More Evidence: We all heal! Ready to live again after 21 months.

[[...]]

I feel blessed right now to have read your post (which I commented on and then forgot about completely) because it is such a beautiful description to share with loved ones. I am struggling right now to cope with the stress of Christmas with brain damage as well as the realization that I have alienated a close family member. I intend to show this post to her, in the hope that she might find it in her heart to forgive my erratic behavior.

 

Thank you again FJ, for this beautiful success story. You have helped so many people here, I'm so grateful to you for your encouragement and beautiful writing.

 

Merry Christmas 

 

PS. It's funny how often someone will comment on a thread that really helps, and then it's in your recent post's.

 

 

 

Hello my sweet friend,

 

I'm right there with you struggling with Christmas and a brain that won't work properly and is 'pinging' all over the place and anxiety that is gripping. I also love FJ's posts as her words are very reassuring even when they have been direscted to someone else. She has had some very undeserved flak on here, so yes I too feel very grateful that she is still around to SUPPORT others.

 

Christmas.............. well it will come and it will go. There's so much pressure for a normal functioning brain at this time of year and we have to try to let it go.......pffft said she. It's hard I know, and families when they are not perfect ( hardly any are), makes it more difficult. Do not blame yourself for relationship worries right now, you/I are not thinking right and we cannot help that. As we repair, so will our relationships. No one at all, no matter how much they love us or we love them has an iota of the suffering that comes with this.

 

Stay strong lady, we will get there

[[Fi...]]

Who-am-I and Marj--thanks so much for showing up on my thread and being supportive of me.  It's much appreciated.

 

Christmas has a way of getting a lot of women whipped up, even when they AREN'T in withdrawal.  We feel we're expected to produce the whole holiday.  If we don't do it, nothing will happen, right?  But maybe this is the year to ease up on yourselves and just refuse to accept those expectations.  This is the year you're sick.  Please be as kind to yourself as you would to somebody else you loved a lot.  Do what you can and let the  rest go.  What often happens in situations like this is that you find out that others are perfectly capable of stepping up.  If they don't, maybe they'll at least become more aware of what it was you always used to do.  What are they doing to say? "Hey! I expected you to do everything just the same even though you were sick!" Nope, they don't have a leg to stand on.  If you are A types who always enjoyed doing it all, take heart.  When you're well you can go back to being that way if it suits you.  For now, just breathe deep.  Put yourself at the top of your own list since you may not be at the top of anybody else's!  Aren't we all trying to deal with a lot of people who have THEMSELVES firmly at the top of their own?  When that's the case, all the more important to make sure you're taking care of yourself.

 

Marj--I know you and I have similar issues with our aging mothers.  Recently my mom had to have hip replacement surgery and I found that trying to step up for that just pushed all my PTSD buttons.  It's like the book titled THE BODY KEEPS THE SCORE.  (Which I haven't read but surely the title says it all!)  Prolonged racing heart hasn't even been a frequent symptom for me during this, but at my 24th month off of Xanax, my mom pushed those buttons and a few days later (after stuffing down my actual reaction) I had two separate  incidents where my heart raced at 140 for several hours.  Five episodes of Nashville!!!!!  I just took this as a message that I really can't fully heal if I subject myself to this.  So--other people stepped up.  My mother's not mad at me.  I actually think it's made her take me for granted a little less.  I look forward to being able to be a person who can take care of others again, but I've learned from this, and I don't plan to go back to putting up with certain things I did in the past.

 

In recent years there's so much emphasis on how stressful Christmas is for everyone, it's almost like people EXPECT to freak out.  I hope we can let expectations go and take what peace and solace we can from the season for our healing.  This is the fourth Christmas my life has been impacted by withdrawal.  Four years ago I was in the middle of detoxing from Oxycodone.  In these years I haven't managed the "Look at our great family!" type of card to send out to everyone.  I've probably been kicked off most people's lists.  I thought maybe I'd get it together this year with a picture of us with our little grandson, who's been the light of our lives, but as soon as I pictured the negativity of trying to boss people into proper clothes and get the picture taken, I decided to back off.  I think I may just make some handmade cards or send some vintage cards I found in my husband's family stash to a few special people who've held onto me through this and let it go at that.

