The Sober Kitchen

I've recently reacquainted myself with The Sober Kitchen: Recipes and Advice for a Lifetime of Sobriety, by Liz Scott. The Sober Kitchen is not only a great coookbook - it's a great recovery tool. Liz is a professional chef and a recovering alcoholic and she speaks candidly about the daunting prospect of abandoning her career to protect her sobriety. Luckily for us, she decided to create a context in which her sobriety and her love for cooking, and sharing healthy and nourshing food, fit together hand in glove. Everything following in italics is a direct quote from the book.

I also know that developing healthy eating habits and attempting a new lifestyle are goals that need to be attained through small and significant steps if they are to have any long-term impact. Changes in diet cannot and should not be thrust upon us, particularly as some magical solution to our addiction. We all know there is no quick-fix dietary answer to getting and staying sober and enjoying the recipes from this book will not guarantee your sobriety. What I am hoping is that you will discover how including good food in the recovery process may play a significant and often overlooked part in its success and, at the very least, help to make the ups and downs of the journey a bit easier to understand and accept.

We are often told that being proud of our recovery is an important part of our progress, but being proud implies that we shouldn't feel ashamed of our disease. Too many of us are compelled to make up socially acceptable reasons why we no longer drink rather than admit to the reality of our illness. Maybe having a cookbook and eating guide that addresses the specific issues we face will convince us , as well as the rest of the world, that we have nothing to be ashamed of.

Liz divides the cookbook into three phases of recovery:

Phase One - Saving Your Life and Staying Sober includes beverages, snacks and sweets, soup and easy dinner solutions. During this early stage of recovery, which lasts anywhere from six months to a year and a half, there is only one real objective and that is to not drink.

Phase Two - Getting Comfortable and Feeding Your Inner Child has breakfast and brunch recipes, comfort food, side dishes and desserts. By Phase Two, what has changed is nearly everything! Cravings are fewer and farther between. Time away from home to attend programs or meetings has lessened. We're hopefully feeling a lot more confident and healthier by having removed alcohol from our lives and are discovering the satisfying and happy life of sobriety. This isn't to say that we feel great every day of the week, but it does get better.

Phase Three - Enhancing Your Health and Becoming a Sober Gourmet showcases salads, vegetarian cooking, food as medicine and sober makeovers of classic recipes. By Phase Three, generally reached by the third or fourth year of sobriety; we have come to an important point in our recovery when, more often than not, life is good, physical and mental health is greatly improved, and we are easily able to face the trials of life without reaching for a chemical substance to get us through them.

Exploring this cookbook has been so much fun and every recipe I've tried has been great! I'll post a few here in the coming weeks starting with the one below. This rediscovered tool fits in perfectly with my East work on the medicine wheel and the self-care I'm implementing. I would recommend this cookbook/recovery tool to anyone.

The Road to Recovery Trail Mix

Simply combine all the ingredients in a canister or zipper-lock bag and toss well. Store any bags of unused nuts and seeds in the fridge or freezer to retain freshness.

2 cups roasted soybeans

1 cup shelled pumpkin seeds

1 cup shelled sunflower seeds

1 cup dried banana chips

1/2 cup honey roasted peanuts

1/2 cup mini semisweet chocolate chips

Makes 12 1/2 cup servings.

New Moon in Aries

Once a month the moon goes through her dark phase, also called the New Moon. This occurs when the moon and sun are conjunct on the ecliptic. When they are so joined, there is no light from which the moon can reflect and so she appears dark in the sky. As the two bodies slowly begin to pull away from each other, she once again begins to reflect the sun's light, in a sliver of a crescent at first, gradually, each night building light on her surface until she rides full and round in the night sky. Today the moon is conjunct the sun in the traditional astrological sign of Aries, heralder of spring, new beginnings and awakening life. In the northern hemisphere of course.

This morning there is a skiff of snow on the valley floor, the sky is clear and blue and the Swan Range in the distance across the lake is proud and stunning. It's cold, but the sun is beginning to carry warmth here and the days will continue to lengthen until they last 18 hours. Dawn and evening will stretch on and on like the taffy of the gods, creating more of those in-between times like twilight and dusk and slow morning; more time for the human soul to integrate the lessons of the earth mother, more time to celebrate the life we have here, more time to heed the call.

