2010: My hopes and thoughts on the New Year

As we close 2009 it seems to me that the past 13 months has felt like 13 years. I still have hope.

Thirteen months ago we were thrown into a recession. We had just experienced what had seemed to be a near-crash of the financial system when the housing bubble popped. We talked about the great depression and made comparisons with it.

While I am not an economist, I would rather have called it the credit bubble. Too many people who would not have normally qualified for the regular 30-year conventional loan were getting these large adjustable rate mortgages (ARM's) with obscenely low rates that were attached to other economic indicators. They were living outside of their means, and when the interest rate went up on their mortgages, they were immediately in arrears.

The banks sold the bad loans and their buyers resold them and converted into securities and derivatives. They had been coined "toxic assets." In November 2008, the federal government bought with tax payer money much of the toxic assets from banks in essence bailing out the banks. The damage had been done to the economy.

We saw the pain slowly creep through the economy. Banks were laying off people. People were not buying cars and so General Motors and Chrysler both declared bankruptcy and reorganized. The pain trickled through the automotive sector and then into other economic sectors. We probably all knew someone who lost a job.

We probably all endured some of the pain passed on in some way. Restaurants were giving out smaller portions. Our employers did not give us raises. We did not get our holiday turkeys or any of the spiffs.

We were expected to draw within ourselves our own sense of intrinsic reward for having a job. Some of us (me especially) were expected to do more with less all the more. It was all the more difficult when you have abusive and neglect management not caring about morale. I sure felt exploited at times.

As different times bring different terms. The most poignant term to me for this recession was "under water." This referred to a mortgage holder who has or had a mortgage that was for more than the assessed value of their home.

There was one benefit to the recession. Gasoline/petroleum prices went down. This is my layman theory: there was less credit for speculators to compete for oil futures. When the credit dried up, the dollars dried up to inflate oil futures. The oil futures deflated and our gas prices practically dropped from around $4.67-$5.00 down to below $2.00 per gallon in late 2008.

When diesel and gas prices were high, we were getting a trickle-down effect of higher grocery and other consumer goods due to the dependence on trucking. When the fuel prices dropped, so did grocery prices, but then people without jobs and with lower pay still had an equal problem with buying power.

That aside, many of us have learned to be simple again in our expectations. Many of us have re-learned the difference between wants and needs. Many of us will do a better job in managing our personal affairs and in being sensible.

It sounds somewhat crazy but Nietzsche and the Bible were in half agreement about what trials do to you. Nietzsche said "That which does not kill us makes us stronger." The Epistle of James in the New Testament said
²Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds,
³because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.
⁴Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not
lacking anything. (New International Version)

Trials do make you stronger in some form or another. For those who seek to learn, they will be more mature and will not make the same mistake twice.

We will lick our wounds, get up and figure out what we will do. Then we will make effort to do it.

We will not always get where where we want to go, but we will put the past and the present behind us and be somewhere that is at least different if not better.

So, at this point, I have hope. I am trying to take inventory of the different life and professional lessons I have learned in the past year. I have hope that I can put what I have learned to use in 2010.

As with most years, the new year is full of most of the same from the past year. People will be people like people have always been people. Some of the same things will be happening:

• Politicians will sling mud
• Babies will be born
• Dogs will get run over in the road
• Bosses will act dumb
• Your crazy relatives will continue to be crazy
• Your brain-less in-laws will continue to be brain-less
• You will have moments of laughter
• You will have sad moments
• You will find yourself angry at times
• What you hoped for is not all going to come true.
  

So, the year is ahead of us. We will have choices and we will be stuck in some situations where we did not seem to have a choice. We will only get out of those stuck-situations when it is time that we get unstuck.

I will do my best. I hope that you do too. It is all that we can do in the end.

A Message of Christmas Hope. December 26 comes 24 hours later

I have have hated Christmas since 1977 when my mother said, "just bring the gifts in and we'll open them around the TV."

In my high school, college, and seminary years when I was home for Christmas, it was some of the most boring times. I could not wait to get into the next school term because a break from school was a trip into boredom.

For at least 32 years since my mom's thoughtless comment, Christmas has been a struggle. I have wanted fulfillment and meaning. There have been a few Christmases that were better than others, but Christmas for me is drudgery as the the holiday itself as the story of the Incarnation does not always move me emotionally.

