Leslie Glass's Blog, page 257

Life After Overdose A Mother Speaks Out

Life after overdose is not a simple step to recovery as some would like us to believe…just as sobriety after addiction is not a simple recovery, either. Addiction and overdose are more complicated, and deadly.

Life after overdose began with a coma

At first, we thought it a miracle that Joshua came out of the coma. After all, he had been left unconscious by his roommate from Friday night until Monday night when he heard him “gurgling.” Then he called 911. Previous to that, he merely thought Josh was “sleeping it off.” This is not an uncommon response.

Overdose doesn’t stop addiction

Josh had quite literally stroked out his entire brain; a recent MRI documented that and also stated chronic microvascular changes. The neurologist told me the good news was that one of the areas that Josh had stroked was the center of addiction. I remembered thinking “great! If my son lives, he’ll likely be a vegetable but he won’t want drugs!” Turns out that wasn’t true.

Life after overdose meant survival of the unfittest

When Josh left the hospital—a month later—he was sent to a nursing home to die, as the doctors predicted. Not only did he fry his brain, but had suffered anoxic encephalopathy, lost his hearing to the stroke or the antibiotics, had acute renal injury, a heart attack, and other bodily insults I can not remember.

So, he went to a nursing home to die. When he was rolled in on a stretcher that August 4 afternoon, he could smile, move a few fingers on one hand and part of a foot, and the staff went to work on him immediately—all the staff, even the cleaning crew. Despite all odds against him, Josh walked out six months later on a cane.

Throughout the years since then, Josh has struggled. He was granted disability, but a few years later he was denied it. As of this writing, we are awaiting a decision for a return of disability for him.

Life After Overdose left a host of problems



Anosognosia makes people think there’s nothing wrong



You May Recognize The Symptoms of Anosognosia



Memory deficit

 He has Anosognosia, which is a fancy term meaning he can’t remember what he doesn’t remember. It’s like phantom limb pain to a person who has lost a limb, but more involved. Josh is basically ignorant of the extent of his disease, or that he even has one. He was pre-coma, an accomplished chef. I could wake him in the middle of the night and a deep sleep, and ask him how to make anything; he’d spout out all the specific details from prep to completion and then go back to sleep.

Now he can’t do two things at once without losing ground. He has a work coach for a menial kitchen job. He has suffered many injuries both due to the results of his long-term drug use, and to his unsteadiness on his feet at times. He had a hip replacement due to avascular necrosis from long years of IV drugs, including heroin. He had falls off his bike because of balance and other issues related to riding a bike, and broken bones as a result. He tried to protect his female roommate from her live-in boyfriend who constantly abused her. The guy sucker-punched Josh and he sustained an orbital rim fracture and required surgery. Doctors would not treat his pain for fear of starting something in him again.

Emotional deficit

The emotional aftermath is worse than the physical and has been more damaging to him. He still drinks and smokes pot, so much for no addiction center. His relationships suffer due to his brain injury. Josh has a wonderful smile and a heart of gold, but he’s a very big guy—almost 6’8”. When he raises his voice, it scares everybody. And Josh has impulse control problems and anger issues, as well as cognitive deficits. Though he is working with a cognitive therapist, this is a very major problem for him.

Inability to work

He’s obtained and been let go of many jobs. He shows them his resume which is good, and tells then that he has had a stroke and is a little slow, but when he starts the job, they see it is way more than that. It is very hard to watch him continually falling off his horse, and yet, he keeps getting back up. The “event” as I call it, for lack of a better description, happened in July 2009. It’s now July 2019, and his brain function is worsening. He can’t handle his financial affairs or even sometimes his day-to-day affairs. He needs a guardian, and, thank God for his emotional support dog-Chloe. He won’t agree to the needed help (see part about Anosognosia) because he says he doesn’t need it.

Asking help from God, a mother gets a surprising answer



Mother Gets Advice From God



Relationship problems

Josh’s relationships don’t last because of his impulse control and anger issues. He is on a lot of medications -13 I think- for these issues and the other physical problems caused by the years of drug use (including heroin); including HTN, another stroke or two after the event, elevated cholesterol, to name a few.

My son is close to 42 and I (his mother) am close to 69. I am fully prepared for him to die before me, and I have all kinds of feelings about that. He has a miserable life most of the time. My best friend who watched her son commit suicide by police action in front of her said this to me one day. “Gail, at least I watched my son die one day, you are watching your son die every day”.

The post Life After Overdose A Mother Speaks Out appeared first on Reach Out Recovery.

Little Mental Health Boosters

In recovery, I’ve learned to be pretty vigilant when it comes to my mental health. I’m quick to squash negative thoughts, I almost never let myself wallow anymore, and when I’m blue, I have a list of small activities I can do that really help. These aren’t remedies for mental illness. These are more like anxiety relief and mood boosters for when you feel lackluster or irritable, restless and discontent sinking in.

Today, there are so many amazing tools available to us from meditation apps to health apps that will tell us when we should go outside and take a walk. All we need to do is be willing to find them and give them a try. Sometimes it takes practice to make something stick, but from my experience, if you take ten minutes every day for 30 days and do any one of these things, you will see some improvement in your mood, or general health and well-being.

One. Get outside and into nature if you can.

