Guest Blog From A Friend: Taking Crazy To A Whole New Level

Talking to anyone about my inner demons is hard for me. I talk to myself plenty. I have long-winded dialogue with myself almost every minute that I’m not conversing with another human being. A lot of those inner conversations are ugly, unvarnished truth. However, admitting my vulnerabilities to others has never been part of my make-up. From where I sit, the world, particularly in the individually-driven country in which I live, tells us to handle our own business. I try not to pry into the personal affairs of other folks unless I’m asked to, and I generally don’t like it when people pry into mine. 

It’s a glitch in my programming. I’m not much of a talker unless I really, really trust the person I’m sharing with, and there aren’t too many folks I trust. That’s somewhat unwarranted, I suppose, but the people I open up to seem to understand.

When my dear friend started this blog, part of me shuddered at the notion of her openly sharing, in vast detail, her struggles with not only addictions, but various other emotional and mental struggles. I wanted to caution her to keep her demons close to her vest, but she arrived at an epiphany long before I did. She called it like it was, which filled me with admiration and awe, but also with a tremendous fear.  The potential stigma - at least that’s what I perceived it to be - seemed so great to me that I feared what I thought would be the resulting damage to her anonymity, privacy, and reputation. I saw the inherent value in her sharing her own struggles so that others might not feel so alone, but my brief flirtation with following suit and writing my own story was quickly tempered by trepidation.  I resolved to follow her lead at the time, and then rapidly retreated into the safety of hiding my own significant “craziness.” After all, I rationalized, I was doing OK. I was sober, getting by day-by-day, maintaining a comfortable façade of respectability, and rationalizing my near-daily anxiety as just “something to deal with.” Sure, I worried about things, and I checked the stove, lights, and doors a few more times than normal before leaving the house, but I was working hard, exercising, and doing my best to be of service to others. My internal fears and obsessions were nobody’s business but my own. I didn’t feel like there was much reason for me to open myself up to the potential ridicule from those who wouldn’t get it. 

I can no longer, in good conscience, be governed by that fear. You see, about a month ago, my mind decided it had had enough. Out of nowhere, an overwhelming remorse and shame for my past met with an intolerable surge of anxiety about my future, and the ability to maintain the facade became not only a difficulty, but a complete impossibility. My pride in four years of continuous sobriety suddenly became meaningless as I tried desperately to find some way to quiet the steady drumbeat of voices in my head. I tried many responsible ways to keep at bay what was quickly becoming a monster that was all-consuming. I walked for miles, praying the entire time for the pain to go away. I got down on my knees three or four times a day, praying earnest and pleading prayers that brought little to no relief. I tied literally dozens of flies at my work bench for trips to the river with my fly rod that couldn’t materialize, thanks to the frigid cold. I cleaned my house incessantly, laundering clothes that hadn’t been worn. I volunteered for extra work at the office, although my lack of concentration should have dictated that I choose the opposite course. The solution that I once knew to work so well - a stiff drink or two - began to occupy my thoughts almost as much as the loneliness and anxiety. To put as fine a point on it as I can, my mind and soul became hopelessly sick. In retrospect, I’m disappointed in the choice I made, which was to reach for a solution that I knew would provide at least a temporary respite. When the respite was over - too quickly, I might add - I was back to self-hatred and hopelessness.

I’ll admit it without reservation. A constant flow of booze long ago became the only solution that ever worked to stop the squirrels from sprinting endlessly in my mind. At the risk of suggesting that alcohol is a solution to anxiety - which I am definitively not doing - it always seemed to work. Obsessive worries always disappeared when I got good and drunk. This occasion was no exception. The first gulp of vodka I took brought instant relief: a nice, warm glow in my chest, a comfortable burn, a demonstrable slowing of my heart rate, and most importantly, the damn squirrels stopped running so fast. I don’t know about you guys, but when the squirrels in my mind start running and don’t stop, getting them to at least slow down causes me to cast reason aside. Never mind the damage I’m doing to my liver, stomach, heart, esophagus. Who cares? I just want some peace.

