in 2015 scientists discover a cure for alcoholism that is contained in a single pill.
when they approach the first alcoholic in the trial run, the explain to him that if he swallows that one pill he will be cured of his alcoholism forever!
so the alcoholic responds," really? what happens if I take two?!"
I had a conversation yesterday. One of my students told me that he'd heard about a drug that was being released some time which cures addiction.
My first thought was, no kidding, "Great, I could take it, then I could drink every day".
It was a good reminder of how my mind works.
That right there is the best "test" I've ever heard of to determine if you ARE an alcoholic.
If you were told something could be done to cure the alcoholism, if your first thought is something to the effect of, "Great! Now I can go get drunk!," you're alcoholic.
I'm an incredibly fortunate man. Just had a complete physical done with blood workup and an EKG.
Blood work is all within normal ranges except for low bilirubin(liver enzyme)
EKG showed normal except for a heart attack :shock: I had at some point in my past. WHO KNEW?? Believe I've narrowed down a night that it likely happened. I can recall a night of heavy crack use that was particularly strong. Ears pounding and heart pounding more so than usual with how I used. Thanfully thats in my past. At least for today.
HAve a sober day!!! Remember NOTHING is so bad that it should cause us to pick up again.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I'm an incredibly fortunate man. Just had a complete physical done with blood workup and an EKG.
Blood work is all within normal ranges except for low bilirubin(liver enzyme)
EKG showed normal except for a heart attack :shock: I had at some point in my past. WHO KNEW?? Believe I've narrowed down a night that it likely happened. I can recall a night of heavy crack use that was particularly strong. Ears pounding and heart pounding more so than usual with how I used. Thanfully thats in my past. At least for today.
HAve a sober day!!! Remember NOTHING is so bad that it should cause us to pick up again.
WOW! Congratulations mickeyrat! Glad you're still alive.
Just checking in.. I quit smoking on July4th, and it really sucks double not smoking or drinking right at the same time!!LOL Thank God for POT!! Although I am thinking of quitting that too.
Just checking in.. I quit smoking on July4th, and it really sucks double not smoking or drinking right at the same time!!LOL Thank God for POT!! Although I am thinking of quitting that too.
It's only as bad as you make it seem to be. The mind is a powerful thing.
It works if you work it.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Amy Winehouse dead at 27. :( It's pure conjecture without knowing the exact circumstances of her death to speculate on the cause but when I saw it I wasn't shocked and I just thought how lucky those of us are who get the program. She seemed to be in and out of rehab and I guess it just didn't happen for her. Reminds me what a gift it is to be sober and clean.
I hope Pete Doherty gets in and stays in some time, he's a talent on her level and I'm amazed we haven't read an article about him yet...
There but for the grace of God go I, you know. That's what makes me grateful when I read such tragic news.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Latest blog from my friend Elle:
One Crafty Mother
Addiction is a DISEASE, dammit.
Posted: 24 Jul 2011 08:30 AM PDT
In today's Boston Sunday Globe there are two full length obituaries.
Above the fold is the tragic tale of soul/pop singer Amy Winehouse's death from drug and alcohol addiction at 27 years old. I am profoundly impacted by her death, although it isn't much of a surprise. Her struggle with addiction has been plastered across headlines for years now. I remember a couple of years ago a British tabloid was running a contest - a morbid countdown of sorts - asking readers to bet on how much longer she would live.
Her obituary spells out in sad clarity the ravages of drugs and alcohol; her life cut short, her talent squandered to the disease of addiction.
Below the fold is another obituary, George Brewster, who died after a fifteen year battle with cancer. He was 70 years old. Despite a life full of challenges, his children describe a man of unbridled optimism, someone whose spirit shone through adversity. His daughter describes how even near the end he would talk about embracing the "glorious day", how he would walk every day; even as cancer treatments weakened his physical condition, his spirit soared. He was 27 years sober at the time of his death, and the obituary describes how he was active in AA, a pillar of the recovery community, always ready to lend a hand to help a fellow alcoholic in need.
The juxtaposition of these two lives leaves me trembling with gratitude and fear. Gratitude that I am sober, that I didn't lose my own battle with the disease of addiction, that I am able to embrace life, with all its ups and downs - as a sober woman of grace and honor. Fear because I know so many people who are struggling to get sober, who haven't surrendered to the fact that alcoholism is a disease, one that cannot be cured. You can't think your way out of addiction any more than you can think your way out of cancer.
Fear because addiction kills. Just last week a member of my home AA group died from an alcoholic seizure. My heart aches for the people I know who are struggling to get sober, because death - as horrible as it is - isn't the worst thing alcoholism does to you. First it destroys your life, your spirit, your family.
