“These questions are decades old.”
Recovery can mean a lot of different things. In the way I use it, recovery means the cessation of addictive substances or behaviors. For some people, that requires total abstinence from certain substances. For others, it might mean harm-reduction or behavior change.
To me, recovery means not only total abstinence from alcohol and mind-altering drugs, but the healing of decades-old trauma, unlearning harmful beliefs about myself and others, and rehabilitating the way I engage in relationships with other people. Each of those things could be a topic that stretches over multiple blogs, so for now I’m just talking about recovery from substance abuse.
I’m going to fast-forward through my childhood for now, but suffice it to say that it was painful and chaotic and I was surrounded by plenty of substance-users. By the time I was an adolescent, I had absolutely debilitating anxiety. I developed a lot of strange obsessions and compulsions in my teens that I think were really just a way to escape to a world that was all my own. I didn’t drink much in high school, but on the few occasions I did, I binge-drank enough to get sick. Alcohol was already another promising way to escape myself. To turn off the noise and quiet the chaos.
And although I wasn’t a daily drinker until my mid-to-late twenties, I increased the binge drinking in college. Drinking was such part of the culture at my rural liberal arts college that I never really questioned my behavior. Even when I passed out at a party one night and ended up taking an ambulance to the local ER, I chalked it up as a one-time mistake resulting from not enough food.
And in my 20′s, I drank regularly and prolifically, finding a place in Atlanta’s bar culture that felt comfortable, if not very consistent. And the truth is, for a while it was kind of fun, in a twisted way. I had learned how to turn all the way off. I never had to be anybody but the bar friend. I could live in the smoky haze of a dark bar without ever really knowing what was going on inside myself or processing the absolutely devastating events that had surrounded me for most of my life. It was the perfect environment in which to halt all emotional growth for about a decade.
Things only got worse in my 30′s. I was drinking pretty much every day, during any free moments I had outside of the workday. I couldn’t just stop. I was well past the point where the people I had been drinking with were no longer drinking like I was. I was past the point of ruining several relationships. My behavior was getting noticed at work. I was thousands of dollars in debt. I had a newly-diagnosed heart condition that made my substance abuse especially dangerous. And still, I couldn’t seem to stop.
I tried to quit for a few years. I even did Intensive Outpatient treatment and stayed sober for about six months. Even then, though, the thought of never drinking again seemed more than I could handle, and I thought obsessively about what conditions would be necessary to allow my drinking again. And I did drink again. Every time I stopped for a while, I convinced myself that a break was all I had needed and I knew better now, circumstances had changed, I’d just be more careful this time…
And of course, that never worked.
I had my last drink on the night of my 34th birthday. I was alone for most of it. I had just gone through a painful breakup. I left my job partly because I was afraid of being fired. I was making one terrible decision after another. I was supposed to have dinner with the person I was dating but we split up that same day. I felt just... completely unmoored. I opened a bottle of red wine, and I remember thinking:
“This is never going to get any better, is it?”
I drank the whole bottle anyway. And I drank more that night, although I didn’t really even want to. I just couldn’t even fathom anything different. I thought that even if I could stop, life beyond would be so unappealing, I’d rather be dead.
And yet, for some reason, I made a different choice the next morning. Hungover, exhausted, and completely defeated, I surrendered.
I chose a program of recovery and I’m not here to talk about which program that is. But, I will say, I had to let go of the idea that I’d ever be free of alcoholism. I had to quit thinking that if I learned enough or stayed dry enough or just did my time, I could forget about recovery altogether. The program I chose requires a conscious effort to stay sober every single day, and I will need to work it for the rest of my life. But that quickly went from burden to blessing as I realized how much different my life could be on the other side.
And yes, for me, that requires total abstinence from mind-altering drugs. I drink coffee, and I’m on therapeutic doses of a few medications, but none produce any immediate mental or cognitive effects. Other people may be able to handle it, but I know I can’t. Other people may be able to learn how to moderate their drinking, but I can’t. My sobriety means no drinking, at all, ever.
And maintaining my sobriety also means maintaining emotional sobriety - which is a large part of the reason for this blog. Life didn’t stop being challenging once I quit drinking - in fact, in many ways, it became even more difficult because I am now facing things that I’ve put off for years.
How do I face those things now? What are my values? How do I let people love me? How do I love myself, given some of the things I’ve done? How can I be seen? Be vulnerable? Be authentic? Be brave?
Some questions are answered every day that I continue to recover. But I once had a therapist that said something that rattled me to the core. Because - even as I was asking - I wasn’t looking deep enough. Or far back enough. Or in dark enough places.
“These questions are decades old.”
But one by one, I’m turning the lights on. Nothing much can grow in the dark.
