When I first got sober the Recovery community folded me into their arms with much love and care.
It saved my life.
To be clear: the Recovery community is amazing and unlike anything I've seen anywhere - before or since!
But to my credit, I made myself available. From my second day sober I was at a meeting from one to three times a day for two years. I kept up a twice-weekly attendance for many more years after that.
I also SPILLED MY GUTS in those meetings. THOUSANDS of times (literally: do the math). I opened up my proverbial book and tossed it all on the table.
This made it so much easier for people to help me.
(Because trust: there are a lot of attendees who huddle in the back silently, or crouch over their phone in the chairs against the wall. "Just listening today, thanks." That's like the zebra chilling out on the outside of the herd. Good luck - and I mean this in sincerity and love!)
I worked at my Recovery so hard that one of my sponsors (I had two - they were a couple) said to me early on, "Kelly you're so serious," -
She meant, too serious.
It was funny to me even then because I knew this disease is not fucking around - modern medicine has not extended the average lifespan of an addict, at all. I mean I knew this disease killed people. What's more serious than that?
But I took her point and ever since I've continually worked to keep my recovery foremost - while enjoying my life. She taught me something wonderful that day.
I want other people to have the chance that I got.
And non-addicts - no offense, I say this with love! - are doing the absolute worst providing us that chance.
So here are twelve things I wish people knew about sobriety:
Addiction is a deadly disease.
Addiction is at the very very least a brain disease and a very serious physical illness. Some recovered (or reprieved) addicts contend this is a combination of a mental obsession (with the drug and/or compulsion) paired with a deadly physical allergy.Others say it's a spiritual and physical malady.
I don't really know about any of that but I do know it's a brain disease which makes it a pretty big deal.
If your kidney stops working you could maybe fix it with medicine or surgery - or get a new kidney.
You REALLY can't swap out your brain! When you have a problem there, it's usually a big problem.
Just look at the statistics. Addiction kills - for sure. Quick or slow.
I you know someone in Recovery who's stayed sober: the odds were and still are against them. If they're staying sober and living even a halfway-useful life (useful to themselves and others) - you are looking at an almost inexplicable miracle: medical and (some say) spiritual.
Show some respect!
Number two:
Society is obsessed with simultaneously stigmatizing, obfuscating, minimizing and ridiculing this disease.
And no one works harder to obfuscate than the addict themselves - and (usually) their family. (More on this in a minute!)
Think about it. If you have cancer, you can openly talk about this and you'll likely receive large amounts of support, empathy, and love.
That is NOT the case for addiction, especially when our behaviors start crossing social lines.
As the comedian Mitch Hedberg said, "Alcoholism is a disease, but it's like - the only disease you can get yelled at for having."
That's not perfectly accurate, but there's a real nugget of truth there.
By the way - Hedberg died of this disease at 37 years old. 37 years old!
This leads me to number three:
Society mocks addicts - or ignores them.
Alcohol addiction is used as a punchline; so especially are porn addiction and sex addiction.
Gambling disorders are all but ignored. So is shopping addiction, marijuana/cannabis addiction, and internet addiction.
Hoarding compulsions are mocked - or made into a spectacle. (Meanwhile the US consumes 17% of the world's resources, hosting only 4% of the world's population.)
Eating disorders are clucked at with pity - equal parts concern and schadenfreude. However for all the appearances of sympathy the mainstream still invests in and promotes weight loss ideologies, diet culture and fatphobia - every day.
Racism and classism are huge factors - the toxic conversations around crack cocaine or methamphetamine use for instance versus the (generally) more sympathetic attitudes around prescription-based opioid dependence or use of psychedelics.
The public investment in denial is just stunning. When a beloved celebrity dies of an overdose (accidental or otherwise) - people will go to weird lengths to insist they weren't an addict. One musician - much beloved - revealed upon autopsy a system flooded with fentanyl, oxycodone, temazepam, alprazolam, citalopram, acetylfentanyl, and despropionyl fentanyl among other drugs. After his death people took to the Twitter to angrily claim he wasn't an addict - tweet after tweet.
I don't know if he was an addict or not - but I know you can't just decide that for someone else and it's weird that you want to!
There are so many movies making a mockery or a punchline of addiction (I've written about some good ones, here). It's annoying if nothing else.
All addicts need help, support - and to be treated with dignity.
