cause and defect

You can pick your friends, and you can pick your nose; but you can’t pick your friend’s nose.

There’s a thin line between recognizing the effect of past events and blaming them. When I started my journey, I didn’t want to consider the possibility that some of my outcomes were rooted in beliefs, that they might be anything deeper than a surface behavior.

Surface behaviors can generally be dealt with by practice. ‘Stop picking your nose‘ may be more effective than counseling sessions for a three-year-old, for example. At three, the child is just being childish. They put fingers into anything where they will fit, and they put things in their nose. Nose-picking is pretty much an inevitability, but it can be stopped before it becomes habitual.

Acting like a pubescent teenager as one rounds forty is also childish. Unfortunately, it fails the ‘acting your age‘ test.

We expect, to some degree, for teenagers to have raging hormones and uncontrolled eyes; but these are not considered positive qualities in a middle-aged man.

So how do we explain it when a man who is ‘old enough to know better‘ acts to the contrary?

Midlife crisis, right?

He’s figured out that there are likely fewer miles in front of his horse than behind it. Some sociologists say the man has a natural desire to procreate and build a legacy through many children. Knowing he probably won’t be around for their adult years, he seeks out a mother-to-be who is younger, likely more fertile, more in the prime years for child-bearing.

How much you wanna bet those sociologists are a bunch of guys in their mid-forties looking for an excuse for how they feel about their graduate assistants?

That oh-so-scientific theory of mid-life behavior does a great job of providing an excuse. Heck, the way I heard it explained, it made me want to go find a coed so I could proudly support the theory. But the more I thought about it, the more that felt like an excuse rather than an explanation.

In my life, I recognize that there were factors that helped to shape me. These factors didn’t make me defective; they just exposed a yearning in me that had to be fulfilled. Some of the factors:

• We moved frequently, too frequently, when I was young; I have no idea what a ‘lifelong friend‘ would be like.
• I was encouraged to be oh-so-nice to everyone, to the point that I just took it when I was beat up on quite regularly in elementary school.
• Dad worked long hours, and would often drop off his briefcase just to pick up his Bible and head to church.
• We continued to go to churches even when they exhibited the most toxic behavior (side note – my dad was a bit of a crusader; he always thought he could help people get their heads on straight in church wars, but usually ended up being pushed out).
• I learned to try to get people to laugh when things were tense. I didn’t understand that tension and friction can sometimes lead to the best of resolutions.

None of these things drove me to my addictions. At worst, they were (forgive me, Roger Waters) another brick in the wall. When I look back on those things now, I recognize the way those items and others helped to shape me, and influenced my thinking. For example, the thing of being oh-so-nice…I got along with almost everyone, except for the guys who used me as a tackling dummy after school. But not only was I not prepared to defend myself, I was actually discouraged from doing anything about it. ‘Turn the other cheek‘ was drilled into me as my defense. And instead of that building a sense of humility in me, it built rage.

With my kids, I’m teaching them not to just take it. As soon as they are old enough, we’re putting them in martial arts classes. And as they get older, firearms training. They are also being taught a balanced view of their own worth, so they know that they deserve a basic level of respect from others, and need to show others that repect as well.

Was my rage a cause of my acting out? Not sure. There was often rage in my acting out. I never felt like such a rebel as during those dark moments.

Was my rage justified? For a while, probably. It was wrong for Brad and his henchmen to practice flying kicks into my back as I tried to walk away.

But that was a long time ago. There is a point where it is my choice as to whether I will let that rage control me and influence my actions, or if I will release it to God and ask Him to heal me.

Wrongs done to me do not justify wrongs done by me. I am an adult now. Carrying rage from my fifth-grade year, and letting it influence my behavior, is about as appropriate and attractive as sitting in team meetings at work and picking my nose.

i object(ify)

Did you see the {name favorite part of the female anatomy} on that one?

That’s not a phrase I would often use, but it is the cliche representing an unfortunate fact; many of us do treat people as objects. That’s a problem.

I’ve jokingly told my wife, “Hey, any time you want to treat me as an object, you go right ahead. Think of me as just a piece of meat.” But I don’t really want to be treated that way. I really want to be connected to her, not used by her.

Objectifying is denying someone’s humanity. It is redefining them as something to be used, and that is demeaning (literally, removing their meaning).

