Seventeen years ago today, my sister-in-law L was killed in an automobile accident. In a sense she was murdered, because the car was stolen two days earlier from an auto dealer's repair bay. No one noticed that it was stolen for two days, and she was killed shortly after the theft was reported. The driver was a 15-year-old with no DL, and he was fleeing the cops, going over 90 mph. She was proceeding through a green light at the speed of 26 mph.
First I was numbly in shock and grief, then I became really angry. It was a year before I could really start to feel anything. All of this happened 10 years before my diagnosis of bipolar. I was a mess. In the summer of 1995, I started attending Al-Anon meetings. I realized that I was emotionally immature. I also started seeing a psychologist, but I had to wait several weeks for an appointment. Apparently, I was sounding lucid enough that I was told to wait. It's reality in our country that I can drop into a local pharmacy clinic for a throat culture with no appointment and little waiting. But I would have had to be psychotic and raving to get attention for psychiatric care. So I waited. I eventually got in to see a psychologist, then another one, but I didn't tell either of them the extent of my feelings or experiences with moods. I especially didn't trust the second one, and I know that I'm smarter than him. I could totally fake him out and make like I was just fine. Just like I've done my whole life.
I've been seeing my current psychiatrist consistently since April 2004. I love him and trust him. I knew right away that I couldn't fake him out. He also trusts me. If I need to ask him something, he calls me on the phone. I'm blessed because my medication has been working for me consistently since December 2005. We've tweaked it, but I haven't been hospitalized yet. For today, I hope to stay out of the hospital again.
The 12-step concept of ODAT (one day at a time), works for bipolar recovery, too. So I'm glad that I have the blessing of having lived with active alcoholism. It is a gift. Everything that happens in my life, God turns into a blessing.
So today, my prayer is finally to forgive LDD for killing my sister-in-law. Remember that I'm an adoptee, so she was every bit as related to me as my sister is. I have no biological siblings. I know that now. I've always tried to treat everyone as if they could be related to me. So, she was a little sister to me. She was even going to be a math teacher, just like me. Only she never got there.
I pray that God will help me forgive LDD. I ask that the Lord will give him every blessing that I would ask for myself. I ask for help in forgiving those silent car repairmen who saw him drive off in that car and said nothing. There's a saying that harboring a grudge is like drinking rat poison and hoping the other person will die. I don't want to carry this anymore.
Later today, I'll sing a song for LDD. When I sing it, I'll pray it for his forgiveness.
"When you sing, you pray twice."
Blessings!
