What is Celebrate Recovery? Why Celebrate Recovery?

Most people who know me well, know I've been involved with Celebrate Recovery in different aspects for the past five years.  From an attender, a small group facilitator, a 12-step facilitator, or in whatever capacity I can help in.  What many people don't know is exactly what Celebrate Recovery is or why people go.  I was talking with someone about it today and decided to write a blog about it.

What is Celebrate Recovery? Why Celebrate Recovery?

You are sitting at church, or pretty much any large gathering for that matter. Look to your right, look to your left.  All around you are hurting people, hiding behind smiling faces. Stop for a moment and take about three minutes and watch the short video, Smiling Addiction.

Look at yourself.  What mask are you wearing right now?  Are you sitting there with a smile plastered on your face, while inside you are struggling with an issue?  What are you using to mask your true self? It doesn’t have to be drugs or alcohol, it could be food.  For that matter, it can be just about anything.  Everyone has some kind of hurt, habit or hang-up in their life. 

Celebrate Recovery is a place at area churches where we can go and take off the masks and be “real.”  Confidentiality is a big key to this, what you say stays there, even that you went is confidential.  It is structured in such a way that you have fellowship with dinner together and then a time to worship during what is called “large group.”  In those times where you may not be able to express yourself with words, the songs sung during large group can give you the means to say those words.  For me, I can express much more emotion through song than any other way.  Also, during this time there is either a lesson given or a testimony from someone sharing how God has changed their life, very often how it has changed through their involvement CR (Celebrate Recovery).  CR operates a CHIP system as well.  There are chips for time that you have spent working on your issue.  And again, this is for everyone, not just the drug and alcohol group.  You don’t have to tell anyone what your chip is for, it is up to you to decide what area of your life you want to work on.  But the chips are great reminders to hang on to mark your progress over time.  Showing up to large group is just the first step, the real work begins in "small group."  It is there that the groups are broken down into specific topics and by gender.  Here is finally a place just for YOU.  You get to share what is going on, whether it be abuse, past issues, chemical dependence, anger issues (drive in Atlanta during rush hour and you will find out how your anger issue is!), etc.  Believe it or not, only one in three people attend CR due to drugs or alcohol.  Every one is dealing with some kind of hurt, habit or hang-up.  Maybe you are the one that was hurt, or you could be the one that has hurt someone else.  But we ALL have issues in our life that we have attempted to hide or sweep under the proverbial “rug.”  After small group, there is some sort of “Café” time.  This is a little bit freer time to share numbers or books or just visit with new friends that you’ve made.  Once you have been in CR for a while you may choose to go even deeper with it and attend a “step group.”  These are small groups dedicated to going through an in-depth series of four books that walks you through a 12-step, 8-principle process using Scripture as a guide. The step group typically takes about a year to complete.

Why share? Why Celebrate Recovery?  This is a SAFE place to share.  Maybe you’ve been burdened for a while but didn’t know where to turn to.  Maybe you feel ashamed because you think that Christians shouldn’t be dealing with “issues.”  Christians are forgiven, but still human.  Here is a place you can finally be real at.  For many people in CR this is the first time they’ve ever had a place to be real.  And just sharing can open up the doorway to taking that first step in healing, not hiding.  It has been said, “We are only as sick as our secrets.” What was the secret in your family of origin? What is your personal secret? Release it so God can take it from you and begin to heal you.

So drop that burden and those secrets you’ve been carrying and hiding and give Celebrate Recovery a try! To find a group in your area, click the icon below.

The Double Yellow Line

We all know what the double yellow line in the road means.  Do not cross.  But have you ever thought about how important that strip of simple yellow paint is?

