Recently I had occasion to walk through the neighboring SF Mission District. For whatever reason, the mystery of memory, I found myself remembering a distant past I had not thought about in ages. It was 1984, I was one year clean and sober. Back then the Mission was a Mexican/Latin American ghetto. Carlos Santana went to Mission High, and one of my favorite haunts was Discolandia, a long-gone Latin Record store, and one of the few places I could find my beloved Pablo Milanes. Now the Mission is a barely recognizable tony, upscale neighborhood, where a parking space is almost as hard to find as Pablo was then. I used to walk through the neighborhood every day, from the BART subway station on the daily commute from my Berkeley apartment to my job. I worked in a small agency called Latino Family Alcohol Counseling Center. I was proud to have a job there and “in the field” especially as a young, Jewish gringa woman. But my Spanish was pretty darn good.
It was a challenging job, as most of the poor clientele were court-ordered for some reason or another, usually drunk driving, and almost exclusively men. In those days the punishments were so different, generally, some modest number of counselling sessions. Perhaps the most challenging part of my job, was that once a month I had to teach the mandatory drunk driving school, which was one full weekend, two eight-hour days, and in Spanish of course. Oy vey. Thinking back on it now, I can’t imagine how I did it. I did my best to make it interesting, lively and interactive. I don’t remember what we did. Back then there was no AV gadgetry. I had a few films I could show, I tried to create activities that the guys could do and/or do together. I don’t remember much, except that we were all doing our best to get through it. They seemed to like me, I guess it meant something to at least some of them that I had my own history and was open about it, and not punitive like their probation officers and often their wives. I also familiarized myself with Spanish language AA which I found pretty awesome in that the program seemed to extend internationally and not become corrupt in one way or another like so many things international did. The addiction field was in its infancy then. I hung in there for that year until I started graduate school. Now forty plus years sober, it all seems like a distant dream, and I am so grateful.
Symptoms
Although AA still has a decidedly moral tone, those of us who studied trauma and neglect understand it as a symptom. And for me, although I never bought into the higher power part, my time spent in those at the time blindingly smoke-filled rooms, was life-saving. I walked devotedly around the corner to my Berkeley Fellowship meetings twice a day: 6:00 AM and 7:00 PM. In conjunction with my then four times-a-week psychotherapy, they saved my life. Thankfully neither my drinking nor the clouds of tobacco smoke seem to have had any lasting damage on my brain that I know of. It was my good fortune and my therapist’s wisdom that got me to quit young enough. By the last of my drinking career, I was consuming a quart, roughly a litre of straight bourbon by myself every night, Old Crow, $6.95 a quart. On my small frame, how did I do it?
We now know that coming out of trauma and neglect, we do what we must to survive the pain and fear. I started out with my near-fatal eating disorder, anorexia that nearly took me down at age 13. Eating disorders were considered the “good girls’ addiction,” although I have always rather baulked at the classification of eating disorders as an addiction because it is unclear if they fit the precise scientific definition. Drinking and bicycling, however, became a ready alternative or addition, depending on the times. And they were at least more social and brought me out of my utter and certainly not unique isolation.
Thankfully the alcoholism field has advanced a lot in the last 40 years. In my early recovery time, AA was all we had, and in eating disorders sadly even less. To my mind that field is still pretty impoverished although perhaps you know more than I do. I am grateful to be I would say fully recovered, although it took a painfully long time.
Within the first four years of my sobriety, my beloved partner, who at the time I thought was the love of my life, was tragically caught in the web of alcoholism himself. I got to see up close what it looks like when someone simply cannot stay sober. We had originally gotten sober together, but he seemed never to be able to make it for long, and there was repeated deception and heartbreak, as well as my learning to my own shock and dismay, the humbling and mystifying phenomenon of denial. The incredibly obvious evidence in plain sight, I was able to somehow ignore and not see. It does help me to be perhaps more compassionate and empathic, at least sometimes, with neglectful parents who are uncannily able to not see, like my parent with my near-fatal starvation.
It took me four years to “successfully” leave that man, four years of a 10-year relationship. The child of neglect riddled with profound interpersonal ambivalence can scale the tightrope for years. And even after getting out, my grief was relentless for another five, and it took years to resolve. I guess this is my way of pitching for patience tolerance, and kindness around relationship loss, whether it be our own, or someone else’s. The important takeaway is that addictions are a symptom, a desperate attempt at regulation, or relief, however momentary.
Admittedly as a therapist, I avoid working with addictions and even eating disorders when I can, which of course is often quite impossible. I know I run short of compassion, especially when there is lying involved, which is of course there usually is, as it is one of addiction’s undeniable symptoms. Although I cannot lie to save my life, especially in my anorexic years, I was a phenomenally creative, chronic liar, and have profound shame and remorse about it now. It is no wonder that AA’s most challenging Step 8 is about making amends, which has in general, become a vitally important practice to me.
In the case of those addictive people who do slip through the cracks into my practice, it is clear that their healing from trauma and neglect is stalled by their use, much as mine was. My trauma recovery really took off when I both got sober and then left the alcoholic relationship. I have not kept pace with advances in the addiction/recovery fields, because I have known that I was not well suited for that work. I am grateful to those of you who are and for leaders like Gabor Mate Johan Hari, David Nutt, and others who I do not even know about because I have not kept up. And for those who have apparently hopelessly addicted partners, my heart goes out to you. And we are indeed powerless. My ex did stay in touch for quite a few years, and I would get long, blubbering messages on my office answering machine, usually on my birthdays or his, although I never returned the calls. I don’t know if he ever quit, or even if he is still alive.
I do not know of any good routes to recovery, other than AA. Perhaps you do. There is good research about neurofeedback; and also perhaps ironically Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy (KAP) which I find intriguing but have not yet attempted. I did attend a first-level KAP training but realize I still have a long way to go. Meanwhile, I struggle with my ineptitude with the handful of clients I do have who continue to wrestle in the grips of addiction, although I am gratified when they tell me candidly what is really going on. My suspicion is not always as gentle as I would like. Remembering that this tragic symptom is another essential reminder of how important it is to break the intergenerational chains of trauma and neglect, is the best route that I know. However clearly, it is not enough. As AA exquisitely reminds us, it is one day at a time.
Today’s Song:
