.01wb * Origin: THE BLACK EAGLE (1:3800/17) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00006 Date: 12/28/95 From: GJOSEPH PECK Time: 12:31am \/To: ALL (Read 1 times) Subj: Seasons Greetings! To You and Yours * * * * * * * * Happy Holidays * * * * * From all our VETLink BBSs; * | From The NamVet Staff; | | | * * | | * | | | | * | | * | | \\=====// \\=====// m=============================================================m H/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////H H/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////H H/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////H H//| |/////////////////////////| |//H H//| MIA/POWs |/////////////////////////| MIA/POWs |//H H//| - - - - - - -|/////////////////////////|- - - - - - - |//H H===== =============================== =====H HHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHH HHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHH HHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHH HHHH `HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH' HHHHH HHHH `HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH' dHHHHH HHHHb ,' `. dHHHHHH HHHHHHb....... ' Happy Hanukah '.......dHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH Merry Christmas HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH Happy New Year !!! HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH . HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH . :. . HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH .,`: .: .`:. .: HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH O ::: `:.. :.. ::..: . O HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH O*O ,:.:: :::.`: :: .: ::. O*O HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH OoO ``'::: : :.:::..: ::`:. OoO HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH ||| `;: '::: :`:.:. ::`:`:::.||| HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH ||| `;:: ::::\\/::\::`:\\::; ||| HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH ||| `:\/.//.//\ \.\\\/|\\\\ '||| HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH ||| /////|/ //\\\ \\\ \\\|\\ ||| HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH |||//\|\/\/\/| /\\ \/\\\\ \\\||| HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH (O|O)//\/\///\///\\\|/\\|\\\\(O|O) HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHH HHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH /// ... and the Peck Family \\\ //Joe, Pat, Georgia, Michael, David, Kimberly, George & Rosa \\ Sphinx XLT/v1.1 * POW's never have a nice day ---------------------------------------- --- InterBBS 7.5 * Origin: VETLink #1/VETNet Gateway (813) 249-8323 (1:377/203.0) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00007 Date: 12/25/95 From: THOM R. Time: 05:32pm \/To: MARTIN WAXMAN (Read 1 times) Subj: Prayer For Tom Please MW> Hello Everyone. MW> I am sending this message out to all of you because my first MW> cousins husband was in a accident last week in Ft. Lauderdale MW> Florida on his bicycle. He is in acoma and is currently MW> diagnoced(sp) with only 10% chance of comming out of it. MW> The nurces are also saying that if he should come out of this, MW> he will more than likely not be what he once was. Prior to goin MW> into acoma, he suffered a seisure and then temporary heart failu MW> So in lite of all of this please help me in praying for his retu MW> to good health. (Tom Larner) Prayers sent, Marty. I am sorry to hear this baout your friend. :( --- * Origin: Recovery BBS, San Francisco, CA - 415-255-2188 (1:125/9) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00008 Date: 12/24/95 From: PHIL BARTER Time: 11:08am \/To: HARRIET LEVY (Read 1 times) Subj: Re: 10 YEARS AGO... -=> Quoting Harriet Levy to Im Dill <=- HL> Yes. HL> HL> Small understatement. These days I feel like I'm in the middle of HL> living a miracle. HL> Because today We are living one. ... DOS never says "EXCELLENT command or filename"... ___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12 --- TriToss (tm) Professional 10.0 - #66 * Origin: Keystone BBS * Shrewsbury, MA * 508-753-3767 (1:322/743.0) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00009 Date: 12/26/95 From: MATRIKA Time: 01:25pm \/To: BROTHER THOMAS (Read 1 times) Subj: Re: CODA I could certainly use some good thoughts - had a very codependent "friend" (or so I thought) from my Church put me in the middle of a very bad scene with another couple who are REAL friends, who are not only from my Church, but one is in Al-Anon with me and one is in S.I.A. (Survivors of Incest Anonymous) with me. It so happens this lovely couple is adopting a little girl. This other so-called "friend" just brought her ex-husband's new girlfriend to Church with her, claiming she was interested in the