Connected

"The leg bone's connected to the - knee bone; The knee bone's connected to the - thigh bone; The thigh bone's connected to the - hip bone. ~ "Dem Bones," James Weldon Johnson

Stay with me on this one...

When I first started training for half marathons, then for the marathon, my body greeted me to many of the requisite injuries concomitant with running long distances: runner's knee, hip soreness, ankle twinges. The ankle tweak came about on the opposite side from where my first injury had erupted, my right leg runner's knee - also know as the dreaded floating patella.

This is when I was introduced to the wonders of the iliotibial band, a lovely fibrous ligament that (in layman's terms) extends from the butt to just below the knee, holding everything at each end and in between together, albeit tenuously.

I would joke to my fellow runners, "I guess the hip bone IS connected to the knee bone," incorrectly paraphrasing "Dem Bones".

I've come to realize in my short but oh so joyous half and marathon running career that everything in our bodies is related, connected and must work together for a successful run on race day. Mind, body and spirit must come together, muscles ligaments, tendons, internal organs - ewwww!, must work in harmony, any negativity that pops into one's mind may appear but must be quickly purged, and the calculations of how many miles,  hours or minutes remain to the finish, the glorious end game of race day, have to give way to remaining in the moment, taking every mile as it comes and relishing in the exhilaration of accomplishing what few can.

Marathoners and half marathoners are a positive subset of our population, yet we fully understand the daunting task ahead when we embark on each training session. Whether 13.1 or 26.2 miles, or the challenge of the 50 or 100 mile races (I am definitely happy to not have to go there - but maybe someday...?) so much can happen between the inaugural training run and race day. Even each training day, each track workout, each ping in the knee, twinge or tweak in the ankle, hip or hammy must be taken at face value. There can be no looking beyond. Each successful run builds on the next, each failed run is a lesson learned and a caution you are not Superman, you're no Wonder Woman, pull back, rest, listen to your body, "YOU'LL BE FINE, GIVE IT TIME."

For a runner patience is not a virtue or an option, it is requisite. And this has all become oh so clear this year as I resume my running schedule after cervical vertebrate and carpal tunnel surgeries. I'm not quite starting over, but I have been provided with a very humbling "Back To Running" schedule by my Fleet Feet Running Club coaches  - 30 minutes max for the next 4 weeks increasing the run to walk minute ratio until the fourth week when I will be running 30 minutes without a walk interval.

As I mentioned, this is humbling, but exactly what is needed, what I NEEDED.

Runners rely on each other. We share in each others successes and relate to and support each other during our times of failure. Runners are raving optimists. I've written about the marathon training kickoff meetings where the air is electric with anticipation. The newbies who have never crossed the 26.2 mile finish line actually think they can do it. And they will!  The community of runners is a positive and joyous force to be reckoned with and I firmly believe training with a group of runners greatly increases the possibility of success while for some odd reason decreasing the risk of injury. Did I mention community?

So what does all this have to do with our journey as parents of addicts? Apart from simply substituting the words parents of addicts or parents of addicts in recovery for the word runners, there are almost endless parallels between our journeys. There are a lot of us out there. We can choose to know we have power over The Addiction if we simply acknowledge we cannot do this on our own.

We are all connected. Even if we don't know each other there is that connection we can find whether or not we consciously reach out for help, through personal counseling or the myriad of groups built to walk parents down the pathway to our own recovery. Simply making that decision to say "ENOUGH!" to The Addiction is enough to connect us as parents affected by the disease.

We must find the positive in our lives as we navigate the tightrope of loving our sons and daughters while hating The Addiction that has, hopefully temporarily, taken over their lives. This is never an easy endeavor. We'll have our good days and bad days. Our spirits WILL become injured. We can listen to our hearts and our souls, find the gentle spaces that remain even after Addiction's oh-so-personal attacks on our psyches, rest, recover, and move on along our recovery pathways. We can find other parents with whom we can laugh, cry and collectively despair over the battles won and lost. Through these connections we can heal. We can become that positive force to be reckoned with who have that raving optimism our children will, with our love and by their own devices, actually beat The Addiction, rendering it irrelevant. We can keep our positivity in the moment, not obsessing about what has passed or what might be, but relishing the little victories and taking a pause to learn from the failures. Know this, the task of our recovery may seem daunting, but it IS doable. It's a marathon, not a sprint, with long periods (plural) of training, but we can all make it to the finish which in the case of parents of addicts can lead to more vistas and joyous experiences.

One big difference? The subset of the population who have or have had a loved one dive into the rabbit hole of the disease of addiction is much larger than the .1% of the population who have completed a marathon. Remember, over half the people you will see in any public place have been directly touched by addiction. You are only alone if you wish to be.

Did I mention community?

. . . keep coming back

"I am a part of all that I have met." ~ Lord Tennyson

The Fable of the White Room

"Do not feel lonely, the entire universe is inside you." ~ Rumi 

The last thing he could remember is a struggle, a long struggle, then saying, "NO!" as loud as he could as he fought off the adversary.

