"No news is good news," they say. Has it really been since November that I have posted here? I did draft one post about forgiveness several weeks ago, but I never got around to completing it. Sometimes I've wondered if that means I still have farther to travel on the forgiveness road. It's really difficult for me to say. I think I have fully released my father from any further obligation to me, for him to somehow make amends for how he abused me. And yet I still find myself waiting fairly long before I call him by phone again to see how he and Mom are doing. I don't know what that's about, either. I guess sometimes we don't always understand how we are doing on our recovery journey.
I've been feeling pretty well for quite a few weeks. I've been pacing myself, not acting too addictively. I continue to deeply appreciate our friends in the growth group my wife and I attend. We are all needy there and each one is willing to try to help whoever is hurting. All are at various points on their own journeys of recovery. It's not a recovery group, per se, but in one way or another, each of us is in recovery. (Actually, I've been discovering that more people are in recovery or need to be that I had ever realized when I was younger.)
I have been spending quality time via IM chat with a dear friend who is going through a critical time in recovery. I'm learning it's OK not to know what to say sometimes. And also that it's OK not to say something when we don't have anything to say. I'm glad that sometimes just being there is a comfort to the other. I know it has been for me during some of my most difficult times.
I did much better than I have in the past this morning operating under stress. My wife forgot an alcohol swab to clean her skin to get an injection to help with the disease she is battling. She told me that as we were headed to a 9 a.m. appointment for me with a doctor. I didn't get upset with her this time. I even pulled off the street and popped into a grocery store to buy some alcohol swabs. I looked for some time but couldn't find them. So I grabbed a antiseptic wash that I thought might work. I paid for it. My wife used it and was appreciative. Then we ended up on the 7th floor of the doctors building, which was the right floor, but the wrong hospital. Tomorrow's appointment for my wife will be at the first place we went to today. The receptionists were nice at the first place and telephoned the right place to say I would arrive late. It all worked out fine and my blood pressure level was even down to normal by the time my intake nurse took my b.p. We made it. My doctor was 45 minutes late and apologized for being late. I told him, "It's all right. We were late too."
Growth is often slow, and sometimes comes in spurts. But it can keep happening. I want it to. My wife appreciates my efforts. And I now feel free to give myself a pat on the back sometimes, as I just did in this post. It feels good. I hope you are experiencing some things in your life that feel good for you, too.
