"Being Convinced"

Recovery Basics: Alcoholism and Drug Addiction

       Why don't people who stop, stay stopped? Throughout these writings I will use references to the 12 steps and most likely say things like "we admitted we were alcoholics". Just replace the words, alcoholics or drug addicts, with whatever you know to be appropriate to you. The beauty of the 12 step inventory process is that it is based on some sound universal principles. Which means that it works with any and all problems we may find ourselves in.

The AA text doesn't start out with the how it works chapter and step one. It does no good to sit with someone and admit you are something that you don't comprehend. Some of you may, at this point, disagree. You say that it's a good thing, that any willingness to change is a step in the right direction. After all not everyone had a perfect understanding of their problem at first, and some made it. I can only answer by saying, that's right, some did: most don't. Most people, no matter what they are doing, have no problem quitting when the pain becomes too much. If quitting was success all addicts would have a perfect success rating. And then some. Lots of people confess, because someone tells them that its the thing to do. People in pain do it hoping the pain will end. It's essential to find those "keys to recovery" that enable some people to stay quit. Those key ingredients for staying on the path and becoming happy and usefully whole. Confessing might, arguably, be good for the soul but it won't solve the problems we face. Admitting you are this or that does not get people, or keep people, sober. So what does?

Before we start on the steps, and the self examination that comes with it, we should come to understand, as fully as possible, that the primary problem is having a disease. Lets look at the disease this way. Lets say that we have a disease that causes us to become addicted to stuff. Lets, for now, say that our disease is not that we are addicted to gambling, sex or drugs. Let's say that these are symptoms of our disease. If I had a weak immune system. Whatever the reason. Maybe I am not able to have a diet that supplies me with what I need for a strong immune system. This results in a constant irritation in my nose. The mucous membrane is the first line of defense in the immune system. Where is my disease? People would say, "he's got that nose thing". I could get prescriptions, nose remedies. Is that what I need? If we want to get better and stay better, for the rest of our lives. If we want to really deal with every aspect of our lives, we'll want to get right to the source. Alcoholism and drug addiction are looked at as chronic diseases. What about an addiction to worrying? Let's for the rest of this reading break the word up like the holistic practices do and think dis-ease. That's where the word came from so why not let it be what it is? This fixation with symptoms can be the first thing we remove from our brain. Next we must be convinced that if this dis-ease is not treated then a deeper suffering will follow. Of all this we need be convinced. This high degree of awareness will allow for continued progress. Is that what we want? Most likely, at this point, we just want to stop suffering. There's nothing wrong with that. The symptoms are telling us to pay attention. So lets look at the symptoms. No matter what they are. We should decide if they are chronic.

Definition of Chronic

Chronic: This important term in medicine comes from the Greek chronos, time and means lasting a long time.

A chronic condition is one lasting 3 months or more, by the definition of the U.S. National Center for Health Statistics. In ancient Greece, the "father of medicine" Hippocrates distinguished diseases that were acute (abrupt, sharp and brief) from those that were chronic. This is still a very useful distinction. Subacute has been coined to designate the mid-ground between acute and chronic.

Being convinced is of prime importance and therefore should be seen as one of the keys to recovery.

To cap off the being convinced aspect I'll make this suggestion. I "am convinced" that the best way to look at our addictions is to treat them like allergies. It's not necessary to our recovery that we understand all the biological, psychological and neurological aspects of our condition. It doesn't hurt, but it's not a requirement. I knew a girl who was allergic to peanuts. If she ate peanuts the least that would happen is she would be very uncomfortable. The worst that could happen is she would die. She didn't get close to peanuts. She never considered tested the condition to see if she still had it. Her relationship with peanuts was decided. No matter what we are addicted to, if we treat it as an allergy we will be on the right path. My friend was also alcoholic. I did my best for her. But she died as a result of alcoholism. I never thought about the allergy comparison when we talked. But this I'm sure of, if she had treated alcohol like she treated peanuts, she could not have died from the effects of alcohol.

If we can get it through our heads, be convinced, that we are allergic to alcohol. If we're convinced, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that we will at least suffer discomfort from ingesting it and at worst die, would we be apt to pick up a drink? It's easy to see how anyone allergic to peanuts would have to be insane to decide to eat peanuts. It's no different with alcohol. Or gambling. People addicted to gambling don't stop from a sane examination of their actions. They stop when the pain and destruction become to great to bear. So the same rules apply. They have an allergic type reaction to the thought of winning a pot. Don't they? As we go along, as we learn more about the brain, this will become more and more clear. It all boils down the brain chemistry. For now if we can just start to say, "I am allergic to... ".

