What is Your Drug of Choice?

**Vodka and Vicodin. What's your drug of choice?**[](http://brendayoder.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/mp900408853.jpg)

This weekend I'll be sharing the powerful story of a young mom who found herself unexpectedly turning to Vicodin and Vodka and ended up in rehab. This was not the life she ever imagined herself living. She was a parent like you, like me, *who learned certain things can numb pain and fill holes in your life.*

**Where are your holes?** **What are the gaping wounds in your soul that you self-medicate?**

If this doesn't apply to you, don't disregard this post. You may not self-medicate with prescription drugs or alcohol, but what do you fill your emotional holes with? **What do you turn to that numbs the holes in your heart?**

[](http://brendayoder.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/mp900442517.jpg)**Food? Shopping? Relationships? Busyness? Appearance? Success? Children? Enabling?**

Or do you turn to substances? A recent study ("Mother's Little Helper, LA Times, Jan. 13, 2012) reported there is an increase in mother's seeking ADHD medication for their children for their own self-medication. As a behavioral professional working with families and children, my colleagues and I observe an increase in parents self-medicating in some form. **Parents are hurting, therefore children hurt.**

**What's filling your holes?**

I don't know if emotional depravity is increasing in our culture or if self-medication is becoming more mainstream. My work with people tells me it's both. **Psychological and emotional wounds seem to be increasing and are present in every walk of life.**

[](http://brendayoder.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/mp900448283.jpg)Ten years ago, I left being home full-time to working in public schools. A student who lived in my rural neighborhood very poignantly said, "**You live in a fairy-tale**." The picket-fence image, the Bubble.

I knew what they said was true, though we had our own struggles as a family. What the student was conveying was at that time **I lived in a small, Christian-everything-is-right-with-the-world-bubble**. Over time, experiencing my own personal struggles and becoming more hands-on as a community member and an educational/counseling professional, I know the fairy-tale life is the minority these days. My own family was on the verge of going over[ several cliffs to destruction](https://brendayoder.com/2013/01/17/the-ugly-picket-fence-journey/), and I've had [self-medicating periods ](https://brendayoder.com/2012/12/03/food-hunger-and-god/)in my own life. I now walk where life is messy, [beyond the picket fence-image](https://brendayoder.com/educating-2/).

**What about you? Do you live in a bubble? Are you aware of those with gaping holes around you?**

As you read Candi's story this weekend, I challenge you to listen to the holes in her heart that she filled with substances. **They are wounds and holes common to most of us**. Cognitive distortions, self-doubt, bitterness.

**Do you struggle with these?**

**Candi's story is our story**. It's the story each of us has who tries to* fill the voids in our life with unhealthy things*. Though the "substance" may be different,** the quest for fulfillment and happiness it similar**. While some are more destructive, none satisfy.[](http://brendayoder.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/mp900396129.jpg)

The root of satisfaction she has found is the same I've found. It's the same found in each of us changed by the **grace of Great Healer, Christ Himself, the Son of the Living God.**

As you anticipate reading Candi's story this weekend, I challenge each of you to examine the holes and voids in your own heart and life and what you attempt to fill them with that's unhealthy. **Facing our wounds is never easy, but giving them healthy means by which to heal diminishes scaring.**

My prayer for you this week from Philippians 4:6-7, The Message:

"*Don't fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God's wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It's wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life."*

May we live not in a bubble, not in denial, not in pain, but in the wholeness of Jesus Christ, letting His grace and peace fill every wounded hole in your being.

**How have you found healing and wholeness from your holes?** We'd love to hear. And tune in this weekend for Candi's inspiring story.

In His love,

[](http://brendayoder.files.wordpress.com/2013/01/my-signature.png)