Life is short

[stan]

when i was a child, i liked listen Vicky Leandros (a beautiful young girl) song on an old "gramaphone" (there was no internet and it was the beginning of vinyl disks)
i saw recently how old she become, my life has also passed, i have not lived how i would and we cannot return back, all this is sad

[Junior]

Stan, I desperately wanted to have children. Family is really important to me and I wanted to be a mother, then a grandmother. I wanted my grandchildren to visit me when I was old. I have a son and I'm very grateful that I have him but I didn't plan to have a child with a disability. He will not have children and I will never be a grandmother. Unfortunately life doesn't always work out the way we want it to but ... well I am a survivor. No matter what happens I just keep moving forward and .... I don't know really. I was thinking about this the other day when I'd been feeling really down and went for a walk. I realised that I must have a very strong survival instinct. You are the same. For some reason, we just keep plodding along no matter what life throws at us.

Hang in there Stan. Things WILL get better. They WILL!

[Sheila]

Charming old song!

Yes, as John Lennon famously said, "Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans."

I think you have to have your feelings about it all -- but remember that feelings are grossly exaggerated and distorted in w/d.

And, then I think you have to find something that helps you make meaning out of your history and something to live for now.

I guarantee that that some of what you're feeling now will pass automatically as you heal neurologically. When you feel better, your view of your history will feel very differently than it does right now. Now, you really can't accurately assess your past, present, or future. You have to mis-trust your own assessment right now. It is neurologically skewed.

But, it is also true for all of us (even if we don't go through a major illness) that we need to keep learning from life experiences, and adjusting how we do things. You can definitely find a way of looking at your life that turns it into something that you can value, respect, learn something from, and do something with. There are many, many different ways of finding or building a worldview that makes your life feel really solid and good.

It is possible for Stan to be happy and feel great about himself!

[Cosette123]

Junior and Sheila your words are very helpful for me at this time which is hard because I am in a wave again.I think like Stan does that life is too short and I feel sad to see that I have already lost 3 years of my life (And even more) because of the Withdrawal. My thoughts are too negative but I hope that my future will be better.

[Sheila]

There's no question that this is a descent experience. It feels like we're being torn apart. And it takes a wearisome amount of time.

But, it's also true that we are learning and growing so, so much because of this ordeal. It is not a waste of time. I watched people come out of the descent for several years on pp, and everyone came out changed for the better. Everyone had their eyes opened in some important way, and some people were very, very changed for the better. Many people found their life mission, which they had not been in touch with before their illness.

This week, I'll post here the collection of stories I have about The Descent Experience as an archetypal kind of experience than many other (but not all) humans have gone through. Stay tuned!

[Junior]

Junior and Sheila your words are very helpful for me at this time which is hard because I am in a wave again.I think like Stan does that life is too short and I feel sad to see that I have already lost 3 years of my life (And even more) because of the Withdrawal. My thoughts are too negative but I hope that my future will be better.

Cosette, you haven't 'lost' three years of your life. You have been on a journey where you have learned a lot of things you wouldn't have otherwise. You are still on that journey. It might not have been a journey you would have chosen for yourself but if you had not gone on it, you would not have learned all the things you have and met all the people you have.

[Junior]

My post above reminded me of this and I wanted to post it here. Someone gave this to me around the time that I was finding out that my son has autism. Although it is written specifically for parents in my position, I believe it has a lot of relevance to other grief situations. I believe the pain of a/d withdrawal is one of those. I hope you like it.

WELCOME TO HOLLAND
by
Emily Perl Kingsley.

c1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. All rights reserved

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like this......

When you're going to have a baby, it's like planning a fabulous vacation trip - to Italy. You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It's all very exciting.

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The stewardess comes in and says, "Welcome to Holland."

"Holland?!?" you say. "What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy! I'm supposed to be in Italy. All my life I've dreamed of going to Italy."

But there's been a change in the flight plan. They've landed in Holland and there you must stay.

The important thing is that they haven't taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease. It's just a different place.

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

It's just a different place. It's slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you've been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around.... and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills....and Holland has tulips. Holland even has Rembrandts.

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy... and they're all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life, you will say "Yes, that's where I was supposed to go. That's what I had planned."

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away... because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

But... if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn't get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things ... about Holland.

http://www.our-kids.org/Archives/Holland.html

[Cosette123]

Cosette, you haven't 'lost' three years of your life. You have been on a journey where you have learned a lot of things you wouldn't have otherwise. You are still on that journey. It might not have been a journey you would have chosen for yourself but if you had not gone on it, you would not have learned all the things you have and met all the people you have.

I agree,Junior.Today is better for me and hope is back. The people I met thanks to Withdrawal are very important and precious for me.I can even say that they saved my life...

[Sheila]

That "Welcome to Holland" essay is just excellent, Junior. Thanks for posting it here. Very smart way of capturing the experience of not ending up where you expected in life.

[stan]

Stan, I desperately wanted to have children. Family is really important to me and I wanted to be a mother, then a grandmother. I wanted my grandchildren to visit me when I was old. I have a son and I'm very grateful that I have him but I didn't plan to have a child with a disability. He will not have children and I will never be a grandmother. Unfortunately life doesn't always work out the way we want it to but ... well I am a survivor. No matter what happens I just keep moving forward and .... I don't know really.

i had all my life GAD bearable as you; i had the same ideas as you , but had to make a different choice when met my ex wife, and , unfortunately, have been thanked after 26 years together and be abandoned in withdrawal hell and divorce before tapering; my first goal is to recover 80% and today it seems it is far at near 32 months after last drop;