This objectification thing has been a serious part of my sickness. I learned from a fairly young age that if I could use my imagination, the person on the other end could be anyone or anything  I wanted them to be. In my mind, because they were no longer human, it was as if I were living in virtual reality. This allowed me to have serial relationships without regard to gender without thinking of myself as gay. This allowed me to continue meeting people for anonymous sex without thinking about myself as a cheater. This allowed me to ignore reality and continue in self-destructive behavior.

My viewpoint is informed by my faith. If I believed that we were all a grand accident, than I’m not sure how I could look at anyone (myself included) as having any innate value, and justifying objectification would be fairly easy. If we are without a soul, than what difference does it make how we treat others? But I believe we were created as something more than animals, and that no one should be treated as “garbage on legs.”

Unfortunately, in my sickness, this is exactly how I treated people. I saw them as something to be used and disposed of, and I became quite proficient at both the using and disposing.

Maybe this is part of the reason I’m a decent programmer – object-oriented programming is based on defining things with the attributes you want and manipulating the object and its attributes. I have thirty-ish years of experience with manipulating objects. I should be good at it by now.

But there is a world of difference between treating an invoice as an object and treating another human being that way.

I’ll probably come back to this topic again soon. I don’t feel like I’ve fully developed it here, but I’m not sure what I’ve missed.

party on, prodigal father?

Prodigal can be defined as lavish. It is in that context that Louie Giglio presented a twist on the story of the ‘prodigal son.’

I’ve heard the story since I was a baby. A son tells his father he wants his inheritance, and wastes it. When he gets so far down there’s nowhere to look but up, he returns to the father to ask for a job as a servant. The Father has a different plan.

The way this story is normally told is as a warning about wasteful living, and with a certain air of deprecation towards the prodigal. We know that we are the wayward son in the story, but we are a little better than him, right?

After all, in that culture, to ask for your inheritance and leave home was like saying, “Father, you are dead to me. And I am dead to you.”

Pretty harsh, dude.

But when Louie offered his interpretation this last Sunday at NorthPoint Community Church, he focused very little on the riotous lifestyle of the son; instead, he focused on the return home, and the father.

I saw myself more clearly in the son this last Sunday than ever. The son was desparate, and he had a plan. He knew that he had offended his father in the worst possible way, and he had no right to be called a son anymore; but he also knew that his father’s servants ate (and probably smelled) better than he did. He was at the end of himself, and ready to approach his father in what seemed like a humble way.

He practiced his speech.

17 But when he came to himself he said, How many hired servants of my father’s have bread enough and to spare, and I perish here with hunger! 18 I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight: 19 I am no more worthy to be called your son: make me as one of thy hired servants. – Luke 15:17-19, American Standard Version

I can picture him walking along practicing his three-point plan. “Mr. Abramson, uh,…no, too formal. Dad! Might be pushing it after wishing him dead. Um, sir… OK, sir. That works. I’ve sinned against you and heaven. Good. Simple, clear, and definitely true. I’m not worthy to be called your son…man, that hurts, but I made my choices. Okay, the money line – Let me be one of your servants.”

He had to have a few doubts. “What if he says, ‘get lost, you big dope!’ I have done some really offensive stuff. Maybe I could work on cleaning up my name, my image…meh, I smell like pigs and I’ve been eating like them too. Maybe he’ll have a sinus infection and won’t notice.”

“Best I can hope for is a laundry list of things I need to do to measure up. Yep, ‘here are your chores for today’ says the foreman as he hands me a couple of scrolls of dummy-dos. Okay, practice the speech again….”

He is working out his plan. He has it all figured out. “I’m coming home, on my terms.”

He might oughta have checked with the father first.

He approaches. His father is sitting on the porch, maybe even standing at his gate, watching, hoping the son will come home. The father spots the son coming over the rise in the road and begins running. This dignified man, a man of means, hikes up his robe and sprints toward his son. He is overcome with joy that the one who was dead to him is returning.

The son sees the father coming, and is suddnely scared. “Omigosh – what if he’s coming out here to brain me with that staff he’s carying? Okay, get the speech out…here he comes… father…”

He is knocked to the ground as his father smothers him with a bear hug and a series of kisses.

“Um, dad…I have sinned against you, and heaven; I don’t deserve to be called your son anymore…”

“Talk to the hand!” interrupts the father. Then he turns back toward the house and shouts a series of instructions – a ring, a bath, some new clothes, and slaughter that cow we’ve been saving.