It's an auspicious time to begin a medicine wheel journey. Because the medicine wheel is a cosomos-viewer created by indigenous peoples in different parts of the world, there are different meanings for the directions, different animal totems, different lessons to be learned, different tools with which to manifest spirit. Which means of course that it's up to the individual to intuitively decide where to begin, what processes to use and how long to spend with each direction.

I've decided that my initial journey around the wheel will begin now, in the spring, in the east. I will journey once around the wheel in the coming year, seasonally and with the rhythms of the moon. The element of the east is air where the power of the mind comes to bear on the creative forces alive in the universe and begins to work in harmony with the elemental muses. I will use my time in the east, which will last until the summer solstice in June, to begin to heal my body from its various abuses by practicing extreme self-care and to prepare for the remainder of the journey.

I will post more about how I'm going about this as I go about it, but for now I've decided to continue my exercise program and hopefully notch it up a bit as well as adding weekly saunas to the routine. My dear friend and employer, Roberta, has a FAR infrared sauna that is available to me almost any time. I've used the sauna, but not in any disciplined way and not with much intent behind it. That's going to change and I intend to sweat. A lot. Sweat is purifying and I want to assist my body with the healing that good old-fashioned sweat can provide. I will rest, as long and as often as I need to. When I can afford extras, I will do them: massage and yoga come immediately to mind.

This seems like a good time to say that I'm up for any and all suggestions about how to implement better self-care. I know nutrition will play a huge part for me.

Another thing I'm going to do is use the new and full moons to write out intentions each month and follow-up with how I'm doing on them. I've done this before, but once again not in a disciplined or meaningful way. My intentions for this cycle are:

1. Stay sober
2. Sweat 5-6 times a week whether through exercise or sauna.
3. Continue with my outside treatment protocol which includes group and individual
therapy, medication management (for depression and anxiety which continue to
show up), relapse prevention, AA attendance and LSR e-mail list participation.

The Medicine Wheel

The Medicine Wheel is an ancient healing/living modality created by Native American and other indigenous peoples throughout the world. It's a way of moving through life which is closely infromed by our connection to the earth; earth as mother, nurturer, healer. Earth as home and hearth. Earth now as victim who requires our assistance and cooperation to help her return to balance. I believe recovery is dependent on this connection and on our willingness to begin to treat the Earth, and ourselves, with respect.

Our physical bodies are part of earth, part of this dense matter, but our spirit - through our consciousness - is not, and exploring that frontier is also part of the Medicine Wheel. Freedom of consciousness is encouraged through intention, ritual and celebration. Acquiring even a small amount of freedom of consciousness requires some level of purification and so purification is also part of the Medicine Wheel.

The Medicine Wheel is a circular and organic process wherein each direction offers specific lessons that bring about balance, joy in living, respect for self and others, understanding and growth. Many of the processes I've previously explored and continue to explore: archetypes, meditation, ritual, mindfulness, self-examination, tarot, astrology and writing have their place within the wheel. The Medicine Wheel is a framework with tremendous room for individual expression and the freedom to customize what is chosen to place within that framework.

Of course, the most important thing about the Medicine Wheel for me is that I'm attracted to it. One of the principles of AA is that it is based on attraction rather than promotion, but in my experience AA was, and continues to be, promoted as the best if not the only way to recover from addiction. It wasn't intended to be that way, but the treatment industry (I think especially here in the west, but I'm not sure about that) basically grabbed onto the 12 steps and for years made it the only available option. When other programs began to spring up, they were mostly secular in nature, touting the rational road to recovery and these programs work well for many people. But the spiritual aspect of AA is not what bothers me at all. I want my recovery to inform my spirituality and vice versa so the secular programs left me feeling like something was missing as well.

I'm excited about exploring this framework here at Eclectic Recovery.

I'd like to apologize to anyone in AA that I offended with my last post. Many AA members in my face to face community and in the blogging community have been really wonderful to me and I'm afraid it sounded a lot like I don't appreciate it. I do. Very much.