It was only this being convinced of the chronic nature of my condition, my allergy, that really made me willing to take action. I went out and ask someone to make sure I did the steps the way they were laid out in the book. I knew I was great at cheating and convincing myself of the okay-ness in any wrong doing. That pattern went so far as to allow me to be OK with things I couldn't accept as OK. Boy did that come in handy. It's a common thing that we addicts become adapted to whatever condition our behavior presents to us. The most atrocious circumstances become acceptable. So I made a decision to go through the same process that the sober people had claimed to go through. It's very likely that if I'd had an ounce of energy left, if I had even the glimmer of an idea of something else to do, I wouldn't have got started on the process at all. We'll never know but that was certainly my habitual pattern: "thanks but I'll manage". Also being beat half to death mentally and physically kept me still long enough to get the allergy concept.

At this point I hadn't really started to find out anything about myself. I hadn't started on an inventory. I did however start to establish some disciplines. Early on I took up the practice of meditation. This wasn't because I reasoned it would be best for me and the rest of humanity. I did it because my brain was driving me nuts and I had to do something about it. Meditation was the only thing I could think of. I recalled the claim that it could bring stillness to the mind. I had read about meditation but never seriously practiced it. I just desperately needed to escape my thoughts and meditation was the recommended way. It's also included as part of the twelve step process. At some point I ask some power greater than myself, that might exist in some state, somewhere, to direct me to what was best. Again this was no altruistic act, I just wanted to stay out of trouble. So only by default did I follow the meditation and prayer step suggested in the book. I also tried to get, at least, in a conversational relationship with people who had spent a substantial period of time sober. When I had questions about how to deal with some issue I followed suggestions from these people.

I had a new found willingness to cooperate. I came by this as a result of "being convinced" that I would never get rid of my symptoms on my own. Through this process of acceptance and honest self examination I became convinced of other things about myself. I accepted, on observations others made, that I was insane. That people looked at me and said, "this man is truly insane". One of the insane activities I participated in was a completely disproportionate emotional reaction to people and situations. That's way to glamorous a description: I acted like a child. So now I know I have a disease: I'm not clear what it is, but I'm convinced of it's chronic nature. I know that if I'm to get better I have to practice, incorporate into my life, a set of spiritual principles. So I'm a big insane baby with a disease. It was, in part, the embarrassment and humiliation that accompanied these truths (more pain) that motivated me to further action. I don't think that people will suffer the pain of change without being convinced of the necessity. This is true with all people and their respective trials. My personal reaction to trauma manifested into alcoholism and drug addiction. The global fiasco we see everyday is also a response to trauma. Wars, hatred, greed, most societies, everything you see that isn't working comes out of a reaction to trauma. The trauma occurs when real people attempt to live in a make believe world. It's universally dysfunctional. But for now let's focus on personal addictions. With addictions and chronic habitual patterns the willingness to change comes when the pain of change is out weighed by the pain of staying the same. Some folks are far easier convinced. Most simply go on to the gates of insanity and death.

The addictive process is a recognizable psychological and behavioral syndrome that expresses itself in a particular individual in regard to specific substances or processes but which exhibits a striking similarity and commonality among addicted individuals regardless of their specific circumstances and particular addictions.

Addictions may be subdivided into:

      * substance addictions, including alcohol, various illicit and licit drugs
      * process addictions such as food, sex, gambling, work and spending.

Crossover, switching of addictions, multiple addictions and a changing pattern of addiction are common but not universal features of an underlying addictive illness with recognizable structural features of its own. In depth understanding of addictive processes must begin with the general and common features of addiction and move to the specifics of the addictive expression in a specific individual. Whether the addiction is single or multiple, substance or process, legal or illegal or an unstable and shifting combination of all the above, certain recurring and recognizable common features distinguish addictive from non-addictive processes.

Characteristics of the addictive process are:

      * salience, obsession, abnormal or pathological importance of the substance or behavior
      * persistence, rigidity, stereotypy, inflexibility and repetition of the particular addictive behavior
      * relative immunity to adverse consequences and resistance to learned modification of behavior
      * the invocation of an interrelated system of psychological defenses which, like a string of military forts, function in concert to protect the individual from the full realization and acknowledgment of the self- and other- harmful nature of his addiction and hence provide cover and concealment for the continued expression of the addictive process. Compiled by Floyd P. Garrett, M.D.

Our heart glows, and secret unrest gnaws at the root of our being. Dealing with the unconscious has become a question of life for us.
Carl Jung

To understand the things that are at our door is the best preparation for understanding those things that lie beyond.
Hypatia

Education is a crutch with which the foolish attack the wise to prove that they are not idiots.
Karl Kraus

The science of the mind can only have for its proper goal the understanding of human nature by every human being, and through its use, brings peace to every human soul.
Alfred Adler

The creation of something new is not accomplished by the intellect but by the play instinct acting from inner necessity. The creative mind plays with the objects it loves.
Carl Jung

The first step toward change is awareness. The second step is acceptance.
Nathaniel Branden

Often the hands will solve a mystery that the intellect has struggled with in vain.
Carl Jung

Acceptance of what has happened is the first step to overcoming the consequences of any misfortune.
William James