“But father, I need to say…”

“Hush, son. You’ve said what you needed to say. “

Here’s where we get messed up. We think God is waiting to whack us on the head (or the knuckles, if you went to Catholic school) for the things we’ve done wrong. We think we can somehow work our way back into his good graces by doing things right for a while and then holding that up for his approval.

But we’re missing the point. Grace, as Louie said it, is God in action. He has already extended us grace. He already sees us as sons and daughters, and there ain’t no pleasing or displeasing that will change that. The best we can do is never up to His standard, but He says, “I love you in spite of that. I am madly, crazily in love with you, and you matter so much more than the little messes you make.”

Are there still consequences? Potentially. But those aren’t punishments. They are the natural result of our choices. There is no gaurantee, or even hint, that we’ll be spared that.

But the Father isn’t waiting to club us or weigh us down with a never-ending list of tasks or set of hoops to jump through. If you see any of that in your version of Christianity, you’re reading in stuff that isn’t there.

Easy grace? Wasn’t for the one who sealed the deal.

Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation* for our sins. – 1 John 4:10, ASV

Propitiation – an atoning sacrifice; that which satisfies a debt

raging of the moon

So, tell me what I can’t explain; this howling deep within my veins,
Is it the pulling of some secret tide?
It’s the raging…
The raging of the moon,
Oh, we must awaken from the raging of the moon.
- Billy Smiley, Mark Gersmehl, Tales of Wonder, 1992

Full moon tonight. I had a friend who was a county deputy once, swore the crazies all came out on full moons. I used to claim the moon had an effect on me, that my acting out peaked with the full moon each month. Of course, I could as easily have claimed that days ending in “y” were the problem.

Tonight, the craziness is around me (note I said craziness, not crazies). I get up pretty stinkin’ early, so bedtime is around 9:00 for me. My wife leaves her Wednesday night group religiously at 8:15; she didn’t come home until after 9:00. My child’s nightlight burned out just as I was (finally) heading for bed.
We have a remote for our TV that comes straight out of a Star Trek movie (not the first one; that wasn’t cool enough) – touch-screen look and feel, blinks when the batteries are getting low. I was sleeping on the couch tonight because my wife was still wound up from her group when she got home, and the remote was blinking like a landing strip beacon.

Now I am awake.

This is how my struggle entices me most often.

I run on too little sleep (welcome to the 21st century, right?). I am almost always on the verge of going to sleep during any meeting at work, conversation with my wife … less trouble for me if I sleep at work. The old acronym of HALT fits me to a T – Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired are the times when we are weakest. “Tired” is always right behind me, and occasionally catches up.

“Hungry” gets us because the pleasure center activated by food is the same one activated by sex, or illicit drugs. Hunger pangs can increase impulsive/unwise choices. I’m currently eating five or six small meals a day, so this one isn’t usually an issue for me.

“Angry” leaves us wanting revenge. I’ll show him/her/them/God – I’ll go do my thing, and nobody is getting in my way. This is a strong pull for me. Anger comes easily.

“Lonely” is probably obvious enough. That’s part of the reason we need accountability partners – “sponsors” and the like in 12-step terms. The more I focus on relationships, the less of a trigger this becomes.

“Tired.” Defenses are down, thought processes aren’t so clear…I might be inclined to sit up late and work on a blog entry instead of getting to sleep. Oops. That’s what I’m doing now.

Remembering that acronym, HALT, has been very helpful to me. It isn’t magic; but I remember, now and then, and am inspired to guard my heart just a little more closely from the Enemy.

warning signs

I was wearing waist size 48 pants, and they were getting tight. The doctor’s scale read ‘328′ – pounds, in case you’re wondering. My doctor was threatening gastric bypass surgery.

My saving graces were hereditary low blood pressure and an amazing lack of any signs of diabetes; but even I had to admit I was on a likely collision course with those side effects of carrying so much weight.

Thankfully, when it came to my food issues, there were very clear indications that I was headed for danger. I was able to take steps before I ran into the wall. I started a year ago with watching what I eat, exercising regularly (maybe a little too regularly), and trying to remember that I am living a new lifestyle rather than dieting.

The result – not as dramatic as I would have hoped; but I’m down 40-something pounds, and I fit comfortably in size 42 pants.

Miles to go before I sleep.

