Crazy Dog says...

Crazy Dog told me this morning to write down three things that I felt strongly about and had felt strongly about for some time. Crazy Dog then listed three examples that didn't really speak to me - however, they did prompt a thought: I miss my mother and resent not having her.
Crazy Dog's advice was the basis of every change-your-life program in the world. If you cannot change what is causing your distress, CHANGE YOUR ATTITUDE TOWARD IT. YOU have the power to make yourself happy, YOU and you alone. No one else can change your life (which is simply a reflection of your mental outlook)but YOU. Money, fame, popularity, purchased goods - it's all just STUFF, and stuff can be taken away or lost.
So, I have to find a way to truly accept this loss in my life. I acknowledge the loss, I do, but I also acknowledge my resentment. Mama had her mother (my Grandmama) in her life until she was 59 years old. Mama died when I was only 42. As I see it, she "owed" me at least another ten years, right? Maybe even 15?
But she left this world, and ME, early. And she used alcohol to do so. Alcohol. I wish I had never told her about that Nicholas Cage movie. I had emphasized to her that cirrhosis of the liver was a painless way to die for the one who had it, that it was a disease that only hurt others in that person's life. At the time, we were all dealing with family members who allowed alcohol to rule their actions, their lives, their brains. I kept trying to impress upon her a need for tough love, a need for the enabling to cease, a need to let them sit in jail and dry out. Maybe so.
Mama developed something wrong with her blood. After a typical woman's life lived on the edge of anemia, her body was now manufacturing too many red blood cells. The doctors couldn't seem to pinpoint the cause, but to treat the symptoms, Mama had to go have a pint of blood withdrawn every other month or so to keep her blood from becoming too think for her heart to pump. The doctor cautioned her that the condition would cause alcohol to be especially toxic to her liver and so, for a while at least, she curtailed the cocktails.
Then, about a year before her death, she started drinking more. Meanwhile, she was still allowing others to bring their alcohol-induced troubles and pile them up on her. And I kept preaching tough love, tough love. And I didn't acknowledge that I was pushing her away.
Now, I cannot count the times I have wanted to call her and share some news. Now, I cannot count the times I have wanted to hear her voice. Now, I cannot count the times I have wanted to hug her and tell her how much I love her. Now, I cannot and I feel so guilty for having let her down, for allowing her to feel that she couldn't talk to me about how distressed she felt because she knew I would say she had to use tough love.
What stupid things people say sometimes. What stupid tings I, me, myself, have said sometimes. Like now. I'm still trying to accept blame for Mama's death because of things I did say or didn't say, as if my words meant life or death.
That's CRAZY. I have no control over the actions or thoughts of others. NONE. Maybe that's the lesson I really still need to learn: I ONLY HAVE CONTROL OVER MY THOUGHTS AND ACTIONS. So, if I have thoughts which are distressing me, I am the one who has control over the effects of those thoughts. I am the one who can CHOOSE how I allow those thoughts to affect me. Damned invisible trees, again.
Perhaps Crazy Dog just might know what he's talking about.