It has been a little better with kids. They, in their child-like mindsets believe in the magic. Their happiness with the toys at least reminds me that there is more to the world than their problems.

The past few years when they have been able to read advertisements and comprehend TV commercials have been a little annoying: "Daddy, can I have that? Can I? Can I? Can I?" I am able to steel my annoyance with the memory that I did that to my parents at that age too. But it all feeds back into my cynicism.

Okay, while I have gotten little feedback about this blog and I am not sure if people really read this outside of one of the guys I go to church with, I seek to offer you an unique message of hope:

It is okay if you are having a depressing Christmas.

You do not have to have a merry Christmas if you are not feeling merry. There is nothing particularly wrong with you if you are depressed with Christmas as we know it. However,

You just need to survive it.

Commercialism and the music industry has been trying to sell us that we should buy . . . buy . . . buy. They and the news media have insinuated that it is our patriotic duty to go out and max out our credit cards because the retail sectors base their whole business plans on holiday sales. They pass on the not-so subtle message that jobs are on the line if stores do not make their sales projections.

Christmas has traditionally been a time where Christians remember the birth of Jesus Christ. The birth of Jesus is a magnificent story where God comes to earth in the form of a human baby to offer salvation to the world, but I wish to clarify. . .

Christmas as we know it is not in the Bible.

Christmas is an observance that was started by church leaders in the 4th Century AD as an alternative to a pagan celebration. There are certain pagan symbols that were mixed in over the years. For example . . . the Christmas Tree is not in the Bible, neither is the lamb talking to the shepherd boy in the apocryphal song "Do You Hear What I Hear?"

The problem with Families.

We long to have connection and intimacy with the people who get labeled family because we are genetically related to them. However, there are a number of humongous if not catastrophic problems with them.

Many of us out there have family members who do not return our phone calls. We and they have relationships where we are both control freaks and we can't really stand each other for more than two minutes at a time if even then.

Many of us have family members who are just evil perpetrators who have fooled other family members into thinking that they are just the greatest thing since sliced bread. We get around them and we feel sick and angry because we were abused and other family members are in total denial about it.

Many of us have family members who simply have their heads stuck up their own posteriors (I had to clean this one up). They do not listen, nor do they comprehend what we are saying or writing. Some of them are also addicted to substances, sex, work or gambling and they are not emotionally and mentally in gear.

I have no easy answers for your pain today. I have to admit that life is full of pain and coping means

tolerating the distress that we have.

We can only tolerate distress for so long. We must get away from it sooner than later. That is why some people attempt or commit suicide at the holidays--they are stuck in their emotions and days can feel like years.

Now that I mentioned the S-word, I am encouraging you NOT to consider it. It is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

Don't get lost in your emotions.

When people get stuck in their negative emotions, they do not look at the facts. This is when people make mountains out of mole hills. So Let's look at these five (5) facts . . .

1. The Christmas holiday season lasts approximately 30 days each year.
2. December 25 lasts only 24 hours.
3. December 26 comes at the same time every year and marks the end to the regular Christmas season.
4. Being alive on December 26 means that you have survived another Christmas if you did not celebrate it.
5. Surviving Christmas is an acceptable option when you are not celebrating it.

I have my ideas of how to survive Christmas in a healthy way, but I am assuming that if you are reading this, you have a brain of your own to make your own decisions.

See you on December 26.

Thankful for simple things that I have

I was feeling sorry for myself given my current condition, especially given that it was another holiday.

(Mind you, I bet if I really told you my condition, you might be one of those who would tell me that I have nothing to complain about. I would likely then say: shut up mother.)

An Epiphany

But anyway, I was feeling sorry for myself about my humiliating situation that does not meet my expectations in this holiday season . . . and then I had an epiphany after listening to one of my senior citizen patients talk:

When they had Christmas as a child, they got one pair of socks and one other clothing item. Their family was dirt poor.

The epiphany was this: "You at least have the simple things that you need. You are better off than you consider" (yes consider--not realize).

Of course my life and my situation is not what I want. I have the simple things that I need.

Yes, there are some humiliating aspects to my situation, but if I choose to dwell on or consider feeling humiliated, I will feel humiliated.

