Sober Blog

I just read this article and thought it was worth adding a picture and passing on! We ladies are told to stick with the women and there are good reasons why!

Gathering with Women Friends
Can Make Us Healthier and Happier

By Rev. Laurie Sue Brockway

Good friends help us express our true selves and find our path in life. They hold up a mirror that shows us who we truly are … and they encourage us to be more than we think we can be!
A landmark UCLA study of female friendships confirmed the healing power of women’s friendships.”Female Responses To Stress: Tend and Befriend, Not Fight or Flight,” published in Psychological Review a few years ago, said gathering with friends in a nurturing way lowers the stress and strain of daily life. Rather that the typical “fight or flight” response believed to be triggered in people under stress, the study suggested women have a more expansive repertoire of behaviors. We release brain chemicals that urge us to gather with other women, as well as tend children (or others). The more time spent with friends, the more oxytocin is released — not just counter-acting stress but inspiring a sense of calm and well-being.
This bears out my belief that when women find a safe harbor in friendship with others, it also helps us connect to the power of our feminine spirit in a profound and deeply life enhancing way.
In the nineties, when I was the editor-in-chief of a national magazine, I invited a group of gal friends who worked in media together for a night of spirituality and girl talk. They were each fascinating, spiritual woman with high-powered careers. It felt very natural to call the evening “A Gathering of Goddesses.” Everyone loved the idea, because it made us connect immediately with the idea that we are Goddesses - beautiful, smart, powerful, able to effect change in our world. We so enjoyed each other’s companionship and support that first night; we decided to turn it into a monthly event. For over two years, we gathered every month to schmooze and share our stories, ending each meeting with a sacred circle in which we each took turns lighting a candle, articulating our dreams and goals and saying a prayer. We would bear witness to one another’s most pressing goals in life, and we would share the vision that all these dreams would come true. Indeed, many of them did.
Because we were journalists, radio personalities, performers, TV spokespeople and authors, I nick-named the group “Media Goddesses.” It was in the course of facilitating these gatherings that I discovered my new calling as an interfaith minister, and I stepped onto a professional path of helping facilitate women’s spiritual development. Having the chance to gather with other women in a loving and mutually supportive way changed all of our lives. We grew and empowered each other to grow more—13 years later, there is still and invisible bond than connects the women who were part of that group.
Having a special group of goddesses in human form in my life made all the difference on my life journey. My media goddess sisters were spiritual cheerleaders, continually reminding me of who I am. I truly believe that our connection to one another helped us all do our part to bring healing to the world.
One of the reasons I love The Three Tomatoes so much is that it provides a gathering point for women. If there is any time in history that women, and our world, can benefit from gathering, it is now. Whether sharing a meal and some girl talk, a night out, or coming together on line or in person to pray for peace, life will change in leaps and bounds the first day you call a bunch of friends together for “a gathering of goddesses.”

Yippee! Registration opens today! July 1-4, 2010 in San Antonio, Texas is the time and the place. Please go to www.aa.org to get your form and fax it in to General Service. There is nothing like being with 50,000 of your closest friends for the weekend! This world convention is only every 5 years and the last one was in Toronto. I don’t know where the 2015 will be, but it may not be in this country again for another 10 years. Don’t miss this opportunity to see how connected your are to something O so much bigger than you think.
Gratitude Cruises is hosting a dinner event on Friday, July 2, 2010 before the opening flag ceremony. Tickets are limited. If you want information, please email me at Snow@sobercelebrations.com.

I do a lot of cruising and see sober folks choose to disregard the clear signage that some of the desserts on the menu are alcohol laced. I have the slogan “Live and Let Live” deeply imbedded in my program and say nothing. Personally, I know I can’t screw with alcohol in any shape or form no matter how cute it looks. A teaspoon can lead to a tablespoon, and then before you know it, why not a shot.
The National Council on Alcoholism, and Drug Dependence survey found that many believe alcohol used in recipes burns off in the cooking process. Federal government research acutally has shown that depending on the alcohol type and the cooking method used, anywhere from 5 to 85% of the alcohol used in recipes remains in the dish after cooking.

