10 SWEET TOOTH

The year was 2015 when I realized I had a problem. I had done my research and plotted my next steps. I knew where to get my next hit. I knew I had to go to Denver to get it. The thought of it made my heart race and kept me awake at night. I just couldn’t let it go. It was the chase. It was all about rebellion for me. I knew I would disappoint some people in my life, but it was worth it. This wasn’t the first time, and I knew it wouldn’t be the last time. I just didn’t know it would cost me so much.

I’m talking about the wild chase for macaroons. And Denver has some of the best.

It was a good idea at first. My Pinterest board supported this decision, and there was no way to change my mind. A cute little cookie that all the French rave about. My friends were making them, and I never knew what I was missing out on until I tried that little raspberry cookie. And I will never be the same.

Anybody else out there have a sweet tooth? Good grief. I could eat a full spread at Fogo de Chão and still walk away craving a molten lava cake from Domino’s. It’s the thorn in my side—sugar. I wish I could tell you that I’m addicted to kale or kombucha, but God did not gift me with a hunger for a healthy constitution.

Another addiction that is telling my story right now is the ambient sound of a cardboard box landing on my front doorstep. (My doorbell literally just rang as I wrote this.) You know the sound I am referring to. Amazon Prime, you are the lover of my soul. You get me. You know exactly how to meet my needs, and you are never, ever late—even on the Sabbath. You take my procrastination and deliver on time, every time. You fill the cracks in my spirit. I can’t live a day without you and never plan to. That’s like saying I could live another day without those woven baskets and new nine-by-thirteen Pyrex baking dishes I just ordered. That’s like saying I could live without HGTV or Instagram. I used to want to be cremated upon death, but as of late, I’ve decided I want to be buried in an Amazon Prime box. You can keep your gift wrap, AP, but fold up those corners and let my lifeless body be at peace within your four walls.

Dear Poshmark, you, too, are a temptation to my pocketbook. I have prayed day and night for my love of gently used goods to go away. I cut my teeth on garage sales and thought I had moved on, but now this. This is the way to satisfy my longing for name brands at reduced prices. You are worse than cupcakes, you temptress. I could’ve lived three lifetimes without buying those used Steve Maddens, but I just couldn’t say no. Thanks for nothing (everything), Poshmark.

There are a lot of things I love, but my single greatest infatuation is reserved only for one. You have won my heart and my paycheck, Free People. It’s always been you. There’s just something about us. And you have a way of communicating that is second to none. I can be having the worst day and be convinced that I don’t need one more pair of jeans, but you always know just what to say to change my mind. And yes, I do need them in four different colors. Thank you! How did you know, Free People?

Don’t you judge me.

And because they run big, I can order a size smaller than I really am, and let’s face it, if you have the choice between buying something that makes you feel skinny and buying something two numerical sizes larger, you know which one you are going to choose! Every. Dang. Time. I am a faithful Free People customer. I am one purchase away from… On the next episode of Hoarders: We have a single mom who kicked out two teenage children to make room for her shopping addiction. The only downside to Free People: they’re anything but free.

I also may or may not have recently acquired an innocent addiction to Botox. I’m talking just the slightest dependence. I also may or may not have an addiction to watching Sister Wives. I just can’t look away.

How about my addiction to watching shows about addiction? Is that a real thing? I bet this is a diagnosis. It’s its own episode.

Yes, in fact, it is. TLC has tapped into that weird part of our brains that makes us watch these shows without fail. My 600-Lb. Life and My Strange Addiction are my secret obsessions. It is, no doubt, the train wreck that I can’t stop watching. The girl who eats sand. The couple who is addicted to coffee enemas. I get you. I see you. I am with you.

I get so involved emotionally with these characters, and they have no idea I exist. If they only lose one hundred pounds at their first checkup, I’m upset and yelling at the television. “PUT IN THE WORK, DEBORAH! YOU ARE WORTH MORE!” Um. She just lost one hundred pounds, and I (the television audience of one) am ticked off. I have supported you and cheered for you and you must not want it as badly as I do, Deborah! Or how about the ones who don’t lose a single pound? I’m over here starving myself for this two-hour episode so you don’t feel alone, just for you to blame your third cousin twice removed for the fact that you can’t break your addiction to mashed potatoes!?!

Forget you, Barry!

Addiction is nothing to joke about. If anybody realizes this, it’s me. Also note: I am eating two packs of Nutty Buddies while I am writing this. Addiction is real. Addiction is life-altering. Addiction is a monster.

Although I like to make light of my adult addiction to Ryan Reynolds or my teenage addiction to tanning beds, I do know the heaviness of dependence. I grew up with addiction in my family. I also know that exposure to addiction is partly to blame for my warped sense of humor. There has to be some real sophisticated scientific data out there to show that children who grow up around addiction turn out really funny and sarcastic 100 percent of the time. Now you know. Humor is my coping mechanism of choice. (That and dark chocolate.) I learned to laugh and make jokes when I was young because things weren’t always funny. I was hurting, and laughter truly was my medicine. It was also my distraction.

I’ve had to turn other people’s mistakes into my responsibility since I can remember. I have seen the relentless loss and destruction addiction can cause. I have also seen the redemption and reconciliation that can bloom from it, too.

This is a sensitive subject and one that I don’t talk about lightly. I have gone back and forth and lost nights of sleep debating whether or not to share. I’ve cried at the thought of hurting other parties with the written truth, but it’s just that—the truth. And it’s part of my story.