 

We will all have time for relationship repair in the future when we're fully well.  In the meantime, all we can do is try not to tear it too bad with people until then!

 

I hope the notion of the peace of the season will overcome everyone's disappointment that they aren't as well as they had envisioned by this Christmas.  I've always been a bigger fan of New Years anyway!  I firmly believe the next year will be the best ever for many of us.

 

Love,

FinallyJoining

 

 

[[wh...]]

Thank you so much for your kind words Marj and FJ. Sending virtual hugs to you both (I'm so sorry, my words are just getting fewer and fewer in this wave, I'm not able to write much.... )

 

FJ, looking forward to that book.....

[[Fi...]]

who-am-I-----maybe I'm just seeing your tagline for the first time?  Laugh out loud points to you for "I'd like to get out of this handbasket now!"  We know where we feel like we're headed, right?  But remember the bit about when you're going through hell, keep going.

[[Ch...]]

Wise words for the holidays, FJ.  I began ordering grocery store holiday dinners in wd and carry the tradition on to this day.  Takes a big load off the Stress List.  Raley's has great dinners for $59 and you can order online and schedule pickup whenever you want.

[[li...]]

Hello FJ

Thanks for writing your lovely and inspiring story.

Wishing you all the best.

From Lib 

[[wh...]]

I keep reading your original post FJ, over and over.

 

Right now, at 20 months, I'm exhausted with the timeline and doubting that I'm ever going to be able to think straight again.

[[Fi...]]

Who-am-I--I've PMed you!

[[...]]

I keep reading your original post FJ, over and over.

 

Right now, at 20 months, I'm exhausted with the timeline and doubting that I'm ever going to be able to think straight again.

 

I'm with you whoami, the exhaustion and spaced outness is so depressing. Sorry to whine on your wonderful success FJ

[[wh...]]

I'm trying to focus on gratitude, since it's impossible for the brain to feel fear and gratitude at the same time. On my list of thing's I'm grateful for are my BB's and kind friends, Marj and FJ.  Bless you both, a thousand times over.

 

We may be getting our branches pruned right now, but they will be that much stronger for it.....

 

[[Ca...]]

Dear FinallyJoining,

 

  I don't know how I missed this wonderful success story....I Thought I had read them all! What an encouraging piece and so well written...thank you! It came to me at the perfect time.

 

  You accurately describe this long journey. I read it to my hubby this morning as both of us are terribly weary. I've been sick with tolerance and recovery for four years....it has taken a toll. I see glimpses of healing. Your story gives us hope. Thank you.

 

  Any news on your book? I've just finished a self published work titled Klonipin Withdrawal and Howling Dogs...Maybe It Was God by Audrey Wagner. A good read.

 

  With great appreciation and compassion,

 

Carita...a fellow Oregonian 

 

[[Fi...]]

Hey Carita--I didn't know I had another fellow Oregonian here!  I'm glad you and your husband found my story inspiring.  This is really a rough go for a marriage.  In sickness and in health.  That's really what my book shows.

 

I'm pretty sure I'm going to be self-publishing it.  I haven't been able to get agents to even look at it because they say that editors refer to all such stories as "misery memoirs" and are very sceptical.  One agent said my book is really strong and powerful but she has been having trouble selling a memoir about a woman dealing with her husband's alcoholism and she--"sigh"--would have to go back to the same editors with this.  Excuse me?  EXCUSE ME?  If I can't get people to understand the difference between alcoholism and doctor-caused addiction to benzos and opioids, what's the use? 

 

That's why I figure I can get it out there faster and to the people who want to read it quicker  if I just try to figure out how to self-publish.  It's all written and ready to go.  I just feel I owe it to people to be 100% healed before I publish it, and I'm still doing mop up on a few physical symptoms.  I'm really hoping it'll be soon, though.

 

Best wishes to you AND your long-suffering husband.  He and my husband could probably relate.  Hope you're not in the way of any mudslides after all this rain.  Our river just flooded up outside the kitchen window, but we're used to that.  The house has been perched on this slight knoll in the flood plain since 1918 without waters ever coming inside, so we don't worry too much!