I don’t buy Dijon mustard made with white wine. I don’t know how many ham and cheese sandwiches with this mustard will set off a physical compulsion or mental obsession that will lead to a drink, but I don’t want to find out. After the physical house cleaning, it’s the mental, spiritual and emotional housecleaning that needs daily attention. Sobriety is like a head of lettuce, it’s perishable. It’s only what you do today that counts.

In the era when I came into recovery, newly sober women either wanted to fix their teeth or get divorced. These days it’s only changed a little; it’s the plastic surgeon or the divorce lawyer. It’s easier to fix something outside than inside, but it’s also possible to be sober and stay married, even if it’s to someone not in the program. No, he “doesn’t understand” and he doesn’t have to, you do!

Saturday, August 15th is my wedding anniversary. I am married to my Velveteen Rabbit for 28 years now. I have loved all the hair and muscles off of him and he is my best guy friend, my lover, my sweetheart, my witness, and the father of my three children. God could not have picked someone more perfect for me as we are two New York City kids, and although he is not in recovery, we “get” each other. He has never told me to go to a meeting or not go to a meeting and I have been active in AA since we met. I was sober six years when we got hitched, so he has never seen me drunk. He has seen me in despair, but not in the complete despair of a drunken woman; he has seen me angry, but not angry enough to kill; he has seen me feeling suicidal, but not seen the razor blade in my hand; he has seen me run away from home and abandon my family, but seen me come back three weeks later, after about 50 meetings, ready rebuild our lives.

It has been real life, up and down, emotionally, financially, physically and spiritually. We have held on, and every time the smoke cleared from whatever bomb it was that went off we were as surprised as anyone else to find that we were still holding hands.

When we fell in love, we were inseparable and locked together. As love grew and the weight and joys and pains of family, children, education, careers, dreams, a house and finances were added, our arms pulled apart to form a rubber band that the weight of it all. The rubber band got stretched to the breaking point. If you have the courage to hold on, if you have the twelve steps to guide you, if you have a connection with a higher power, you can live, pray and wait past the breaking point to get to the other side. Waiting is something alcoholics hate to do, but you have to wait in order for things to pass. Eventually you start moving in each other’s direction again as the things in between you shift and change. The school bus doesn’t need to come anymore, the career changes, the finances change, the responsibilities change. Waiting for this to happen takes time, sometimes two or three years, sometimes ten. It will all pass eventually.

When you are at the absolute breaking point, that’s when most people get divorced. It’s easier, because it’s too painful. It’s human nature to not want to hurt. Yes, the children see this horrid relationship and it’s a bad thing for them to see, or is it? If we want them to have long term stable marriages, isn’t this what they are, staying together through the good times and bad times and coming out the other side? How can we be role models if we pretend marriages are only two options; honey cakes or divorce? We have already had the courage to get sober, the hardest thing any of us ever had to do. A bad time in a marriage is easy compared to getting sober. There aren’t good days and bad days in any long term relationship, there are good years and bad years.

Technology is creating young adults living in an instant gratification world. Status updates on facebook, twitter, cell phones and laptops provides instant communication and the illusion that they have “relationships” with thousands of people. There is no instant gratification in a long term marriage. I wonder how the 50% divorce rate will change with this next generation of tech savvy young adults. Are they going to think they should have instant conflict resolution in marriages and if not, to just get divorced and tweet on?

My parents were married 60 years when my Dad died. I asked my Mom what their marriage was like at that point. She said “We’re just like brother and sister.” I knew what she meant; they were as close a family member as you could get. My whole life I watched them kiss each other hello every morning and kiss each other good night every night. Maybe the small things are the glue of a relationship. My Aunt Chick still combs my Uncle Joey’s hair every morning after 64 years of marriage. I have a feeling that this type of kindness is the underlying element in long term love.