Even if you live in New York City, find a park or go to the closest river. Being outside in the fresh air can really help if you’re feeling stressed, or sad. Studies have proven that being in nature reduces anxiety as well. Maybe try walking to work, if that’s possible, or taking a walk on your lunch break. Add some music to the mix if that sparks your fancy.

Two. Put down your technology.

We’ve all heard about how technology is addictive and can cause depression and loneliness. Social media has created a FOMO monster in all of us at one time or another. Try putting down your phone and turning off your computer so you can focus on the people and things around you.

Three. Try ten minutes of meditation.

I was told to meditate for years before I made it a practice. Ten minutes a day turned into guided meditation classes. Today, I can’t go more than two weeks without a good soundbath. All the great leaders meditate, it does great things when done properly. Try it.

Four. Any exercise ritual, including simply walking for 10-20 minutes.

Exercise helps raise endorphins. That’s a fact. I also know people who struggle with anxiety who exercise every morning because they believe the rhythmic breathing helps set them straight for the day. Whatever it is, when you want to get out of your head, get into your body!!

Five. Self-care.

Everybody’s talking about it for a reason. Whether you’re into mani-pedis and massages, or learning new things and growing your recovery, take time to do the things you love, and that makes you happy. As you stay in recovery, self-care may change and turn into financial accountability or becoming a Vegetarian. Whatever works for your mental health.

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What Is Detachment?

When I first came into recovery, I didn’t know what is detachment, or  how enmeshed I was with family problems that were out of my control. I was bitter and burnt out. I heard the word detachment and ran.

What is detachment anyway

I had some learning to do. Early in my recovery, my friend Chel explained detachment like this: In golf, it’s crucial to stand far away from the person swinging the club. If I stand too close to my fellow golfer, his club won’t get hurt. In fact, he won’t get hurt. I am the one who is at risk. The same principle applies to addiction and dysfunction. If I am too close emotionally to someone else’s problems, I am more likely to get hurt.

Detachment is standing back

How far back I need to stay depends on the magnitude of the crisis happening at home. Before I found recovery, I was hyper-focused on curing Ricky of his addiction, and curing my Mom’s addiction to Ricky. Regularly, I pointed out how I thought the way they were handling their problems was 100% wrong. I “kindly” told them the “right” way to solve them. When they forgot my suggestions, I reminded them with great passion and fervor.  And can you believe they didn’t want my help? Yet I kept offering and controlling.

When I finally found recovery, I literally moved hundreds of miles away from my mother and my brother Ricky. I fantasized about changing my phone number and never contacting them again. Standing back was the first step to my healing. I’ll never forget the first time I heard the truth:

The only person I can change is me.

How did I enter adulthood without knowing this basic truth about human nature?

Detachment gave me time to heal

My over-involvement in my Mom and Ricky’s dysfunctional relationship only hurt me, and I needed an extreme relationship makeover. I did end up giving my Mom my phone number, but I quit calling Ricky. I also quit taking all of my Mom’s phone calls.

In the beginning, I texted her back to let her know I was OK but couldn’t talk that day. Then I told her when I would be able to talk. This practice sounds so easy, but it took several weeks and my sponsor’s encouragement to orchestrate. I too was enmeshed in my Mom’s life.

I also quit asking my Mom questions like:

How are you?
How is Ricky?
What’s new?

Superficial questions like these invited my Mom to unload. Next, I stopped the unloading. After a few months of recovery, I was able to tell my Mom that Ricky’s drama was too sad for me. I could no longer discuss his problems.

Finding my safe distance in detachment

Three years later, I’ve healed enough to see Ricky’s addiction for what it really is – a progressive brain disease. My Mom has also been affected by the disease of addiction. Neither of them have taken any steps towards recovery. In fact, they are getting sicker. Last month, Ricky moved back in with my parents.

This family disease often makes me sad. Even though they are all still alive, I’ve lost my brother, nieces, and my Mother to addiction. But thanks to detachment, I can see Ricky as a person with a sickness, and I can love him from afar. Loving my Mom is still a work in progress, but detachment keeps me safer from the wreckage and gives me a chance at loving her without hurt and resentment.

Melody Beattie On WHEN To Detach

My Mom is coming to visit me later this month, which means I must sharpen my detachment skills. To prep for her visit, I dusted off my copy of Codependent No More by Melody Beattie. Because detachment is so important to self-care, Beattie has devoted an entire chapter to this subject. She writes that we should detach WHEN:

“We can’t stop thinking, talking about, or worrying about someone or something;
“Our emotions are churning and boiling;
“We feel like we have to do something about someone because we can’t stand it another minute;
“We’re hanging on by a thread, and it feels like that single thread is frayed; and
“We believe we can no longer live with the problem we’ve been trying to live with.”

In closing, I have found what Beattie says about detaching to be true, “If you can’t detach in love, it is my opinion that it is better to detach in anger rather than to stay attached.” In both golf and dysfunction, we have to stand back far enough to keep from getting hit.

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When Disaster Strikes

We’re not in control of so many aspects of our lives. We can’t control what the other people in our lives are going to do, things can go wrong at work, and then there’s the weather… There’s a lot to manage in normal, grown-up life, but throw in a natural disaster, or freak weather that now seems normal, and life gets crazy real quick. So, what to do when disaster strikes?