Now that I have been in recovery for almost four years, I fully understand the power of the disease of addiction. It is a disease that tells you you don't have a disease, that if you just tried harder, had more will power, you could beat it. It drives you into isolation, full of shame and fear, and slowly erodes your spirit, your will. It wants you silent, alone and afraid.
I am humbled and honored to be able to help women who are struggling to get sober. It helps my own recovery to reach out, share what I have learned, be an empathetic voice at the other end of a phone line, or over coffee. I know I can't get anyone sober. I realize that in order to get sober a person has to surrender, to accept that they are powerless over alcohol, that they need help. All I can do is encourage them to get honest, to be a safe harbor in their sea of bewildered hurt.
But I'm scared. I'm scared for everyone who is in the clenches of alcoholism. I know first hand how hard it is to wrench yourself from the jaws of addiction. The statistics aren't good. I hate talking about statistics, hate how despairing they are; I prefer to focus on the hope. But the bleak reality is that alcoholism eventually kills the majority of the people afflicted by this horrible disease.
And it is a disease. I am aware that this is a controversial topic, and I listen with an open mind to to those who argue that it isn't. But I'm done being polite about it, because I know it is a disease. It is a disease of the mind, body and spirit. No addict wants to destroy their life. When bewildered loved ones ask addicts "WHY? Why are you doing this to yourself?" I know the answer is this: because they have a disease. An alcoholic who drinks can no more control how their body reacts to alcohol than a diabetic can control their body's insulin.
People who argue against the disease concept - and many of them are in recovery themselves - don't like the loophole it creates, fearing the alcoholic will keep drinking, saying "I can't help it. I have a disease."
My response to this is simple: my disease isn't my fault, but my recovery is my responsibility. My responsibility is to stay away from that first drink, the one that will activate my disease. To stay away from that first drink I choose a program of recovery; I surround myself with other alcoholics in recovery, I talk about how I'm feeling. I ask for help. A lot.
I didn't choose to be someone who can't have one or two drinks safely. I would never, ever have done the things I did, taken myself and my family down such a dark road, if I had been able to stop drinking on my own. I don't know that I will ever be able to find adequate words to describe what alcohol did to my brain. It possessed me. Even when I wasn't drinking, it nagged at my consciousness, pulling me back in over and over. I don't know how to describe to someone who isn't an alcoholic what it feels like to wake up in the morning thinking, "Oh NO. I did it again."
I have a disease. A disease that springs to life if I have one drink. It may not destroy me right away, but eventually, it will. I have no control over my own life when I'm drinking, because alcohol calls all the shots.
The only way out of the disease of addiction is to surrender to it. To accept in your heart that you can't have even one drink without triggering the craving, the obsession.
Surrendering is hard. It takes more guts to surrender than it does to fight, because surrendering involves vulnerability, and we're hard-wired to avoid feeling vulnerable.
The stigma of addiction keeps people unsurrendered. People simply don't understand what alcohol does to an alcoholic, how it eventually takes over every aspect of our thinking. It is hard to ask for help, because the response is all too often, "well, why don't you just stop, then?"
Choking out the words, "I can't stop," feels like defeat of the worst kind. It feels like you are the weakest, most morally corrupt person on the planet. Ironically, choking out those words is the bravest thing anyone can do. Eventually, alcohol degrades a person's life to the point where drinking feels like the only good thing left. And then the script changes, goes from "I can't stop" to "I won't stop".
THAT is the disease of addiction.
To break the cycle, to get out of the spiral, you have to surrender. You have to look yourself dead in the eye, and admit that you have tried everything you can to stop, and nothing is working. That you aren't in control when it comes to drinking. Peel your hands off the wheel, and go get help. Fall back into the arms of people who understand, who can carry you until you feel like carrying yourself.
When I die, I want to be that sober person who faced the ups and downs of life with gratitude in my heart and a hopeful spring in my step. I want to grow and learn through adversity, not skirt around it, shrinking from the hard truths in a bottle.
I didn't choose to be an alcoholic. But I can choose surrender, I can choose recovery.
I feel sometimes like I end every post about addiction and recovery this way, but I will keep saying it over and over: if you are struggling with alcoholism, open your mouth to save your life. Tell your truths. And please, please surrender. You will never be able to have one drink in safety. If that thought sends terror into your heart, go find the people who understand, who have walked the path before you, who can show you that a life full of light and hope is waiting for you.
Because here is the bleak truth: it will kill you. But first it will destroy your spirit, your happiness, your ability to love. It will.