We are not guaranteed everything

I am being theological here, but I conclude that God does not guarantee that you will have a Turkey or all the holiday trimmings that you want Thanksgiving. God will give people what they need--the feast is beyond need. Jesus said that God will take care of our needs (see Matthew 6--the first book of the new testament).

I also conclude that that God does not guarantee that your family will get together and play nice-nice. While the Bible wants you and me to live at peace with all people if at all possible--sometimes it just is not possible. The people we do not get along with in our families can truly be toxic, ugly, mean, vicious, dysfunctional, sick, mentally ill or psycho--we just have the problem of being related to them, and we cannot merely find new family members like we can find new friends.

Feeling ashamed

With the recession going on and on, and with 10 percent of the people unemployed and people on commission making fewer sales, many of us are doing with less and less. We want to be able to give to others the holiday gifts but many of us cannot, and we feel ashamed.

There is no two ways about it. Many of us have had the "shoulds" "musts" and "oughts" about getting things for other people for Christmas. There is the feeling that something is very much wrong with us if we do not have the money to get people things for the holiday.

Then there is the "shoulds" "musts" and "oughts" about other people. Our relatives should come behave and exercise good manners and self-control at our holiday gatherings. But the reality is that they don't no matter how much individual therapy you get.

Moving from feeling ashamed to feeling thankful

So, I have concluded at this moment in time that I can live in the ashamed feeling or the humiliated feeling or I can truly live in the thankful feeling.

How does one get to the thankful feeling? It starts with agreeing with yourself that you are surviving in this time. You tell yourself that . . .

this is a bad time, but it will pass.
When you are surviving the rules change.
The rules are that you cannot afford stuff so you don't get it.

One may have to say this hundreds of times of day.

I think that when it is an overall bad time you do not have much and are seeking to be thankful, you are thankful for simple things. When you are without, you appreciate what you have in addition to identifying what matters to you and what you want.

Yeah, my life is very much NOT what I want it to be. There is so much more that I feel that I should have and should be doing. But for me, I have had to make the gratitude list that many of us therapists tell clients and patients to make.

My beginning of a simple gratitude list:
1) I am in good health.
2) My wife is recovering from her surgery earlier this year.
3) We are managing to pay the bills on time.
4) The cars work
5) My kids are healthy and doing well in school
6) We have the food we need
7) I do have a job (even with a toxic boss) that pays the bills
8) We have the clothes we need
9) I live in a free country that is relatively safe and not torn up by war
10) My name is written in the lamb's book of life.

If you think this technique might work for you. Try it.

This is not perfect and will not make you feel all better, but if it can give you a few moments of peace, what is there to lose? Feel free to comment.

I wish you a tolerable Thanksgiving Day.

The Holiday Season: When you do not have money you have relationships

Today was a fruitful day for thinking along the lines of getting through difficult times.

The holiday season is coming. Or maybe it is here already.

What is likely going to make this holiday season worse this year is that money is tight for many people. Christmas is supposed to be a time for gift giving and extravagance.

There is such an intensity (especially in U.S. society) around the holidays. You are to have a cozy and warm Thanksgiving. You are to have a festive and merry Christmas. You are to have a happy new year.

There is all kinds of talk about what you are going to do, what you are going to buy, and where you are going? There are all kinds of decorations and clothing. There are special foods for Thanksgiving and Christmas. There are all kinds of special events.

The intensity is fueled by nonstop Christmas muzak in all kinds of stores starting after Halloween. The countless broadcast commercials and print advertisements seem to start earlier and earlier each year. A neighborhood store put out its Christmas displays three weeks ago before Halloween.

The intensity adds pressure to the expectation out there is that you should have a merry Christmas. The problem is that most people do not expect a merry Christmas for one reason or another.

The holiday season is a sad and depressing time where there are actually a lot of suicides. People feel abandoned and alone.

I have likened holidays to hurricanes. Everyone gets ready for weeks to run home, lock the door and wait for the storm to pass. They talk about it and get all kinds of survival gear to make sure they have what they need. Holidays have not exactly been joyful.

I have been analyzing the holiday season for some time. Why has it become the un-ignorable monster?