Keep Calm To Manage The Fear

The world is scary. You don’t have to be in recovery to feel unbalanced. Any number of things can make anyone feel shaken.  You just have to know what to do. Safety becomes number one. Getting in contact with people and maintaining forms of contact with family and friends is critical. Confirm for others that you and anyone you’re responsible for are safe. Let someone know immediately if you are not safe, physically or mentally. If you’re in harm, call for help. If it’s more emotional, make sure you have a list of people handy you can contact by phone, computer, or whatever other means you’re using. Write phone numbers and emails down in case your phone loses power and you need to use someone else’s.

What Matters Is Staying In The Keep Calm Solution 

Once I’m sure I’m safe, here are the things I do to keep calm.

I call someone and make a plan for the next day, three days, or week. Whatever is called for. That person could be a significant other, a parent, a sponsor, a reliable friend, or a professional of some kind. It always helps to make a plan with someone who can check in on you and cares for your well-being.
If possible, I get to a recovery place and do a recovery thing. For me, that’s a meeting, meditation class, yoga or hiking. Getting out of my head and into action of some kind always gives me that space to detach a little from the problem and return to it when I have more perspective and tolerance.
I work a program and don’t spin about the problem. That means I pay extra time and attention to self-care, nutrition, and staying connected to friends. That’s also the time I show up to work or life and just do the next right thing. I try not to think three steps ahead and focus entirely on what I can do that day.

We can’t control what happens but we can control how we react to it. Having three basic actions to take one the situation is safe helps me to keep calm and carry on, no matter what’s going on.

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Why Detachment Empowers

In recovery we talk about letting go and detaching, but we don’t often add that detachment empowers. How can it empower when it seems the very opposite? It doesn’t seem to make sense. For loved ones and family members letting go can feel like having to abandon the very deepest beliefs that we hold. For me, it’s still as hard and anguish-making as….well, as it is for any substance user not to quit his or her drug of choice  Why is detachment from this disease so hard?

I’d say, without my beliefs and actions, how do I know who I am? How do I know I’m a good person? How do I show I care? How can I keep the bad things from happening?

 5 myths that create dysfunction

Caring means taking action whenever there is a problem.
Loving requires complete attention, which often translates into dropping everything whenever issues come up and listening no matter what.
Being good parents requires self-sacrifice. That may mean skimping to give an adult child things he or she needs. Or postponing activities or fun things because a loved one needs them. For different parents self-sacrifice means different things.
Parents are responsible for keeping adult children alive no matter what the circumstances.
You can only be as happy as your saddest child.

Detachment means saving yourself to better help others

I had to let go of those five myths  that were the guides of my life. While they may have worked for babies and toddlers, they ruined my relationship with teen and adult children.  Those myths had filled my head and changed me into someone no one wants to be. As an enmeshed parent, I was unhappy, and worse, I was no help to anyone.

What Is Detachment And Why Do You Need It
Addiction had taken me hostage 

 What was I like before addiction changed our family into a dysfunctional mess? I was a pretty happy mom. 

I loved the ridiculous.
I laughed and mugged around a lot. People thought I was funny.
I danced to the music and played the piano. I sang with the radio.
I was preoccupied with orchids, gardens, weeds, bread-making. Seasonal bounty.
I really liked food.
I cried at the drop of a hat: GE commercials never failed to make me cry.
I wrote about murder and mayhem, but not about substance use.

I didn’t feel myself changing into a different person altogether. I just slowly stopped loving the ridiculous. I didn’t feel funny, didn’t sing or play the piano. I didn’t water the plants. They all died, and I didn’t care. I stopped being a very diligent house cleaner. And I couldn’t even cry because crying meant I wasn’t up to the bigger task that was now set for me, which was to be perfectly totally vigilant in every way so the unthinkable, unbearable disaster wouldn’t happen to us. That was my job. And that’s magical thinking.

You know we have no control over happens, right? And you also know that trying to perfect is far from perfection. In fact, it’s the opposite. Plus you lose whatever self was you.

When family members do not love you back
What does detachment look like

How did detachment work for me? I had to stop grilling my loved ones about every little thing. I had to stop fixing every little thing that went wrong. I closed the purse strings. The mantra at the back of my mind was: they need to learn how to do things for themselves. That meant I had to trust that they could do it. 

People in recovery have to earn your trust. That means you have to give them the opportunity to grow up.  Could my loved ones actually take over their own controls? Turns out they could. If you have a really sick child, however, this is not the approach to take. For teens or adults with depression or suicidal thoughts, intervention by professional is necessary; detaching from at risk loved ones can be the wrong tack to take. For those who are working their recovery, however, your detachment can mean empowerment for both of you.

How detachment set me free

I still love and care for and do positive things for loved ones in recovery; but my head, and body, can go to the beach now. And my private headspace can fill up with….whatever nonsense appeals. Does that mean I can sing, dance and be funny again. Yes, I am funny and ridiculous again. And yes, if you really must know detaching was tumultuous and messy, and sometimes it looked as if we would not reach the recovery we all longed for. There was a lot of anger and fear, and not speaking, and lonely times. But detachment empowered us and brought us back together again in a much healthier way. 

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When Tragedy Strikes

From Psychology Today:

Talking with your teen about crisis.

The new normal of violent shootings and terror tactics by hate groups and individuals here at home shouldn’t be something you shy away from talking about with your teen. 