I still feel very conflicted about AA and probably what I should've said was that AA feels the same to me in many ways as the Baptist church did. I'm starting to gain some understanding of why this is, but it's still very much in process and I'm not ready to write anymore about it further at this time.

In the meantime, my commitment to sobriety is strong and right now I feel good with what I'm doing to support and encourage that commitment. Between therapy, getting signed up with the local cd center - which happens next week, finally! - , work, exercise, friends, Brent, writer's group and whatever else comes up I'm managing to stay just busy enough and still have time to give much consideration to the changes that are taking place within me. I don't have much money, but I have time to focus, time to rest and prepare myself good food, time to write, time to pray, even time to do absolutely nothing.

I'm also doing some interesting reading which I will post about more in the coming days. I hope you'll keep coming back. Pun fully intended.

Thoughts on Day 33

I've been sober 33 days. I have once again been visited by the grace that makes it possible for me to not only stay sober, but to enjoy myself and feel a great sense of gratitude that I have another opportunity to live. I worry about the future, of course. With my history of sobriety and relapse, there's no way not to and I've once again come to the realization that sobriety is the only foundation on which to build my life. It's been a difficult 33 days in many ways, but it hasn't been difficult to avoid the drink; I really don't want it, but I'm pretty sure the day will come when I do.

I'm putting together a plan so that when that day comes, I will hopefully get through it to see another sober day. Here's my relapse prevention plan to date:

Before I decide to drink, I will:

Call someone sober. (I actually have names and phone numbers here.)
Go to an AA meeting.
Post on LSR list.
Optional calls: more names and numbers.
Write here.
Check what seems to be working and what doesn't.
Go to someone's house.

I want to say a few words here about AA. I said in a recent post that I'd reopened my heart to the value of AA, and I have. It's not lost on me the value of a large group of people gathering together for a common purpose - to stay sober. I think it would be pretty stupid of me at this point to not take advantage of every means available to support my sobriety. But I have no more intention of getting a sponsor, or working the 12 steps, or immersing myself in the AA lifestyle than I have of going back to the Baptist church and expecting Jesus to save me from myself - and yes, I think they are very close to the same thing.

I was disturbed by a post I read recently in which the writer, a long-time sober member of AA, was railing about people that attend AA and don't do it exactly the way it says to do it in the Big Book. She even diagnosed all the rest of us that don't get sober through AA as not real alcoholics and this is not the first time I have heard this drivel. As a matter of fact, it is common enough in AA meetings as is the notion that if anyone veers from the structured program, not only are they hurting themselves but they could actually kill someone else with their ignorance should they speak this blasphemy aloud. I don't know. What happened to sharing experience, strength and hope? It seems more like judgementalism and condmenation to me. When I see a woman (and it's usually women and minorities, ever wonder why that is?) that comes in and out of AA, I don't automatically think, "Well I wonder what's wrong with her. I wonder why she can't get it. Poor sot." I think, "I wonder if a different set of steps or a different approach might be the key to recovery for this person."

I will continue to attend AA for now, while I feel I need it, on the basis of the third tradition which states that the only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. I've long thought the traditions were more brilliant than the steps and I'm grateful for that third one because until the existing paradigm shifts, AA is still the only game in town for support meetings. Things are changing, they're just changing very slowly. In order to be part of that change, I need to be sober. There are too many people who give up (I know, I was one) because there are too few choices and too little tolerance in the choices that are available. Giving up is no longer an option.

Tarot Thursday on Wednesday

I'm starting an in-depth study of the tarot. I've had my own cards for a few years, but the cards don't work if the student is not spiritually centered and I haven't exactly been spiritually centered for awhile. I've been amazed at how differently the cards are speaking to me now that I am sober and committed to staying that way. The Univerise is opening itself in so many ways and I am humbled and awed.

So, Elena at Lunar Musings is doing a tarot study group and what she has done is wonderful and gorgeous! I am so looking forward to going through the cards this way. Elena has a strong intuitive grasp of the cards, is able to write about them in a clear and easy-to-understand way and has done an incredible job with setting up this project. Look at the right-hand page of her blog to see the link to Tarot Thursday. I had trouble downloading the badge, but will try again later.