My first thought is a rather Marxian one: it has been exploited in the name of economics. Too much of the retail economy has become dependent on Christmas sales. Christmas is no longer holy or set apart as a sacred time.

However, my first thought is counter-acted by the second thought. Even if it is a sacred time, Christmas is not a magical time that is going to provide fulfillment to erase all of the pain we feel in this world. I have came to the conclusion that many people are nostalgic and looking for magic. Little children in their limited cognitive ability see the magic. Adults want that magic feeling, but the sad tragedy is that there is a bliss in the ignorance that little kids have.

Third, no matter how much nostalgia, the reality is that most of us have family members who are highly dysfunctional who will ruin holiday gatherings and any shot at nostalgia. We get tense and they get tense as we have ruminated over our fears that the other family member is going to just wreck things.

Anyway with all of those problems, to get a feeling of magic, people spend money. Maybe there is a sense of magic in the giving and getting of presents and feasting. We gain weight and usually pay credit card bills way off into April or May. We will buy the cans of diet shake power that are out there front and center in the stores in January where the Christmas candy used to be the month before.

Well, this year the money will not be there. If at best we will have the relationships. The relationships matter where you can have them.

I move that we all start a tradition that is cheap. It would be best that the tradition does not cost money.

The traditions that we have are not about themselves, but about the relationships in which we share the traditions. Good traditions exude love and laughter and meaning. Good traditions honor our relationships.

If your family is not going to be available for traditions this year, find someone to do something with to start a cheap tradition. When you do not have the money, you have the relationships--that is if you look for them.

More to come . . .

Of course it could always get worse

Things at work have been difficult to say the least. There are multiple aspects and layers and I could discuss it all in detail, but I just had a conversation with a schoolmate today that helped me get perspective.

My schoolmate was truly clinically depressed. His thoughts were depressing.

My former schoolmate was divorced and his ex-wife in his words is a master manipulator. He discussed feeling suicidal due to all of her maneuvering and games. He felt hopeless. He talked about hating that he had few alternatives.

He had a new job that fell through. Some of the problem was that his ex-wife created some legal stir that took him out of work for one week that was part of his getting terminated shortly after taking the job.

His house is getting foreclosed on. He cannot get enough money together to get payments caught up.

He talked about being sabotaged in parenting his three kids.

He talked about his considering a federal job in another country. He had applied for two different jobs. The problem is that he would be abandoning his children, but he needs to preserve himself.

I empathized with him.


My thought to him was that he was essentially engaging in harm reduction. There was going to be pain either way with or without him given his wife's behaviors. He was just choosing over how his kids were going to be mad.

I told him that I would support him in any way I could. I discussed my concern for his safety, but I tired hard to be the friend and not the therapist.

There were limits as to what I could do to help him. He had some pretty crappy choices to make and it was a matter of deciding between which smelled less offensive.

My message to myself is that yes, it could always get worse. You may indeed have the greener grass in the situation. It may just not be as green as you think it should be. Sometimes you are reminded of the fact.

Time has gone on but pain stays around--so much for time healing all wounds

It is difficult to come to grips with the reality that summer is already over. Well, it is not really over in terms of the calendar. (There are approximately three more weeks give or take a day until it is the first day of autumn.) Part of me is looking for my maturity and character in this time.

One of the difficulties in acting mature is that emotions still have a sense of childishness to them. You want to be able to put things behind you, but it can be just too difficult at times when you are thinking about your pain.

I spent most of the winter and spring waiting for summer. I was waiting for the days when all I had to wear was a t-shirt and shorts and no socks. (Yes, I like the beach bum look. I could wear it all year.

Why has the summer gone too fast? I have a number of thoughts amongst my feeling of pain. First, as you get older, you have had more experience of time and so it seems to go faster. Second, I have been been very busy with work. Third, my wife's medical condition has made my nights seem even more busy. Thus, I have been tired and I have had little time to do anything that I really wanted.

Regardless of the answer, I still lament the summer having gone so quickly. We did not go anywhere, nor could we go anywhere. I am still sad that the money went for hospital bills and not for a trip back to the Midwest or Disneyworld. I somewhat soothe myself that even if I had the extra money, my wife was not able to travel. However, for all my hard work as a social worker due to being understaffed, and do not feel any further ahead for a newly minted PhD. I honestly have had to deal with resentment in the mix. This is again difficult when trying to act mature.