It seems impossible to explain aggravated assault, domestic terrorism, and murder over and over again to our children, who may not understand why such events keep happening or why people would behave that way in the first place. Many children and teens fear that they will be the next target, and that the lockdown drills at school simply reinforce the idea that danger is around the corner, even when it never comes. 

For teenagers dealing with addiction recovery, news of such events may trigger the need for release and create a road to relapse. Those in therapyor on medication for mental health issues may be triggered into an episode they can’t get out of.

Just Turn It Off

In a regular news cycle, you and your teen may hear about the same story or a journalistic angle or opinion about that story more than enough, including classroom lectures, texts, posts, news reports, and memes. Chances are that we are often hyperaware of every tragedy, shooting, and bombing in ways that make us paranoid, cautious when we do not need to be, and self-reflective. 

Give your teen–and yourself–a refuge from the media onslaught by turning off the news and focusing on something else for the night.

Make sure their phone–and yours–isn’t always buzzing about a late-breaking story or a breaking news piece. While this may seem like an overcautious move it’s better to take a break and connect in different ways than over such tragic happenings. 

The Kids Are Not the Cause, and Shouldn’t Feel Stigmatized 

Children and teenagers who deal with mental illness may think they will be drawn into a world where they themselves will carry out violent acts, or that the next tragedy will find them at school or a house of worship.

Many kids and adults feel this way anyway in our current climate of constant mass shootings and overdose deaths, but those suffering from anxiety and depression on a daily basis can be affected all the more.

According to a report in the American Journal of Public Health, “less than 5 percent of 120,000 gun-related killings in America” over a decade were committed by people with a diagnosed mental illness. This fact can help the public understand that we are not bombarded with violence because of those with mental illness but rather that those who are working on mental health issues are part of the general population and shouldn’t be thought of as different. 

Knowing the triggers of a mental health episode will empower parents to do as they see fit and protect their children from oversaturation of media. Let them know that they are safe and that you and their teachers and counselors will protect them.

We all become a bit numb to the constant barrage of violent news stories, or the focus and narrative of just one awful incident. Whatever the case, let your teenager know that just because they an event is broadcast over and over they don ‘t have to focus on it, and that there are more wonderful stories out there that never get reported. 

Let Them Grieve in Their Own Way

Whether it’s the news of another violent act close to home or far away, we all feel a sense of grief and loss when it comes to thinking about our safety.

If your teen’s emotional state is easily affected, then the best thing is to talk with them about how to think and grieve, because they need to own their feelings, just like adults. Some griefs are short-lived, but we all can carry trauma and the feelings of trauma with us the rest of our lives, whether or not we’re directly connected to the incident. 

There is no wrong way to grieve, as long as it’s safe and healthy. You and your teen may want to do something for those in crisis like a fundraiser, protest, or something quiet and personal like writing letters to victims’ families or civic leaders. Parents can often take the lead on this process and help empower their children to do what they feel is right for them and the issue at hand. 

Focus on the Future

Often tragedies leave one with a sense of powerlessness and hopelessness. The feeling that an issue is very real without a means to counter it can be overwhelming, and it can leave teen with a negative outlook and bleak perspective on the future.

There is no wrong way to grieve, as long as it’s safe and healthy. You and your teen may want to do something for those in crisis like a fundraiser, protest, or something quiet and personal like writing letters to victims’ families or civic leaders. Parents can often take the lead on this process and help empower their children to do what they feel is right for them and the issue at hand. 

It is for this reason that helping your teen focus on the future and, most important, how they can contribute to a better future can go a long way to empowering them and giving them a sense of control on the outcomes of their own futures. 

Volunteer work, charity, advocacy, and even attendance at supportive events are small (and potentially big) ways in which they can contribute to the positive change necessary to develop a better future. There is no greater gift than the power to create a future that is worth living for.

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6-Plus Ways Heavy Drinking Harms Your Health

From Psychology Today:

Excessive alcohol hurts every part of your body, including your brain.

Approximately six people die from alcohol poisoning (high blood alcohol levels) every day in the United States, and the death count from alcohol consumption climbs higher when factoring in other alcohol-related deaths, such as driving fatalities, homicides, suicides, risky sexual behavior, and the development of chronic diseases. The statistics are alarming: More than 15 million Americans struggle with a diagnosable alcohol use disorder. Yet fewer than 8 percent of people who struggle with the disorder get treatment. 

Of drinkers in general, more than 65 million surveyed reported at least one episode of binge drinking (defined as five or more drinks on a single occasion for men, four or more for women) in the past month. One in every six American adults reportedly binge drinks approximately four times a month. Most bingers are not (yet) considered alcohol-dependent, but that may be because binge drinking is most common among young adults ages 18 to 34. Every year, more than 4,300 deaths among those under the age of 21 are attributed to excessive drinking.

Even if excessive alcohol doesn’t kill you on the spot, and even if you’re never diagnosed with an alcohol-related disorder, routine binge drinking has a profound effect over time on almost every part of your body. Some of the more devastating, long-term physical and mental health effects include:

Depression and anxietyLearning, memory, and social problemsHigh blood pressureHeart diseaseLiver diseaseCancers of the digestive tract, including the mouth, throat, esophagus, and colon, as well as increased risk of breast cancer in women

Excessive use of alcohol also interferes with reproductive health and sexual functioning, affecting testicular activity and hormone production in men, disrupting the menstrual cycle and increasing the risk of infertility in women, as well as contributing to miscarriage, stillbirth, Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders, and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome in pregnant women who drink alcohol and their babies. 