Church. To do this she left her son with a man who was a perpetrator of sexual abuse on the child when he was younger and who is a psychotic, who has had violent episodes WHICH I HAVE PERSONALLY SEEN. (the violent episodes - I've seen one) It turned out the woman was not investigating out Church, but was the real mother of the child my true friends are adopting. I am so grateful that the other couple and I are all in 12 step programs because we were able to talk about this. In doing so I learned that it was NOT a coincidence as the child's birth-mother had brought with her a bag of items to give to the child. So I was set up and you can believe I am really VERY upset about all this. I have let the woman who is trying to adopt this child, with her husband, know I did not know who this woman was. I also let the so-called "friend" who brought her KNOW I did not appreciate this - to put it mildly - and that IF I ever do give her a ride to Church again, it will be her and her own children ONLY - NO guests whatsoever. I also told her if it comes out to the State agencies that she left her son with the man who had abused him, I don't want to here her whine when they take HER kids away from her. (I can't believe she could do this and believe a 13 year old child is old enough to defend himself from a full grown adult LARGE male.) But I told her point blank that I didn't know if my husband would be willing to give them a ride even under those terms. After all, it IS his car and he is the driver. Also he wasn't very happy either. I guess this is setting boundaries - which the woman who set me up just doesn't have - and I've become very good at it, thanks to Al-Anon. I just get sick of having to do it. I guess I had hoped that now that I wasn't living with any active alcoholics and drug addicts that I had put all of this sort of problem behind me. Oh well! I guess that just isn't the real world. I know what Al-Anon would say to me on this. They would tell me to detach with compassion. I believe I am doing this because, having given up 2 sons for adoption to protect them from their father (my first ex-husband), I do know how the birth-mother of the child feels - it is pretty awful to lose your kids. But I also know I had to accept the awful feelings and take some responsibility. Al-Anon would say don't accept unacceptable behavior. I believe I am doing this by confronting the woman who set it up and setting some clear, strong and distinct boundaries in no uncertain terms. I also know Al-Anon would call upon me to see the woman who set me up as sick, which I can because I know she is a survivor of incest and a codependent who is not Y.E.T. in recovery - Y.E.T. meaning You're (her in this case) Eligible Too. I also can see the birth-mother of the child as pretty messed up since she herself seems to me to be acting pretty childish by her own behavior now. So what I'd be interesting in knowing, specifically, is how Coda would reflect on this case. Would a CODA sponsor respond differently or say something more that might be helpful to me here? I'd really like to know as I could use any additional insight on this circumstance that I could get. I might add that I guess I may have had unrealistic expectations that the woman who "set me up" would behave in a different way seeing that she has a history of four or more codependent unhealthy marriages - even more than I do - and several other extremely codependent sexual and romantic relationships with men she didn't marry. Perhaps as many as 14-20 men have been in and out of her life. I suspect it was unrealistic of me to buy into her self-deception and denial when she told me how she was trying to straighten out her life and stay away from problem men without Al-Anon, Nar-Anon, or CODA - or anything else besides just going to our Church once a week. I've been there, tried to do it on my own - it didn't work for me, so why I listened to this and nodded my head yes, I don't understand. It's probably part of the willingness many of us share in this society to not "rock the boat" at all. I knew it wouldn't work - consciously - but I didn't say anything. I probably also didn't say anything because she did not ASK for help or ASK for my opinion. So it was, to my way of thinking, none of my business. How would Coda respond to all this? The biggest problem is how I feel of course. I know intellectually that I am doing the right thing to stand up to this woman and set some boundaries; however, believe it or not, I still feel guilty - even with years of trying to recover under my belt. I would love YOUR (personal) feedback on this, from the Coda perspective. I consider it an oppurtunity to learn from you about that program - and I am very open to new perspectives at this time, since I no longer do live with any