I watched this rerun episode of The Nature Of Things about addiction:
http://www.cbc.ca/natureofthings/m/episodes/wasted
I found it very informative but it has left me feeling quite melancholy. I feel like I’m broken and always have been broken… that I was predetermined to be this way. I have wrecked so many things and because of my actions in the past, I will continue to wreck things… setting events in
motion that cannot be undone.
The past few years have represented some significant changes in my life, particularly with respect to my health and wellbeing. Between car accidents, alcohol abuse and a tonic clonic seizure due to alcohol withdrawal… I’ve had more run-ins with our fantastic health care system than I would like.
I had been abusing alcohol for a while; exactly when it went from semi-casual consumption to out-of-control alcoholism, I can’t really say. However it had obviously been long enough that, when I decided to take a break from booze, I had a withdrawal seizure less than 36 hours later. Regardless of how long the road was, the destination was the same and the facts are irrefutable.
With the seizure, I experienced a posterior dislocation of my left shoulder and I am quite certain that I also anteriorly dislocated my right shoulder which subsequently popped back in. My shoulder being in a funky sling for a few months was the primary thing that I had to deal with but the long term effects of that dislocation continue to nag me. I am plagued with pain and have to be careful about what I lift and how I lift them. But the most significant and disturbing change that I have noticed since going sober is with respect to my brain. The first things that I can recognize as having changed are my memory, my ability to process information and being able to focus.
I often have trouble remembering the specifics of events or, sometimes, entire events themselves. There are times where I can recall the memory if someone reminds me of a few key parts of it however there are an equal number of times where recollection is just not possible. It’s gone. In addition to memory, being able to process information has been impacted. Being able to take a situation and break it down in my head, figure out the important facts and then extrapolate or apply that to other situations is much more difficult now. Then throw in the struggle associated with staying on task? It’s kind of difficult to know exactly what I’m going to be like from one day to the next.
I also find that my judgment is questionable at times. I think that’s related to my aforementioned issue of difficulty in processing information… the faster I have to make a decision, the more likely it will be that the answer should be highly suspect.
From what I’ve been able to read, both alcoholism and seizures will cause some level of damage to the brain. So, it’s really difficult to say how much I had done to myself before the seizure and how much damage was directly related to the seizure. I feel like I don’t really have a solid connection to the person I was before the seizure and the alcoholic blur my life was before it so I can’t really tell when the degradation of who I am started.
Immediately after my seizure, I attended a week-long session about substance abuse recovery and took away a lot of lessons… of particular note were the recommendations to start taking a vitamin B complex. Alcohol decimates vitamin B levels in your body and brain and, considering how important vitamin B is to the body, I felt that I needed to try to limit the damage and maybe try to feed my brain again. Maybe a case of ‘too little, too late’ but I’m not giving up hope.
My emotional state? It’s related but… I think that’s maybe best saved for another post at another date.
Take me for a ride
Break me up and steal what’s left inside
And hope and pray iniquity has died inside and left a scar
I’m on red alert
Bring me peace and wash away my dirt
Spin me round and help me to divert and walk into the light
Warm my heart tonight
Hold my head up high
Help me to survive
Kick me when I’m down
Feed me poison, fill me till I drown
Wake me up before I get pushed out and fall into the night
Warm my heart tonight
(Force me to lose control)
Hold my head up high
(Watch as I lose my soul)
Help me to survive
(Push me until I fall)
Given Barney’s nature as an alcoholic, I’m not sure if posting this is in poor taste or if it’s just effectively me poking fun at myself. Rather than dwell on it too long, I’ll just post it and let the chips fall where they may.
Barney Gumble; the working man’s anti-hero.
Enjoy.
The mind is its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven.
– John Milton, Paradise Lost
I made it through Christmas Day dinner unscathed. It was a family dinner with a dozen other people, the majority of them indulging in alcohol at some point in the evening.
There was the fridge full of beer, the bottles of wine on the table during dinner, the after-dinner licquers… all of which I had partaken of last year. This year, I would not.
It wasn’t even all that tempting; I didn’t have any craving for the alcohol around me. It was really more socially awkward for some people than anything else. Others didn’t bat an eye about it. There were plenty of soft drinks and bottled water available and even more great food!
My oldest son would pour himself a can of Guinness which mesmerized me for a moment but only because it’s visually stimulating to watch the frothy stout slug out of an upside down can and then settle out. And the lighting of the Drambuie-soaked plum pudding caught everyone’s attention.
I don’t know the scientific explanation, but fire made it good.
I made it until 9:30 and then left to bring my oldest son and his girlfriend home to spend some time in my chair with my journal before retiring for the evening.
Today is Day 49.
Writing is hard.
Well, for me, I always try to write honestly and on a subject that I know something about; writing becomes hard when I’m trying to force it.
I have always believed that there is so much that can be learned about the present and the future by studying the past. It helps to know where you once were to understand where you should be going… where you need to be going. This is why I am doing this, writing about myself so that I can try to avoid making some of the same choices that got me to where I was.
From what I can remember; I used to spend a lot of time trying to forget… to ignore that a person even lived inside this skin. I drank a lot; I lived like escaping into the bottle was committing some kind of poetic, slow suicide. It was the most cowardly method and it seemed appropriate for a coward; a passive allowance with no heady commitment that comes with a firearm or a blade.
Are there a lot of insights that I can take away from what I can remember? I’m really not sure. I’ll keep writing and I guess we’ll see.
The process of addiction is generally a long one and rarely can one moment along that journey be identified as a watershed moment, changing every other moment that happens after it. In contrast, initiating the process of recovery is often the exact opposite. Often, one single moment will tip the balance toward recognition that there is a problem and that something needs to be done about it. Maybe it’s losing your job. Maybe it’s having your husband or wife leave you. Maybe it’s being arrested by the police. Maybe it’s suffering an overdose.
