Addiction paper

  Two months I was given an assignment of writing about child pornography as a addiction. This has been the hardest paper I have ever written. Every time I sit down I feel evil. I really feel it when ever I have to think about this subject or put time into it. Then I came over to my friend, Kevin Beaven's house so that he could finalize the paper with me. He is very technical and very critical of most things I write. So I am always on the defense with him. Because he is a technical and logical person I am sure I get on his nerves.

To change the subject, I have been thinking about going to graduate school away from Indiana. I am going to apply at University of Ky in lexington. Outside of my parents and boys there is nothing here in Indiana for me.

Tradition

Tradition is deep in my family. I think its because we love how mom and dad did things. One of the things we do and I  love is my dad and I have our annual shopping trip on Black Friday. Its fun and I look forward to it all year. With mom we plan this amazing day in November that we attend the Christmas and Hobby show at the fairgrounds together. The whole day is just for us. Both things I look forward to and we have such a blast.
Yesterday, Aaron and Mom went with us. We had such a good time. We went to HH Gregg at 4, and then worked our way to Target, Walmart, and the Mall.Mom and Dad have worked hard so that we loved Christmas and the Holidays. I really don't think there is a holiday where we have not established a tradition.


I love Black Friday because where so many people look at it as a day of head aches. I see alot of people shopping for the people they love. I see mom and dad shopping because they know they get great deals and they can afford the one extra gift that any other day they would not be able to afford.  I see a whole lot of Love in that day.

3 weeks

 I am three weeks away from the end of my first semester at University of Indianapolis. This semester has been tough emotionally and physically for me. Over and over my health has really taken a toll on me. I have also been really depressed. I think often I need to be the strong one and not let anyone see that I am hurting. I wonder if all women feel that way. I also know that during my life I have had it a lot harder so it really does not matter when I feel a little down. My lungs still hurt!!! but not like they had been.

Sabbath

  I have two really cute friends that I have learned to love. They are ladies in my Dad's ward. Sometimes in life you are blessed with the opportunity to help someone and you end up learning more from them then they from you. This morning Shirley had her first talk in sacrament meeting and it was on gratitude. It was simple and sweet. She has worried about it and fret and she did wonderful. I walked away from the talk thinking about how we forget to be grateful for the simple things.Like our family just because they love us. Our church family because they are willing to help us. and our calling just because they love us and we love them.

Dreams

Isn't it funny how dreams change over time. When my sister, Tina and I were little girls are dreams are a lot different now. I remember Tina's dream being a business woman with one kid, mine was to be a mommy but no work dream. That is the nice thing about dreaming it can change. Now I watch Tina with her six children and what a great mom she is!!! I know her dreams include her children and her wonderful husband.
  My dreams are very different. I know that my dream is what kept me alive often. The three little boys who I love more then anything. The idea that I would never see them again keeps my clean along with a lot of other things. That dream has changed from when I was a little girl. I often think about how my choices have changed my life. I wanted to be married forever and now I have been divorced for 15 years and never remarried. I wanted to only be a mommy!! Now the boys are grown and I am full time student. I can see myself in the poorest areas working and working the rest of my life.
  I love dreaming and seeing what I am dreaming! I am grateful for all the dreams that are available to dream!! In a book I was reading it talked about different people and their dreams. The book is called I Believe!!
Did you know these facts? Ray Kroc founded McDonald's at age 57, Michelangelo painted the Sisten Chapel at age 71, George Burns won his first oscar at age 80. Cal Evans wrote his first book on the American West at age 104. Its never to late to dream!!

Saturday

   I am busy working on homework. I have a paper to finish on Zionsville for Social Work Macro Class. Then for addiction class I have a paper on child pornography, which is very hard. If google child porn it will literally turn up child pornography. So the paper has turned out to be harder then I thought. Then the third paper is about an agency and its profile. Well enough about all the things I have. I did forget about my paper of Job. Anyone wants to help?

