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Not sure who I’m talking to here, myself perhaps, but one of my favorite sayings is, “living through someone’s addiction is like going through surgery without anesthesia.”
In other words, it hurts, it is excruciatingly painful and really traumatic. Addicts are semi conscious, they are medicated, but those who love them are often wide awake and feeling every little thing.
I had a great revelation once about guarding my heart, about coping with the pain of watching someone slowly kill themselves. When God decides to take out Adam’s rib, He causes him to fall into a deep sleep. This was centuries before anesthesia was even a concept, and yet God in His mercy did not want to traumatize or distress Adam. He kindly put him into a deep sleep and woke him up to a beautiful woman.
That really is the Lord’s heart for us, to wipe away every tear, to protect us from harm, to shelter us from trauma and needless pain. It was a great revelation because I realized I wasn’t standing in the Father’s heart, in His will for me, when I didn’t guard my own heart as the Lord once guarded Adam’s.
Addicts and toxic people in general often have no idea how much pain they cause, how much others suffer on their behalf. “Hurting people, hurt people,” right? There are a lot of desperate prayers going up on their behalf, a lot of midnight tears, a lot of waffling somewhere between hope and despair, wanting so badly for loved ones to become whole, healthy, free of the chains that hold them.
A lot of fear. Those of us on the outside just kind of wait for that midnight phone call from jail, the hospital the morgue, and these are not misplaced fears at all, they are real, we have all gotten those phone calls, we have all had to sleep with one eye open. We’ve all felt that sense of relief when someone winds up in jail and not dead in an overdose.
Free of their chains in part because we really need you, because we want you to lead the way, because we see your potential, because we see the beauty of the person beneath the addiction, in ways those who are anesthetized cannot. So it hurts, it is painful stuff, and often infused with a great deal of powerlessness, an inability to help those who cannot or will not help themselves.
So that’s my grief and my hope today, what’s in my heart, my struggle to care for those who are broken, and yet to remember to guard my own heart, to remember to love myself as God loved Adam.
Often addicts don’t realize it, they aren’t aware of it, but all around you are dozens of hurting people, all living through your addiction, your disease, much like going through surgery without anesthesia, and it hurts, it is excruciatingly painful, and sometimes all we can do if to offer our tears up to the Lord who collects them in a bottle.
I sometimes imagine those who have died way too soon, those who over dosed, meeting up with Jesus and Him showing them all those bottle of tears, rooms and rooms of them, shelves just filled with bottled tears, from all those who saw you and cared, who loved you and felt your pain.
Somehow it matters to me, it’s important to me that not one person leaves this earth without knowing that there is always so, so many bottles of tears offered up to God on your behalf.
charlypriest said:
I can empathasie with that thought but from the other side meaning as a recovering alcoholic. Quite amazing how you slowly start seeing things in the world that you didn´t before, even if this is my 5th time at getting it right. Hopefully it will continue, I know the written part of how to get sober from A to Z, and great at making arguments and talking to addicts about my experience and how I got through it, which I did at a point in my life why I was high as a kite talking to them. Hopefully at my age now I really get it straight, for me since I know all what the psychologist are going to tell me I decided to not even try to go to a détox center this time, I wrote on a piece of paper my days Schedule and stick to it through pure will power, at the end that will that God has give me is the one that I need to implement day in and day out.
Back to your thought went out on a limb…. The people who care about the addict problably suffer more seeing that loved one person destroy themselves. And when the addict is starting to get sober those people that really love him they are happy as they could ever be. And the people around the addict that are not in the so called ¨inner circle¨but close, get a weird face of is saying, ¨who is that?¨. Which personally I love to see.
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charlypriest said:
Great post by the way
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Anna Waldherr said:
If only this message of love could reach those hearts.
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gmgoetz said:
Thank you IB. From the heart, to the heart. God’s heart being shown by you. Thank you. 😀❤️
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seekingdivineperspective said:
Wow. Lots to think about… I’m thinking the addict has no idea the pain they’re causing others, because often they’re convinced that no one cares about them. – A lie from the pit of hell. And this is quite possibly the lie that started or contributed to the addiction in the first place.
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seekingdivineperspective said:
By the way, you have a way of explaining things so clearly. I hope the people who need to see this see it today.
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authorstephanieparkermckean said:
Beautiful. I’ve been there and have the tears in bottles to prove it. You are so right about the need to guard your heart. I can’t say enough positive about this lovely blog, so I’m going to share it. God bless you. Thanks for your tears for those who have lost the ability to cry for themselves.
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authorstephanieparkermckean said:
Reblogged this on Stephanie Parker McKean and commented:
Thanks to Insanity Bytes for this beautiful blog. Guard your heart like God guarded Adam.
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Tene’t said:
What a refreshing beautiful piece. I love how you describe the Fathers heart for Adam and he put him to sleep. Equating this to guarding your own heart. I have been here too. Not only with addiction but with a difficult loved one who is narcissistic and bipolar and unmedicated. I often have to guard my own heart and get into the WORD and seek HIM before I can open myself back up to the tears and torture. Thank you for this sweet simple read!
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ColorStorm said:
Loved the whole idea of God’s anesthesia. He proved it with Adam.
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