Peace, of course, never lasts very long when it’s alcohol-induced. Pretty quickly, it became obvious to me that I was on the course for death…again. By this point, I had skipped a week of work, and just assumed I’d be fired, not knowing that I had two bosses who were worried sick enough about me to call the police and send them to my house to check on my welfare. A co-worker suddenly sent a request to be friends on Facebook, with a simple note of “concerned about you.” I was so far gone that I waved off the officer at my door with some lame excuse about just being “under the weather.“ I got to thinking that dying wouldn’t actually be so bad. Waking up every day with a new worry or obsession in my head had grown to be an exhausting routine, and now I‘d essentially cast aside everyone and everything - a good job where my bosses clearly cared about me, a family that has never given up on me, and relationships that I had spent four years cultivating and treasuring. 

The resulting shame led me to a conclusion that I never in a million years would have expected from myself, and that was that life was no longer worth living. A mere two months ago, I’d have told you that I was happy. Then, with no warning, obsessive thoughts came from nowhere, and with no comfort level to share them with anyone, I had quickly spiraled into an unwarranted sense of foreboding and hopelessness. The thoughts had entered my mind without any warning, and I couldn’t let them go. The only way I knew to stop them was to drink them away, which doubled my shame and put me into a familiar cycle of self-destruction. Feeling as though I had thrown away everything I’d worked to achieve, I started thinking of the softest way to simply disappear. Suddenly and inexplicably, I no longer wanted to live, let alone fight or struggle to simply endure what was temporary, but certainly not unfamiliar mental anguish. 

With no firearms in the house, I found myself having to think creatively. I hopped online and started researching how to tie a proper noose. I couldn’t find any rope, so I thought maybe some excess telephone cable might do the trick. In my state of intoxicated apathy, I found myself unable to get the noose tied properly, and in any event, there didn’t seem to be any beam or bar that would support my weight.

I tried cutting my wrists, but I simply didn’t have the nerve to go deep enough, and the knife I tried seemed frustratingly dull. The outer scars are faint now, visible only if I look carefully enough. The inner scars will be with me for some time.

I finally surmised that taking enough of any kind of pills would bring about the result I thought I wanted at the time. I didn’t have anything really powerful in the house, but I did finally find a bottle of old, expired blood pressure medication that I had been prescribed long ago but rarely bothered to take for some reason - benign neglect, I suppose. I swallowed a handful with a vodka chaser and waited for the end, wondering the entire time if it would be enough, or would simply add some vomiting and diarrhea to my already pathetic condition.

Here’s where something happened that was either spiritual or simply medical, or maybe a combination. I briefly left my house for no other reason than to take one last look around outside. After a half hour or so, I had to return quickly, as the toxic brew churning in my gut felt as though it was going to expel itself from my body. I raced to my bathroom and there, in black ink, was a long paragraph of text on the bathroom floor. It was a message from my father, and not just a simple “don’t do it,” but a long letter, written in stark detail and demonstrating intimate knowledge of the issues that had been plaguing my mind for days on end. I can’t remember the exact wording, but I can best describe it as a loving rage, questioning on the one hand why I would choose such a selfish solution, but including an offer to walk through whatever fire was burning me up inside. I glanced to the right and saw another long message from my mother. I remember even less of what her letter said, but it was clear that my death would take a piece of her with me. I began to walk around the house, and suddenly realized that the carpets, tables, doors, and walls were covered in messages from my two oldest nephews, my siblings, friends, and even some that were signed by people I’d never heard of or met. Members of my twelve-step home group had left lighthearted notes designed, I assume, to ease my burden in the only way they knew. In all, they were pleas for me to reconsider, expressions of love, suggestions for new career paths, and personal stories of anguish-turned-triumph. 

I made it to the front door, and read one last message, written by my friend and author of this blog. Unlike any of the other notes, this one expressed a vivid, prescient understanding of exactly what I was going through. It was a message of empathy. Not sympathy, but empathy. She understood, and her note urged me to find another way. If my current approach, which had worked so well but no longer seemed to do the trick, wasn’t the way, then certainly there was something else to be tried. When I saw her later, in the days after my attempt at stopping the damn squirrels for good, she simply encouraged me to “get at the root” and seek the right kind of help.

I pulled out my cell phone to take pictures of the letters, and just as suddenly as the messages had appeared, they vanished, and I sunk into my easy chair, exhausted and confused.