 

Hope  you have a peaceful holiday, knowing that surely healing is right around the corner. 

[[Fi...]]

Recently a fellow BB clued me into a book called You Are the Placebo: Making Your Mind Matter by Dr. Joe Dispenza.  I’ve found it so inspiring, I thought I’d try to pass along the main point which to me is—try telling yourself a better story!

 

People in benzo withdrawal naturally react negatively to the suggestion that all they need to do to get well is to think positively, and rightly so.  BW symptoms are completely real.  They’re not “all in our heads.”  We don’t feel lousy because we expect to feel lousy.

 

I expected to be dancing eight weeks after my knee replacement surgery as my surgeon predicted.  Not what happened.  I was slammed down by pain.  When I did a rapid taper off of Oxycodone, I was suddenly nauseated.  I didn’t expect that.  I didn’t even know it was a common symptom of drug withdrawal until I Googled it.  When I cold-turkeyed my small but long-time dose of Xanax eight months later, I had no expectations.  I hoped I wasn’t even addicted and I’d be feeling good right away.  Nope, slammed again.

 

When I first read in an addiction  book that I shouldn’t resent my symptoms because they were signs of healing, well, I really resented THAT!  It seemed pretty clear to me that the symptoms were signs my CNS was still a mess.

 

Somewhere along the way, though, I managed to relax into the whole thing a little bit.  I read the promises of eventual healing on the BB board and decided to buy into it.  I read Spark! by John Ratey and started making an active effort to work a little program of exercise to help my brain along.

 

And now, here’s the book You Are the Placebo.  Basically, the idea is that your thoughts actually can change what’s going on in your brain.  If you try to act more like a well person, your brain will reconfigure to accommodate that.  Likewise, if you’re telling yourself you’re going to be sick forever, your brain will go along with that, too.

 

In a wave, I used to lie there and think what we all do, “Oh, my God!  Look at this!  I’m sick!  I’m so sick!  I’m just a sick sick person and I will always be a sick person!”  At some point, though, I switched to blocking those thoughts with this:  “I have a beautiful mind and it’s doing the best it can to heal for me just as quickly as it can.  I have a beautiful mind and…..”

 

It’s pretty much impossible to think like this when you’re in acute.  You’re just trying to hang on and survive, right?  But I think people hit a point where they’re going back and forth between being a sick person and a well one, and maybe that’s the point where really paying attention to the story you’re telling yourself is important.

 

I can picture some of you getting ready to fire back why this won’t work for you.  Why you have xyz pre-existing conditions so that means you’re different.  Hey, I’m 64.  After a point, don’t MOST of us have pre-existing conditions?  Being alive’ll do that to you!

 

So please don’t waste your precious energy pleading your case to me, to fellow BBs or the universe.  Nobody can help you, really, but you yourself.  All the emotional energy here that goes into detailing symptoms and explaining why are you just aren’t well is just feeding a negative story to your brain.

 

I think it’s Megan who always says, “Distract, distract, distract.”  She’s right.  I’m just saying it a different way.  Put something less negative in your  brain than focusing on your symptoms.

 

Do you think it would be helpful to someone you loved to every day tell them a story of how damaged they are?  PERMANENTLY damaged?  How they are sick sick sick and no doubt different that all the people who heal?  That something was terribly wrong with their brain before they ever started on benzos and they obviously need some sort of drug, for God’s sake?

 

No, you wouldn’t do that.  So please don’t do that to yourself.  Tell yourself the story of how you are going to be well someday and then take whatever little steps you can today to push that reality forward.

 

I firmly believe that everyone can heal from these drugs eventually if they get their brain clean and stay off of everything.

 

Happy New Year!  2016 is going to be brilliant for me.  At least that’s the story I’m telling myself!

.

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest [pu...]]

Recently a fellow BB clued me into a book called You Are the Placebo: Making Your Mind Matter by Dr. Joe Dispenza.  I’ve found it so inspiring, I thought I’d try to pass along the main point which to me is—try telling yourself a better story!