What can you do? Choose to drink moderately, if at all (no more than one drink a day for women, two for men), and help others around you do the same. Serve less alcohol at parties, and don’t serve alcoholic beverages to anyone who shouldn’t be drinking, such as minors and anyone who has already had too much to drink. And if you know your drinking isn’t reserved for special occasions, or if you just drink too much, too often, or your drinking behavior is risky (or if excessive drinking affects someone you know), speak with your doctor who can help you get over any shame you may feel and determine if further help is necessary from a support group, psychological counseling, medication, or other programs and steps that can lead to reduced cravings for alcohol and, perhaps, ultimately abstinence. 

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Dealing With Grief

When my 39-year old sister died, I couldn’t function. I couldn’t quit crying let alone make it off the couch to cook dinner for my family. I thought I’d never find normal again. Yet life moves on, and I had to go back to work. To cope, I decided to ignore my grief. Little did I know, this method of coping led to an emotional infection of unresolved grief.

What is Clean Emotional Pain?

Dr. John Preston, PsyD explains that clean pain comes from experiencing “normal” human experiences like:

Losing a loved one
Contracting a serious illness
Experiencing abuse
Humiliating experiences
Failing at something we hoped would succeed at

Let’s say I got cut with a clean kitchen knife. The cut hurts, but if I clean the cut, it’s not likely to become infected. The cut is a good analogy for clean emotional pain. It is an unavoidable part of life.

What is Dirty Emotional Pain?

Dirty pain stems from how we handle the clean pain in our lives, and it includes:

Unrealistic expectations of how we should be feeling
Harsh judgments from others or the world on how we are dealing with the pain
Fixating on unfairness
Ignoring or mishandling the original pain

Next, let’s say I got cut again with a clean kitchen knife. However, this time I didn’t clean the cut. My cut becomes infected, and now I have two problems: the original wound and a nasty infection. The infection is a good analogy for dirty emotional pain or unprocessed grief. Ouch and double ouch.

Dirty Pain Is Optional

Pain is inevitable. Everyone we love will eventually pass. Children leave home. Jobs come and go, and some marriages fail. How we process the pain is what makes the difference. Martha Beck’s article on Oprah.com explains clean and dirty pain as:

“The two kinds of suffering occupy different sections of the brain: One part simply registers events, while another creates a continuous stream of thoughts about those events. The vast majority of our unhappiness comes from this secondary response — not from painful reality, but from painful thoughts about reality.”

In his book, The Paradoxes of Mourning: Healing Your Grief with Three Forgotten Truths, internationally noted author and grief counselor, Dr. Alan Wolfeit writes,

“Dirty pain is the story we tell ourselves about the clean pain. Dirty pain, once identified, can be safely separated out and ignored, leaving you with more psychic energy to embrace only the pain that truly needs embracing.”

Serenity And Emotional Pain

“Should’ve been” or “Ought to” are signs of dirty pain or lingering grief, and they spit in the face of acceptance.  In recovery, I’ve found the Serenity Prayer holds the answers to many of my problems. “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change.”

When I ignore my need to accept grief, I determine the length and intensity of my suffering. While my sister’s death was unfair, refusing to accept it kept hurting me. After I finally decided to face the truth, I began to find some peace in her passing.

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Combat Veterans More Likely To Experience Mental Health Issues In Later Life

From Science Daily:

Military veterans exposed to combat were more likely to exhibit signs of depression and anxiety in later life than veterans who had not seen combat, a new study shows.

The findings suggest that military service, and particularly combat experience, is a hidden variable in research on aging, said Carolyn Aldwin, director of the Center for Healthy Aging Research in the College of Public Health and Human Sciences at OSU and one of the study’s authors.

“There are a lot factors of aging that can impact mental health in late life, but there is something about having been a combat veteran that is especially important,” Aldwin said.

The findings were published this month in the journal Psychology and Aging. The first author is Hyunyup Lee, who conducted the research as a doctoral student at OSU; co-authors are Soyoung Choun of OSU and Avron Spiro III of Boston University and the VA Boston Healthcare System. The research was funded by the National Institutes on Aging and the Department of Veterans Affairs.

There is little existing research that examines the effects of combat exposure on aging and in particular on the impacts of combat on mental health in late life, Aldwin said. Many aging studies ask about participants’ status as veterans, but don’t unpack that further to look at differences between those who were exposed to combat and those who weren’t.

Using data from the Veterans Affairs Normative Aging Study, a longitudinal study that began in the 1960s to investigate aging in initially healthy men, the researchers explored the relationship between combat exposure and depressive and anxiety symptoms, as well as self-rated health and stressful life events.

They found that increased rates of mental health symptoms in late life were found only among combat veterans. The increases were not seen in veterans who had not been exposed to combat.

Generally, mental health symptoms such as depression and anxiety tend to decrease or remain stable during adulthood but can increase in later life. The researchers found that combat exposure has a unique impact on that trajectory, independent of other health issues or stressful life events.