As it became clear to me that my attempt at drifting away into irrelevance was going to do nothing other than make me sick and more twisted, I started trying to process what had just happened. At first, I suspected that a friend and mentor of mine had intuitively known what I was going through, and had orchestrated the entire event using some kind of special ink that would disappear after a certain amount of time. When my sister and brother in-law suddenly showed up at my door and exposed my obvious intoxication to the light of day, I opened the floodgates and confessed to my days-long battle with my own mind. I began to quiz them as to how everyone had gotten in the house so fast in my brief absence and written such detailed notes to me in disappearing ink over every square inch of my home. Obviously, neither had any clue as to what I was referring. I expected anger and dismay. Instead, I received kindness, but saw sadness and worry in the eyes of my sister. 

I’m guessing now that the messages, at least in logical terms, were simple hallucinations. Still, I have to wonder if the God I believed in, but lacked faith in, had a hand in all of it as well.

After a night in the hospital, I spent the next week with family, recovering. At long last, I began to share the worries and shame that had started what now seems like a ridiculous chain of events. What I got from this was not ridicule, but perspective. The sins of my past were overblown, they said, and in any event had been forgiven. The worries about the future were surmountable at worst, and opportunities for growth, at best. I quickly saw things in a new light, a light that would have shined vividly before any damage had been done had I bothered to simply tell someone. In the weeks since my nightmare, I’ve had the benefit of medical care and healing, with the opportunity now to seek real professional help for an obvious, if undiagnosed, mental illness. 

The real point of all this, if there is one, is not to simply recount a horror story and admit that I, too, suffer from mental illness. I’m extremely fortunate to have family, friends, and resources to now move forward and not only learn, but heal. My siblings both work in mental health, and they’ve gone to great lengths to point me in the right direction. In plain English, I’m lucky. I wonder what would have happened had I not had the chance to finally tell someone, without judgment or fear of aspersion, troubles that had seemed so real to me, yet so manageable to an objective listener. In my travels, despite my own obvious sickness, I’ve met people who have the same demons, but no family to share them with. I’ve taken other alcoholics to the hospital, desperately hoping they could get some real help, only to watch doctors and supposed substance abuse “counselors” cast them back into the wilderness without so much as checking their blood pressure or blood-alcohol content. During my recent stay in the hospital, the security guard charged with watching me was by far the most compassionate, kind person I encountered during the entire process. He brought me food, and apologized profusely when the kitchen sent up a turkey sandwich instead of the roast beef I had asked for. I couldn’t have cared less that my order came back wrong, but the man actually wanted to send it back so I could have roast beef! I laughed and declined, so he sat in the room offering encouragement as I tried to get him to see the writing I was seeing on the hospital floor – clearly more hallucinations that were visible only to my eyes. I was uplifted by his kindness. That man did more to start me on the road to healing than anyone else, simply by showing some obvious, heartfelt compassion for the town drunk. 

In her post entitled “My Daily Nightmare,” my friend wrote: “Other countries have more expanded options for people with mental health issues…our pharmaceutical lobby is so powerful that we often destroy the lives of people with mental health issues, treating them like guinea pigs when there are other interventions available that are never tried…community supports are often few.” My hope is that recounting my story might serve as a small bit of that community support. I want people with troubles to share them with supportive family, if they have them. I want our society to start taking mental health seriously. Not with derision, but with compassion. If my story can give just one person some hope, then I’m overjoyed. I hope others will set aside their fears and share their own stories. It’s high time that the stigma of being “crazy” goes away, and if my story can help move that process forward, it’s well worth any remaining apprehension I have with sharing it.

In the weeks since my own sudden, unexpected nightmare, I’ve alternated between hope and hopelessness. I’ve taken far too many over-the-counter sleeping pills, which seem to do no good whatsoever and, I think, are simply tearing my stomach apart at this point. Anxiety rears its head nearly every morning at 5 a.m., like clockwork. My heart races, my pulse quickens, and I try my best to breathe deeply and go back to sleep. Usually, I end up just getting out of bed and starting my day. I spend my days working as much as possible, because it seems like that’s the one thing that can distract me enough to make the days manageable. Quite frankly, there are days where I ask God to spare me any further time here. Somehow, I get the impression that those pleas are being deferred because I’m supposed to still do something better. 

Still, it helps to know I’m not the only one. In the recent days, I’ve simply started to share what happened to me with people, few holds barred, in matter-of-fact terms.  Both bosses, and several co-workers, have shown nothing but compassion and thankfulness that I’m back at work. Some have even opened up about their own struggles with Bi-Polar disorder, depression, and anxiety. 