 

People in benzo withdrawal naturally react negatively to the suggestion that all they need to do to get well is to think positively, and rightly so.  BW symptoms are completely real.  They’re not “all in our heads.”  We don’t feel lousy because we expect to feel lousy.

 

I expected to be dancing eight weeks after my knee replacement surgery as my surgeon predicted.  Not what happened.  I was slammed down by pain.  When I did a rapid taper off of Oxycodone, I was suddenly nauseated.  I didn’t expect that.  I didn’t even know it was a common symptom of drug withdrawal until I Googled it.  When I cold-turkeyed my small but long-time dose of Xanax eight months later, I had no expectations.  I hoped I wasn’t even addicted and I’d be feeling good right away.  Nope, slammed again.

 

When I first read in an addiction  book that I shouldn’t resent my symptoms because they were signs of healing, well, I really resented THAT!  It seemed pretty clear to me that the symptoms were signs my CNS was still a mess.

 

Somewhere along the way, though, I managed to relax into the whole thing a little bit.  I read the promises of eventual healing on the BB board and decided to buy into it.  I read Spark! by John Ratey and started making an active effort to work a little program of exercise to help my brain along.

 

And now, here’s the book You Are the Placebo.  Basically, the idea is that your thoughts actually can change what’s going on in your brain.  If you try to act more like a well person, your brain will reconfigure to accommodate that.  Likewise, if you’re telling yourself you’re going to be sick forever, your brain will go along with that, too.

 

In a wave, I used to lie there and think what we all do, “Oh, my God!  Look at this!  I’m sick!  I’m so sick!  I’m just a sick sick person and I will always be a sick person!”  At some point, though, I switched to blocking those thoughts with this:  “I have a beautiful mind and it’s doing the best it can to heal for me just as quickly as it can.  I have a beautiful mind and…..”

 

It’s pretty much impossible to think like this when you’re in acute.  You’re just trying to hang on and survive, right?  But I think people hit a point where they’re going back and forth between being a sick person and a well one, and maybe that’s the point where really paying attention to the story you’re telling yourself is important.

 

I can picture some of you getting ready to fire back why this won’t work for you.  Why you have xyz pre-existing conditions so that means you’re different.  Hey, I’m 64.  After a point, don’t MOST of us have pre-existing conditions?  Being alive’ll do that to you!

 

So please don’t waste your precious energy pleading your case to me, to fellow BBs or the universe.  Nobody can help you, really, but you yourself.  All the emotional energy here that goes into detailing symptoms and explaining why are you just aren’t well is just feeding a negative story to your brain.

 

I think it’s Megan who always says, “Distract, distract, distract.”  She’s right.  I’m just saying it a different way.  Put something less negative in your  brain than focusing on your symptoms.

 

Do you think it would be helpful to someone you loved to every day tell them a story of how damaged they are?  PERMANENTLY damaged?  How they are sick sick sick and no doubt different that all the people who heal?  That something was terribly wrong with their brain before they ever started on benzos and they obviously need some sort of drug, for God’s sake?

 

No, you wouldn’t do that.  So please don’t do that to yourself.  Tell yourself the story of how you are going to be well someday and then take whatever little steps you can today to push that reality forward.

 

I firmly believe that everyone can heal from these drugs eventually if they get their brain clean and stay off of everything.

 

Happy New Year!  2016 is going to be brilliant for me.  At least that’s the story I’m telling myself!

.

Love this thank you!

[[Fi...]]

Thanks, Purevida.  Seems like you're somebody I've managed to annoy in the past, so I'm especially glad what I wrote here was helpful to you! 

[Guest [pu...]]

I think were all annoyed in this process. I do appreciate what you bring to the community. We may not always agree, but please know, I have a deep respect for you and enjoy reading your posts.  Thank you again. I did print this out. I like your no non sense attitude. 

[[Fi...]]

:smitten:Back atcha!

[[wh...]]

Recently a fellow BB clued me into a book called You Are the Placebo: Making Your Mind Matter by Dr. Joe Dispenza.  I’ve found it so inspiring, I thought I’d try to pass along the main point which to me is—try telling yourself a better story!

