Learning and Applying

This experience with addiction has opened up a door to a whole new wing for me in this mansion of choices and life experiences I am exploring.  This was a wing of the mansion that held a lot of my nightmares.  The hallway where this door was located was dark, dusty and full of creepy crawlies.  I would have never turned the corner and walked down here if I had had a choice.  It wasn't in my plans.  As I said, it was in my nightmares, not my dreams. 

I am the type of person, who, even though I may grumble and complain, at first (okay, and maybe a little during and after) I still try to make the best of a situation.  After the initial moaning and groaning, I stop, look around and begin the 'clean up' to try and make the place as livable as possible.  If it is a neglected yard, I start to plant.  A neglected house, I start to paint.  A neglected life, I start to plan.

This journey with addiction was not what I planned for my daughter.  But it happened and as the dust is settling and I'm understanding and more familiar with it, I am starting to make the best of the situation, and with addiction, for me that is learning and applying what I can. 

Enabling is one of the concepts that I have learned.  It has both helped and infuriated me. It has helped me by clearing my mind.  When actions and situations were so confusing and blurred, the concept of enabling helped me to define the boundaries.  It helped me to step back so that I could see the whole picture more clearly.  It allowed me to breath easier and calm down.  It hurt me because it caused me to struggle with how I define loving someone ( 1 Cor. 13.  That is my definition of love).  It put a wedge (temporarily) in those beautifully written words.  It made me rigid in my thinking and my actions.  At times, it made me doubt my inner voice (which I hate doing). 

So, I made a decision to put boundaries around enabling (Sometimes it feels as though my brain is in the center of a very complicated yet soothing labyrinth).  Kind of like color coding. I am aware of an opportunity to enable and I can then weigh it--is this enabling that will help or is this enabling that will hurt?  And then I make the decision.  I have applied that concept to all of my interactions, especially with the children (and their families) at work. 

Many of the children I teach are from bad homes, not all, but more than there should be.  Some have parents who are active in their addictions.  Some have abusive parents.  A lot are living with grandparents because parents are either in jail or no longer with them.  It is hard trying to make fractions meaningful to someone who's only hot meal comes at 11:40 at school.  Anyway, recently we had a book fair at the library.  All of the kids go.  Parents send in money and they get to buy books, book markers that glitter, posters, and colorful pencils.  In my room, there are often many sad faces because the parents don't send in money.  So, my delima, do I give them money (I have done it in the past) or is this enabling the parents to keep their money for themselves and not take responsibility for their children?  Am I enabling the parents to continue in their bad choices and 'freeing' them for the moment from their responsibility of being a parent?  Would they even realize that?  At this point, do I even care what the parents will think?  Not so much.  So, I decide to give five dollars to the children who didn't have money, so that they can buy a book.  My money.  Not much, I know, but still, am I enabling?  The answer is, yes.  But this is the enabling that will help, I decide.  It will help the child.  I give them the money secretly.  I call them to my desk and quietly say, here, you can buy a book but it is between you and me (meaning don't tell the other kids...I always tell them to never keep secrets from their parents).  So, we have our 'secret' as they joyfully look for a book.  They do come in the next day, lean in to me and whisper that they told their parents and they will send in money. I smile and whisper back, "Thank you", but it never happens.  I don't care.  They have their books.

So, that is a way I have tried to make the best of this situation with addiction.  I am applying what I've learned to my personal as well as my public life.