Right at this moment, I accept that when it comes to substance abuse, sometimes it doesn’t matter where you were. Sometimes, what matters is that you acknowledge that you can’t go back there ever again. It’s knowing that every minute of every hour of every day going forward is a battle. It’s choosing to be stronger than the you from before. It’s choosing to go to war against something that wants to destroy you.
I was about to write, “I’m not sure if it’s stupid to keep writing posts like this,” but fuck that noise. This is my blog, my journey and my little space to track whatever I want. I’m not fishing for a virtual high five or a pat on the back; I’m making this statement as a matter of public record.
It’s Day 26 of me being sober. It’s also the fifth session of a five day workshop at Edmonton’s downtown Addiction Services office for Self-Evaluation & Support. This session is about Relapse Prevention.
So far, I haven’t felt a lot of challenges with respect to wanting or needing a drink. I’ve learned a ton about addiction and substance abuse; some of the things apply to me and some of the things, I feel, don’t apply to me. But that’s one of the things about addiction, it’s not the same for everyone. It’s pretty much like anything in this world, the experience can be vastly different because people are inherently different.
This workshop has taught me first hand, amongst many things that I will likely write about in the future, is that addiction and substance abuse affects people from every demographic of society that you can possibly imagine. I base this statement upon the fact that there are all kinds of people from all walks of life in these sessions.
While I know that I have had it pretty easy with respect to cravings and challenges to my sobriety, I know that I haven’t been living within the exact same routine that got me to the point of having a seizure at my workplace because of alcohol withdrawal. I’ve been off work for 4 weeks with a significantly reduced stress load.
I realize that, besides my stress load at work, there are significant triggers for me that are based around not having a supporting family environment. My home isn’t terrible (I know there are people who have to face violence or other people’s addictions or abuse) but the thoughts of not having a spouse who I can talk to or rely upon to just listen has caused me to well up with tears in these sessions (and right now just writing about it) and I’ve had to redirect just to not break down.
But that’s something for Future Jeff to deal with. Right now, this Jeff has to get his ass to the Churchill station to hop on the LRT for home.
I haven’t written about my emotions in quite some time. Hell, I’ve been trying to escape them with the drink. At least, I think that’s what I’ve been doing. Really, I’d lost my focus and my direction a long time ago and finding the numbness seems like it was my guiding principle, if I could even be accused of having a guiding principle.
Anyway, I just finished Day 20. And it was a hard day to close out.
I woke up early, got showered and dressed, poured half a cup of coffee down the hatch and then left the house with my 14 year old son. It was a brisk winter morning, cold but not unbearably so. We got on the public transit together; he would be getting off at his regular stop to go to school and I would be continuing on downtown. My destination: my initial intake drop-in appointment with Addiction Services.
The initial appointment didn’t take all that long, I filled out some paperwork and talked to an advisor who gave me a list of groups and classes and programs to get into before taking the next step.
I left there feeling powerful and strong and in control. I maintained that feeling until the afternoon. It was quiet; my wife was still sleeping, my kids are at school and everything that’s on TV is shit. I’m bored and I’m coming off that endorphin high.
One thing that I’ve learned about myself is that with every major extroverted expenditure of emotion I have, be it joy or rage or love or frustration, the event ultimately leaves me in an emotional deficit. I become quiet, introverted… and then the dark thoughts enter.
At this point, I haven’t quite wanted a drink yet… but I’m feeling uncomfortable. Kind of like I’m a bit stir crazy and maybe thinking a little too much. The boredom doesn’t help. So, I channel flip and grow slightly anxious. I clean up and rearrange the desk in the Man Room to keep my head and body busy. My MacBook Pro gets set into place. So far, it’s working.
The kids get home from school and the wife wakes up; there is a whole bunch of coming and going with everyone that doesn’t include me until everyone is gone for the evening. The younger two boys make their way home together via public transit around 10:30pm. During that time on my own, I’d drank two cans of Dr. Pepper, watched the Detroit Red Wings beat the Edmonton Oilers in overtime, cursed out my Apple TV and watched episodes 1 and 2 from season 2 of The Strain on my MacBook.
(The Strain was supposed to be FX’s answer to AMC’s The Walking Dead, which it fails miserably at. Taking it out of that context, however, it’s not half bad.)
Anyway, during the whole day there are tons of commercials for Molson Canadian, Coors Light, Budweiser, Gibson’s Finest, Crown Royal, Ketel One and programming showing people drinking straight vodka or Scotch out of refined glasses during what is a burgeoning apocalypse. I don’t think you realize how much is there until you’re trying to ignore it.
For me, the advertising and seeing people drink in shows doesn’t seem to affect Me yet. It’s the boredom. It’s the loneliness. It’s the seeming lack of purpose that drives me to want a drink. That feeling I had all afternoon and into the evening. I acknowledged that I could walk to the liquor store and buy a bottle or a case of beer. But what would have been the purpose? What would be the end game for that? What would be the gain?
I couldn’t figure it out so I went to bed and started writing this post. Because I need to tell someone. Even if I don’t know you.
I’ve finished ten days of sobriety. Admittedly, I’m an alcoholic and it took a 36+ hour bender followed by a withdrawal seizure where I dislocated my arm in the process to commit me to sobriety. Granted, I’m off work right now on short term disability however things have been going well on my recovery. Going back to work will be the real test of my fortitude but, at this moment, I feel liberated. I feel like I’ve cast off the shackles that alcoholism has clasped around my ankles and wrists. It feels really positive.