Respect Knowledge, Love your Body

They say that your body is your sanctuary, your home, your friend, your life. When I look back at the way I use to view my body, it brings tears to my eyes.

I see that little girl wearing her sister’s tutu and for the first time in that little girl’s life, she felt shame. The little girl looked in the mirror and something inside her shifted. She was exposed to a new world, filled with disgust, insecurities and rejection. Her life was never the same.

She began to see things that she had never noticed before. Her knowledge of this new world hurt and so she picked up her barbies, and forgot about her dreams. She looked at the naked, shiny, smooth skin and slowly the fondness she had for her magical realms became a pessimistic appreciation of the world. She was lost, lost from the world of love.

The thing about being lost is that you can find yourself again. The little girl is still inside me, but I take care of her now, she is loved and loves.

-Sober Jacqueline

John Jacob Jingle Hymer Smith

Hello all!

I will be away for the next three months, may make periodcial updates, such as this, as I progress in treatment.

Thanks for your support!

Sobriety and Jacqueline

Toxic

I need to go for a run outside. I’m in the room and am sick of watching zombie movies.

I think all these negative thoughts about myself and then I confirm them by acting on old behaviors. Self-sabotage. I don’t know how it feels to be in a “normal” state of mind. I’m addicted to the chaos. I create the chaos because I don’t know how to live any other way. In all it’s un-comfortability I feel comfortable.

If you read my past post about standing in the storm on Denman, and how I felt so comfortable with all the chaos surrounding me, well that’s the perfect analogy to my life.

I can’t stop listening to Yael Naim, her music is helping my sadness with the beauty.

The cravings begin when the sun starts to rise

A girl walks from a motel called, inner-city. Her hair flaps in the morning wind. Behind her are screams. She can see her breath. That was fucking ridiculous. Fucking idiot. She walks in the general direction of the sky train. She sees a car coming from the opposite direction, sticks her thumb out, and decides she doesn’t want the night to end. The cravings begin when the sun starts to rise. Maybe I’ll have better luck walking down a side street. A car is left running outside of a home. The girl stumbles towards the car, her eyes dart around, looking for the driver, looking for someone to ease her pain.

Reality sets in and she remembers she has sleeping pills back at her tiny one bedroom apartment across town. The pills will help her sleep, if nothing else, she can go online and find a john to get her high.

She walks back to the main road and journeys yet again in the general direction of the skytrain. She sticks her thumb out at the cars that pass hoping she doesn’t have to catch the train all the way across town, look at the people going to work, feel their stares on her wild hair and red eyes.

The rest is a blur.

She sleeps through the next day with 5 missed calls, an apologetic text from the john at the inner city motel, and a lingering question:

How did I get home?

North Winds

Vayu, the hindu’s god of wind, brought wind from the north, to a corner of Denmen Island. The Consequences of Vayu’s actions were not severe.

Some whitecaps out at sea, 

sand tumbling from a cliff.

Not a lot to really see the effects, but we know things are changing. 

We walked and felt the brutal cold from the bitter north winds. Took pictures that capture the beauty, so we don’t have to. Our minds have so much to carry already. Why stop to smell the metaphorical roses?

Too cold for recollection?

Perhaps.

New Light

I am 2 monthes clean and 1 month smoke free.

I am happy

There is not a cloud in the sky.

Life is okay.

It is beautiful

So am I

-

Collected results

Hidden in plain sight
Step after step

Touching turns to pain
Laughter into sighs
passes, walks, runs.

Chimes alert
Beauty in the wind
The barrier recedes

Hidden
Lost in the masses

Respective Memoirs

-Jacqueline

Shrunken Heads

I’m back in Vancouver, and am missing the tiny island full of interesting characters. I have been back for a few days and am already feeling lost among the crowds. Feeling trapped is so easy in this city and it’s increasingly hard to find my footing here. I walk past hundreds of people everyday and I don’t know a single one of them, it’s almost daunting. Although it does become easy to hide here. No one notices what your doing, they’re so focused on themselves.

I moved into the supportive recovery bed, and I like it already. How could you go wrong with your own bathroom! Bringing my laptop was a smart idea as well since they have internet here, so I will not go completely insane.

Everything is just one day at a time, recovery is so hard and if I look at the big picture, I will overwhelm myself. I keep pushing my friends away. I push and push, and I think they have finally stopped pushing back. I sort of miss the prodding and poking, but I also really enjoy the fact that now I can start over, clean, scrap all that garbage into the toilet and let the ocean worry about my pollution. Although I know that it doesn’t work that way, but for now, it will have to do.

Besides what better place then this big city to rebuild yourself, although I know now, with social media, there are only about 4 degrees of separation, but I’ll just pretend I don’t know anything about that…

For now.

In the midst of a storm.

There is something calming about standing in the midst of a storm. Standing at the edge of the ocean with the wind pushing at you while you try to stay upright, the wind whipping your hair, the ocean’s whitecaps hitting the rocks. Beauty.

I have noticed my grief. The grief that I keep pushing down. I realize that right now, I am not using. I am not hiding my track marks, I have no track marks to hide. I have faint scars on my anti-elbow that I see, but unrecognizable by most. I have scars from my young teenage hood that I bare, not with pride, but with indifference. It made me who I am, it is apart of my past. I refuse to hide those scars. Although I do have a tattoo that I absolutely hate, which sadly, I feel shame for. It just looks so ridiculous, a skull with bows, on my back, ‘nuff said.

When standing on the rocks at the edge of the ocean looking out at the whitecaps, I felt calm.

I feel calm and serene when surrounded by chaos.

Strange.

healthdemystified asked: Jacqueline, thank you for posting what you post. It must be really tough to go through what you go through on a daily basis trying to overcome your addiction. In my practice i've come across so many people just like you struggling with addiction, but it's rare to see someone so honest and real about it. Let me know if you ever have any questions about health in general -Eric

Wow, thank you so much, I truly appreciate your kind words.

I will definitely keep you in mind if I have questions in the future!

Thank you again,your comment made my day =)

-Jacqueline