“In late life, it’s pretty normal to do a life review,” Aldwin said. “For combat veterans, that review of life experiences and losses may have more of an impact on their mental health. They may need help to see meaning in their service and not just dwell on the horrors of war.”

Veterans’ homecoming experience may also color how they view their service later in life, Aldwin said. Welcoming veterans home and focusing on reintegration could help to reduce the mental toll of their service over time.

Most of the veterans in the study served in World War II or Korea. Additional research is need to understand more about how veterans’ experiences may vary from war to war, Aldwin said.

Aldwin and colleagues are currently working on a pilot study, VALOR, or Veterans Aging: Longitudinal studies in Oregon, to better understand impacts of combat exposure. The pilot study is supported by a grant from the OSU Research Office and includes veterans with service in Vietnam, the Persian Gulf and the post-9/11 conflicts.

The researchers have collected data from 300 veterans and are beginning to analyze it. Based on their initial findings, they are also planning a second, larger study with more veterans. They expect to see differences between veterans from different wars.

“Each war is different. They are going to affect veterans differently,” Aldwin said. “Following 9-11, traumatic brain injuries have risen among veterans, while mortality rates have lowered. We have many more survivors with far more injuries. These veterans have had a much higher levels of exposure to combat, as well.”

VALOR also offers researchers the opportunity to explore the impact of service on women veterans, whose experiences have not often been captured in previous research. About one-third of the participants in the pilot study were female veterans, Aldwin said.

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How to Find Self-Love and Acceptance Through Grief and Fear

From Yoga Journal:

In her new book, On Being Human: A Memoir of Waking Up, Living Real, and Listening Hard, yoga teacher Jennifer Pastiloff examines how facing loss, grief, and vulnerability allowed her to find endless love, self-acceptance, and wild happiness.

Four years into dating, Robert and I were walking to the movies to see Inglourious Basterds when he nudged me to the other side of the sidewalk. He always insists (still) on walking on the side closer to the street. I wasn’t expecting it, so when he pushed me, I almost lost my footing.

“So, um, would you ever want to be Mrs. Taleghany?” he asked, and he shoved me, which I equated to pulling the hair of a girl you like on the playground.

“Are you asking me to marry you?” I said.

“Well, would you want to?”

“Wait. Is this how you are asking me to marry you?”

It sure was. The next morning, I woke up to a velvet jewelry box on my pillow from a local jeweler. Inside was a small diamond engagement ring. I opened my eyes and rolled over onto the jewelry box. He said, “I waited for you for 10 years.” He had.

I wanted to keep my last name. I felt like it was my only connection left with my father, who died at age 38, when I was eight years old. I am always going to be Jen Pastiloff, Melvin’s daughter. Daughter of Mel The Jew—his nickname when he hung out on 5th and Wharton in South Philly as a teen.

I am an Avoider, not a Facer. And that is what I call a Classic Bullshit Story. The patterns of holding my grief inside my body have created neural pathways that cause me to binge-watch Netflix for hours under the covers instead of facing what is really going on. I equated wedding planning with going to the dentist. So I waited. I didn’t have any money, and traditionally the wife’s family pays for the wedding. My mom sure as shit didn’t have any money, so eventually I suggested we just get married in court.

I was really into Wayne Dyer at this moment in time, and I kept thinking of him saying, “How may I serve?” My mom had tried to get me to read him for years. I was a hard No. Until one day, I heard Wayne on PBS and realized my mom perhaps knew more than I gave her credit for. I downloaded all of his talks onto my iPod.

But the first time I heard him say those life-changing words was in an auditorium with thousands of people. I was in the front row because I was determined to meet the man who was changing my life, and also so I could hear better. When he said those words, I shuddered. How may I serve? It made me want to barf in my mouth because at the time all I was doing was serving people all day at my waitressing job. Veggie burgers and eggs and chocolate-espresso no-nut brownies and decaf coffee and screw serving.

Then it hit me. I never woke up in the morning and asked, How may I serve? If my friends booked acting jobs and I didn’t, even though I didn’t really even want to be an actress, my first thought was always, What’s wrong with me? Why am I not enough? I am never going to get out of this restaurant. I was living in a desert of lack, a city of not-enoughness. I listened to Wayne speak and wondered, What if there really was enough? What if I am enough? And, Oh my God, I have been such an asshole for so long. I suggested to Robert that we turn our wedding into an opportunity to serve other people.

I had no idea who was saying the words coming out of my mouth. Who was I? Having a wedding to serve other people? Did I think I was Wayne Dyer of the yoga world?

Each time I thought about breaking a pattern that wasn’t serving me, I took a breath in, asked “Now what?” and then waded into water. And there was always someone holding my hand. I didn’t get there in a vacuum, and neither will you. Look around for the folks who will help you identify your bullshit stories and call them out. Look for those who will ask you, like my mom asked me, “Do you want to keep getting what you’ve always gotten?”

“What do you mean?” Robert asked as we sipped pinot noir on my carpet.

“I mean, I can ask if they will let me cancel my Sunday yoga class and instead have a party and invite everyone but tell them they can’t give presents. We can ask them to bring donations, and if anyone wants to sing or speak or play music or whatever, they can. It’ll be like a yoga-party-wedding thing, and we won’t have to spend any money. Oh my God, this is such a good idea.”

“OK,” he said.

