There are good ways and bad ways to cope with emotional pain and some times it is hard to tell them apart.  What on the surface can look like a piss poor idea can actually turn out to be a blessing.   On the other hand, some of my brilliant ideas to feel better failed pretty miserably.  Still, I always say failure is a catalyst to learn and grow.  Speaking of learning and growing:

I learned that if you sit on the couch with a cat and watch TV you will grow.  You will grow exactly seven pounds.

I learned for the millionth time that alcohol will not make me feel better.  A week after Sofie left I drank for the first time in seven and a half years.  I learned you should go to more AA meetings not zero AA meetings when you are in crisis. If I had taken care of myself and gone to meetings I might not have found myself at the grocery store getting “stuff” for “dinner” and thinking wine is an entree.  One is supposed to call another member of AA when one feels like drinking but this one thought that was a really stupid idea because one will tell this one not to do it.  So I kept my phone in my purse and put a bottle of moderately priced wine in the grocery cart.  When I got home I put the groceries away and fixed Addie a non alcoholic dinner really fast so I wouldn’t smarten up and change my mind.  Next I had to find the corkscrew and I was panicking because I didn’t know where Don kept it.  I was worried I would not be able to open it, but it was just like riding a bike and I have spent way more time opening wine bottles than I have riding bikes.  As I poured the glass this little voice in my head kept saying, “Just drink it, just drink it.  Remember how cool and fabulous you used to be and how alcohol is the answer to all problems?”  So, I drank it.   Hmmmm.  Nothing.  I did not feel better. I did not feel the glamour I feel I am so sorely lacking because I no longer hold a wine glass.  They (the AA old timers) say that no matter how long it has been since you had a drink if you pick up again you will be right back drinking as much as you were when you stopped.  This seems to be true in my case because after two glasses I wasn’t even tipsy.  In my lost weekend days two glasses of wine were what I drank while I was shaking my martini.  Afterward, I was surprised to find I wasn’t feeling guilty, but I did need to tell on myself so I texted Don (conveniently out of town) and Peggy.  The next morning bright and early Peggy called:

Peg:  Are you going to a meeting today?

Me:  I don’t know Peg.  I haven’t decided how I feel about it.

Peg:  Well, can you do me a favor and if you won’t go for yourself can you go for me and for Sofie?  We just cannot handle another crisis right now.

Me:  God Damn it Peg!

Peg:  I promise when my cancer treatment is over and Sofie is home it can be all about you but not now.

Great.

So, I went to a meeting and a very dangerous bad idea gave me a lot of information to keep me sober in the future.  Any AA’s reading this please do not try this at home!  I was very lucky stop right away.  Most people who go out do not get back.  So pick up the phone not the glass and call someone who loves you.  They won’t tell you not to drink they will just listen to why you want to do it.  Actually, you should probably call Peggy.

Finally, what I thought was a really bad idea turned out to be the thing that saved me.  I learned that kittens don’t care if you are sad.  Life is great to a kitten- all life all the time.  It’s a party. Two weeks before Sofie left I thought if we got her a kitten it would fix everything and we got her a cute little kitten that naturally didn’t fix anything.  In fact, it made it worse because now I was yelling at her for not changing the litter box.  One week before she left, fate (named Addie Todd) brought home an abandoned 2 ½ week old baby cat.  I told Addie we could not keep her because we already had a kitten, but we could foster her.  I went to Pet Co bought  around $7,000 worth of cat formula, bottles and crates and then found myself sleeping on the couch with the kitten waking up every two hours to feed her and make her go to the bathroom.  I did not know about the bathroom part when I agreed to take care of her. The next thing I know I am carrying the “baby” around in a baby sling and putting her down for naps.  El gato es mio ahora.  That little tiny fuzz ball saved my life.  As things were sliding out of control with Sofie, I could fix the kitten and the kitten not only lived but thrived.  I grew a cat!

To Be Continued:

Part III Hoping

I have been an Aunt for twenty five years and during that time I have been referred to as a Fabulous Aunt, Sainted Aunt, Tattle Tale Aunt and even Bitch of an Aunt when my nieces got in trouble because I tattled.  But yesterday, when my niece Mallory gave birth to baby Jack,  I became the best adjective of all, a Great Aunt.  Malllory lived with us for a while when she was fifteen and at the time I didn’t think she would make it to sixteen.   Now she has become a 24- year- old nursing student married to a man defending our country and has a beautiful newborn.  Good job Mal.

You may have noticed this blog has been rather quiet as of late.  That is because I was too busy with my depression to write and I had to sit on the couch everyday eating junk food and watching Bravo reality television with my new kitten.

Last October, after a whirlwind two months having a delinquent teenage girl, we sent said teenage girl to “boarding school in Utah”.  “Boarding school in Utah, Arizona, Idaho or Montana” is almost always and in this case is code for “residential treatment program”.  These schools are located exclusively in Red States because the law in those states says you can admit a minor over fourteen into a facility against their will.  Sometimes those Republicans know what they are doing.  We sent Sofie to a school with thirty- six girls dealing with such issues as self harm, suicidal ideation, adoption attachment, anxiety, depression, addiction, substance abuse and trauma.  It’s a fun place.  Pick a couple of those issues at random and you will have Sofie’s diagnosis.  The school is great and the staff is incredible.  I am so happy we found a place for her to get better, but it feels like I cut off my arm and sent it to Utah for a while.  Even as I write this the grief and sadness of the past few months covers me like a wet blanket and I can only cry. I have cried more in the last few months than in my entire life.  The computer screen looks blurry right now and it was already blurry because I am getting really old and my eyes are bad.  Things can really suck.  Sofie has never been an easy kid, but if she can learn to use her power for good and not evil she will be amazing.  My job was supposed to be to teach her how to do that and I failed.  It may not have been my fault, but I couldn’t do it.  She is only fourteen and she is not supposed to be away from me.  I am relieved she is in a safe place where she can’t hurt herself, but I hurt everyday she’s gone.  I know it’s the right thing, but as I so eloquently just said, things can really suck.

Not surprisingly my depression wasn’t going over very well with the rest of the family and I finally had to get off the couch because Don pointed out that I did have another child and she needed a bath and to go to school.  Oh yeah.  I thought it might be time when my couch buddy kitten decided there was a world beyond the blankets and left to go see it.  However, the main reason I rose like Lazarus from the couch is that the season of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills ended. That show is not even a guilty pleasure.  It’s horrible and any one who watches it should feel genuinely guilty.  I watched it because those housewives were the only people in the world acting worse than I felt.  Finally, I was able to decided I must stop all this nonsense and get up because if I was still on the couch when the Real Housewives of Orange County started I would have to shoot myself in the head.

That is not such a funny joke if you know that my Grandfather and my Great Grandfather both shot themselves in the head. It appears that depression and alcoholism run in the family.  Sorry Sofie, that’s why we sent you to live with the Mormons so quickly into your rebellion. 

Speaking of Mormons, and who isn’t these days, one silver lining has been the school is fifteen minutes away from my Mormon Aunt and Uncle.  They have been quite literally a Godsend and have been amazingly supportive. My Uncle Jack (named after Mallory’s baby) decided to join the Marine Corps and the Mormon Church when he was sixteen.  This is a man who likes structure. It has been so wonderful to connect with my Aunt and Uncle and their many children and their even many more grandchildren.  Mormon’s have some wacky ideas and some Mormon’s even have some pretty hateful ideas (prop 8), but I have never met better people than My Mormon’s and there is not a better man alive than my Uncle Jack.  I wish he was running for president instead of Mitt Romney.

To be continued : Part II Coping

Told with Sofie’s permission.