As I’ve taken the time to get this off my chest and share it with the world, I’ve been trying to think of what the overall point has been. Maybe the point has just been to put it out there in hopes that someone else won’t feel so alone. Maybe the point is that there shouldn’t be shame in seeking help. Maybe the point is that there just flat out isn’t enough help for us “nut-jobs.”  Or, maybe the point is that there is help, but we just don’t seek it out. I don’t really know for sure. What I do know is that pretending it wasn’t an issue didn’t work for me, and succumbing to the idea that it’s shameful isn’t an option any longer.

To those reading this who suffer, I wish you all the things I wish for myself - some joy, contentment, and relief. Know that my heart aches along with yours, because in many respects, I’m there with you. Our demons may be different, but our pain isn’t. Maybe sharing it with each other is the best medicine we can hope for. I hope I’ve done my part.

12 Steps to Nowhere

Years ago, I suffered a loss so incomprehensible that I could not take the pain. I medicated myself with alcohol and tried to numb out the pain as much as possible.  For years, my drinking was never 'out of control', just a daily evening dose of medicine to numb the pain.  I started to feel this 'medicine''s effect on my mind and body and realized I had to do something or I would continue to numb myself into a slow death.  In looking for 'help', I chose to try one of the only methods I knew of, Alcoholic's Anonymous.  Although, my story was not the story of many 'in the program', I learned to do what people told me to do and 'look for similarities instead of differences' and slowly began to be slightly brainwashed by something that never quite 'fit' for me.

With lack of any other available options, I chose to go to a place where I was told this was the 'only solution' to my addiction. Before this, I wallowed around scared and alone, not knowing where to turn.  I entered AA, vulnerable and sad.  I did not know or understand that perhaps if I focused on my underlying grief and trauma issues, I could live a fuller life.  Instead, I went in to something where alcohol and the 'ism' attached to it, became part of my 'character' in this insidious way.  I struggled through in these rooms with concepts that never quite made sense to me.

I stayed because I love connecting with people; because I was lonely.  I stayed because a gentle man worked through the steps with me in an openhearted way, patient and nonjudgmental about my questions.  I started to heal a little, with time and with my own work, from the grief and pain that brought me here.  I watched some 'get it' and take on this program with the fervor of a Southern preacher.  And sadly, I watched some come in and out sad and vulnerable, thinking that no matter how much work they did, they just couldn't quite get it. Seeing these people who worked hard, but could not stay sober,  broke my heart. It made me wonder if there was another way for some and that instead of saying 'it works if you work it', maybe the saying should be 'if it doesn't work try something else because your life depends on it'. I started to question, more and more. I started to question many of the steps as they did not fit with much that made sense to me on a deep level.

I went in with help for my addiction and was told I had a 'special type of personality', that my make up was vastly different from the 'normies', as they were called.  This puzzled me as my experience showed me that anyone can become an addict and that many of these 'special' traits that were talked about were also experienced by people who were not addicts.  My pain and grief had led me to numb out with an intoxicating substance. This did not make me unique or different from people who numb out in other socially acceptable ways like TV or video games. My trauma, my grief, my resentments were things that were universally felt by addicts and non addicts alike.

When I struggled with depression and anxiety, it filled me with deep discomfort to hear others in the 'rooms' say that AA was the only way and to scoff at therapy and psychiatry.  These people were not the majority, but their attitude towards outside help could make a deeply vulnerable person ashamed that they could not deal with everything with AA and the 12 steps.  They implied that someone who needed outside help was just not working the steps hard enough.  I firmly believe that this is one of the most destructive aspects of AA and other offshoot 12 step programs.  It could be literally killing people who need more help than the 'program' can offer them.

I now know, from my 4 years in and out of the program, that I saw the great value that came from connecting with others with similar problems. For some, the connection to faith and spirituality was life transforming.  For others, it was a baffling puzzle that never made sense. I saw lives transformed in the 'program' and I saw others that floundered. Central to this floundering, at times, was this inability to 'get' the deeply patriarchal religious underpinnings of this program.  For some of us, those ideas and concepts just do not work and trying to shame us into believing that they should is just wrong.

