I came home from work today and my 8 year old
daughter said "Mom's drunk again."
So matter of fact. Nothing to
it. You’re eight years old and a
bi-polar alcoholic mother is what you got.
Sometimes it's pretty rough – in fact a lot of times. Sometimes there's a day of sobriety or almost
sobriety that makes you think, “hey this isn't so bad, we can survive this.” But then comes the mood swings, the
irrational behavior, the emotional and sometimes physical abuse of the children
and I can only be there when I can be there.
We're each learning to live it out in our own ways.
The
Princess is handling it pretty well all things considered. She has her Grandmother, my mother-in-law,
who lives with us. She's been sleeping
in Grandma’s bed since shortly after coming home from the hospital. Grandma or Abuela as we call her, makes all
the difference in the world for my daughter.
Not so for the Wild Man.
The Wild
Man, my 13 year old son, gets the bonus package. He’s not only dealing with his Momma but he
also gets the added benefit of the roller coaster emotions created by the onset
of puberty. A young man with an intense
personality, he is pressed against the crumbling edge that drops precipitously
into absolute anger, resentment, and rebellion.
Lots of behavior issues that we work through one day at a time.
The
College Man has some issues that I know from experience will bring forth a
harvest probably in his 40's. But for
now, away at college, he's in pretty good shape.
Abuela
loves her daughter. Not many would stick
it out with us when they figured out there's no end in sight. We've been through rehab a couple of times
and all kinds of meds but no matter where we go - there we are. Abuela is an old school first generation
immigrant who’s emotions swing pretty hard.
She looks like she's aging a little more quickly now but she still seems
to be hanging in there.
And me,
I don't know. It's really hard to see
myself. I know I struggle with the
anger. I'm extremely irritable at
home. I try not to be but I catch myself
in the middle of it all the time. At
work, I believe I've managed to keep the SECRET, the jail time, probation, the
innumerable hospital stays. But at home
it's all out in the open. In sickness
and in health, for better or for worse.
That's what I always remind myself.
I can guarantee you this is sickness, this is worse. But it's what I signed up for. I just didn't know it when I stood before God
and man and swore that I would keep her until "death do us
part."
Without
my friend Jesus I don't know what I'd do.
He has been a friend that sticks closer than a brother, I can attest to
that.
I'm
learning from Him. He's been around and
he's developed some practical ideas that work.
A lot of times, he just listens and a lot times, that's all I need. On occasion he'll offer an idea or two and
when I'm ready to try them, they really help.
One thing he's shown me is how not to quit. He won't quit on me with all the messes I've
made and he's teaching me how to do the same with others.
Another
thing He’s showing me is how to see. He
sees the end from the beginning. He's not
stuck in the here and now like me. He’s showing
me how to see my wife yesterday, today, and tomorrow. Most times I can only see her in the
now. All the anger, all the behavior
that makes me cringe or when I come to and find myself shouting, like some out
of body experience. Is that really
me?
When I
look in the now and see the physical effects of a decade of alcohol and
prescription drug abuse, when I see the behavior that puts us all on edge or
over the edge, I sometimes think “that's not my wife.”
Oh man,
but sometimes, sometimes I can see her when we were first married some 26 years
ago. So young and achingly beautiful, it
makes my chest hurt to think of her.
Then later in our marriage, presenting me with babies one at a
time. Babies like no one's ever had
before. Babies that are untouched,
perfect, arrows loosed in hope to the end of the century. I remember and I just smile.
When I’m
free from the now I sometimes imagine what she'll look like when we're at the
end, when it's all over. In my mind’s
eye were still together maybe holding hands.
Old, wrinkled, and bent over and when we look at each other, there's a
knowing look. A look that comes from a
knowledge that says "I know what you're made of, you won’t quit.” Despite our flaws, so many, so manifest;
despite all the failures, overwhelming; but through it all we didn't quit, we
clung. Oh some days I quit and some days
she does too, but rarely on the same day.
But through it all, I imagine we clung to each other, we clung to my
friend Jesus - and we made it. Yea when
I see her like that I think "there she is" "there's my wife." “The one I was made for and the one who was
made for me.”