active alcoholics or addicts in my own home either. --- TriToss (tm) Professional 10.0 - #66 * Origin: Keystone BBS * Shrewsbury, MA * 508-753-3767 (1:322/743.0) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00010 Date: 12/28/95 From: MATRIKA Time: 08:35am \/To: BROTHER THOMAS (Read 1 times) Subj: Re: CODA Thanks again for your prayers. I am curious about something. Your messages origin line comes from "St. Judes' House O.S.P. San Antonio Texas". This would probably be better answered via net-mail, if you have it, as it's WAY off topic, but what precisely IS St. Judes' House, if you don't mind my asking? If you do, just ignore it. I am curious because I was allegedly named after this St. It was allegedly due to my birth-mother not being able to have kids and doing a novena to said being, then ending up with me. But when she got mad she'd say that she named me after this person because he was the saint of hopeless cases and I was a hopeless case. (Spiritual abuse?) I tend to believe that most of the time, although I work hard at trying not to. I had an insight today that really surprised me. I realized that Suicide is NOT an act of powerlessness, as someone had said to me yesterday - someone at a meeting, who was in an even WORSE space than I am, apparently. It is the last act that a person who feels totally helpless has to fight back and to lash out. It is an act of anger and perhaps even rebellion. I think I have come to that conclusion because just about everyone I have ever known in recovery who has attempted this rather ultimate act is someone who has been a battered wife or a survivor of some severe childhood abuse or something pretty brutal, who had no other way to fight back or ask for help. This scares me and I don't no why, except that I understand where they are coming from so well - perhaps because of my own past. But that rather blew me away, all in all. --- TriToss (tm) Professional 1.0 - (Unregistered) * Origin: Dreamer's Lot BBS (1:322/758.0) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00011 Date: 12/28/95 From: MATRIKA Time: 08:44am \/To: RAIN (Read 1 times) Subj: Coda Re - low B.S. atmosphere - I agree with you about that, it must be. (working with violent mental patients) It's a shame that the rest of the world can't be like that. RIght now I am in a lot of situations where a lot of people are full of B.S. and I don't mean that they are matriculating for their Bachelor of Science degrees either. This is all being done in the name of social acceptability and, quite frankly, I am rather disgusted. On other matters, I gave a yule gift to a pagan friend in one of my 12 step programs last night. (actually she is in 2 of my 12 step programs, but we only go to the same meeting in one of them) It was delayed this long because the meeting was snowed out last week. I really had fun with it. I put it in a plain envelope and I made specifically YULE decorations for it - like the traditional holiday evergreen wreath, with a red bow, being made into a Pentacle. I had fun making her gift too. It's really nice when we can share our various heritages and holiday traditions. I did Yule in other ways, with my Pagan friends. I did Xmas with my Church going friends and family. I did Chanukah with my Jewish friends, who are like family. I was saying that I would have done Kwanza, but I didn't know how - until I found out that on Kwanza one of the traditions is to exchange beaded necklaces. I got a kick out of it because almost every female on my list - woman or girl - got a hand beaded necklace this year. (I've been doing some Native American style beading to stay sane when snowed in) So I guess, in a way, I was doing SOME of Kwanza too. But I'm glad it's just about over - it was fun, but getting overwhelming. I am probably rambling and making little or no sense, since I just woke up and haven't eaten or checked my blood sugar yet. So I think I'll sign off now. --- TriToss (tm) Professional 1.0 - (Unregistered) * Origin: Dreamer's Lot BBS (1:322/758.0) --------------- FIDO MESSAGE AREA==> TOPIC: 231 RECOVERY Ref: CGZ00012 Date: 12/29/95 From: GJOSEPH PECK Time: 08:32pm \/To: ALL (Read 1 times) Subj: Happy New Year!!! H H AAA PPPP PPPP Y Y H H A A P P P P Y Y HHHHH AAAAA PPPP PPPP Y H H A A P P Y H H A A P P Y N N EEEEE W W Y Y EEEEE AAA RRRR NN N E W W Y Y E A A R R N N N EEEEE W WW W Y EEE AAAAA RRRR N NN E WW WW Y E A A R R N N EEEEE W W Y EEEEE A A R R " CHAO MUNG NAM MOI " // O o // O o // o \-------//----/ \ // / \ // / From VETLink #1 \ / Keep it LIGHT ... \ / \ / Keep it soda ... \ / | Remember the chips ... | | | | ============= Sphinx XLT/v1.1 * Gotta run - my cat's caught in the printer! ---------------------------------------- --- InterBBS 7.5 * Origin: VETLink #1/VETNet Gateway (813) 249-8323 (1:377/203.0)