I knew what brought me here was deep pain; pain born of many traumas, many losses, much grief. This deep pain was often brushed over and disregarded as self pity, or 'terminal uniqueness'. I knew that these rooms were not addressing a lot of these deep pains or traumas.  This questioning led me to being in these rooms feeling like my head was going to explode, but feeling I must because I was told I had to. I was told I had a 'progressive disease'. Some took this idea so far that they believe their diseased character will just get progressively worse even when clean from the substance. I was told that if I stopped coming, I was bound to 'relapse'. Furthermore, that it is a given with this disease, if I relapse I will start using the substance worse than I used to and probably end up dead, in prison or in an institution. I was not told that a great majority of people who have problems with alcohol somehow 'mature' out of it and either move on eventually to moderate drinking or abstinence with no AA or specialized alcohol treatment.

Being clean of this substance did not protect me from horrible pain. Being in these rooms did not take away mind numbing debilitating pain and depression. Seeing others, who had many years of 'sobriety' be just as unhealthy, sometimes more so, than the newcomer, spurred me towards more reflection on what this all meant to me, to others. Things become clear.  A weight lifted, and I realized that I did have a choice.  I could change my relationship with alcohol just as I had changed my relationship with food many years earlier.  The 'rooms' were not what I needed, and I was now more aware of myself and knew that if I was drawn to self medication and numbing, that I might need something else, not some archaic program that made no sense to me. Not a higher power. But, my self will, harnessed and aligned and learning to fight for my own survival.  My self will was not the enemy I heard it was. It was something that could actually save me; because without this 'self will', I would not be here today. Nor would I have survived all the traumas that led me here.

In this country, our treatment of addiction and mental health issues is woefully inadequate.  For years, we have looked in the wrong direction with both, believing that 12 step models worked well(when the evidence clearly proved otherwise) for addiction and that pharmaceuticals were the answer for mental health issues.  For both, it is my firm belief, that the key to both, in many cases, is unresolved trauma, loss, and grief.  Further research has proven that it is also social connection and support networks that make the difference in both.(which, to me, shows why 12 step programs work for a lot of people) Years ago, I would talk to a friend about things I found on the Internet that were anti AA. Her question was why rail against AA? Why not just do your own thing and quit being so negative? For me, the answer is this: if there is just one person out there in the 'program' that hears what I say and feels less alone, then, I will have done what I set out to do.  If there is anyone out there 'in the room's feeling like their head is going to explode, that they just can't 'get it', my message is clear: find other things that work. Therapy. Exercise. Positive social connections. Fight for your life. Find treatment for trauma. Find treatment for grief.  You do not have to stay with something that doesn't feel right to you. There are other options. We,as a country, need to quit being so backward and recognize that addiction is a multi faceted experience with many answers.  If we continue down the path we are going without looking deeper at many options, we will continue to see tragic deaths of people that truly believed they 'failed' at the one answer they had and that there were no other answers.  Do we really want these deaths on our hands?

Trauma's Long Term Wounding

Several months ago, I was embroiled in a bit of a family drama. I received a vicious e-mail from a cousin, who I do not know, about one of my blog posts.  This blog post expressed my love for experiences we had at our beloved family cabin, but also expressed hurt that the cabin was gone.  Having someone completely belittle my experience and viciously attack me about a heartfelt blog post, made me sick and sad. Knowing that 'family' could be this heartless and unkind made me sick to my stomach.  It also triggered old traumas, old hurts.

Since rape and domestic violence in my late teens and early 20's, I have suffered from PTSD.  More than 20 years later, at times, I expect this hurt, this pain, that I carry deep within my body, to be gone.  I often don't realize how easily triggered I am, nor recognize when I begin to shut down.  The e-mail that I received and the actions of other family members in this same clan made me question myself, made me shut down and hide.  I felt overwhelmed and felt that I had  no worth.  The same feelings and insidious messages my abuser had instilled in me.  I recently read that one symptom of PTSD is the feeling that your world is about to fall down around you at any moment.  One trigger can set me into this feeling and throw me into complete panic. With the events that happened back in February, I have slowly begun to realize how easily I am still triggered.  Abuse and trauma never completely go away. 

Many traditions and philosophies have a message of 'acceptance', of learning to accept those things we cannot change. This philosophy, while helpful for some, can be harmful at times for those of us who have suffered from abuse.  When we have the type of body trauma and anxiety that comes from deeply abusive and invasive experiences, it is really hard to accept those things we cannot change.  It can take years to heal from traumatic experiences and jumping to 'acceptance' or 'forgiveness' can, at times, suppress the real healing that comes from feeling the rage, the sadness, and  the loss of innocence and trust.