Accomplishments

 This morning I am trying to get to moving. Here is some of my thoughts. I having some different problems going on in my body. I wonder if I did not quit using what would my body look like? I really do know this answer, I have prayed about it. But in order to share this I have to tell you another story about when I first became clean. Right after I knew I wanted to be clean I moved in with my parents and my sons. By this time everything I owned was gone, and I had no where to go. I always knew that if I quit using I could go home. Well anyway back to the story, Eric (known as the devil according to my sons) is the man who got me hooked on the drug. No matter where I went or how hard I tried he found me when I was first getting clean. I worked at Toys R Us that first christmas. One day I am there I looked up and Eric had got a job there. ?Well I was a morning cashier and he was night stocker. So I never saw him much and I even changed my schedule to come in later. So once a gain Satan is playing with me the whole time of me wanting to do right. Any way his birthday is coming and he ask me if I wanted to go out to dinner at the Mall. So we did and then he said he got a room over at the hotel, I knew I had to be on the 10 pm bus or I would not have a home to go home to. So I agree and I brought him a birthday present. So we to the hotel and he pulled out a eight ball. To this day I remember my heart beating and my mouth watering. I wanted to. Remember by this time I had been clean 2 months. I wanted to bad.
THEN I remembered super nose which is my mom. My mom can smell anything and we jokely call her super nose. Well she scared me and I also knew that she held my life in her hands for a couple of reasons, she had my sons, I had to have a home for probation, and I was starting to feel better. So the fear of my mom was worst then the desire to use that day. I told Eric no and I ran out the door and I knew I still had time to catch the proper bus and be home on time to meet the guidelines so that I could still live at home.
The next morning I called Eric to see if he had a nice birthday. His brother Jeffrey said Joyce he is dead. I said"give him the phone quit playing". Jeffrey said that he came home and was laying in the floor and he told Jeffrey that his heart did not feel right and he took a deep breathe and died. The coroner's report his heart explored from the crack. The crack I would have smoked that night. My fear of my mom's nose saved my life. The hope that I could do this saved my life. This is a true story and it really happened. But to answer the question if I still used I would have died right along with Eric that night. Except we would have died in the hotel room and it would have taken a couple of days to find us. So noses are wonderful!
  So my next thought is what if I had never used what would my body be like now?  When I ask this question it makes me ask myself would I be on the path I am today. I do not know if I would have gone back to school. Probably not. Would I take my life for granted? Would I take my family for granted? I know now that in a blink of eye Satan can get a hold of you and hold you so tight that none of the things that matter no longer matter. I do know that I am clean because Heavenly Father never allowed me to lose the thought of my family completely or that he lives and loves me completely. So I have many accomplishments in my life but my biggest one is my family and everything it took to get them back.

Group

  I am part time group counselor and being off work has caused me to start thinking alot about different things. In one of groups we looked at a video and its name was Cross Addiction. I think the one thing I have learned by working at Treatment center that most of clients want to continue to getting high but not into trouble when they first arrive. The second thing I have learned is this amazing hope and love for the clients. Each one has taught me something very different, sometimes about myself or about being a social worker.
 So anyway on the film they were talking about relapsing and how its done very innocently and by quitting what you know will keep you strong. For example: quit meetings, stop exercising, pushing family away, etc. You get the point right?  One lady started she got hit by a car and the doctor gave her pain pills. Then she started using the pain pills wrong and that lead her into the thinking process of its ok to have one drink. She said within a few months she was thinking a liter a day, she would put her child on the bus then make all of her calls and pushed her husband away and eventually divorced him. I thought the part that she started because she was in pain. Then her thought process lead her to think what is one drink? Then she was back into the drinking and etc.So relapse is not oops I did this without thinking but a process.  I can not think of anything would cause me to go back to using. I know I am very careful about where and what I do. Even though its been 11 years.
  Another guy talked about the different activities that takes his mind back to his using. He said one night he was getting a mirror out to shave with and changing his razor and all of sudden his mind went back to when he was cutting coke to get high. We all have those things that remind us of getting high. One of mine, you know the children's cotton candy that comes in the alumunim packages that you find out the counter well when you first open that the smell reminds me of crack. But regular cotton candy does not make me feel that way. The feeling of walking outside on a really cold cold day and you take a real deep breathe and you body goes numb to me that is what crack used to do. The difference today is I have tools to fight with, I have examine the deeper issues and the fixable one I have and/or know what I need to do to stay clean. I don't go around buying the cotton candy or I do not on purpose take a deep breath outside. It does not have to be drugs What do you do that reminds you of a bad time?