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EV intro to Chloe Dancer / Crown of Thorns
10/25/13 Hartford
Well done!!!! I used to smoke, sooooo hard to quit but you feel so much better. Food tastes better too. Just think the longer you go without one, the easier it gets.
“ "Thank you Palestrina. It’s a wonderful evening, it’s great to be here and I wanna dedicate you a super sexy song." " (last words of Mark Sandman of Morphine)
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Hey man, good luck. I've got until the weekend and then I'm gonna make a huge effort as I'm not gonna take any cigs to the UK. The time has come I think...
Hi all. I haven't read this whole thread, but I am glad I found it. My 20 year old daughter has been addicted to opiates for a little over 2 years now. She went to rehab last spring but has relapsed several times over the past year since she's been home. She finally broke down and yesterday told me she needs to go back. She's been using heroin.
I've got such a mixed bag of emotions going on here I don't even know how to feel. As a mother, the hardest thing ever is to see your child suffering. And she has been suffering for a long time. Before she turned to drugs, she cut herself. It hurts so badly to see her destroying herself. I also feel guilt...in my mind I know I've done the best I could raising her, trying to get her help...but I know I'm not perfect. I have my own demons.
I'm not addict tho...and I don't understand addiction...I mean to a point I guess I do. I AM addicted to cigarettes. I abuse alcohol...I self medicate with pot. But there was always this big red light when it came to harder stuff like coke and heroin...I just wouldn't EVER go there. I don't understand its appeal. And as mentioned in the post above, I am one of those people who struggle with the concept that she just can't stop it. Just DON'T do it.
I'm not so sure I agree with the 12 step methods...she was going to meetings at first when she got back, but I think she struggled with their ideals as well. But I think she just didn't want to believe/accept that she can't use - at all - including alcohol, because it would set her back. I don't know. I just feel that if you know yourself well enough, and are honest with yourself, that you should be able to kick it.
Also - I'm angry. Her addiction has led her to steal from her family. If that wasn't bad enough, I let her back into our home and she stole again. Shame on me I guess? But what could I have done? Throw her out on the street? I have a friend whose son has been living on the street in Camden (NJ). Not a nice place for a skinny little white girl to be.
And I just don't understand what has happened to her that has lead her to this path of self destruction. She has some learning disabilities. She is def ADHD. But those should not be excuses to use.
I know I'm rambling, but like I said I'm so torn apart right now...exhausted. And now I need to help her book a flight to get the hell out of here...away from this madness. I mean, heroin is the big thing here in my town...fucking heroin. I've never even seen heroin. And I have a 15 year old daughter as well - who knows people that do heroin. It's sick. Well, I just needed to vent.
No time to be void or save up on life...you've got to spend it all.
I am one of those people who struggle with the concept that she just can't stop it. Just DON'T do it.
I'm not so sure I agree with the 12 step methods...I just feel that if you know yourself well enough, and are honest with yourself, that you should be able to kick it.
Also - I'm angry. Shame on me I guess? But what could I have done?
I know I'm rambling, but like I said I'm so torn apart right now...exhausted.
Sending love and light to you and especially your daughter. I attend 12 Step al-anon to deal with my addict. Hearing that I am not the only one that has been made to feel exhausted because of what someone else does in their life provides me strength and community. The steps do work. Meetings are a place for you to be brutally honest. But it isn't a magic wand, and it is really, really hard work IMO.
One thing I carry with me every day from Al-Anon are the three c's. They help me maintain my sanity daily:
I did not CAUSE my addict's addiction.
I can not CONTROL my addict. (nor other people for that matter)
I can not CURE my addict.
All I can do is love them, and take good care of myself.
Thank you. I am trying. And I am grateful at least that SHE knows that she needs help and WANTS to get help. We just booked a flight to FL for Sunday morning.
No time to be void or save up on life...you've got to spend it all.
Thank you. I am trying. And I am grateful at least that SHE knows that she needs help and WANTS to get help. We just booked a flight to FL for Sunday morning.
Its good to have the Alanon perspective here.
Being WHAT I am , I'm more qualified to help your daughter. What I am is an addict/alcoholic. Fact. No shame. I didnt ask for it, but I did my part to be one.
If you have any questions, I and I hope others will try our best to answer them. At least from our own experience.