That’s Robert. OK. It’s going to be OK.

We got married at the Beverly Hills Courthouse on February 25, 2010. I taught a yoga class that morning at a donation-based yoga studio. I rushed out yelling, “I have to go get married now!” and almost forgot to collect my donations. I ran home to shower and change. I had 30 minutes. I wore a black dress I’d borrowed from someone and a little mascara. Robert wore a dark suit and a maroon tie. The judge who married us, a funny and warm woman, had us take each other’s hands under a wreath of beautiful white flowers to take our vows.

It was just as I always imagined my wedding would be, which is to say, like any other day, only different. I had never imagined myself getting married because I could never imagine the future. I hadn’t thought I deserved one. My mind, even at 35 years old, would still freeze up when I tried to think of anything beyond one month into the future.

Finding “Now What?”

In my empowerment workshops, I talk about how unbelievably hard it is to break patterns. How we can’t beat ourselves up when we struggle. We all struggle. It’s part of being human. I’d see someone come to my workshops again and again, and she would write the same things down when asked what she wanted to let go of. I didn’t judge. I was, in my late 30s and early 40s, doing the exact same thing. Moaning about how I needed to let go of the belief that I didn’t deserve a future, that I couldn’t plan anything. I would panic when I had to think about any moment beyond the one I was living in. I’d hear these women (it wasn’t just one woman; we all do this) repeat the same things over and over. It was from listening to them that I saw myself.

If I wasn’t asking, “Now what?” after identifying a pattern that I claimed I wanted to break, then I was just making a list of reasons why I sucked. I saw these women doing this, paying a bunch of money to come to a weird yoga workshop and make a list that they would stick in a drawer and forget about. It’s what we do.

I started asking them to ask themselves, “Now what?” after making the lists. If I was asking them to do this, I absolutely had to do the same thing. I thought about how my mom, despite how complex our relationship is, has taught me so much. She introduced me to Wayne Dyer, and without him I never would have started the journey I am on. When I started dating Robert and I was deep in a cycle of over-exercising and starving myself (yet another pattern that came and went over the years like a virus), I called my mom and said, “I don’t know, Mom. He’s so great, but I’m not sure I’m ready for a relationship. I like my routines. I like coming home from the restaurant and being able to do my exercise and not talk to anyone and sit on the computer all night if I want to. If I have a boyfriend, I can’t just do whatever I want.”

She said, “If you keep doing what Jenny Jen P has always done, you’ll keep getting what Jenny Jen P has always gotten.”

“Oh my God, Mom. Did you really just call me Jenny Jen P? But, ugh, you’re right. Why are you always right? I love you. Bye.”

Jenny Jen P was my nickname and my AOL Instant Messenger screen name and email address at the time. Essentially, my mother was asking me to ask myself, “Now what?” I would have talked myself out of allowing myself to be in a relationship just so I could keep up my self-destructive patterns.

Turns out, being in relationship did interfere with my patterns. Thankfully.

“Now what?” will be my challenge for the rest of my life, as it will probably be yours, too. Allowing myself to enter into a relationship with Robert, and then having him move in, and then marrying him, helped me break the cycle. The first step was asking myself, “Now what?” Now what became “Yes, I will go out with you.” Then, “Yes, I will marry you.” Both things terrified me. And yet, moment by moment I entered into them as if entering cold water. And look, it did not kill me.

Each time I thought about breaking a pattern that wasn’t serving me, I took a breath in, asked “Now what?” and then waded into water. And there was always someone holding my hand. I didn’t get there in a vacuum, and neither will you. Look around for the folks who will help you identify your bullshit stories and call them out. Look for those who will ask you, like my mom asked me, “Do you want to keep getting what you’ve always gotten?”

A Leap of Faith

I wrote a blog post about my upcoming wedding and why it was special—and it wasn’t about how much money (that I didn’t have, that my mom didn’t have) I’d be spending, but about something much greater that had started to come together for me as a yogi, and as a leader of yoga retreats, and, finally, as the writer I’d always wanted to be. I wrote:

This is such a special occasion. Not only is it marking my new life, but it is a sign of the yoga (meaning “union”) of the human spirit. When I told people I was giving the money to Haiti for my wedding, they wanted to be a part of it. Not only are we all coming together on Sunday, February 28, 2010, for something as beautiful as a marriage of two people (Jennifer Pastiloff and Robert Taleghany), but for the marriage of two different cultures: one in need, one in the place to give.

The pots and pans and dish towels will always be there.

I would really love a wok, though.

At the wedding party at the yoga studio, little kids walked around with white buckets and collected money from everyone for the Red Cross relief efforts in Haiti. A woman who had taken my yoga classes for years did my makeup as a wedding gift, and I didn’t wear shoes since there was a “no shoes” policy in the yoga studio. I painted my own grubby toenails. Not surprisingly, I didn’t plan it very well because I only had wine, cheese, and crackers. My friend Gabby ran out and bought tons of burritos and tacos and came back with them 30 minutes later. We ate Mexican food with donated wine as we collected money for Haiti and celebrated my new life in our bare feet. We ate leftover bean burritos for a week.

I asked anyone who wanted to perform music or read poems or get up onstage to do so. A friend of mine played the cello, another sang. Someone read poetry, some said prayers. Someone offered a blessing. My friend Annabel gave a speech. I stood on stage and spoke, although I have no idea what I said.