I am still resentful of the University of Louisville administration short-changing my graduation in December 2008. They gave only 72 hours notice that we were not going to be recognized at commencement but would be graduated at the hooding ceremony. (well they gave advance knowledge for the spring commencement that it would be the same way for May 2009 Ph.D graduates, but at least they got to have a reception months in advance)

Furthermore, the hooding ceremony was not catered, not rehearsed, and undignified, with profanity used on stage by the faculty member in his opening comments. (Given the public circumstances at the time I felt that we were the expendable group and our achievement was cheapened to save the University any more P.R. expense for the Felner/Deasy catastrophe and its 'anonymous crap'). The president himself was not there, although it the story was that he had the flu.

There was no apology when I gave my feedback to the university's e-mail—they have not cared. I continue to feel short-changed for all of the work I put in and all the abuse I tolerated from a particular, dysfunctional faculty member who alone held my dissertation process up for two additional years—I deserved more recognition, like the 300 PhD graduates got in the when I graduated with my bachelors in May 1987 -- I sat through watching them walk across the stage over 90 minutes. (They got the privilege of public exhibition where we merely stood in our places).

Consensus of the Graduate School Senate that it should be this way? Yeah right.
Sometimes, at least writing or verbalizing it can at least help me get it out for now. Should someone of faith really have these resentments? I would say yes. People of faith have beliefs and practices, but they at least have a faith resource that can help them cope with the vicissitudes of life and give them more hope than they would either have. Also, they can eventually remember the perspective of their faith about depravity and the fall and how they themselves have hurt others and others hold resentments against them. Thus they can put it on the shelf.

I am still resentful of the vice president who I wrote about in the spring. Her management decisions lately have been quite bone-headed, which only remind me of her behavior that I have blogged about earlier this year. My cynicism has increased despite my other recent efforts to keep it in check.

So, part of me has times where I struggle with all three of these matters in my head. You would think that it should be easier to deal with these things. However, pain is pain and time does go by slowly when you are remembering the painful experiences.

Part of me says “Buck up soldier, this is life.” No one really cares about your pain except for you—and people will only think you are stupid for dwelling on it as they have their own lives to worry about. You are not going to get any kind of expected restitution from the University administration, nor from that poor excuse for a vice president. They are not going to believe they did anything wrong (especially the vice president).

Another part of me, says, “Yes, life is not fair and your expectations are not met, so cry, you're at least entitled to do that.

A third part of me says, find the balance. “Don't cry for long or nurse your resentments for long because you will only be dwelling on it to your own ruin.” Nursing grudges takes your energy. I am trying to forgive the University of Louisville administrators. I am trying to forgive the vice president. I am trying to pray and wait. Begin looking for another ship to come in that you can get on and move away.

Anyway, despite my emotions and attitude, the time has passed. My kids are back in school. The Halloween candy is already in the stores. I predict that in about six weeks from now, just before Halloween, the first Christmas candy will be out. On November 1, my local Walmart will have Halloween candy in carts up front and the Christmas stuff will be out in full-force.

By December 1, I will have been told by my kids 10 different things they want for Christmas because they have seen them on TV. The difficulty will be that 90 percent of those things will have been sold out due to black Friday and black Monday (that cyber-shopping day). The second difficulty will be evaluating what we can get because the hospital bills will still have balances.

There will be other things to occupy my mind. There will be other life business that must get done. People who dwell too much on their pain waste opportunities and the energy to look for those opportunities.

This is the difficulty of life in tough times when opportunity is sparse. The emotion is still tough in light of solutions that are simply stated or maybe just too simplistic. Life goes on even when your emotions continue to exist.

The intensity of your feelings makes you want to discount any kind of glib soothing comments from well-intended but (well okay stupid) individuals. The person who tells you to count your blessings (well, it is an achievement that you have your PhD) takes their life their hands.

Well, as I have bared my soul this labor day, my pain will have to be my responsibility. Just as your pain will be your responsibility. Time does not heal all wounds if the person holds onto the pain.