With each trigger, I learn that my trauma lies deep within my body, mind and spirit. I wonder about the very public victims we have heard about the past year: the women who were raped by Cosby, the young victims of Josh Duggar, the many victims of campus rape, the ex-wife of Bill O'Reilly, and more.  How are they faring? Are they easily triggered?   Do they shy away from intimacy and struggle with this many years later? Do they have a hard time trusting anyone? Do they carry their trauma as wounds to their souls and have they been given a chance to heal?  My heart hurts for them. This long term hurting and healing is often forgotten in discussions about sexual and domestic violence.  Media doesn't focus on the fact that abuse is a wound on the victims' soul, a wound that can be re-opened, that can refuse to heal.  Sometimes, they talk about the hypocrisy of the perpetrator, but we forget that years later, there are still victims of these crimes that are facing ongoing life-changing hurt.

I also feel deep sympathy for 'public' victims as they not only have their own trauma from the abuse, they are also re-traumatized by people in the media who minimize their pain.  The media has been rife with examples of this cultural need to require victims to shut up, accept, forgive and move on. We hear public figures call abuse ' a mistake' while trying to minimize the impact, the deep hurt that the victims are subject to for the rest of their lives. My call to the media, to public figures who speak out, is to think before you speak, think of the victim and the trauma they endure and then re-endure when their abuse is made public by choice or by chance.  My call to all of us is to be kind, to think about the impact that your mere words can have on someones life, be it a nasty e-mail or a hateful comment on social media.  There are so many of us out here, wounded and trying to heal.  We could do with more compassion and a little less judgment and denial.

I feel my trauma deep in my mind, my body and soul.  I have worked hard to heal.  But, that trauma is still there, at times, lurking beneath the surface. Sometimes I don't even recognize it when my wound is re-opened and raw. This wound is not visible to the outside, but it is there nonetheless. There are millions of us walking around with similar wounds that at times become infected and life threatening be it through suppression and minimization of pain or through new abusive and hurtful experiences.  All of us need to do more to prevent our lives and our children's lives from being shattered by abuse.  We need to stand up to those who want to shut us up, who want to deny our experience.  As we all work to prevent and heal from abuse, we need to hold our hearts open for others who are hurt and wounded.  Remember that our trauma is a long term wound and that we must be gentle with ourselves to move forward.  Together, we can heal, grow, and work towards a world where abuse is rare, not common, and those traumatized are supported, not suppressed and re-traumatized. 

Addiction: Looking Deeper

Since my teen years, I have fought a battle between doing what I know is 'healthy' for me and doing things that I know are decidedly not.  What is it about some of us humans that we yearn for those moments of peace and calm that certain substances and behaviors give us even when we know they are killing us? Whether it be killing our body and our minds with alcohol, nicotine or other drugs or killing our minds with endless gaming and TV watching, many of us cannot stop  that call to escape 'reality'.

Those of us that are on that razor thin line between the two choices are often judged for not trying hard enough.  Others are baffled at why one continues behaviors that harm themselves and sometimes others. They are appalled at those who deal with grave health consequences while continuing the substance that is causing the problem.   Many assume, wrongly, that one form of 'treatment' should fit for everyone and those who are not helped by the treatment are not working hard enough or doing it right.  Others assume, also wrongly, that someone should just be able to quit with no problem.  They have no idea the internal pain that people go through; the strong internal desire to live coupled with the equally strong desire to numb while slowly dying.

I ponder why some of us can commit to being healthy and go for it with no problem.  I ponder why a very large percentage of people quit addictions like alcohol and cigarettes with absolutely no support or help when some of us can't seem to figure it out even when we do have support and resources to quit. I ponder why some of us easily embrace programs and groups that work for us, while some of us can't help but look at those programs with a cynical distrust that diminishes their value to us. 

Growing older, I have watched people struggle with horrible addiction only to be 'scared straight' by near death experiences or brushes with the law.  They seem to brush themselves on and move on, never seeming to crave the drug that was killing them before.  I have watched people with horrible addictions benefit from 12 step programs that truly transform their lives.  Conversely, I have seen people who are 'in' and 'out' of 12 step programs, never seeming to commit to health and sobriety.  I have seen people truly look at their addictions and rid themselves of their addiction by discovering what works for them, be it therapy, in-depth trauma work, and even finding healthy hobbies. 