All addictions and all compulsive behaviors can bring so much misery and all of them can bring death - quick or slow.
Please realize this disease is real and impactful to the lives of millions - we are not punchlines, nor uncomfortable truths to be glossed over.
Given the social stigma it's no wonder that:
Families in and of addicts are usually heavily invested in denial.
I have seen family members invent the most implausible stories to retain the family reputation, or cling to some illusion of control, or to avoid stigma.
Years ago my mother said to me, "Oh you know about your dad's DUI back in the day."
No I did not! No one ever told me that story!
For the record, I don't believe my father was an alcoholic. But I do KNOW that both sides of my family would obfuscate, deny and minimize the role of drugs and alcohol in our lives. (I once found out an uncle sold his boat for cocaine money. You know. NORMAL stuff that REGULAR people do!)
I've seen someone create an entire website to explain away a loved one's demise via a variety of in-depth conspiracy theories. I've seen people drive their partners across the state (or borders) for "diet pills" or special cold medicine.
I knew a young woman who was so over-medicated I couldn't believe she was able to get to her workplace, let alone perform her duties. Her doctor and her family - including her parents and her partner - were involved. She suffered terribly, as she was drinking on top of the medications - a fact her family patently ignored. I watched her go through the shakes; I held her hand in the hospital as several medical professionals stood around her bed to tell her they had nothing - nothing to offer her but advice that she go to treatment when she could afford it. (She survived and is still sober today.)
I have a lot more stories, obviously.
One thing I am saying is: if you think you've got a problem, maybe your family and (current) friends aren't going to be the assets you think they are.
The afflicted's behavior can go from cute to tragic - really quick.
Listen, I have loads of stories of end-stage addicts and alcoholics whom I was SURE, absolutely sure, would not survive even a week longer - but they did.
Some of them recovered!
However much, much, MUCH more common is the person who didn't survive. Who "died suddenly" and it's all rather hushed up. Who took their own life - and took other lives with them. Families cover this stuff up. Drowned, died in a car accident, accidentally overdosed, died by suicide. It's like the number one job these families adopt, is to make sure no one knows about the addiction.
WHY?
Because of stigma!
The thing is, it's more socially acceptable to be a drunk - even a rather unpleasant one at times - than to be committed to sobriety, because sobriety grates on our collective denial.
And because of this denial, we get a whole lotta mess. Like:
If sober life can be co-opted, monetized, cheated, over-analyzed or diluted - it has been or will be.
As we go further down the line in our active addiction we are also working overtime to convince - ourselves and others - that we don't have a problem.
We flip backwards somersaults to find a way to justify our behaviors - and the so-called free market is aware of this.
You'll see programs that swap one drug for another, torturous inpatient aversion therapies, hypnotism and sober coaching programs ($$$), snake oil salesmen, and self-help gurus making big bucks off their "moderation" and "responsible use" promises ("California sober" anyone?).
In early recovery this shit used to REALLY freak me out because I thought, What if I'd fallen into one of those "moderation" camps? I mean I was HAUNTED.
But the answer is simple: I would have continued on, suffered a lot more damage, and maybe died (hurting my family every step of the way).
Maybe I would have lived long enough to get Recovery.
Who knows?
Beware anyone trying to make profits off so-called treatment programs.
Fortunately:
There IS quality help available - 24/7/365.
The world of Recovery is not some magician act that can - poof! cure the addict.
However, the Recovery community is the most active, anarchistic, functionally helpful world I've ever seen and there is help available around the clock. Truly.
Now some of us need hospitalization at first and that's a fact. Some of us need medications too. Most of us should be working with doctors who understand addiction. (I owe my life to one!)
We ALSO need support from other addicts - and this is always available.
My first day sober my doctor told me to go find these groups. He said, "I'm here to support you, but you're going to need to get to meetings." I aired my complaints - I said, "It seems like it's full of people who just make not-drinking their identity."
I was wrong about that (lol), but he didn't try to argue with me.
He said something smart. He said: "So what? You came to me for help." I swear he said it with kindness - but it was like a slap. "Listen bitch, this is gonna be tough at first. If you're going to piss and moan about hearing the word "God" or having to wait your turn to talk, kinda sounds like you just want to find a reason to drink again." (That's my internal voice, to me - to be clear! He was nothing but professional and kind.)
It's true: the world of Recovery isn't perfect.
Weird that we'd expect it to be?