I will suggest , you attend a few meetings yourself. Open meetings where all who are interested are welcome. Speaker meeting would be a good place to start. Just to see for yourself what goes on and some of what its really about. You might be surprised. Just to give you some perspective of what your daughter is going through.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I found this beautiful piece that Russell Brand wrote after Amy Winehouse's passing the other day and thought I'd share it. I think he does an excellent job telling the truth and paying tribute to his friend: http://www.russellbrand.tv/2011/07/for-amy/
I am lost, I'm no guide, but I'm by your side. I am right by your side.
I found this beautiful piece that Russell Brand wrote after Amy Winehouse's passing the other day and thought I'd share it. I think he does an excellent job telling the truth and paying tribute to his friend: http://www.russellbrand.tv/2011/07/for-amy/
I found this beautiful piece that Russell Brand wrote after Amy Winehouse's passing the other day and thought I'd share it. I think he does an excellent job telling the truth and paying tribute to his friend: http://www.russellbrand.tv/2011/07/for-amy/
I found this beautiful piece that Russell Brand wrote after Amy Winehouse's passing the other day and thought I'd share it. I think he does an excellent job telling the truth and paying tribute to his friend: http://www.russellbrand.tv/2011/07/for-amy/
Spot on about what this thing is. Does anyone else hear the start of the phone ringing?
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I found this beautiful piece that Russell Brand wrote after Amy Winehouse's passing the other day and thought I'd share it. I think he does an excellent job telling the truth and paying tribute to his friend: http://www.russellbrand.tv/2011/07/for-amy/
Russell Brand talks sense? First time for everything!
But he really nails this article. Great find and thanks for sharing.
I found this beautiful piece that Russell Brand wrote after Amy Winehouse's passing the other day and thought I'd share it. I think he does an excellent job telling the truth and paying tribute to his friend: http://www.russellbrand.tv/2011/07/for-amy/
Russell Brand talks sense? First time for everything!
But he really nails this article. Great find and thanks for sharing.
He's a great writer...wouldn't have thunk it until I read his first 'Booky Wook'. He's got a way with words for shiz.
thought this deserved to be posted here to read. Here is the article linked to above.
When you love someone who suffers from the disease of addiction you await the phone call. There will be a phone call. The sincere hope is that the call will be from the addict themselves, telling you they’ve had enough, that they’re ready to stop, ready to try something new. Of course though, you fear the other call, the sad nocturnal chime from a friend or relative telling you it’s too late, she’s gone.
Frustratingly it’s not a call you can ever make it must be received. It is impossible to intervene.
I’ve known Amy Winehouse for years. When I first met her around Camden she was just some twit in a pink satin jacket shuffling round bars with mutual friends, most of whom were in cool Indie bands or peripheral Camden figures Withnail-ing their way through life on impotent charisma. Carl Barrat told me that “Winehouse” (which I usually called her and got a kick out of cos it’s kind of funny to call a girl by her surname) was a jazz singer, which struck me as bizarrely anomalous in that crowd. To me with my limited musical knowledge this information placed Amy beyond an invisible boundary of relevance; “Jazz singer? She must be some kind of eccentric” I thought. I chatted to her anyway though, she was after all, a girl, and she was sweet and peculiar but most of all vulnerable.
I was myself at that time barely out of rehab and was thirstily seeking less complicated women so I barely reflected on the now glaringly obvious fact that Winehouse and I shared an affliction, the disease of addiction. All addicts, regardless of the substance or their social status share a consistent and obvious symptom; they’re not quite present when you talk to them. They communicate to you through a barely discernible but un-ignorable veil. Whether a homeless smack head troubling you for 50p for a cup of tea or a coked-up, pinstriped exec foaming off about his “speedboat” there is a toxic aura that prevents connection. They have about them the air of elsewhere, that they’re looking through you to somewhere else they’d rather be. And of course they are. The priority of any addict is to anaesthetise the pain of living to ease the passage of the day with some purchased relief.
From time to time I’d bump into Amy she had good banter so we could chat a bit and have a laugh, she was “a character” but that world was riddled with half cut, doped up chancers, I was one of them, even in early recovery I was kept afloat only by clinging to the bodies of strangers so Winehouse, but for her gentle quirks didn’t especially register.
Then she became massively famous and I was pleased to see her acknowledged but mostly baffled because I’d not experienced her work and this not being the 1950’s I wondered how a “jazz singer” had achieved such cultural prominence. I wasn’t curious enough to do anything so extreme as listen to her music or go to one of her gigs, I was becoming famous myself at the time and that was an all consuming experience. It was only by chance that I attended a Paul Weller gig at the Roundhouse that I ever saw her live.