"Have I died?" he wondered.

"Am I dead"?

"Is this heaven"?

"Or hell"?

With much difficulty he tried to look to his left and saw only a white nothingness. His movements were clearly restricted, but he could sense no shackles, bindings, fetters or ropes confining him. He felt as though he was wrapped in some sort of invisible cloak or sheathe. Perhaps this was a cruel joke played on him by one of many enemies encountered over countless travels. Or perhaps this was the result of his pursuit of something, anything different from the life he had been living - a punishment of sorts, or just a sign his body mind and soul had given up, failed, expired.

"Perhaps I am not dead," he thought. "But perhaps I am dying."

As he struggled to look to his right he perceived his most recent foe, slain, next to him, motionless and prone.

"What the hell is going on?" he thought.

When he had said the single word sparked by endless battles against countless opponents that seemed to constantly confront him, that word, "NO!" pulsed beyond the confines of his personal arena, dispatching the beast and delivering him to this place. This single word precipitated a transformative experience, instantly conveying both him and his latest antagonist to this ... place ... whatever this place is.

"Where the hell am I?"

He had grown tired of the constant struggle, the never-ending and pointless battles. He had come to believe this behavior had become part of his go-to lifestyle, an easy continuation of a life he had never asked for but had no idea how to depart from. He would ask himself if continuing the pursuit of a life in which he constantly got in his own way was a result of fear of an unknown beyond the familiar, or simply laziness. Was he too stupid to break free? Was he not good enough?

"Stop it," he thought. "Purge these thoughts from your mind!"

As he lay, motionless, still unable to move, he realized for the first time in his memory he considered fighting the negativity that had consumed him for so long. He had for too long embraced the negativity, a blanket of consistency that had dictated his every thought, action and reaction. It was a shroud that shielded him from something.

"But shielding me from what?"

This internal conversation made him wonder if he was losing his mind. He shook his head in effort to achieve some clarity and noticed his encumbrance still encasing him, but loosening.

"Fascinating."

His thoughts then turned for the first time to what had been before, before the turn of events, before his dive deep into what had ultimately led to a life of nothingness, with no landscapes, colors, tastes or textures - the life had led to this place, white, soundless, with no depth, neither a positive, nor negative. His former life of nothingness had been replete with experiences he couldn't clearly recall, things acquired, yet now gone, friends ...

"Friends," he tried to envision friends, anyone, he could consider held close and cherished. There was no one - nobody there even in the remnants of his deepest recollections.

"But I feel, something," he thought. "For the first time in a long, long time I feel. I don't know what I feel. But it is ... there."

It was then he felt it, the tear, progressing slowly down his cheek.

"I was something, before", he thought. "I was good at it too, I think. ... I had friends, a life, purpose. I had ... parents, who loved me."

He could feel his restraints loosening, his hands releasing from the invisible bindings, his legs now free, his head no longer seemingly pinned to the floor, or whatever he was lying on in the nothingness. He rose and painfully lifted his body to a standing position. It seemed like eons since he had been able to stand with no purpose but to simply be, standing. There was no foe to vanquish, no insatiable need to fulfill for an unknown reason. The thought of being overjoyed by something so simple made him laugh, out loud, another experience that seemed foreign to him.

He began to explore his new world, the nothingness. walking thorough it.  Yet, was he moving, making progress? With no point of reference he had no idea if he was a man in motion or still bound, without the bindings, a prisoner of his past tendencies.

"I have no direction here in this white void. I might as well be on a treadmill."

It was then, seemingly off in the distance he could see arms and hands reaching out through the colorlessness. He had seen these before, in the prior, the before time. Every time he had gone to reach out he could feel one adversary after another pull him, back, back into the void of nothingness, replete with experiences he couldn't clearly recall, things acquired, yet now gone, friends ...

"No one..."

As he continued, walking, "Am I even moving? he did seem to be ever closer to the arms and hands reaching out. This had happened before, he had approached the invitation, the love, but would feel nothing. He could feel it now. The adversaries had never let him feel the goodness, the unselfishness. He grasped the hands reaching into his void. Deep inside him he could hear the words:

"This is up to you now. This is your choice. Your path will be neither easy nor impassable. You will only succeed if you simply get out of your own way..."

"The voice stopped with his words - his own words. How did the voice know this? Was this another ruse of his antagonists? Who could he trust?" 

He still held the hands. the grasp loosening. He fell to his knees, he was fingertip to fingertip yet could still feel something, different. He arose and he, he was the one reaching out, seizing, seeking, restoring his connection to this goodness, this love he could feel but not quite understand, pulling him into something new, something different yet familiar from another time.

With as much passion as when he shouted his defiant "NO!",  he declared, "I WILL follow you. I will trust, even though I do not under..."

. . . keep coming back

"Not all those who wander are lost." ~ J. R. R. Tolkien