My daughter and I were sitting in heavy Atlanta rush hour traffic earlier this week.  We had gotten off the interstate for a run through the Chick-fil-A drive thru and were about to get back on.  As we sat on an overpass we watched the cars on the interstate creep below us.  I looked to my left and so close that I could have reached out and touched it was another vehicle.  It was facing the opposite direction.  What kept us apart?  That double yellow line.  We were two vehicles, headed in completely opposite directions with nothing between us but paint!  I looked over to my daughter and commented, all these vehicles and the only thing keeping us all from being a tangled pile of metal is rules and painted directions.  Yellow lines, white lines, turn arrows, etc.  I asked her if she thought it was fair that there were so many driving rules.  She gave me a quizzical look and replied no.  I asked her if we could break them...yes, but we might get hurt.  I asked if we would be safer and happier if we watched for the lines and signals and followed them...of course.  Then I told her that is what it is like to be a parent.  We lay out the lines and rules.  Some paths are so dangerous that we erect barriers, like the concrete ones on the interstate.  But on other paths and roads, our only guidelines are the stripes of paint.  We know what we are supposed to do, but nothing is preventing us from crossing that line.  So for her to remember that when she thought some rules might not be fair, or how easy it would be to cross over some of the lines and boundaries we've placed.  That as parents we don't make those to ruin the fun, but so that she can travel far and safe and have even more freedom.  Without the lines our freedom would soon end in a mangled heap.  A lesson not just for my preteen, but for me to remember as well with the guidelines God has set out in His Word, the Bible.  Some of the "rules" may seem old fashioned and out-dated.  But they are there for our protection, not to stop us, but to help us travel further.

LeAnne's Nose

Just as I was walking into work last Friday (January 28) I received a phone call from the middle school.  The school office told me LeAnne had tripped and had a bloody nose.  She can be clumsy and has had other falls at school so it didn't register real high on my "concern meter" at first.  Then she said that they had called a nurse who was on the way to the school.  My "concern" needle started vibrating.  "We have to have a parent come up here right now, it's quite a bit of blood."  With my "concern" needle shooting way up I spun around, left my office and immediately headed to school.  As I was walking into the office I see two janitors walking out with an armful of white towels, covered in bright red blood.  My daughter's blood.  I felt faint.  I see two more cleaning up blood stains on the carpet, shaking I ask if my daughter is down the hall.  I'm escorted into the nurses area, where the nurse had beaten me to the school.  I look over and LeAnne seems ok and in one piece.  I slowly exhale, not even realizing at first that I had been holding my breath.  Sit down with her and it seems they have everything under control.  She had changed shirts due to all the blood, though there was still blood on her pants and shoes.  But the nose was no longer bleeding.  On the outside was a cut.  The nurse pulled me to the side and informed that she thought it was broken.  I asked if she was sure, she nodded a yes.  Said to get her to the doctor as soon as I could to make sure pieces of bone hadn't gone into her sinuses.  We have Kaiser insurance, so that meant I had to call and jump through all their hoops to get her seen.  They could see her quickly, but I'd have to go to the Sugarhill facility.  On the way there I told her, well baby I guess we get to spend the day together.  She replied, "I don't think this counts as quality time, Mom."  Guess not, not when you have been bleeding like crazy, have a broken nose and shaking in pain.  Get the x-rays and the broken nose is confirmed.  Instructions are to go home, stay propped up on pillows for 24 hr and ice it for 10 minutes every hour or so.  Follow up with an ENT.  She was such a trooper, kept asking the doctor if she could please go back to school.  This was her first day that she missed school the whole year.

Tuesday.  Our appointment with the ENT to find out what next.  Have had people praying for us.  Poor LeAnne is a nervous wreck.  It really hasn't swelled too badly and not much bruising either.  I'm hoping for the best.  Get to school to get her and her principal tells me LeAnne has hugged him three times and is nervous.  She comes to the office for me to sign her out and the principal tells us he is praying for us.  So very grateful for a Christian principal.  Thanks to Kaiser we have to drive 50 miles to the ENT.  She turns out to be extremely nice though and talked directly to LeAnne in terms she (and myself) could easily understand.  Apparently LeAnne cracked off a tee tiny piece of bone on the end of her nose.  The doctor said to hit it with that force, had she had her head turned a little to the left or a little more to the right and it would have disfigured her nose.  Requiring reconstructive surgery.  Said the knot/bump on the top of her nose was just swelling around the piece of bone.  Suggested we ice it three more days.  If it still doesn't go down then they could give her a shot of steroid in her nose, breaking down the scar tissue so it could finish going down. Thank you, Jesus! So now LeAnne has a story to tell her grand kids one day and the worst case scenario she might get a shot.  I did ask her if she wanted her nose pieced, told her it was hurting already so it wouldn't be a big deal.  Her response? A long drawn out "Ma .. um, Puh-lease!"  LOL