I arrived late and as I made my way to the audience through the plastic smiles and plastic cups I heard the rolling, wondrous resonance of a female vocal. Entering the space I saw Amy on stage with Weller and his band; and then the awe. The awe that envelops when witnessing a genius. From her oddly dainty presence that voice, a voice that seemed not to come from her but from somewhere beyond even Billie and Ella, from the font of all greatness. A voice that was filled with such power and pain that it was at once entirely human yet laced with the divine. My ears, my mouth, my heart and mind all instantly opened. Winehouse. Winehouse? Winehouse! That twerp, all eyeliner and lager dithering up Chalk Farm Road under a back-combed barnet, the lips that I’d only seen clenching a fishwife fag and dribbling curses now a portal for this holy sound. So now I knew. She wasn’t just some hapless wannabe, yet another pissed up nit who was never gonna make it, nor was she even a ten-a-penny-chanteuse enjoying her fifteen minutes. She was a fucking genius.
Shallow fool that I am I now regarded her in a different light, the light that blazed down from heaven when she sang. That lit her up now and a new phase in our friendship began. She came on a few of my TV and radio shows, I still saw her about but now attended to her with a little more interest. Publicly though, Amy increasingly became defined by her addiction. Our media though is more interested in tragedy than talent, so the ink began to defect from praising her gift to chronicling her downfall. The destructive personal relationships, the blood soaked ballet slippers, the aborted shows, that youtube madness with the baby mice. In the public perception this ephemeral tittle-tattle replaced her timeless talent. This and her manner in our occasional meetings brought home to me the severity of her condition. Addiction is a serious disease; it will end with jail, mental institutions or death. I was 27 years old when through the friendship and help of Chip Somers of the treatment centre, Focus12 I found recovery, through Focus I was introduced to support fellowships for alcoholics and drug addicts which are very easy to find and open to anybody with a desire to stop drinking and without which I would not be alive.
Now Amy Winehouse is dead, like many others whose unnecessary deaths have been retrospectively romanticised, at 27 years old. Whether this tragedy was preventable or not is now irrelevant. It is not preventable today. We have lost a beautiful and talented woman to this disease. Not all addicts have Amy’s incredible talent. Or Kurt’s or Jimi’s or Janis’s, some people just get the affliction. All we can do is adapt the way we view this condition, not as a crime or a romantic affectation but as a disease that will kill. We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care. We need to look at the way our government funds rehabilitation. It is cheaper to rehabilitate an addict than to send them to prison, so criminalisation doesn’t even make economic sense. Not all of us know someone with the incredible talent that Amy had but we all know drunks and junkies and they all need help and the help is out there. All they have to do is pick up the phone and make the call. Or not. Either way, there will be a phone call.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Comments
EV intro to Chloe Dancer / Crown of Thorns
10/25/13 Hartford
That right there is the best "test" I've ever heard of to determine if you ARE an alcoholic.
If you were told something could be done to cure the alcoholism, if your first thought is something to the effect of, "Great! Now I can go get drunk!," you're alcoholic.
Blood work is all within normal ranges except for low bilirubin(liver enzyme)
EKG showed normal except for a heart attack :shock:
HAve a sober day!!! Remember NOTHING is so bad that it should cause us to pick up again.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
WOW! Congratulations mickeyrat! Glad you're still alive.
It's only as bad as you make it seem to be. The mind is a powerful thing.
It works if you work it.
I am right by your side.
Congratulations. That is absolutely great!
I still remember your countdowns froma couple of years ago, that was a labour of love
Thanks! Yeah, maybe I need to do something like that again some time, eh?
I am right by your side.
Good for you!
Maybe a couple of Pearl Jam 20 lists.
Top twenty songs to get you through tough times
and
Top twenty songs to party with.
Very very cool ideas! :ugeek:
I am right by your side.
2 packs of smokes left.
I'm told that the steps work with quitting smoking too.
Damn, you mean I have to do a 4th step again?!?!?!?!?!? Fuck me!!
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I hope Pete Doherty gets in and stays in some time, he's a talent on her level and I'm amazed we haven't read an article about him yet...
There but for the grace of God go I, you know. That's what makes me grateful when I read such tragic news.
Peace
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
One Crafty Mother
Addiction is a DISEASE, dammit.
Posted: 24 Jul 2011 08:30 AM PDT
In today's Boston Sunday Globe there are two full length obituaries.
Above the fold is the tragic tale of soul/pop singer Amy Winehouse's death from drug and alcohol addiction at 27 years old. I am profoundly impacted by her death, although it isn't much of a surprise. Her struggle with addiction has been plastered across headlines for years now. I remember a couple of years ago a British tabloid was running a contest - a morbid countdown of sorts - asking readers to bet on how much longer she would live.
