It took about 11 days to go through all of the prescriptions I stole from my mom, and she had plenty. Leftovers from surgeries and sicknesses - she never bothered to take more than a couple. Vicodin and Percocet and Ativan and codeine cough syrup. Delish. When those were gone, I was back with the…
Hell is other people. Love them anyway.
I sat in a meeting tonight and felt completely slimed by another woman's share. It was so pregnant with noxious trauma and so saturated in delusion and resentment and suffering that every word that spewed out of her mouth felt like a noose around my neck. I had to clutch my throat and shut my…
Alcoholism Pt. 3: Moving Down South
It was like summer camp in a lot of ways. There I was, living in a house just minutes from the beach, surrounded by a bunch of young people who felt charged with a frenetic energy that can only come from rehab. Rehab can be a lot of fun. It really can. You sit around garages and…
Alcoholism Pt. 2: Numb
I'm 18. I've dropped out of college. I'm on Zoloft. I'm gaining weight. I'm stuffed to the brim with toxic shame and suffering. I don't yet know how to express anything or to ask for help, and I don't yet know how to accept that I am an alcoholic. Not a place I'd ever want…
Alcoholism Pt. 1: In the beginning…
When I turned fourteen, I started smoking a lot of pot. I loved getting high. It was like entering a new world where everything sounded better and smelled better and felt better. And food tasted so good. If I had a bag of weed on me, it was like security. It was a gateway to…
On Teaching: Part Two
Teaching is what I do for a living. It puts food on table and pays the rent. There have been moments where I have loved it. It was what I thought I always wanted to do. But like so many of us, the job begins to drain us of our inner source rather than fill…
Perception: Body
Perhaps perception plays its most deceitful and nasty and fascinating and sometimes wonderful tricks when it comes to how we view our bodies and the bodies of others. Especially when you are a woman coming of age in the western world anytime in the past two centuries. The overriding perception is often this: there is something…
The Wonder of Perception
Perception is an interesting thing. In general, it is defined as our way of seeing or understanding something. It can also be defined as our way of interpreting something. Even further, it can be narrowed down to a specific sort of intuition or insight. In recovery we talk about perception very much being a choice…
On Teaching: Part One
Ah, the work place. Is there a better environment in which to stir up all of your deepest triggers and fears and childhood wounds and place them on the table to finally have a reckoning? It has been for me. I teach at an independent K-8 school in Los Angeles. It's sort of a progressive…
Men, Love Addiction, and Miracles
I believe in miracles. Where you from? You sexy thang. That's right, I'm talking to you. Who? Me? Yes, you. You. (Me.) I'm that sexy thang I've been searching for all along. And I believe in miracles. I also love men. Handsome, strong, funny, sultry, scrumptious, manly men. And yet: they can't fix me and…
A Full Life 