Psyched
with Candace Plattor, Addiction Specialist

5 Tips for Avoiding Holiday Stress and Overindulgence This Season

1) Lower your expectations – especially if you are a perfectionist.

Lower the bar of perfection you may have set for yourself, and see if you can’t enjoy the holidays as much – and perhaps even more — when you don’t try to live up to Martha Stewart standards. Just be yourself and do what feels healthy and good for you.

2) Be realistic in your holiday expectations.

The holidays can set us up for a fall. Everywhere in the media, in TV and radio ads, movies, and music, we are being given the message that ‘it’s the most wonderful time of the year’. But that’s just not realistic for many people. Difficult situations like illness, job loss, and relationship break-ups happen at this time of year, and even if things are ‘normal’ in your life, the body doesn’t know it’s a holiday. The days are shorter and darker, and yet we are often demanding that the body do more, eat more, drink more — and get less sleep. This is the opposite way animals in the natural world behave in winter and, for us humans, it’s a recipe for stress and sickness. Remember — the happiness and joy we are supposed to feel in this season won’t come through a credit card. It’s not about what we buy — it’s actually about what we choose to ‘buy into’, so be sure to make self-caring decisions for yourself.

3) Do less. It’s okay to take short cuts.

Try making a list of at least 3 things you can choose NOT to do this holiday season in order to give yourself the gift of some stillness, rest, and simplicity. Maybe you’ll be able to find 5 or 10 things to put on that list. One pair of friends I know give each other the gift of ‘one less obligation’ at Christmas. They have made a pact to not buy each other a gift or card in December, but instead they go out together for at least one dinner a month the rest of the year. This helps them feel less stressed emotionally and financially – and keeps them connected — they find they can truly enjoy and celebrate each other’s company doing it this way.

4) Have a plan — but accept that it might change.

You planned to get the latest, greatest Tickle-Me-Elmo/Cabbage Patch/Sponge Bob deely-bopper as the ‘big’ present for little Emily or Justin this year — but at the last minute, the store runs out. Is it really the end of the world? Maybe it’s a good lesson that there are lots of nice gifts out there – and a good reminder that this is not what the season is about anyway. One family I know give their son one gift and then take him to the store so he can choose another gift to give to a child whose family can’t afford presents.

5) Opt out of Holiday Madness.

Yes, it’s a crazy time of year — but so much of the madness is optional. You can enjoy the Christmas lights and the holiday displays at the grand stores and malls without feeling like you have to spend any money. Just enjoy the sights and feel grateful someone did all that work for your pleasure. You might choose to say ‘no’ to a couple of holiday parties, and go for a massage instead. Bundle up and walk around Lost Lagoon, Deer Lake or Pacific Spirit Park (or your favourite place to experience the wonders of nature) with a close friend or with family members. If you feel that you’re drinking, eating, smoking, gambling or spending too much, perhaps you can talk to a friend or counsellor about that.  Above all, remember to be gentle with yourself. This season can make us all crazy, but can also be a happy, peaceful time if we choose to practice healthy self-care and step out of the stress lane!

Several weeks ago, my brother sent me an article from the Financial Post — and my life changed in an instant.

My brother and I were born in the United States, but we left as teens. I have lived and worked in Canada for close to the last four decades, as a proud Canadian citizen.

The article talked about the fact that the U.S. is the only country in the world that taxes its citizens who are neither living in the U.S. nor working there. Even if American ex-pats are not earning an income there, the U.S. government is still able to tax them.

But it gets worse –- in its supreme arrogance, because our neighbor to the south is broke and in considerable debt, it is now bullying folks like me, by laying down the law saying that all of its citizens must pay U.S. taxes, regardless of the circumstances. And if any non-resident citizens choose to be ‘non-compliant’ and not file up to several years of back taxes, they could be punished by facing stiff fines of up to 25% of their entire financial worth, and maybe even go to jail. The jackbooted tone of the warning was clear. The IRS meant to scare –- and it worked.

After reading that article, I felt like a deer in the headlights.

I was frozen, scared, confused –- how could this be?

I grew up in the U.S. until I was 18, when I emigrated to Canada with my family. When we proudly became Canadian citizens in 1974, we were compelled to forfeit our American citizenship. I recall having some mixed feelings about that, as the U.S. was the country of my childhood. Later, when I was given the opportunity to take back my U.S. citizenship, I jumped at the chance –- after all, I asked myself, what could it hurt to be a citizen of the two countries that I loved?

I now have my answer to that question. It hurts a lot.

