Why did I decide to write this?

Why did I decide to write a blog? Did I want to bash people? Am I resentful? Did I want to hurt people? The answer to all of these questions is absolutely, NO. I wrote it with the hopes that my mistakes and lessons learned could possibly help other people in situtaions similar to my own. People throughout the years have always said I should write a book. Since I have no idea how to, it was suggested by several people to write a blog. It truly was as simple as that. I am not afraid to write about my life. My life is an open book. Why? Because everything that has happened to me, all of the memories that I have, all the experiences that I have been a part of have made me the person I am today. I have spent a great deal of my days hating myself, expecting people to leave me and thinking that the negative things I have heard from whoever, whenever is my reality and I am done with that. Take it or leave it, I will be me and I am learning that I am able to be loved by others and I am able to love myself. If you chooses to leave it, I will be sad but I will recover and carry on.
 For all the people it has angered, more than 5 times as many have written and told me it has helped them in some way. In this life, I have learned, I can't please everyone all of the time and I am done trying to. Pleasing others does nothing but make me feel like crap. I am starting to really understand the saying "Who cares what people think.?"
The other day was parent teacher conferences. A 40 something bald fat white man felt it necessary to wear a "53,000,000 babies dead since 1973" t-shirt. People never cease to amaze me. Whatever side of the argument you are on, why would one choose to display it on a t-shirt at an elementary school parent teacher conference? Thank goodness that my 7 year old didn't read it. I would rather spare him from nonsence like this as long as possible than have to explain why people do things like this.
Throughout this blog I have only written about my past.
Recently, I have emphasized to my children that there is plenty of hate in the World and as a family, we need to make our house a place of love and we need to spread love instead of hate. This is something I have had the pleasure of watching them put into action. It truly is amazing to see them internalize things like this and it makes me proud to be their Mother.
This year has met me with several challenges that have almost broken me. It has also been a time of enlightenment. I realized that when I focus on what is wrong with my life and what I am missing, it is nearly impossible for me to find happiness. When I am unaccepting of others it is because I am running from something I dislike about myself. The biggest battle I have to fight next to addiction is my fear of abandonment. I almost expect people to leave me. No one knows this better than my dear husband. What the source of this fear is can be left up for speculation. Is it nature, nurture or some other variable I have not yet considered? Who cares? All I know is that is there and unless I admit it, I will continue to self-sabotage and make this worst fear of mine come true. People say that when you go to jail, you find out who your friend are. That is kindof true but when you really find out who your friends are is when you have a nervous breakdown. This happened to me when I turned 30. For some reason, I felt that I should have a successful career. My priorities have since changed. I managed to become the director of a drug abuse program,I worked with a number of kids and owned and operated a halfway house. Due to some serious ethical issues surrounding the people I worked with, I had to quit. Around the same time, I contracted a strep infection in my blood that nearly did me in. The recipe was right for a downward spiral that had me nearly lose my family and everything I had worked hard for.
Doctors had prscribed me anti anxiety drugs and anti depressants. Both of these drugs made me insane. I saw friends drop like flies. I have never wanted to die in my life until I woke up and realized what had become of me. I had gone to Puerto Rico with a girl I had recently met when I had a moment of clarity. I knew that If I did not change, I would lose the things in my life that mattered the most, I would lose the love I had come to take for granted. At that moment, I decided to take myself off of all of the meds I was on (don't ever do this) lock myself in my hotel room until I could catch a flight home, cut ties with the people that were helping me destroy myself and start to rebuild. One would think I would have learned this lesson but sometimes, I have to relearn and relearn and relearn. I came home, and did what I had to do to become the person I needed to be for my family.
Throughout my time as a counselor, I noticed a pattern emerging from several of the adolescents I had the pleasure of working with. Addiction is a family disease. Everyone has a role to play in it. Most parents of the kids I knew were focused on careers, money, and materialistic that in the end, doesn't ever matter. This is not true for all families, sometimes there were other variables, this is just a pattern I saw. I have come to recognize that for me and for my children, it is extremely important to make them my career. Sure, I will ever be the high powered business woman I pictured myself being but rarely if ever do things go the way I imagined they should go. I may not be able to afford to go to Italy, help build an orphanage for abandoned children in Africa, or have a villa in Argentina but I have the most important thing of all, a family of my own that loves me unconditionally. I hve a husband that truly meant it when he said "till death do us part." And although I sometimes expect him to leave, I am learning that he isn't going anywhere.
Everyone has their issues. Mine are just more obvious than others. My hope is by admitting them, sharing my hopes, my fears, my dreams and my nightmares, someone somewhere might relate and realize not only are they not alone but someone out there understands, fights the same battles with herself and continues to remain teachable in order to better my life and the lives of those I meet or of those who read these words.
Write at you later.
Shelley