During the bad times, I put the marriage in God’s hands every single moment of every day and asked Him to figure it out. Now, 28 years later, we can’t wait to have a date and go to brunch on the beach every Sunday, can’t wait to spend time together and go play. We still get a kick out of each other and believe in each other and in each other’s dreams. Things will definitely change as we continue getting older and more factors introduce themselves into this love affair and yes, maybe we will get divorced someday after all. I don’t know what the future holds, but I know God holds the future. He already has it figured out, and I will defer to His wisdom while our beautiful fellowship holds me through whatever is next.

I don’t keep any alcohol in the house because I am a real alcoholic. Although it has been many moons since I had a drink, I know that it is cunning, insidious and powerful. I awoke many mornings in the old days baffled as to how I had yet another hangover when I set out with such determination the night before. I was sure I didn’t want to get looped and yet there, against my will, it happened again.
I don’t keep booze in the house because with this disease, I don’t know when or how it will strike and I prefer to keep constant vigilence. There can be a split moment when it looks at me and before I know it, I could be lifting a glass with poison in it to my lips.
Of course, there are many things I need to do to stay spiritually fit so that alcohol has no relevance in my life, but good housekeeping is also part of a healthy lifestyle. I find when someone brings over wine for a dinner party and there is a leftover bottle, it bothers me the way a mosquito in a room does. I don’t know if it will bite me, but I am surely not taking any chances.

Heart Shape Avalanche I saw from a plane

http://www.blogyourwaytoantarctica.com/blogs/view/179

Vote for me at above link. Here is my blog entry for this contest. Blogger who wins gets a trip to Antarctica.

Alaska, June, 2009
By Snow Piccolo June 26th, 2009 | 4:42 am

The depth and breathe of this trip to Alaska defies description. Words collapse beneath the weight of its beauty and the camera lens is small and impotent. If you have not been to Alaska, you must make plans to go at least once in this lifetime. I never knew that God’s world had so many awesome mountains, bulging purple starfish and a sun that comes up at 3:30 am.
Due to cloud cover, Mt. McKinley can only be seen 30% of the year. Our first morning out, while riding a glass domed train having reindeer sausage in the dining car, the clouds parted and there was McKinley in all its majesty.
Breathtaking excursions laced this trip with gratitude and wonder. I was dropped by a helicopter onto Mendenhall Glacier where I went dog sledding. My dog team placed eight in the Iditarod last year, the world’s longest dog sled race of 1150 miles. I didn’t ride quite that far, but the thrill was undeniable! The dogs were much smaller than I had imagined. I have relied too much on Hollywood for information.
I flew in a small plane in the evening with three other women over unexplored and unnamed mountains, over majestic glaciers sporting round pools of blue water which stared up at us like Mother Nature’s eyes. We landed on Ruth Glacier and yelled out “Denali.” Echoes came back through the prehistoric air four times. On the return to home base we saw a valentine in the snow, a dual avalanche in the shape of a heart. I took 576 pictures on this 12 day trip before returning to Florida, seemingly the other side of the world.
I should be Quark’s Official Blogger because my eyes, ears and artists heart are always to dictation and I love to write!

Oceania’s new ship to offer culinary sessions with chefs
By Nadine Goodwin
Oceania Cruises has partnered with Bon Appetit magazine to create a culinary studio aboard the 1,258-passsenger Marina, set to debut in winter 2010. The culinary studio will enable passengers to gain hands-on cooking experience at the side of master chefs. Passengers will have their own work stations, including individual induction cooktops. “Many ships offer cooking demonstrations. Our goal when designing Marina was to be the first to let guests experience cooking side by side with a master chef as opposed to passively watching from the audience,” said Oceania President Bob Binder.
Oceania said Bon Appetit would assist in designing a curriculum that would appeal to a wide range of tastes and offer options for passengers at all levels of cooking skills and interests. Passengers will accompany chefs on shoreside shopping excursions. They may also participate in private wine tastings or visits to well-known shoreside kitchens, Oceania said.
Calling the Marina a ship for food lovers, Oceania said it would have 10 dining venues, including six open-seating gourmet restaurants.
Oceania unveiled one of those restaurants, Red Ginger, at its press event in New York on Thursday. With seating for 126, Red Ginger will feature Japanese, Thai and Vietnamese cuisine.
Guests will have the choice of a five-course tasting menu or the restaurant’s a la carte dishes. The menu will include traditional fare and fusion dishes.
Passengers won’t be assessed a supplement or surcharge to dine at Red Ginger, Oceania said. Call Snow for independent travel with your friends or family for this cruise. 561-702-2312.

