Wrecking, Reckoning, Recovering

We Are All Okay

“The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.” ― Ralph Waldo Emerson

You who are reading this have developed a good sense of self, it is my hopeful assumption. The unique individual that you have created for yourself since birth, the personhood that defines you, has value and deserves to be here, unequivocally, and it is good to internalize that precept as you go through life. We all, if we are being honest with our self-inventories, make mistakes, misspeak, or fail to live up to our expectations for ourselves; but, when we are fighting hard and down in the trenches, it is important to not lose contact with an inherent feeling of self-worth.

The problems created by my former alcohol abuse, in those years of discontent and struggle that I return to out of necessity as I give an informed account of my life, went much deeper than the ongoing havoc created during the out-of-control drinking episodes. That erratic behavior and its consequences had to be confronted and dealt with in the light of day, usually “the morning after,” but, also, “the Monday after” following a weekend bender given over to my addiction. My high school French teacher, Madame Thomine, renamed me Lundi (French for Monday), as I started early in learning how to feel like crap and be absent on that particular weekday.

For too many years that post-drinking, self-confronting reckoning would take place and damage control would follow. If I was lucky, the only victim of my actions was myself, and I did create, mostly out of thin air, many messes that I had to deal with. If my inebriate orbit captured and negatively affected others, I would try to clean up those messes, if I could. The operative word here is “if,” and there were many times penitence and restitution could only go so far; in those cases, my self esteem would plummet, adding mental anguish to my physical distress. Eventually, as my disease progressed, that self esteem would fall into the basement, and change into self-loathing.

I started drinking alcohol (mostly beer) when I was just 15 years old, and drank to excess far too often right from the start. It is said, by those who are knowledgeable on the subject, that personal growth stops with the onset of alcoholic drinking. I think that was true, for the most part, in my personal history.

After twenty years of free falling, I landed in a heap, confused, desperate, and tortured; luckily, there was still a smoldering ember of fortitude, resilience, and determination within me to pick myself up and, with the help and wise counsel of many empathetic folks, begin climbing. It took some time, but it was time well spent, as I immersed myself in recovery efforts, and pulled myself up (and got pushed!) toward the light. Alcoholics Anonymous, a substance abuse counselor, and group therapy all helped to keep me moving. But it was my daughter Katie, my firstborn, who got me started.

When my first wife, Donna, and I had our daughter, Katie, it was a transcendental moment in my life. Though it would be another three years before I stopped drinking alcohol, I was sober at the time, and I felt the full weight of the magic of new life, the awesome responsibility that was now mine, and the dawning glow of the purest love in the universe. That feeling would only widen and deepen in the next few years, and by the time I was bottoming out into a sad and discombobulated heap, my brain synapses still kept firing and reminding me of her importance in my life. In short, I didn't want to lose her, and, if I didn’t get sober/stay sober, I most certainly would.

So, with all of that help and motivation fueling my innate stubborn streak, I was able to stay the course this time, but it was two trips around the sun, for me, before I was fully able to embrace my new sober life. If you stop to think about it, there are many occasions throughout the calendar year that are times to break out the booze, and far fewer that are not, especially in my circle of family and friends back then. Going through those holidays and events sober the first time is just “practice.” The second time around you will have learned what to expect, and a few coping skills!

Now it has been forty-one years and counting of sobriety. My personal growth that had been repressed for all those years, all those years ago, resumed with a new clarity and sense of purpose that has borne fruit and rewarded and gratified me in a great many ways along the way. While I still take a self-inventory at times, I’m not overly hard on myself. I honor, respect, and like myself just fine, thank you, and you’re okay as well!