Wednesday I went home from work I had serious pain in my right side. I never really say anything about anything hurting. My legs have hurt since I was 18 because of all the blood clots and the circulation in my legs are horrible. By the time I get home in the evening my left leg is usually about 5/6 inches bigger then my right and very swollen. But my side hurt and it hurt real bad and it was hurting in between my shoulder blades.  So I left the work and since my doctor could not work me in I went to the walk in clinic in Anson. Which i really like. Well we did a chest xray and cat scan for the pain. We found pneumonia in the lungs and small kidney stone. So he put me on medication and told me to follow up with Dr. office. On Friday I went to see Kelly at the doctor office. We found pleurisy.

Pleurisy is caused by inflammation of the linings around the lungs (the pleura), a condition also known as pleuritis. There are two layers of pleura: one covering the lung (termed the visceral pleura) and the other covering the inner wall of the chest (the parietal pleura). These two layers are lubricated by pleural fluid.
Pleurisy can be caused by any of the following conditions:

• Infections: bacterial (including those that cause tuberculosis), fungi, parasites, or viruses
  
• Inhaled chemicals or toxic substances: exposure to some cleaning agents like ammonia
  
• Collagen vascular diseases: lupus, rheumatoid arthritis
  
• Cancers: for example, the spread of lung cancer or breast cancer to the pleura.
• I am off work for at least two weeks. So now what? I have more test to come
  
  

My Testimony

  I know that Christ lives. I know he die for my sins so that I could and would have eternal life. I know that God knows me by name and loves me. I know that I am his child and that Christ is my elder brother. I know my family is forever and is ordained by God. I am grateful for my membership in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. I am grateful for temples and the fact there is one place that i can go have peace. I know if I work toward my goals that God will help me do the things that I am not able to do. I have seen forgiveness work in my life, I have a firm testimony of if you forgive others then you will feel peace. I know when I pray that he will hear and answer my prayers the way that I need them answered for my life. I will go and do the things that i am asked to do even when I do not understand why I need to do them. I am grateful for my life and my family. Happy Birthday President Uchtdorf!!!

Step 10

Have you ever thought you could be done with something and then return and realized how much you missed it. Last night I went to the recovery group at church. For anyone who does not know what that is, it is a 12 step program for anyone who suffering with an addiction with the church. Last night we had a great group, I promise that the spirit is so strong there that you could reach out and touch it. Bryan and Durell does a great job for the missionary couple.We talked about step 10 which take a daily inventory of yourself and promptly admit when you are wrong. So I believe that the 12 steps can and should be applied to your life whether you have an addiction or not. All this is telling you is not to let things brew inside and when you know you are wrong go say you are sorry or can we fix this. I know I sometimes forget that this important in my recovery, but more then that I forget this is Christ life. I wonder how often just a simple sorry could help a situation become better.

Butterflies

  I work at outpatient drug and alcohol center with christian values. It is ran by two older ladies who love everyone and they have "found" God in their walk. Well Jan Jackson is one of the counselors and she is always talking about her babies and the miracles that have taken place. During 10 months at Amani I have witness some of those miracles. Tonight probably one of my favorite clients graduated. She has had a hard life and she is the same age as Kevin and when she was giving her story I thought of the coin we gave her.One side has butterfly and the other serneity prayer. Over the 4 months she has been there I have privilege to witness a miracle and to have a sure knowledge of this miracle. I felt so honor and prievelege to be part of  it. To witness what God has allowed to plant in this young woman's life.  To me out of all the creatures that Heavenly Father has created the butterfly is the most amazing. It starts off as this ugly brown fuzzy thing that crawls on the ground and ends up being the most colorful amazing thing that gets to fly and see all the earth.