Reconciliation

Any recovering addict knows that a huge part of the recovery and healing process is reconciliation.  Reconciling with yourself, forgiving yourself for your past as an addict. Reconciling with yourself means making the commitment to make the changes you know you need to make.  It also means learning to love yourself again and learning how to treat yourself the way you deserve to be treated!

Reconciling with your loved ones... all of the people you have hurt while engaging in the addictive behavior.  Many people do not understand food addiction.  It is easy to see how someone can be afflicted with the disease of addiction when it involves drugs or alcohol.  But everyone has to eat.  Many people are able to eat all food in moderation without it consuming their lives.  But being a food addict means that your life has become unmanageable because of the control that food has over you.  When your life is unmanageable it affects anyone who loves you.  For me as a wife and mother, my family has definitely had to deal with the consequences of my addiction. I need to continue to reconcile with them as I work on this journey!

Finally, the only way to recover from addiction is to heal yourself spiritually.  To reconcile with God.  To admit that we are powerless over our addiction and acknowledge that our Higher Power is the only one that can take control of the addiction and lead us to recovery.  Being raised Catholic, I learned that the way to be forgiven by God is through the sacrament of Reconciliation.  I do not feel that this is THE ONLY way to reconcile with God and be forgiven.  In fact, I had not been to confession since 8th grade when the priest told me I was going to hell because I did not know my Act of Contrition.

Those kind of experiences made me doubt organized religion.  I don't want to be told that if I don't believe certain things, then my relationship with God doesn't matter on Judgement Day. I do not want to be told by the church who to vote for on election day based on issues like abortion and gay rights!  However, as a parent wanting to give my children some sort of moral compass, I have had to reconcile with the Catholic Church.  I want my kids to learn about loving all people equally, but I also cherish some of the traditions and rituals that were part of my life as a Catholic, and want to share that with my children as well.

So over the past few years, I have slowly started that process.  AND, last night, my son had his first reconciliation.  How can I, as a parent, expect my child to do things that I don't participate in.  As we walked over to the church, holding hands in the bitter cold, my little man looked up at me and said, "Mom, you should go to confession tonight too."  What was I to say?  I told him I would.


We walked in the church and saw all of the nervous second graders, waiting to admit to all of the sins that they have committed in their short seven or eight years, and knew that I really needed to go too.  Only after I had promised myself and my son that I would go, did I realize that there was no confessional.  Just our priest and his identical twin brother, (who is also a priest), sitting on chairs in the front corners of the church.  You could see each child's face as they sat with the identical priests on either side of the altar.  The kids looked so serious. 

Most of the children were in line waiting and not one parent had gotten up to recieve the sacrament yet.  My confident little boy, who was not as nervous as the rest of the kids, (i'm not sure if that is good or bad), told his teacher that I promised to go too and that I had not been to confession in a REALLY REALLY long time.  So his CCD teacher waves me up into the line with all of the kids!  I felt like a 275 pound second grader waiting for my first confession.

It was my turn, I even went before my son had his turn.  I walked up to the smiling face of Father Joe, blessed myself and said, "Bless me father for I have sinned, it has been 19 YEARS since my last confession."  He smiled and said, "Welcome back!" To be honest, I knew that I would not be able to share 20 years worth of sin sitting in that folding chair in front of the chruch.  Years that included my entire life as a teenager and life before being a wife and mother. I didn't think I would really get much out of it because of that.  But I sat there and told him that I had probably committed all the typical sins of a young person, but what I was struggling with now was the sin of addiction.  I told him I had been recovering for 67 days, and that I have had some real lows, but that right now I was in the best place I had been spiritually.

Father never stopped smiling.  He said, "Lets make it 68 days, huh?  And then one day at a time, right?"  He also told me that he was proud of me for setting this example for my son.  He told me to continue to come back, and that I am definitely on the right path.  He gave me only two Hail Mary's and two Our Father's as my penance. Pretty small for 19 years of "unforgiven" sin. As I knelt there saying my prayers and watching my sweet boy receive his first confession, all I felt was complete peace!  Maybe there is more to this than I thought?!?