 

People in benzo withdrawal naturally react negatively to the suggestion that all they need to do to get well is to think positively, and rightly so.  BW symptoms are completely real.  They’re not “all in our heads.”  We don’t feel lousy because we expect to feel lousy.

 

I expected to be dancing eight weeks after my knee replacement surgery as my surgeon predicted.  Not what happened.  I was slammed down by pain.  When I did a rapid taper off of Oxycodone, I was suddenly nauseated.  I didn’t expect that.  I didn’t even know it was a common symptom of drug withdrawal until I Googled it.  When I cold-turkeyed my small but long-time dose of Xanax eight months later, I had no expectations.  I hoped I wasn’t even addicted and I’d be feeling good right away.  Nope, slammed again.

 

When I first read in an addiction  book that I shouldn’t resent my symptoms because they were signs of healing, well, I really resented THAT!  It seemed pretty clear to me that the symptoms were signs my CNS was still a mess.

 

Somewhere along the way, though, I managed to relax into the whole thing a little bit.  I read the promises of eventual healing on the BB board and decided to buy into it.  I read Spark! by John Ratey and started making an active effort to work a little program of exercise to help my brain along.

 

And now, here’s the book You Are the Placebo.  Basically, the idea is that your thoughts actually can change what’s going on in your brain.  If you try to act more like a well person, your brain will reconfigure to accommodate that.  Likewise, if you’re telling yourself you’re going to be sick forever, your brain will go along with that, too.

 

In a wave, I used to lie there and think what we all do, “Oh, my God!  Look at this!  I’m sick!  I’m so sick!  I’m just a sick sick person and I will always be a sick person!”  At some point, though, I switched to blocking those thoughts with this:  “I have a beautiful mind and it’s doing the best it can to heal for me just as quickly as it can.  I have a beautiful mind and…..”

 

It’s pretty much impossible to think like this when you’re in acute.  You’re just trying to hang on and survive, right?  But I think people hit a point where they’re going back and forth between being a sick person and a well one, and maybe that’s the point where really paying attention to the story you’re telling yourself is important.

 

I can picture some of you getting ready to fire back why this won’t work for you.  Why you have xyz pre-existing conditions so that means you’re different.  Hey, I’m 64.  After a point, don’t MOST of us have pre-existing conditions?  Being alive’ll do that to you!

 

So please don’t waste your precious energy pleading your case to me, to fellow BBs or the universe.  Nobody can help you, really, but you yourself.  All the emotional energy here that goes into detailing symptoms and explaining why are you just aren’t well is just feeding a negative story to your brain.

 

I think it’s Megan who always says, “Distract, distract, distract.”  She’s right.  I’m just saying it a different way.  Put something less negative in your  brain than focusing on your symptoms.

 

Do you think it would be helpful to someone you loved to every day tell them a story of how damaged they are?  PERMANENTLY damaged?  How they are sick sick sick and no doubt different that all the people who heal?  That something was terribly wrong with their brain before they ever started on benzos and they obviously need some sort of drug, for God’s sake?

 

No, you wouldn’t do that.  So please don’t do that to yourself.  Tell yourself the story of how you are going to be well someday and then take whatever little steps you can today to push that reality forward.

 

I firmly believe that everyone can heal from these drugs eventually if they get their brain clean and stay off of everything.

 

Happy New Year!  2016 is going to be brilliant for me.  At least that’s the story I’m telling myself!

.

 

I LOVE THIS! Thank you FJ, great advice. I will check the book out.

 

This brought to mind what my neurologist (who I must say is amazing) told me, and that is that what we think all day long has a profound effect on the structure of the brain. Negativity, in any form, brings more negativity, and that includes the brain and the body. Along with getting proactive with any lingering depression issues, her prescription for healing the brain were:

 

Exercise regularly

Be with people, nurture your relationships

Get out and experience/learn new things

 

That is my goal for 2016.

 

And I agree, 2016 is going to be GREAT!

 

T

 

PS. I just want to say thank you for all the support you have provided me in 2015, you really helped me more than you know!

[[Fi...]]

Thank you, who-am-I.  (I know who you are !!!)