Her obituary spells out in sad clarity the ravages of drugs and alcohol; her life cut short, her talent squandered to the disease of addiction.
Below the fold is another obituary, George Brewster, who died after a fifteen year battle with cancer. He was 70 years old. Despite a life full of challenges, his children describe a man of unbridled optimism, someone whose spirit shone through adversity. His daughter describes how even near the end he would talk about embracing the "glorious day", how he would walk every day; even as cancer treatments weakened his physical condition, his spirit soared. He was 27 years sober at the time of his death, and the obituary describes how he was active in AA, a pillar of the recovery community, always ready to lend a hand to help a fellow alcoholic in need.
The juxtaposition of these two lives leaves me trembling with gratitude and fear. Gratitude that I am sober, that I didn't lose my own battle with the disease of addiction, that I am able to embrace life, with all its ups and downs - as a sober woman of grace and honor. Fear because I know so many people who are struggling to get sober, who haven't surrendered to the fact that alcoholism is a disease, one that cannot be cured. You can't think your way out of addiction any more than you can think your way out of cancer.
Fear because addiction kills. Just last week a member of my home AA group died from an alcoholic seizure. My heart aches for the people I know who are struggling to get sober, because death - as horrible as it is - isn't the worst thing alcoholism does to you. First it destroys your life, your spirit, your family.
Now that I have been in recovery for almost four years, I fully understand the power of the disease of addiction. It is a disease that tells you you don't have a disease, that if you just tried harder, had more will power, you could beat it. It drives you into isolation, full of shame and fear, and slowly erodes your spirit, your will. It wants you silent, alone and afraid.
I am humbled and honored to be able to help women who are struggling to get sober. It helps my own recovery to reach out, share what I have learned, be an empathetic voice at the other end of a phone line, or over coffee. I know I can't get anyone sober. I realize that in order to get sober a person has to surrender, to accept that they are powerless over alcohol, that they need help. All I can do is encourage them to get honest, to be a safe harbor in their sea of bewildered hurt.
But I'm scared. I'm scared for everyone who is in the clenches of alcoholism. I know first hand how hard it is to wrench yourself from the jaws of addiction. The statistics aren't good. I hate talking about statistics, hate how despairing they are; I prefer to focus on the hope. But the bleak reality is that alcoholism eventually kills the majority of the people afflicted by this horrible disease.
And it is a disease. I am aware that this is a controversial topic, and I listen with an open mind to to those who argue that it isn't. But I'm done being polite about it, because I know it is a disease. It is a disease of the mind, body and spirit. No addict wants to destroy their life. When bewildered loved ones ask addicts "WHY? Why are you doing this to yourself?" I know the answer is this: because they have a disease. An alcoholic who drinks can no more control how their body reacts to alcohol than a diabetic can control their body's insulin.
People who argue against the disease concept - and many of them are in recovery themselves - don't like the loophole it creates, fearing the alcoholic will keep drinking, saying "I can't help it. I have a disease."
My response to this is simple: my disease isn't my fault, but my recovery is my responsibility. My responsibility is to stay away from that first drink, the one that will activate my disease. To stay away from that first drink I choose a program of recovery; I surround myself with other alcoholics in recovery, I talk about how I'm feeling. I ask for help. A lot.
I didn't choose to be someone who can't have one or two drinks safely. I would never, ever have done the things I did, taken myself and my family down such a dark road, if I had been able to stop drinking on my own. I don't know that I will ever be able to find adequate words to describe what alcohol did to my brain. It possessed me. Even when I wasn't drinking, it nagged at my consciousness, pulling me back in over and over. I don't know how to describe to someone who isn't an alcoholic what it feels like to wake up in the morning thinking, "Oh NO. I did it again."
I have a disease. A disease that springs to life if I have one drink. It may not destroy me right away, but eventually, it will. I have no control over my own life when I'm drinking, because alcohol calls all the shots.
The only way out of the disease of addiction is to surrender to it. To accept in your heart that you can't have even one drink without triggering the craving, the obsession.
Surrendering is hard. It takes more guts to surrender than it does to fight, because surrendering involves vulnerability, and we're hard-wired to avoid feeling vulnerable.
The stigma of addiction keeps people unsurrendered. People simply don't understand what alcohol does to an alcoholic, how it eventually takes over every aspect of our thinking. It is hard to ask for help, because the response is all too often, "well, why don't you just stop, then?"
Choking out the words, "I can't stop," feels like defeat of the worst kind. It feels like you are the weakest, most morally corrupt person on the planet. Ironically, choking out those words is the bravest thing anyone can do. Eventually, alcohol degrades a person's life to the point where drinking feels like the only good thing left. And then the script changes, goes from "I can't stop" to "I won't stop".