I ponder my big heart, my depression, my sadness, my anger, my empathy.  I realize that all of those things have led me to substances that help me 'escape' from this world.  My journey has led me from 'alternative' therapies, traditional therapies and various support and 12 step groups.  In many cases, all of these things have 'helped' in their way.  Still, I cannot seem to fully commit myself to completely ridding myself of self destructive behaviors.  Somehow, I still have that addict thought in my head that the benefits outweigh the risks. With a substance like tobacco, we all know that thinking is ridiculous! For those of us addicted to substances, there is also the overwhelming fear of the pain of detox.  Although I am not actively engaged in old addictions like eating disorders or alcoholism, I am still a slave to a substance.  And that thought is incredibly frustrating! 

I wonder what the answer is for myself and others.  And I realize, from watching people die or slowly kill themselves and from watching people get sober and thrive that the answer lies within each person.  We must let go of the idea that there is 'one' answer for treating addiction.  Behind addiction is trauma, is fear, is mental illness, is sadness, is self hatred, and more.  Addressing those core issues or not, holds the key to life and moving forward.  Addiction holds a different message for each of us and the trick is trying to overcome the physical hold of addiction while also addressing the reasons hidden underneath it.

For me, the learning continues.  Each of my major addictions carried some major growth when I finally decided to heal and address them. It is my hope, for me and others, that people see addiction for what it is, instead of seeing it as a moral failing and look at addicts with compassion, instead of judgment.  Perhaps my biggest hope and observation traveling this path is that we need to open our minds and hearts to different options of helping people; that we no longer assume someone wasn't 'working' hard enough if something didn't work for them.  If we cannot open our minds to many options, instead of few, people will continue dying horrible deaths from addiction. For myself, I hope that I can continue to learn to be present in this world without feeling the need to escape, the urge to destruct.  

Our Tragic Legacy of Hiding

Since last week, I have been in heavy 'musing' mode, struggling to find the words to thoughts that overwhelm and disturb me.  So many times I come face to face with the issue of secrecy, hiding and shame and it seems like it is beyond my abilities to address it.  It is so deeply embedded in our society and our families.  Our ability to communicate and listen, to confront, and to soothe is so badly damaged that people are literally dying both quick and long deaths because of it.

This post is for the woman living in fear of a husband who abuses her, who hides this from everyone because he is a 'well respected' member of his community and no-one would believe her; a woman who suffers more than anyone should ever suffer without community to support her.

This post is for a man with mental health issues who lives in perpetual suffering in his head; who fears reaching out because 'men just don't do that'.  Even if he did reach out, the methods of 'care' are sadly lacking because of our deep ties to the pharmaceutical industry and our inability to find better options.  Options that may be more available if we, as a society, had just learned how to question, how to look deeply and confront wrongs and find better answers.

This post is for the sexual abuse survivor who tells small parts of her community her story, only to be shunned, ignored and sometimes even ostracized; a survivor who learns that hiding is better because that's the message society gives her.  This survivor loses key supports by isolating and those who 'know' are often left to carry a heavy burden themselves, without community, without communication; sickening whole communities of people.

This post of for the gay teenager living in a small religious community, who hides a major part of who he is for fear of ostracism and sometimes worse; a teenager who may become addicted to alcohol or drugs or even kill himself because the price of hiding is just too great.

This post is for the person who grieves the loss of a close loved on in secret because our culture puts a 'timeline' on grief and looks down on long term expressions of grief ; a person suffering in silence instead of sharing a load that may be made lighter just by the sharing of it. 

This post is for countless others who hide parts of themselves, who hide parts of their stories, because there is no support out there for them; who, when they do share their stories, are often ignored or diminished in sometimes deeply wounding ways.

We are as sick as the secrets we keep, the shame that we hold on to and are terrified to share and release.  This shame isolates all of us and teaches us to shut our hearts down in the face of pain.  It separates us from other people; diminishing our sense of community by closing all of us down to the pain and trauma that is merely a part of human experience. 

We learn from this culture that some things must be hidden.  Our deep hurts, our grief, our traumas, our addictions, our illnesses all must be hidden away.  We are taught to 'hide' and  'move on'.  Our children are taught that tough situations must be hidden, that its better not to talk about major trauma.  This hiding and suppression is deadly to both children and adults alike.  Those of us that refuse to hide are often ostracized.  Hiding our trauma often leads to addiction, physical and mental health issues. The traumas that happen to one person often affect entire communities with a dark and dysfunctional weight, a legacy of shame and pain. 

