Sad to say. . .

One of the fantasies that adult children of addict parents hold onto is that someday their addict parent, (brother, sister) will understand how we feel, see how they've injured and terrorized us as a child, "finally" love and accept us as we are, be supportive after all these years, and stop lying, denying, and rejecting us. As painful as this is to say, "I'm sorry this isn't going to happen." I'll never get the things I needed as a five-year-old, or when I was little, . . . . today. . . I'm sorry there's been a tragedy in the family. The tragic loss is that I'm not going to be able to have the relationship I needed so much with my parents or siblings when I was little.

Please God,

"So you choose to exist here. It is not linear."

Aliens. From: The premier episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. "Emissary" January 1993.

"Before we can go forward, the cycle must end."

Picard. From: Star Trek: The Next Generation. "Time Squared" April 1989.

The story of Moses, as told by Cecil B. DeMille's 1956 remake of "The Ten Commandments," tells of a metaphoric death. The death is of a false Moses. A mythical idea. From birth, Moses is separated from his true or actualized self, or origin, and raised in an environment which is false to him. He becomes what he thinks he needs to do to become safe or survive. However, in that process he is lead to believe that he is something or someone that he is not. His true self (identity) is kept from him by his mother, brother, sister, and his surrogate parent during the time he grows up and develops a sense of safeness in his false environment. Everything "looks good" to Moses at this time.

Eventually he is made aware by accident that he is not who he thought he was. As a result of this he tries to find out who he is. And as a result of trying to find out who he is and where he comes from, he is cast out into the desert by the people in his false environment and abandoned to die. After many months of agony in the desert, he finds water, food, and shelter with people who nurture and accept him as he is. Dwelling in this nurturing environment, he is able to define himself and discovery a destiny for him which was obscure to him up to now. He is then able to return to the false environment without being afraid of losing his true self again.

This metaphoric death (of his false self), discovery (that he is not who he thought), and rebirth (the discovery, development, and formation of his true self) is a travel guide for adult children raised as objects of addiction. I must psychologically and emotionally trade my perception of, (by using a type of planned change), the old relationship of addict-parent-object-child with nurturing-parent-nurtured-child in order to develop any new relationship; whether that relationship is with myself, my children, my sister, my brother, my partner, my therapist, my counselor, my minister, my rabbi, my guru, my grocer, my teacher, my grandparents, my boss, my doctor, my lawyer, my clients, my friends, my sponsor, my lovers, my dog, my cat, my goldfish, my parents, my uncles, my aunts, my cousins, my higher power, my neighbor, my dentist, and so fourth.

End Section II.

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