 

Maybe the hardest part for most of us about coming to believe in the power of positive thinking is that we've been dealing with this horrid illness where we've had to defend ourselves for so long against the accusations of others that if ONLY we'd just employ the power of positive thinking, we'd get well--like, right now! 

 

So maybe we're a bit resistant to embracing the idea? I think that's what's been going on with me.  I think reading about the scientific basis behind the power of exercise from the author of Spark! and the benefits of positive thinking from You Are the Placebo wore down my defenses.

 

BELIEVING you are healing is so much more than a poster of a seagull against the sunset!

 

Happy New Year!

 

 

[[wh...]]

Thank you, who-am-I.  (I know who you are !!!)

 

 

[Guest [pu...]]

Thank you, who-am-I.  (I know who you are !!!)

 

Maybe the hardest part for most of us about coming to believe in the power of positive thinking is that we've been dealing with this horrid illness where we've had to defend ourselves for so long against the accusations of others that if ONLY we'd just employ the power of positive thinking, we'd get well--like, right now! 

 

So maybe we're a bit resistant to embracing the idea? I think that's what's been going on with me.  I think reading about the scientific basis behind the power of exercise from the author of Spark! and the benefits of positive thinking from You Are the Placebo wore down my defenses.

 

BELIEVING you are healing is so much more than a poster of a seagull against the sunset!

 

Happy New Year!

 

I completely belive that we manifest our circumstances through thought. Not to sound all new age, but even though this process is grueling, better to get a more positive spin on it. Not to diminish anyone's suffering, but that's why I printed that post out. I actually put it on my mirror so I can give myself a kick in the ass. The time is going to pass anyway. Might  as well at least try to take the edge off on the suffering.

[[Fi...]]

Purevida--exactly.  It's all about trying to make it a little easier on ourselves for the duration.  A few people on here are their own worst enemies for feeding themselves such daily negativity.  They would never talk to others the way they beat up themselves.

 

Apparently the brains of those folks heal just the same whether they believe in the healing or not, but they make it harder on themselves as they trying to survive this.

 

When you can't change your circumstances, you can at least change the way you look at it!

[Guest [pu...]]

Purevida--exactly.  It's all about trying to make it a little easier on ourselves for the duration.  A few people on here are their own worst enemies for feeding themselves such daily negativity.  They would never talk to others the way they beat up themselves.

 

Apparently the brains of those folks heal just the same whether they believe in the healing or not, but they make it harder on themselves as they trying to survive this.

 

When you can't change your circumstances, you can at least change the way you look at it!

 

That's all we can do. I wanted to have a pity party today because I'm so fatigued and can't get out of the house, but instead of holding onto that awful thought and going into a death spiral, I decicded to to be greatful that I have a nice, quiet home and organized a bookshelf and managed to make some eggplant parm for dinner. I just decided to get busy with life stuck at home. That shelf is now organized (which I've been meaning to do for ever), plus there is something nice and yummy in the oven, so when my guy gets home I can at least not feel so guilty about not being a fully functional partner, but BAM! Homade eggplant parm.

[[Fi...]]

Good for you!  This is exactly what I tried to do, just be flexible about my life and do what I could when I could and not beat myself up for what I couldn't.  I've become such an expert at self-care!  I think of myself as two separate entities--the boss and the sick person.  The boss makes the plans and tries to make things nice for the sick one as if she deserves it.  The sick one's job is to at least TRY to do what the boss suggests, whether that's go out for a walk, do a little yoga, whatever.  In the end I'm happy with how this worked out, because my boss never did anything stupid like suggesting reinstatement, and my sick girl really did try the best she could!

 

Like you say, if nothing else, your shelf is tidied and your have a good dinner at hand! 

[[Bu...]]

FJ,

 

A couple weeks ago, you suggested Belleruth Naparsteck's audio meditation to me (Anger and Forgiveness). I got it, and I've listened to it every day. I listen to it as I am going to bed, or when I go out for a walk. I just wanted to say thank you! I really enjoy it. It relaxes the turmoil in my mind and in my heart. It's one more tool in my "recovery toolbox". Thank you so much for the suggestion! Meditation, exercise, and paying attention to my anger have been key elements in my recovery process. Thanks again.

 

Bubbles