Grit

It made me understand so much more about myself. It provided me more of a direction to go as I move forward with life.

Truth is, I firmly intended on keeping the promises I made, but I wasn't equipped with the tools necessary to say no to my greatest love affair - it was all about the snow.

Remember the session with Evy regarding her anger towards anyone in recovery (refer to Part II)? I was in the same area as her in the building when she came to me and in a very excited voice said, “I have a present for you, do you have some time?” I was heading into a meeting, so I told her I would come find her after. She told me, if I missed her and she had already left to go out of state, she would leave it with the front desk. When the meeting was over, I was on a mission

"Realize it's not personal; people act out of their own traumas and emotional problems from way back, not because of you." – Robert Greene Often times, the “why” of #behavior, #beliefs, and #morals comes from experienced # trauma. While some believe if you process #trauma, it won’t have a negative impact. My experience is that it takes away the possibility of re-traumatizing, but it does not take away the memory or the meaning. When an individual tells me about an ongoing rea

When I was a child, I knew for certain I was going to be a veterinarian and live on a farm. When I was an adolescent, I thoroughly intended on being the first female president of the United States (or when feeling less grandiose, a social worker). When I was a teenager, I had no aspirations to be much of anything for longer than 10 minutes. The way I saw it, I was lucky to still be alive. In retrospect, I often think that I was too afraid of failure to really carve out what I

I think peace looks really different when you have to fight so hard for it. I’m currently experiencing the most peaceful crash out ever. Like everything is falling apart a little. I’m #stressed, #overwhelmed, and slightly losing it .. but also #relaxing, #vibing, and weirdly at peace at the same time. The first time I really understood “finding peace” was in rehab. I had been running hard my whole life – always doing something, always trying to prove my usefulness, always bei

Imagine being on a roller coaster – up and down, left and right, fast and slow, fun and outright petrifying. Now imagine being on the same rollercoaster, but instead of a quick 3 minute trip … it’s decades long. That’s the best analogy for my life. I wanted to get off, to walk on solid ground, to not be flipped upside down, to not feel debilitating fear when things move too fast, and complete anxiety when they moved too slow. I wanted to be able to connect with people, not ju