THAT is the disease of addiction.
To break the cycle, to get out of the spiral, you have to surrender. You have to look yourself dead in the eye, and admit that you have tried everything you can to stop, and nothing is working. That you aren't in control when it comes to drinking. Peel your hands off the wheel, and go get help. Fall back into the arms of people who understand, who can carry you until you feel like carrying yourself.
When I die, I want to be that sober person who faced the ups and downs of life with gratitude in my heart and a hopeful spring in my step. I want to grow and learn through adversity, not skirt around it, shrinking from the hard truths in a bottle.
I didn't choose to be an alcoholic. But I can choose surrender, I can choose recovery.
I feel sometimes like I end every post about addiction and recovery this way, but I will keep saying it over and over: if you are struggling with alcoholism, open your mouth to save your life. Tell your truths. And please, please surrender. You will never be able to have one drink in safety. If that thought sends terror into your heart, go find the people who understand, who have walked the path before you, who can show you that a life full of light and hope is waiting for you.
Because here is the bleak truth: it will kill you. But first it will destroy your spirit, your happiness, your ability to love. It will.
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Hey man, good luck. I've got until the weekend and then I'm gonna make a huge effort as I'm not gonna take any cigs to the UK. The time has come I think...
I've got such a mixed bag of emotions going on here I don't even know how to feel. As a mother, the hardest thing ever is to see your child suffering. And she has been suffering for a long time. Before she turned to drugs, she cut herself. It hurts so badly to see her destroying herself. I also feel guilt...in my mind I know I've done the best I could raising her, trying to get her help...but I know I'm not perfect. I have my own demons.
I'm not addict tho...and I don't understand addiction...I mean to a point I guess I do. I AM addicted to cigarettes. I abuse alcohol...I self medicate with pot. But there was always this big red light when it came to harder stuff like coke and heroin...I just wouldn't EVER go there. I don't understand its appeal. And as mentioned in the post above, I am one of those people who struggle with the concept that she just can't stop it. Just DON'T do it.
I'm not so sure I agree with the 12 step methods...she was going to meetings at first when she got back, but I think she struggled with their ideals as well. But I think she just didn't want to believe/accept that she can't use - at all - including alcohol, because it would set her back. I don't know. I just feel that if you know yourself well enough, and are honest with yourself, that you should be able to kick it.
Also - I'm angry. Her addiction has led her to steal from her family. If that wasn't bad enough, I let her back into our home and she stole again. Shame on me I guess? But what could I have done? Throw her out on the street? I have a friend whose son has been living on the street in Camden (NJ). Not a nice place for a skinny little white girl to be.
And I just don't understand what has happened to her that has lead her to this path of self destruction. She has some learning disabilities. She is def ADHD. But those should not be excuses to use.
I know I'm rambling, but like I said I'm so torn apart right now...exhausted. And now I need to help her book a flight to get the hell out of here...away from this madness. I mean, heroin is the big thing here in my town...fucking heroin. I've never even seen heroin. And I have a 15 year old daughter as well - who knows people that do heroin. It's sick. Well, I just needed to vent.
Being WHAT I am , I'm more qualified to help your daughter. What I am is an addict/alcoholic. Fact. No shame. I didnt ask for it, but I did my part to be one.
If you have any questions, I and I hope others will try our best to answer them. At least from our own experience.
I will suggest , you attend a few meetings yourself. Open meetings where all who are interested are welcome. Speaker meeting would be a good place to start. Just to see for yourself what goes on and some of what its really about. You might be surprised. Just to give you some perspective of what your daughter is going through.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
I am right by your side.
Great article. :thumbup:
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Russell Brand talks sense? First time for everything!
But he really nails this article. Great find and thanks for sharing.
When you love someone who suffers from the disease of addiction you await the phone call. There will be a phone call. The sincere hope is that the call will be from the addict themselves, telling you they’ve had enough, that they’re ready to stop, ready to try something new. Of course though, you fear the other call, the sad nocturnal chime from a friend or relative telling you it’s too late, she’s gone.
Frustratingly it’s not a call you can ever make it must be received. It is impossible to intervene.
