What's Up

As i go through the early days of recovery I have a song in my head, maybe in my soul. It is a surprise coming from a deep place even though it may not seem like a deep song. I’ll try to explain. Unlike ‘I’m So Glad Im’ Standing Here Today’ it is not about victory. The war is not over, only winding down and no one has won. The song is ‘Whats Going On’ by 4 Non Blonds my preferred version is a cover by Lady Gaga:http://tinyurl.com/mpcc4tz ). I first heard the song in a TV series Sense8 where it was perfectly placed to reflect the confusion in the struggle for consciousness. 

‘And I scream at the top of my lungs, WHAT’S GOING ON!’. A point of consciousness screaming to God and emptiness. 

The pain is slowly receeding. Yesterday, Wednesday I went out for the first time and had lunch with friends Susan and I used to walk with around the Rose Bowl. I just have tea but it is good to be out and to see friends not only connected to them but seeing their connection to each other as well. In the evening my mens’ group has a virtual meeting. Its all I can do to stare at my iPhone and participate but I get it again, my connections and the connections with each other. Thanksgiving was the first time I noticed that, I could see past my condition and see the connections family and friends have with each other as well as me. So actually, its not about me.

What has emerged is a part of me screaming out now, now that it is ‘safe’. I think on a subconscious level I had to keep control to get through or the only option would be a despair from which there would be no coming back. I must have held ‘strong’, like ‘strong hearts just keep going on, and thats why I’m still standing here today’ . But I’m not strong, I’m not standing, Im crawling and I didn’t beat anything, I just survived and wonder what’s going on? I remember reading about interviews with people who survived the Nazi death camps. When ‘liberated’ the people were told they could go home now and they wondered what to do. They had fortified themselves with hopes and images not of release but justice and maybe retribution, how else to make sense of their suffering and keep themselves together. So I am not the strong heart I told myselfI was, I am none of that at all. I meditate a bit and I learned early that my whole social identity is just a story I tell and get general positive feedback. Meditation strips those layers. In the last couple years I have gone deeper and had to confront that I am not the story I tell myself. I am literally called into being by my relation to others. 

And for weeks now I have been a golem/gollum, take your choice, traditional Hebrew or current Hobbit, they merge for me, into me, no energy and a struggle for consciousness. How Susan has survived this she may be able to explain someday but day after day watching me crawl out drugged up yet still in pain eating food that tastes like soap water every meal and in pain doing that. 

But its OK to scream now, it is safe. Instead I play ‘What’s Up’ and hold her, tears flowing down my whole shaky body..