But it is consistent, active, passionate - and the world of Recovery knows an awful lot about active addiction AND recovering from it.
Something to know about that:
In early Recovery the line between grief (healthy) and self-pity (not so much) - does not (yet) exist.
Grief is important, it is necessary and good.
Self-pity (and it's self-obsessed cousin, morbid guilt) will sink our ship faster than almost anything.
It's no use trying to sort that out for the addict new to sobriety. They are a MESS. They will eventually start to untangle things - if they do what they're supposed to.
I once had an addict friend compare early Recovery work to being constipated, and receiving an enema - clearing the system out.
It's not pretty, it's not. But it's necessary.
Best to let the addict do that work with their sponsor(s), therapist(s), meetings and sober friends. You as a family member or friend do not (and probably should not) need to be a major part of that process.
Let them do their thing. They'll get better.
But:
Not enough is said about the "baffling" part of the disease.
This is subtle, but it's key.
Every single person I see with a new sobriety date - whether their first time really trying it, or their twentieth relapse; whether off the street or out of (yet another) posh rehab - ALL of them share at least two traits:
One, they feel ashamed (however much bluster or even hostility they may evidence), and
Two, they are confused as to how this happened to them.
I almost feel like those who went to rehab have it worse because of all the pop psychology they pack into these programs these days. The last thing we addicts need are to obsess about ourselves more!
To get sober you need to take action - not just talk about yourself and your troubles.
Listen: it's a confusing disease. FOR REAL.
I don't quite understand my addiction and I also don't fully understand my Recovery.
But I do know what I had to do to recover, and I keep doing it. That's how I'm coming up on thirteen years sober.
One thing to note:
There is no hierarchy in Recovery and anyone who thinks there is, is deluded.
For about three and a half years I was tasked (by my sponsor) to run two meetings a week, up at the treatment center as an unpaid (of course) volunteer.
This meant administering meetings of about eight to twelve people, all of them medicated, all of them not feeling well.
At one meeting while listening to the group a woman shared her story and as she spoke she defended her behavior. "I'm no dime bag hoe," she said with malice - and at that utterance I observed about four other women stiffening up.
It wasn't a sensitive thing for her to say. But I understood even in that moment that the woman who wasn't a dime bag hoe wasn't intending to deride any of the others there - she was really, really struggling with what she'd done and who she really was and she was trying to place herself.
Of course, on that day she pissed those other women off. But that's part of Recovery too. Getting pissed, and getting over it.
To quote the late Robin Williams - "An [addict] is someone who will violate their standards quicker than they can lower them." It honestly doesn't matter if your standard is not drinking before work, smoking heroin vs. using needles, marrying another addict rather than selling sex - it doesn't matter. We ALL have standards in addiction and we ALL violate them and it's this wild, frenetic inner struggle to try to understand what's happening to us.
We're all baffled when we get here.
But sadly:
The mainstream likes our drama more than our success.
This may be the thing that disgusts me most, I am still working on my spirit of compassion. The mainstream LOVES messy stories and is BORED by those of us who survive and thrive.
They love seeing our ninety-day posts - emotional posts, often still groveling with low-self worth. In contrast. they mostly yawn over our two year, twelve year, forty-five year sobriety.
That's because people like OTHER people's tragedies, so they can either feel better about themselves or safe, in some way.
(No one is safe from this disease. Just consider those who've lost a loved one to drunk driving!)
I don't think people with more time are more deserving. I do think you are seeing something incredible - someone who stuck to the work and didn't lapse. Those of us who've stayed recovered (or reprieved) have a lot to offer. At the very least, we should be celebrated for our precious lives!
That said:
No one gives you a medal for getting sober.
Well, you do get these little plastic or bronze chips. I have loads! :)
But here's my point: as an addict you learn real quick that most people won't give you the kudos, acknowledgement and encouragement that you'd like - and frankly, deserve.
So what?
And here I speak to the addict or maybe-addict who is reading here:
Are we really getting and staying sober for THEM?
Well, a little. We know they'd suffer so much more if we let ourselves slip (back again).
And it's to our credit that we care about them as much as we do.
But hopefully if you're sober you've had enough sober time to care about yourself - for your OWN sake.
As it's said:
"We'll love you until you can learn to love yourself."
Tough work, that.
But I, along with millions! - we are proof it can be done!
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Thank you for reading!