Unfortunately, many other addictions do not exhibit external warnings. The nicotine addict may not know there’s a problem until the x-ray shows spots in the lungs. The functional alcoholic may be unaware until the liver tests come back with questionnable results. The porn addict is without warning through medical technology – he or she just slowly drifts away from meaningful relationships and focuses increasingly on their own gratification and less on relating. In all cases, a careful look at the bank account could provide some warning, I suppose; but the externals aren’t there.

That is part of the reason addiction happens. It is subtle, progresses slowly, and eventually consumes the subject.

I think the test you might consider, if you think there just might be a problem (or if someone else says you hve a problem, but you don’t think so) is to look at how your time and treasure are being spent. Take an honest look at how that looks today compared to a few months ago. Any changes? If you were to give up that behavior for a few days, a few weeks, a few months, would you become more and more agitated, and get the feeling that one little present to yourself (taking that drink, visiting that strip club, whatever) would make it all better? If that fits you, I would suggest you might have a problem.

For me, I was able to set aside my sexual activity for long periods. But then I started eating more. Much more.

Transferrance. Substituting one medication for another. Finding comfort rather than seeking resolution.

can’t get no…

I’m not a big fan of televangelists. I don’t watch the shows because, well, generally I find the shows to be more about selling stuff to support their ministry than about ministering.

That said…last night we had one of the longer-running shows from that category on as we vegged. Long day, lots of driving, the kids were in bed, and we didn’t really feel like thinking much. That somehow led to watching one of the religious broadcasting channels.

The show I saw had two guests with surprisingly relevant stories to share. The second was John Schlitt, formerly of Christian rock artists Petra, and more formerly of one-hit-wonders Head East. If you don’t remember the song, Don’t Misunderstand Me, you might remember the album title – Flat As a Pancake. Schlitt was recalling the drugs part of sex and drugs and rock and roll, and how he was literally planning his suicide when his wife brought him to a pastor who spoke some truth into his life. By the way, according to the Wikipedia article about him, he spent several years working in a factory and a mine between his drug-infested rocker days and joining Petra. Symbolically hit rock bottom, you might say.

He was the second guest on the show. The first was Brian “Head” Welch, formerly of Korn, whose story was strikingly similar to Schlitt’s. Just twenty years later. The song remains the same.

I guess the reason this all struck me was that I was reading, just before joining my wife on the couch for the show, that Stone’s guitarist Ron Wood has taken an 18-year-old barmaid to his Irish estate and stopped talking to his bandmates. Or his wife. All of his support system says that he has gone back into heavy drinking and that has impaired his judgment.

I’m not trying to rag on rockers here. I’m saying that pursuing an alternative to reality isn’t anything new. Mr. Wood is living a short-term fantasy, fueled by alcohol and whatever else. And when he comes back down, he’s still going to be a guy who has outlived his legend, and doesn’t know how to age gracefully. He’ll still be himself, only now with a bit more baggage.

This is the way of addiction. Acting out never offers a positive outcome, only a short-term sense of relief with larger repercussions.

ripple effect

A case has been in the news for the last week about a teenage girl who disappeared after her uncle dropped her off at a convenience store. She was found yesterday, in a shallow grave, found by police who had searched her uncle’s house. He was a repeat offender, a graduate of his state’s ‘exemplary’ program for reforming sex offenders. He was being supervised by the state. And he was (allegedly) molesting another of his relations for the last five years, starting when she was nine.

A lot of people are outraged right now. I feel that.

But I also feel a little of a sense of “there, but for the grace of God, go I.”

Most sex addicts are not into kids. Most respect the boundary of legal age, if for no other reason than fear. But the thing about boundaries is that they blur more and more as an addict descends. The things I said I would never do at fifteen became habitual by the time I was twenty.

I kept a strong boundary between my Friday-night and Sunday-morning lives. I thought I could always be the perfect gentleman regarding the women I met at church as long as I had my other outlets. But eventually I crossed that boundary; and once it was crossed, I never looked back. I was teaching a college-age Sunday School class one morning when I looked around and realized that most of the females in the room had good reasons, personal reasons, to think me unqualified to lead the class.

And I know of a few cases where my sickness had a lasting effect on someone else’s life.

One woman passed up an excellent professional opportunity because I was in hot pursuit, and was very convincing. Once I realized that she wasn’t going to be a conquest, I dropped her; but by then she had accepted a much lesser opportunity so that she could be near me.

