My Resentment Gems
When she was three years old, my friend Christina refused to hug her grandfather. From that moment on, she was known in her family as someone who did not like hugs. She does not have a memory of this moment. It is a story she was told, and retold about herself, many...
Loving Each Other All The Way Through
You can listen to this blog here: This story has a happy ending. I need to tell you that here at the top of the page, because things will happen in the paragraphs below that will make you doubt the ending. I don’t care for tension, so I am taking it out here for both...
My Three Favorite Words of Wisdom
A few years ago I started a new job and during my first staff meeting, I was asked to share one unusual thing about myself. Without hesitation I shared with my new coworkers my love of Suzanne Somers. Now, to the unenlightened, Suzanne Somers is best known as the...
Embracing the Woo Woo in LA
Thank you terror Thank you disillusionment Thank you frailty Thank you consequence Thank you, thank you silence – Alanis Morrissett Oprah Winfrey has given us three of my favorite phrases: vajayjay, Ah ha, and woo woo. Vajayjay and Ah ha are fairly well known...
The Ultimate Act of Self Care
“Your birth altered my whole posture on this planet … because of you, I couldn’t die and couldn’t monster myself, either. So you were the agent of my rescue – not a job for somebody barely three feet tall.” –– Mary Karr writing about her son in Lit: A Memoir Last...
The Ideal Mother is a Terrible Parent
The fallacy of the ideal mother I was a reluctant mother. Unless they are just bathed, dressed in clean pajamas and holding their own warm bottle in their tiny hands, I don’t like babies very much. Before I had my two sons, I would see moms in the Walmart with their...
Three Doors. It’s Your Choice.
Show me a woman in her late 30s/40s, whose life partnership is at least a decade old and whose kid(s) is out of diapers, and I’ll show you a woman who is about to say, “Wait. What?” to her life. This woman has done life mostly by the rules. She did both what was...
Living Awake: Sarah Blondin and the Unraveling
This is a guest post written by Lori Ann H., who lives in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada and has been writing/ blogging privately about her recovery since 2016. Mindful Meditation It is fascinating to me the succession of events that come together in our lives by...
Defining Our Stories with Truth and Love
My sons are 12 and 14, and they are fully and completely their ages. This means they are constantly engaged in testing both their limits and mine. A few weeks ago, report cards came home. Things escalated quickly and I could feel my 12-year-old digging his heels into...
The Third Thing You Need: Other People
“To succeed, most people need a community of support.” – Cheryl Strayed Many of us are working on our recovery alone or piecing it together from various programs, therapies and online resources. These tools are powerful, but they do not replace the need for actual...
The Second Thing You Need: Attitude
When we decide to make hard changes in our lives, we find ourselves facing down our own personal demons. These demons – or Big Bads – come in all different shapes and sizes. My demon was alcohol. (Or at least that is how it first presented itself.) Your demon may be...
The First Thing You Need: Desire
It’s Day Six of 2018. Is your resolve shaky? Are you rethinking your decision to change? To stay sober, stay sane, stay steady on your new course? Are you starting to give into the voice that says: “Maybe it wasn’t that bad. Maybe I can stay the same.” I get it. I...
Self-Care and the Holidays
Keeping track of it all Last weekend I was at a Christmas party at the home of a couple who have two children with special needs. Stephanie, age 7, was born with only one hand. Christopher, age 5, has Down Syndrome. The parents warmly greeted their guests. You could...
Braving the Wilderness: The Power and Limitations of “Tribe”
Braving the Wilderness In the history of me, there is before 2017 and after 2017. With every passing day of this year, I have taken my words and intentions and used them as a weapon – first against other people and then, in a much better use of my energies, against my...
It Takes What It Takes
The truth pattern of recovery: Clarity. Rock Bottom. Acceptance. Gratitude. Lately I have developed a healthy fear of answers. Answers seem to have too much rigidity around them. Black and White. You’re Wrong, I’m Right. Answers tend to turn ugly, quickly. I much...
Relationships change when you do. It’s scary. And worthwhile. (I think.)
“Relationships change.” My father-in-law’s new wife gifted me with this life truth a few months after she married into our family. I had just honestly and gently shared with her that my husband, her new son-in-law, and his brothers were feeling abandoned by their...
Finding a Whole World Outside of the Cloud of Smoke
The post below, originally published at The Fix, was written by Rebecca Rush who attended a She Recovers retreat in Bali earlier this year. (This fantastic picture is a favorite from that trip!) “I knew something needed to change in my life and originally signed up...
Letting Good Things Happen
You do not have to spend too much time in recovery before the Good Things come. Refugees from a foreign land, they arrive slowly. Just one tiny, quiet Good Thing at first. Then, because word gets out that you are accepting Good Things, others follow. Faster. Bigger....
Sobriety is a Gateway Drug
Please help us welcome Erin W. who will be writing for and managing our She Recovers blog. She is amazing. Read on and see for yourself. ~Dawn~ The Reasons It started with Baby #1. I like a routine; a schedule. And I read that babies do, too. So every night at...