Yes, the pain will come back from time to time, and it will be each our our own jobs to deal with it and put it away when restitution never comes. Sometimes my resources will be better than others for dealing with pain. Sometimes I can tolerate the exhortations to count blessings than other times.

Coping is sometimes of varying quality. Getting by is till coping when the pain stays around.

Even bad times pass . . . while you're still going through them.

It has been over one month since I have written. I have been busy and have chosen to blog about political issues in my neighborhood. It has gotten some attention and I have been taking my own advice and doing that which I have enjoyed. If you have been following and looking to me for thoughts, I am sorry (but at this point, I have not noticed anyone commenting, so I have no idea if anyone is reading these posts).

Otherwise, the month of July 2009 has come and gone and we are now in August. While this is trite, the month has been good and it has been bad. But the good news is 1) we made it through the month, 2) the good times were enjoyed for the most part, and 3) we got through the bad moments.

I still feel somewhat cheated that I really did not get to enjoy the summer. I have only grilled out twice, whereas I usually grill out every weekend. We did not get to go on the summer trip I wanted to go on to show my family where I was raised. The kids go back to school next week.

My wife's illness has been the major issue we did not go on vacation. She is getting better, but at the beginning of July, things seemed like they were not improving at that time. Now she is back to more of her old self. I am hoping that this VP Shunt works this time. Our major problem is her energy level and she can barely get through the grocery store.

If we get to go anywhere, such as my grandmother's funeral (she turned 99 last week and seems in good health, but she at that age could still go), it will be me going alone as my wife is not going to be able to tolerate the road trip. Overall, we were stuck at home but we did get to use the new "Sprayground" at our neighborhood park.

I have also been extremely busy with work as I am short one person (whose position the organization will not fill due to "economic conditions"), and our patient load has picked back up. I had brought work home much of the month. There was no room to take any more time off for me and my family. Yeah, I have the vacation time, but there is no room for me to take it given being short on staffing. Furthermore, if I do take the time off, my wife is not physically capable of going anywhere for any long period of time. I am trying to use my self-talk that this is life and that I need to accept it.

One of our cars had the "service engine soon" light come on again this week and it is running rough. I need to get that serviced, and it will mean the credit card. More credit card debt for something that is not foolish or extravagant really stinks.

Of course thinking about the summer vacations I was supposed to have taken my family on by this time in life is also depressing me. My salary (while decent for most standards) pays the bills and there is little discretionary income left over. It got worse when my organization declared without telling me that my son's antihemophilia medication is now a "Class 4" medication subject to a $200 co-pay. My wife's hospital bills will mean me paying them into Christmas because the neurosurgeon, and the two hospitals all have a $500 co-pay. Yeah, I have my Ph.D., but when do I get to take my kids to Disneyworld and Yellowstone Park?

Okay, so I try to look outward beyond myself. I do have a job. I am keeping the bills paid and I make a little more than the minimums. I know a guy from church who is an accountant and he has been unemployed since January--I tell myself that it could be worse.

My parents came for 11 days. They brought their new dog, a seven-year-old Brittany Spaniel named Coco. He turned out to be like a third child to me whom I greatly enjoyed. It was kind of cool too as I walked through the neighborhood with him, people would ask me what kind of dog he is? Brittany Spaniels are not common in Louisville. Otherwise, I had some good conversations with my mother and they helped out around the house while my wife continued to recover.

Taking everything into account, we did get some meaningful help and not those casseroles that only I would be eating. The people from my office and from church gave us some gift cards and some other simple foods that my kids would eat. While there were many evenings in late June and early July where I felt pretty drained from working like a fiend all day in the frying pain and then jumping into the fire with my wife and kids, people did help us and that was good. It was not all bad.

I go back to thinking that the summer is almost over. It was not always comfortable, and I am clearly not where I want to be, but we made it through. We were not entirely alone. I have made decisions day by day and week by week. I kept my priorities in mind, prayed frequently in both need and in praise, and made reasonable decisions. We had our daily bread every day.

We kept it together. We are keeping it together now.

I have worked hard to avoid the "What if" catastrophic thinking that keeps many people up at night. Being prepared does not require one to constantly dwell on the worst case scenario. We will most likely keep it together in the future. I am keeping hope that the bad times pass even when you're still going through them--it happens one day at a time.