I’ve known Amy Winehouse for years. When I first met her around Camden she was just some twit in a pink satin jacket shuffling round bars with mutual friends, most of whom were in cool Indie bands or peripheral Camden figures Withnail-ing their way through life on impotent charisma. Carl Barrat told me that “Winehouse” (which I usually called her and got a kick out of cos it’s kind of funny to call a girl by her surname) was a jazz singer, which struck me as bizarrely anomalous in that crowd. To me with my limited musical knowledge this information placed Amy beyond an invisible boundary of relevance; “Jazz singer? She must be some kind of eccentric” I thought. I chatted to her anyway though, she was after all, a girl, and she was sweet and peculiar but most of all vulnerable.
I was myself at that time barely out of rehab and was thirstily seeking less complicated women so I barely reflected on the now glaringly obvious fact that Winehouse and I shared an affliction, the disease of addiction. All addicts, regardless of the substance or their social status share a consistent and obvious symptom; they’re not quite present when you talk to them. They communicate to you through a barely discernible but un-ignorable veil. Whether a homeless smack head troubling you for 50p for a cup of tea or a coked-up, pinstriped exec foaming off about his “speedboat” there is a toxic aura that prevents connection. They have about them the air of elsewhere, that they’re looking through you to somewhere else they’d rather be. And of course they are. The priority of any addict is to anaesthetise the pain of living to ease the passage of the day with some purchased relief.
From time to time I’d bump into Amy she had good banter so we could chat a bit and have a laugh, she was “a character” but that world was riddled with half cut, doped up chancers, I was one of them, even in early recovery I was kept afloat only by clinging to the bodies of strangers so Winehouse, but for her gentle quirks didn’t especially register.
Then she became massively famous and I was pleased to see her acknowledged but mostly baffled because I’d not experienced her work and this not being the 1950’s I wondered how a “jazz singer” had achieved such cultural prominence. I wasn’t curious enough to do anything so extreme as listen to her music or go to one of her gigs, I was becoming famous myself at the time and that was an all consuming experience. It was only by chance that I attended a Paul Weller gig at the Roundhouse that I ever saw her live.
I arrived late and as I made my way to the audience through the plastic smiles and plastic cups I heard the rolling, wondrous resonance of a female vocal. Entering the space I saw Amy on stage with Weller and his band; and then the awe. The awe that envelops when witnessing a genius. From her oddly dainty presence that voice, a voice that seemed not to come from her but from somewhere beyond even Billie and Ella, from the font of all greatness. A voice that was filled with such power and pain that it was at once entirely human yet laced with the divine. My ears, my mouth, my heart and mind all instantly opened. Winehouse. Winehouse? Winehouse! That twerp, all eyeliner and lager dithering up Chalk Farm Road under a back-combed barnet, the lips that I’d only seen clenching a fishwife fag and dribbling curses now a portal for this holy sound. So now I knew. She wasn’t just some hapless wannabe, yet another pissed up nit who was never gonna make it, nor was she even a ten-a-penny-chanteuse enjoying her fifteen minutes. She was a fucking genius.
Shallow fool that I am I now regarded her in a different light, the light that blazed down from heaven when she sang. That lit her up now and a new phase in our friendship began. She came on a few of my TV and radio shows, I still saw her about but now attended to her with a little more interest. Publicly though, Amy increasingly became defined by her addiction. Our media though is more interested in tragedy than talent, so the ink began to defect from praising her gift to chronicling her downfall. The destructive personal relationships, the blood soaked ballet slippers, the aborted shows, that youtube madness with the baby mice. In the public perception this ephemeral tittle-tattle replaced her timeless talent. This and her manner in our occasional meetings brought home to me the severity of her condition. Addiction is a serious disease; it will end with jail, mental institutions or death. I was 27 years old when through the friendship and help of Chip Somers of the treatment centre, Focus12 I found recovery, through Focus I was introduced to support fellowships for alcoholics and drug addicts which are very easy to find and open to anybody with a desire to stop drinking and without which I would not be alive.
Now Amy Winehouse is dead, like many others whose unnecessary deaths have been retrospectively romanticised, at 27 years old. Whether this tragedy was preventable or not is now irrelevant. It is not preventable today. We have lost a beautiful and talented woman to this disease. Not all addicts have Amy’s incredible talent. Or Kurt’s or Jimi’s or Janis’s, some people just get the affliction. All we can do is adapt the way we view this condition, not as a crime or a romantic affectation but as a disease that will kill. We need to review the way society treats addicts, not as criminals but as sick people in need of care. We need to look at the way our government funds rehabilitation. It is cheaper to rehabilitate an addict than to send them to prison, so criminalisation doesn’t even make economic sense. Not all of us know someone with the incredible talent that Amy had but we all know drunks and junkies and they all need help and the help is out there. All they have to do is pick up the phone and make the call. Or not. Either way, there will be a phone call.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14