I remember thinking I had to get up and speak. I hadn’t planned to, but as soon as I got up there in my silky dress and bare feet, the words poured out of my mouth. It wasn’t the wine, either. Being in front of people and speaking—connecting with them—was home for me. Once I was up there, I never wanted to get down.

I had always been terrified that if I really accepted the beautiful scene in front of me, that it would all vanish, so I kept a part of me at bay, locked in my time machine, fiddling with the dials, trying to escape. I looked over at my stepfather, Jack, and my new father-in-law laughing with each other and I closed my eyes and imagined my dad in there, too, trying to smoke inside as if it were still the ’80s, making everyone laugh even though he wouldn’t have wanted me to leave him. He’d discreetly look at me and press his finger into his nostril and say, “You know what I mean?” Our secret code. And I would say, “Yes, of course, I know what you mean.”

I had spent so long not allowing myself to be present, drifting off and leaving when things felt like too much, that I didn’t even know whether I was physically hungry or not. I wasn’t ever sure how I felt. I was married. Oh. OK, I am married now. I remembered when my dad died, I said I didn’t care. That was not the truth, but that’s all I could allow myself. Only I don’t care. I smiled really wide for pictures, and I made jokes, but I wasn’t 100 percent there. I can see in the photographs I was indeed there, but I was not inhabiting my body.

I wished I had continued therapy through the years. I had only gone a few times to a few different therapists over the span of 37 years. It’s always felt overwhelming, like dating. Having to go and retell your story again and again and hoping you find the right match. The closest thing I had to working through my shit was listening to Wayne Dyer and doing yoga. I had never dealt with my grief, my eating disorder, my relationship with my mother. And yet, there I was, married. A real adult.

The guilt and the drama that don’t belong to me or that once belonged to me? Goodbye.

Lightening the Load

The next day, I walked into the local Red Cross with our donations. I don’t remember ever feeling as good. How could I keep doing this, this idea of serving?

In life, we have so much shit, and we constantly collect new shit on top of the old shit, and we mostly don’t even remember the shit we already have, so when we get a new espresso maker we act delighted and we use it for a while before we stick it in the cupboard with the other things that don’t fit on the counter and then forget about all of them because they’re hidden. Isn’t it funny how we house so much crap that we aren’t even consciously aware of? We do the same thing inside our bodies. So much pain piled on top of pain and memories on top of memories that we just shut the door to our minds and pretend there is nothing in there. That we are fine.

After I brought the money to the Red Cross, I couldn’t stop thinking about the idea of stuff. I’m a stuff person. The kind who always has an indentation in her shoulder where the big heavy bag digs in. The kind who always leaves a trail and is always knocking something over because there’s so much stuff around.

When I worked at the restaurant, the guys in the kitchen used to put things in my bag. Melons and cast iron skillets and bottles of hot sauce. There was a fantastic blue cornbread we served in a cute little cast iron skillet that always ended up in my backpack. I wouldn’t realize until I got home because my bag was already so heavy and filled with unnecessary things like shoes, hardcover books, sneakers, underwear, bottles of water, bananas. Sometimes I’d be happy, because, Hey, I needed a cast iron skillet! But mostly I felt embarrassed that I hadn’t noticed, that I walked around with so much that I didn’t notice when someone added their own stuff to my life. That’s how it is, though, isn’t it? When you have a lot of crap it takes a while to notice that more is being added, however slowly. This guilt? Not mine. This hot sauce? Not mine (but I’ll keep it). This shame? Not mine. This drama? Not mine.

It’s hard to not realize you have the cast iron skillet before it’s too late. Once you get all the way home with it, you might as well keep it, right? Because, let’s face it, it’s kind of embarrassing to go back with it, explaining that you didn’t steal it, that someone stuffed it in your big-ass bag and you just didn’t notice. Or maybe it’s not embarrassing and you just want to keep the cast iron skillet because you think you should have one. Maybe you think you deserve one. That’s what we do: I know it isn’t mine to take on, but I’ll keep it because I probably deserve it.

You think as you get older the weight gets lighter? It doesn’t. It gets heavier and heavier until you are buried in a pile of it and you can’t even reach to the front door.

The things we take. The things handed to us that we walk around with as they dig into our shoulders and cause us pain, and yet we say, “No, I’m fine. I got this. I can carry it all.” When you carry so much shit, you don’t notice when other people add their shit, so truthfully, I was glad to have not gotten any more. As I walked out of the Red Cross, I remembered those days with my backpack at the restaurant and remembered my hiker friend Joe, who told me: “Carry only what you need.”

After I got married, I thought about what I could carry. I decided to take an assessment of what was on my back and in my car and in my heart and to imagine what it would be like to be free of it all. If I imagine myself free of my dad’s memory, I want to vomit. So thank you very much, but I will keep that one. The rest, though? The guilt and the drama that don’t belong to me or that once belonged to me? Goodbye. I am putting you back with the cast iron skillet and the melons that aren’t mine.

I did get a bunch of woks, though. But what I got more was the power of community. I saw how I was able to bring people together, not just at my retreat, but at my wedding, and on the internet. And I wanted more of it.

 

The post How to Find Self-Love and Acceptance Through Grief and Fear appeared first on Reach Out Recovery.