I have neither lived nor worked in the US since 1974, when I went back for only one year to spend some time with my father. For the past 38 years, living and working in Canada, I have gladly supported my country financially with my tax returns every year. Never once have I been ‘non-compliant.’

I am a person who felt fondly toward my country of origin. I have enjoyed going back to the States when I’ve had occasion to do so. I cared about who became the President of the United States — and what that would mean for Canada and the world at large — so I made a point of voting in the last election. Little did I know that all of this would come around to bite me on the butt.

Voting in the last presidential election, I suppose, technically prevents me from crying ‘taxation without representation’. But it’s unlikely that my ‘representative’, President Obama, is likely to heed the cries of outraged ex-pat constituents like myself, who live and work in, and have adopted, another country as their homeland.

So, really, where is my ‘representation’? I am angry and I am hurt, to put it mildly.

I hate the fact that I seem to have no say in this –- I am but a number in this complex cog, this blatant tax grab. I am so furious with the U.S. that I now want to renounce my citizenship. But guess what? There’s another Catch-22. In order to renounce my citizenship, I have to pay at least 6 years of back taxes.

It’s Orwellian.

Although I am but a number, I am one of close to a million Canadians who are facing this exact predicament. These are tax requirements so complex and labyrinthine that virtually no citizen can prepare them without paying a lawyer or tax advisor. Accountant fees alone will cost each of us, on average, $15,000 –- in addition to assessed back taxes.

Many of the Canadians affected, like myself, are either retired or close to retirement age, when we have only a fixed amount of money to live on — which only adds insult to injury. But because there are so many of us dealing with this brazenly unfair and crippling U.S. tax situation, we have a voice –- and our Canadian government (which works for us, which we often forget) needs to help us –- NOW.

The Globe and Mail reports that, ‘Ottawa has protested to the Obama administration that the law goes too far and may violate Canadian banking and privacy laws. But the U.S. appears determined to press on.’

It is unfair that tens of thousands of Canadian seniors are losing their hard-worked-for retirement income (earned in Canada) in their golden years. Ottawa will have to pick up the burden if their retirement nest egg no longer supports them for the years they have left to live, thanks to the Yankee tax collector.

I am not usually a political animal, and even when I have strong feelings, I rarely write about them and share them with the world. But this is different. This is outrageous.

If you –- or someone you know –- is facing this absurdly nasty situation, please let your thoughts and feeling be known. We need to find a way to band together and rally our elected officials to change the policy now in place that allows the U.S. to do this to Canadian citizens.

Canada always talks about America as our good neighbor to the south; our biggest trading partner and ally.

Well, America doesn’t feel like my ally right now.

It feels like the neighbourhood thug who just hit me over the head and stole my purse.

I’ve seen Amy Winehouse perform on TV several times over the past few years – and I was always amazed at how much her voice reminded me of Janis Joplin’s.  I was a big Janis fan back in the day, and although Amy’s music wasn’t as resonant for me personally, I do know that for many, she was a ‘voice’ of her generation – and a musical inspiration to many other young soulful artists.

I’m greatly saddened by her death.

Very few among us could have any idea what it must have been like for a young, blue collar girl from north London to be suddenly faced with international fame; to have enormous wealth and a parasitic British tabloid press watching her every move, hungry for each stumble; to be scrutinized for her looks, weight, voice, career trajectory and personal relationships. We can’t know what it must have felt like, in one’s early 20’s, to win 5 Grammys in one star-studded night, including Best New Artist. Wins that would have had the corporate music industry relying on her as a profitable investment, who would keep churning out hits, touring the world and making prime time media appearances.

Perhaps this lends some context to the frustration I feel as I read more and more about Amy and what appeared to be her perpetually recalcitrant attitude about alcohol and drug use – so clearly, and now tragically, summed up in her anthemic hit Rehab.

She seemed to understand the potentially tragic pitfalls.  She must have watched, just like we all did, when other celebs like Heath Ledger, Kurt Cobain, and of course Michael Jackson, had their lives snuffed out by addiction. Yet in song she was taking the stance of the sad, troubled, yet defiant rebel – I don’t need or want your help.

My concern is, as we mourn Amy’s passing and listen to her music with renewed interest, that we don’t romanticize what she was going through – and the fatal decisions she made — that we don’t make saying ‘no, no, no’ to rehab the cool, badass ‘what would Amy do?’ thing to emulate. Outside her home, fans and mourners gathered to lay flowers – some leaving glasses of wine, bottles of spirits, and cigarettes, as is the practice on Jim Morrison’s grave in Paris. These are worrisome signs of a myth already forming – one with a troubling message.