I was the first in a string of affairs for the wife of a one-time friend. Given her personality, that might have happened whether I was involved or not. Don’t know, doesn’t matter. I was the first one to intrude in their marital bed, which was a line she was quite sure she would never cross.

There is a lot of wreckage in my wake.

At one point, early in my teens, I told myself, “I’m not hurting anyone else with this.” I believed it. It was a lie.

I was lowering my own standards and boundaries, and you can’t keep doing that without, eventually, having a very direct impact on someone else.

There are a few, very few, lines I never crossed. I take no pride in that. When I went to my first meeting, I remember thinking, “Some of these people are really sick. I’m nowhere as far gone as them.” Now I understand. I’m every bit as far gone. I just have a different set of haunting memories to deal with.

So what about this sensational case in Vermont?  I may be making a supposition or two, but I would be willing to bet that the story of this twisted uncle probably starts similarly to mine. His ‘ripples’ spread further than mine, hurt more people more directly; but I am no better than him.

pathway to addiction

I’ve written before that addiction is not really about the object (drugs, sex, food, alcohol, whatever); it is about something in your heart that never healed properly.

I am the youngest of several kids. My dad grew up poor, and insisted on making sure that we lived better than he had. He worked hard, for long hours, and all for a very noble purpose. When he came home, he was often on his way to church. He was a leader, a teacher, a choir member … and even preached once or twice. He was a very busy man, busy at very important and worthwhile things.

But I needed a father.

Plenty of studies have shown that the crucial years in a child’s development go through phases. For the baby and toddler stages, the mother is their primary support. The child learns love and comfort in the mother’s arms. As preschool starts turning to school, the father becomes more crucial. For a daughter, this is where she really forms her main ideas about the type of man she hopes (if she hopes) to marry someday. For a son, this is where he figures out what a man is or isn’t.

My dad wasn’t there a lot during that time, so I did what people do – I adapted. I transferred my hopes and expectations from my dad to my oldest brother.

Interesting. If I’d grown up in an inner-city environment, I might be a gang-banger today.

My brother was not mature, and didn’t deserve that kind of expectation from me, so he would do everything he could to get me to leave him alone. He locked me in a closet when he knew no one else would be home for hours. He called me his “little sister” when his friends were around. He told me we would play hide-and-seek out in the woods, then he would go back to the house to watch TV while I was counting.

Some of it is pretty funny, now. But it was fairly painful for a seven-year-old boy.

Couple all of that with my dad’s career moves, which meant I had no friendships with a duration longer than about three years, and I became one disconnected little boy. I was a time bomb waiting to be set off.

It isn’t a pretty picture, but I was a huge sore in search of a salve. Guess where I found it.

When I was twelve years old, my parents left me with my grandmothers for a couple of weeks. One of my grandmothers was great – took me around to show me off to her friends, took me to the old ice cream place where my mom used to go when she was a teen, made me feel like I mattered. The other grandma would eventually be recognized as the family crazy. I think that is a technical term psychologists use, but I think you can catch the meaning.

She exposed herself to me.

I don’t know that it was intentional. She hadn’t had anyone else in her house overnight in a long time. It doesn’t much matter. When a boy deep in puberty sees his first naked woman, it is formative. When it is a family member, that’s wrong. When said family member is past retirement age, that is just gross. That would likely mess anybody up.

Imagine my relief when I found my brother’s cache of softcore porn mags a few weeks later. It could never quite erase what I had seen, but there was some consolation that there were women who didn’t look like her. Of course, I learned about plastic surgery and airbrushing later; but it was better.

There is more, much more; but I fear I’ve been too graphic already. One of the premises of most recovery groups is that you share your story carefully, with safe people – people who won’t make excuses for you or condemn you. I am putting this out in a very unsafe place. But I am also fairly anonymous.

I give you a little more than is ’safe’ in hopes that you can see that what evolved from my pain was not the real problem. Acting out through sex was a symptom. Eating until I was nearly ill, on a regualr basis, was also a symptom. The issue was my heart, and a wound that I couldn’t quite seem to cover.

People who say they are interested in recovery, but are not willing to take a look at the roots of their actions, may be kidding themselves about wanting recovery. I went for as long as a year without any sexual activity, but the wound was still open. The right trigger was pushed, and I was right back in it.

For me, looking back at what set me up was more crucial to recovery than trying to white-knuckle my way through.

For me, opening my heart to the only One who can heal those kinds of wounds was the start to recovery.