In the meantime, I've been spending quite a bit of time with the cards and have begun journaling with them. Yesterday I chose one major arcana card and one minor arcana card to spend a few days with - these are my two cards:

The Chariot: Adversity, possibly already overcome. Conflicting influences. Turmoil. Vengeance. Success. Possibly a voyage or journey. Escape. Rushing to a decision. Need to pay attention to details. Urgency to gain control of one's emotions.

Queen of Wands: A sympathetic and understanding person. Friendly. Loving. Chaste. Practical. Charm and grace. Gracious hostess. Sincere interest in others.

One really interesting thing about these two cards is that the figure in each card is the exact same figure - only one is a man and one is a woman.

Adversity. Possibly already overcome. Success. Conflucting influences. Friendly, loving, practical.

Let me say now that I'm terrible about keeping up with a project where I need to post weekly. This week I have a friend visiting from out of town and will probably be away from the computer for a few days. So when I feel the cards have something to say about my recovery, I will post about it here, but up front I'm not going to try and post every Thursday. However, I did want to post about it and link to it because Elena has done such a beautiful job and I think it's going to be a fantastic learning process and a great addition to my recovery work.

Hands

It is a Monday evening and I've been sober 25 days. Each day is a challenge and I find myself wishing I hadn't waited so long to stop drinking again. Looking back, it doesn't seem like I had that much choice, but I know I did. I'm trying hard not to beat myself up about it and I think it's actually an energy I can use to sustain my sobriety. I forgot that for me the most important thing, the first thing and sometimes the only thing, is to not drink. When you have alcoholism, sobriety is sobriety and everything else is everything else. I forgot that for a long time.

I seem to be getting back to my right mind. I'm glad there are meetings to attend, e-mail lists to particpate in and blogs to read. I'm grateful for all the hands that are reaching out for me.

FEAR

My fear is a great and dark beast who visits my dreams and stalks my waking hours. I fear many things: death, disease, old age, losing people I love, failure, success, poverty, riches, the past, the future. I try to hide from the beast like a child playing hide-and-seek who thinks he has finally found the one place in all the world where no one can find him. Then he realizes that everyone has stopped looking for him and he is alone and terrified in his hidey-spot, just he and the beast. His frustration grow as he realizes there is no hiding from that which lives inside. So he begins to run as fast and as hard as he can, run like the wind, run like there is no tomorrow, run for your life. Soon his lttle legs are like putty and his lungs can't keep enough air to sustain his flight and he falls exhausted in a heap. He covers his eyes and when he finally gathers the courage to peek through his fingers, the beast is there - calmly waiting, eyelids slowly blinking with patience that knows no bounds, no space, no time. However long it takes the beast will wait. The boy begins to look into those eyes, huge liquid things that suck him in like quicksand. They are his own eyes, a mirror into the unseen depths of that which is he. As he slowly gives himself over to the beast's gaze a wondrous thing happens. The fear dissipates and is replaced by a great joy. Warmth enfolds his being as he is filled with love and a sense of homecoming, of protection and safety. How can this be, he wonders. Is it possible that all the beast ever wanted was his attention, that his acknowledgement was the key to transformation? Still, the boy is exhausted. He falls into a deep and peaceful sleep and when he awakes he thinks he is alone until he realizes that he has a new friend living inside him. And he is not afraid.

Intense Pressure

This term, intense pressure, is the best description I've come up with thus far to describe the past few months of my life. I have felt an increasing sense of urgency to DECIDE NOW! how I will live the next 20 years of my life. Making decisions at 47 years of age is a world away from making them at 27 or 37.

I'm in a somewhat precarious situation here in Montana - 2000 miles away from family and life-time friends. There is a business in Georgia that I could run if I decided to go back and my inability to find full-time employment here is creating a lot of financial stress. I have been considering moving in with Brent and attending the college in Kalispell, but I don't think I'm ready to live with him, or anyone.

What I'm realizing is that I can't make any of these decisions while I'm still feeling the intense pressure to DECIDE!. What I can do is stay sober one day at a time and do what is in front of me to do today. The time will come when the decisions are to be made and I can trust that when that time arrives, I will be ready.

In the meantime, there are chores to do and days to live, free of the burden of alcohol and fully participating in my own life and the lives of those I love.