To her credit, she did attend a 2-week treatment program in 2008 which, according to various entertainment news sources, “didn’t take”– largely because effective treatment for drug and alcohol addiction requires far longer than 2 weeks to be successful, in my professional opinion. Entering such a program may have been a bid in trying to get her family, friends, and record company off her back by showing her willingness to go for help.  She even spent some time at the famous private celebrity rehab facility The Priory in May of this year – even though she was urged to seek a longer government-provided treatment program, she chose a short assessment followed by ‘outpatient’ treatment at The Priory.

I’ve been a therapist treating clients with addictive behaviors for over 20 years – and my hunch is that Amy was fighting some pretty hefty demons that she didn’t think she could conquer. It has been said that recovery from addiction is an ‘inside job’, one that is not for the faint of heart. I wonder if Amy did not believe strongly enough in her own courage and resourcefulness. Rather than face her deep inner pain sober, she opted for the other choice: to say no to effective rehab.

When people with mental illness and addictions begin to spin out of control, family and friends discover how powerless they are to ‘make them change’. Even as we try to get them to see realistically what is happening to them – and how it is affecting those of us who love them — the only real hope is that they themselves will recognize the need for help and go for it. The reality is that many people struggling with addiction do choose to recover — and some don’t. For the ones who don’t, there isn’t much we can do for them. Unfortunately, some of them end up dying.

As a recovering addict myself – one who chose to get help many years ago – it’s challenging for me to understand people who make the decision to keep using, even to the point where it kills them. On the surface, Amy had it all – her life shone like the star she was. She had ‘made it’ – she was young and beautiful, had tons of talent, fans followed her all over the globe. In fact, one mourner keeping vigil outside her Camden home even compared the memory of her, in death, to that of John Lennon – even though Lennon’s death was not due to addiction. Nonetheless, being compared to John Lennon’s musical genius is incredible praise, if you ask me.

And so, along with a great many others, I feel very sad today about another young life snuffed out by something that could have been prevented. But I know all too well that recovery from any kind of addiction is a choice – a choice the young Amy Winehouse said ‘no’ to  - one time too many.

In addition to her musical legacy, it is my fervent hope that the message her untimely death leaves is less a romantic myth – and more a cautionary tale.

Amy – wishing you well in the next phase of your journey.

…and if Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play my tune today – it would be a victory march.

But it could have been a funeral march.

As I write this, it is the eve of my anniversary of sobriety – on July 18^th, I will have been clean and sober for 24 years.

Looking back on it, the time has flown by, even though in the early years it was sometimes difficult to not give up and give in to my addictions. If anyone had told me then that I’d be celebrating 24 years of sobriety from mind-altering substances today, I definitely would have thought they were crazy.

The gratitude I feel about my life today is immense. Everything is so different now than it was back then. I think the most amazing change is that I now truly like and respect myself – something that was fleeting, at best, before embarking on my rocky, stumbling and eventually rock-solid path to recovery.

In 1973, when I was in my early 20’s, I suddenly and unexpectedly became very ill, eventually being diagnosed with Crohn’s Disease – an extremely painful and debilitating inflammatory bowel illness much like the more well-known colitis. Because the doctors didn’t have a clue how to treat Crohn’s at that time, they did what they knew to do – prescribe drugs, lots of them. I was given as much Valium, codeine, and Demerol (the OxyContin of its day) as I requested, and for many years took them all faithfully just like the doctor ordered.

Unfortunately, not much was known about addiction at that time. In fact, the concept of drug addiction never came up in conversation with those doctors when I went in, time and time again, to get my prescriptions refilled. I think because they felt so powerless to help me, with their limited understanding of this disease that was virtually crippling my life, they just wanted to do what they could to get me out of their offices.

At least, that’s how it often felt to me.

So on and on it went – years of prescription drugs as well as the marijuana that I began using on a daily basis, to take away the emotional pain of having an illness that no one wanted to talk about. After all, diarrhea and constipation weren’t appropriate topics of conversation amongst the people I hung out with – that is, when I wasn’t hiding out in my apartment with the drapes closed and the phone unplugged, high as a kite, but falling fast.

By the Spring of 1987, I had been ingesting all of these substances for nearly 15 years — thoroughly addicted to them, as any human body would be after that much exposure.  I didn’t understand at that time that Valium, codeine, Demerol, and pot are all depressants in the human body – but what I was very aware of was that I was so emotionally depressed that I had become suicidal. Not that I truly wanted to die – I just knew I couldn’t go on the way I was living.

