Thoughts in circles

This is one of those days when the thoughts just keep going in circles.

It’s been an eventful couple of weeks and a while since I’ve had a chance to write. So many thoughts, so little time.

I was able to see my son and his family last week, and my greatest concern was how the baby was doing after these chaotic months that happened to be key ones in her development.

The joy: she seems to be a healthy and happy about-to-turn-one-year old, and I was so blessed to get to see her really start to walk. After putting one or two steps together, she moved on to four, five and six steps at a time before falling. By the time I left, she was walking across the room without falling. Yay!!

The heartbreak: wondering if she is really getting the nurturing, hugs and kisses when she needs them. Wondering how long it will be before she can just go to sleep in her own bed for a whole week, then two, then permanently.

Seeing her took me back to her daddy’s first birthday and how cute and sweet he was as a child. It boggles my mind to try to understand how he went from that child to become the addicted person he is today. How could it happen? I know it wasn’t a path he deliberately chose, although the choices he made since then have taken him down a long road of pain and problems.

As recovering alcoholic Bill Webb said in a recent blog post, “Perhaps it might help to remember that no one wakes up one day and says, ‘Hey! It’s a nice day today—I think I’ll become an addict!’ All of us thought we could control it to begin with, and all of us were blind-sided by its power.”

It helped to read his words that followed: “I tell sponsees over and over that when we’re using we suffer from chemically-induced insanity—that we were literally not in our right minds—and still they are often unable to forgive themselves for what they have visited on themselves and others. How much harder it must be for those who have not experienced the power of drugs and alcohol first hand to understand the mindless compulsion that shapes every minute of an active addict’s life.”

Yes, it is so hard to understand. And the saga continues.

Hopefully, THIS will be the week my son and his wife decide to walk away from the insanity they’ve been living for months now. Before immediate consequences extend into lengthy ones. Or their baby is left with life-long scars.