I grew up in addiction. It was in my home, and it was “normal.” It was all I knew. Not only did I grow up watching it and being deeply affected by it, but I grew up being taught by others to enable it. I was taught that I had a part to play in how good or bad this thing was gonna get. I was taught to walk on eggshells, to be good, to stay out of the way. To do more. To do less. And if I could, in fact, do and be all of these things, then all would be well… until the next time when it wasn’t. If I could toe the line, then not only would I make things better for the abuser and for myself, but I would make life better for other people who were closely affected by this addiction, too. It was up to me. Talk less. Smile more. You can do it.

Life was wonderful and full in many ways. I had amazing friends and life events that kept me busy and happy(ish). My sweet granny did most of the heavy lifting when it came to my heart and emotions. If it hadn’t been for her, I might be addicted to cocaine, not Coke Zero. She kept life stable when it was falling apart.

During my life in the pressure cooker, I became programmed to absorb the needs of everyone around me. I was trained to stay. To fix. To work harder. And I was trained that you don’t leave.

We lay down our lives for others. We make everyone else a priority. I became the peacemaker at all cost. Whatever it takes, make it happen: peace. I was in charge. It was up to me. I never caused any trouble, because I was too busy learning to take ownership and blame for the mistakes of others.

I became the mother, the father, the judge, and the jury. I became the bailiff, holding the keys (or so I thought) that would set the prisoner free. It is codependency at its finest: I will care about you more than you care about yourself. I was a pro at one-sided relationships where I met all the emotional and self-esteem needs. Expending all of my energy meeting the needs of others. Never saying “no” or “enough.”

After walking an extremely long road as a casualty of others’ addictions, I learned that we are not responsible for fixing anyone but ourselves. In fact, we can’t. We cannot make changes for someone else. They have to put in the work. They do. We don’t own their choices. They do. Do I need to say that again? LET THEM OWN THEIR CHOICES. Remember that toolbox I mentioned that I carried into adulthood? My toolbox that I drag around with me everywhere in order to fix people? Well, there are not enough tools in there to accomplish anything. Because we do not have the tools to fix someone else’s problems. They don’t sell those down at the Home Depot. The only tools we can possess are the ones to fix our own stuff.

Please know this: I am so saddened by addiction. I am not hard-hearted toward the life issues and circumstances that cause addictions in the first place. I don’t blame or hate. I know it is not easy out there. I know that pain is hard. We are broken. We get broken. We are victims. We are villains. We experience loss. We experience abandonment. We have seasons of feast and famine. All of us. It’s all just really hard. While your story may look different from another’s, we are all doing the best we can with the tools we have.

When all we are ever served is a full helping of brokenness, it’s all we know how to give. She’s broken, so she breaks others. He’s broken, so he breaks others. Accepting the pardon and living our destiny and purpose are not easy, but they are a choice.

I love people, and I love to give. This is my real addiction. I might as well face it, I’m addicted to love. (You just started singing it, didn’t you?) Gotta admit that Robert Palmer music video with his swaying red-lipped female guitarists goes down as one of the most memorable music videos of my childhood. Addiction to loving people is not a bad thing, right? Except, I was addicted to fixing people and calling it love.

Giving until there’s nothing left. I have worn it like a badge of honor. Taking on burdens and weaknesses and making them mine. I would try them on for size and see if they fit on my shoulders nicely. I was trained for this. It is a blurry line for Christ followers. It is a mixed bag of opinions on this subject of self-sacrifice. My heart says to love people without hesitation. But I finally learned that unconditional love didn’t require unconditional staying. (Pause here because I feel like someone might need to read that again.) Unconditional love does not require unconditional staying.

Loving someone who has hurt you or has the potential to hurt you comes with boundaries—a word I was not taught in Sunday school. Sure, I learned how to spell Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, but I never learned a dang thing about how to protect my heart and how to not fall into a self-destructive life of becoming an empath.

What is an empath? We are a special breed. We are highly attuned to other people’s moods, and we feel everything deeply and extremely. We are nurturers. We are healers. We feel everything, and we absorb the pain and stress of others. It is exhausting. It took a lot of pain for me to understand my tendencies and habits. It took lots of self-reflection to realize that setting a boundary was the only thing that would protect me. I can’t be trusted to protect myself. To establish boundaries, I had to be clear about my beliefs, values, and limits. Boundaries require me to prioritize myself and find my own voice.

Boundaries are powerful. Knowledge is power. So is counseling. Bless my counselor. She can have all my money and my house, too. She helped me realize that I am not the first person and I won’t be the last person who has experienced the same behaviors. To hear someone say, “You aren’t the only person hurting here,” flipped a switch for me. An empath feels others’ pain, remember? She shifted my perspective on what I thought other people owed me. She helped me lower some of my emotional expectations of others but raise expectations for myself and my life. She filled my toolbox with what I needed for me and took out the tools I have been carrying around since my childhood to fix everybody else.

In a weird way, it feels so much better to learn there is a name for you—to learn that your behavior is listed in a psychology book out there. I am textbook. As much as I would like to think of myself as unique, there I am, a carbon copy of every other empath in the world. That knowledge really gave me power. Knowing the behaviors, the triggers, the slippery slope of my love addiction. That is powerful! That is the kind of power that takes your love and repositions it on the right person. I can now see that I learned some savvy grit and resilience that allowed me to take control of my own adult life circumstances. I don’t believe I would have learned that as a young girl. As a female in the Bible Belt, you are taught by well-meaning people to get married, learn to cook, smile, nod, agree, be pretty, and everything will work out for you. But I want to teach my children to love well, to have healthy boundaries and stand up for truth and justice, and to stand up for themselves and say, “I ain’t doin’ it.”