Even after all these years, I can clearly recall the day I began thinking in earnest about this. I was at work, not feeling well — as was often the case. As I was lying down on a couch in the break room, I realized I had more than enough pills to kill myself. And if I timed it right, no one would find me for several days. I suddenly discovered that I was actually creating a plan for how I could do it….

Sick and addicted though I was – this experience scared me enough to make the choice to reach out for help.  And I am so deeply grateful that there were caring and skillful people there to answer my calls.

For the past 24 years, I have been on my spiritual journey of recovery – from drugs, alcohol, and several other addictive behaviours I have used to hide from the difficult life I had led since childhood. And this journey has yielded the most amazing results, allowing me to now live a life I hadn’t even been able to dream of!

Today I am proud of myself. That wasn’t something I ever felt while in the state of active addiction. I have become a successful therapist in private practice here in Vancouver, helping others to understand and discover the triggering issues lying underneath the symptom of addiction – which is what addiction is, in my view – a symptom of deeper issues and pain that needs to be felt and explored, ideally with therapy and/or peer support. I now help other people to understand their self-sabotaging patterns so that they can lead the lives they truly want. I am a published author of a successful book that has helped countless people and families navigate the tough waters of addiction. Almost every day, I receive notes and e-mails from people telling me how much it has helped them get off the roller-coaster chaos of addiction, maintain their own serenity, and live their best lives.

After years of scrambling for my rent money, I live today in a lovely home in the West End of Vancouver near English Bay. I am blessed to have people in my life who love me, and who I am able to love back – which isn’t something I was able to have in my addiction.

And as a result of my intentional and holistic self-care, my Crohn’s Disease –supposedly an illness that cannot be cured — has been in remission with very minimal symptoms for over 15 years.

Who knew any of this could happen?

I ingested my last Valium and smoked my very last joint 24 years ago today. Little did I know how awesome this journey would be. It was the best decision I ever made.

Happy Birthday to me — Sgt. Pepper, strike up the band!

Today I received an extraordinary email from Ward Grant.

In case you missed seeing him interviewed on TV, Ward is the man who started Vancouver’s “Wall of Hope” – after feeling so angry and disheartened to see what was happening to our amazing city after the final Stanley Cup game, he was one of the first to take positive action.

The morning after ‘the night before’, Ward came downtown with a handmade poster he had created – a sign that told both the team he supported and the people of his beloved city how he felt. He arrived at what would become the Wall of Hope and put up his profoundly simple poster for the world to see, even before he knew how anyone else felt about what had happened. He needed to do this – it was a mission of love and healing for him, not to mention a gift to Vancouver.

In my eyes, his was an act of courage on so many levels, as being the first to speak out against injustice so often is. I understand, because at the same time he was hanging his sign that morning, I was writing my first blog post about that horrible night – and we were essentially saying the same thing.

I have never met Ward Grant in person, but tonight he sent me an email asking a favour of me — which I am about to fulfill here after asking his permission to do so.

I want to share his email with all of you:

“Dear Candace,

My name is Ward.  I watched in stunned disbelief as my city burned.  In the morning after, I decided I could not and would not accept what had happened.  I didn’t want the small group of %^#@@ to present this city to the world as the Kabul of the west coast.

I decided to paint a poster and went down early to hang it up on the Bay building.  I was hoping no one would notice, but as it turned out, someone did.

Ward Grant putting up his sign

Global news and the Georgia Straight were there, and when I was asked why I was doing what I was doing, I challenged everyone who were sickened by the violence to come down and show their support for the good people of this city and sign the boards.  I hoped maybe a couple might get signed.

At 3:30 pm that afternoon, I wandered down to see how things were going.  I was stunned.  All the boards, all the way around the store were being signed.  I sat on a bench across the street on Granville and tears streamed down my face…really grateful for sunglasses right then!

Please thank the citizens of Vancouver and the Lower Mainland for me.  Thank those who took the time to sign a piece of plywood; who chose to stand with me in support of the good people who live here; who chose to stand with me in defiance of those who would choose to be less than they can be.  Perhaps all of us standing together can show them that to aspire to be better than we are fosters life and growth and friendship and peace and love and all those ideals that somehow are getting lost in the rush to be in a hurry.

Thank you.

Sincerely in Service,

Ward Grant”

Thank you, Ward, for being so brave and so honest, for being the role model we all needed right then and there. Thank you for entrusting me with your request – I am honoured to fulfill it.

Thank you for showing your love to Vancouver and for being one of our healers – you will not be forgotten.