“All that we are is the result of what we have thought.” Buddha

I just came back from a cruise to Alaska where a posse of us carried the message to several small local meetings while on the road. At one meeting a gentleman was lamenting that he could not have a couple of beers in celebration of Memorial Day. After all, it was summer, and it was his American right to have a few beers. He could not make the connection between beer and the fact that he had just gotten out of jail after his sixth DUI. It truly is an astounding disease. Alcohol twists our minds so much we can’t quite comprehend what it says in the Big Book, “We are like men who have lost their legs; they never grow new ones.”

My first summer sober, I remember being on the beach playing scrabble with another newcomer. We wanted to be like the other young girls in bikinis seemingly having fun drinking. The weather was steaming hot and I remember really wanting a cold beer. It didn’t even matter that I hated beer’s bloating bubbles and bad taste and that I didn’t drink it even when I was active. I kept telling myself it was just a another cold drink. It was the seduction of it that I had to deal with, and another old idea that I could drink like other people that had to be smashed. I bought a cold soda, played several resentful games of scrabble that day, and just put more time into the getting sober thing. I was not sure I wanted it, all I knew is that I would get it first and decide later if I wanted it or not. They told me I could go back to drinking any time I wanted to.

How do you stay sober in summer when it seems like everyone else is having fun drinking?

#1 You must first accept that we are bodily and mentally different from our fellows.
For us to drink is to die or go insane. I had a pretty easy time admitting this, but a hard time accepting it. I had to pray fervently on my knees every day to the God of my sponsors understanding for help accepting it, just for today.

#2 Never go to any event on an empty stomach. We get confused on body signals with cravings and huger.

#3 If possible, take your own car to all events so you can leave if you feel uncomfortable.

#4 When you go to the beach
Take a small cooler of your very own with water, drinks and snacks. Bring some for sharing so you don’t run out if there are moochers around!

#5 When you go to B-B-Qs
Bring your own preferred beverages and some sweets to the host/hostess as a gift. Leave a small cooler with your favorite beverages and snacks in your car in case you run out.

#6 When you go fishing or to a baseball game
See above.

#7 When you go on vacation, go to www.aa.org and get the list of meetings that are available in the city where you will be going. Use the telephone to call your sponsor at home or the local intergroup to tell them you are in town. Get a temporary sponsor if you are spending lots of time on holiday in one place.

#8 Have fun at fellowship events
Check your local Intergroup for fun events like “Bowling for Big Books” “Movie Night”
“Picnics,”

#9 Plan a Fellowship Vacation
There are plenty of conventions, round ups and conferences to attend. Get some pals and plan to go on a program vacation at one or more of these. Plan on going on a Gratitude Cruise in fellowship.

#10 Create your own events to look forward to
Have a fellowship BBQ, Pool Party, Breakfast Bike Ride, Scrabble Tournament, or Pictionary Party. Get involved on any fellowship committee that is planning something, especially any fundraiser for your local Intergroup. Become part of the solution of staying sober in the summer for others.

#11 Carry Support
Gratitude Boosters: Write on ten small pieces of paper things you are grateful for and keep them in your pocket. If you feel bad for a minute, take one out and read it. Also, carry a little Big Book so you can go to the rest room and read until the dark moment passes.

#12 Remember, God will meet you anywhere!

Snow@sobercelebrations.com
561-702-2312