We cannot afford to keep hiding.  Our children deserve so much more than the society that they are born into.  They deserve communities of support where they can express things that torment them without fear and surrounded by love. Without expression of our deep sadness and trauma, we can never experience real joy.  All of us deserve a place where we can be open about trauma, where it is not a 'dirty little secret' that we carry around while it silently kills us.  We can no longer run from those things that make us uncomfortable. Those who are suffering deserve so much more than silence and avoidance. We all deserve so much more.

We Must Demand Better

There is nothing worse than watching someone you love deteriorate with an illness for which there is seemingly no cure. With a loved one, I am currently watching a nightmare that has unfolded for many years.  No-one else realizes how many things this loved one has tried to get better or that everything tried has failed. Watching her suffer has filled me with a sense of hopelessness and an even greater skepticism about our medical system. 

It is 2014, and one would hope we had better medical and mental health treatment; something that could give hope to those who feel hopeless.  But, the reality is that for many 'disorders', there are no good answers.  For 'invisible illnesses like Lyme Disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, all major mental health conditions, and many others, the treatment is guess work, at best.  People with these illnesses often feel isolated, hopeless and stigmatized.  I don't see people organizing meals for them or their families when things are particularly bad.  People with these chronic conditions feel great shame at having conditions that no-one knows how to treat.  In fact, many of the so-called 'treatments' that are tried actually end up making them feel worse.  Their ability to do basic activities is obliterated and yet, many judge them for having diseases that aren't visible, that aren't as easy to define as things like cancer or heart disease. 

Although I, too, suffer from an invisible illness, it is far worse to watch someone I love go through this torture.  Watching my loved one suffer with no hope in sight beats me down to the point of extreme hopelessness.  It is incredible how many people I have met who feel the same way; who have loved one's with various conditions who are not getting 'better'.  These families do everything they can to help their loved one in a system that is broken, that rarely has any answers.  Many wrongly assume there is good 'treatment' out there for some of these conditions, and they judge the sufferer or their family members for not 'getting' enough 'help'.  Believe me, if you were in 'our' shoes, you would know that all we do is try because to stop trying would mean giving up hope.

Perhaps the most frustrating thing is that we loved ones and sufferers alike have no energy left to fight for better treatment.  Everywhere we turn we hit brick walls until we are are left so beaten down that we can barely move.  This is unacceptable.

As a nation, we should be better than this.  It is not o.k. when I hear a story about a young man who cannot get help because the 'treatment' is sub-par and he is turned away because he doesn't fit the mold of whatever 'program' there is to help him; who is just too difficult, and thus, forgotten and left to die.  It is not o.k. when I hear of a friend who died of stage 4 lung cancer; who had a diagnosed mental health condition and all of her physical symptoms were ignored for months because the doctors thought she was 'just crazy'.   It is not o.k. when a young person I know is treated with medications that are doing more harm than good, when there are no good alternatives and no answers and she is left without hope to potentially die.  It is not o.k. when countless people with various pain, immune, mental health and fatigue disorders are left behind by a system that is just too baffled to put resources into helping them.  So much promise, lost.  So much hope, gone.

For our love ones and for those suffering, there must be a change in our attitudes.  We need to stop offering 'helpful' tips when someone talks about their chronic pain, mental health issues, fatigue, etc.  Those suffering have heard and probably tried every 'helpful' tip you have to offer.  We must listen to and support families with chronic mental and physical health conditions.  Often, all that is needed is a listening non-judgmental ear.  Don't assume that if someone 'just got out more', or 'got a job', they could get better.  Many who suffer would love to be able to do work or socialize more, but they really can't.  Do not question their reality.   Most importantly, remember how much families and the sufferers are being tortured by these ongoing problems.  Offer practical support, offer emotional support and most importantly, drop your judgments if you do not understand.  

Finally, we must demand more options, more research for 'help' that really works.  We must crawl out of the holes that we have been forced into and fight for change.  Our system is not working for far too many people.  Something is horribly wrong.  We need help.  We need others, who may not suffer or even know someone who suffers from these disorders, to stand with us.  We need others to help us band together and come up with creative solutions.  Western medicine has been proven very effective for many conditions, but for some it is sadly lacking.  Doctors must open their minds to creative and holistic solutions and actually see that some of the 'treatments' they prescribe are often worse than the disorder they are treating.  Our whole model of 'treating' people needs to be turned on its head to understand and actually, help people with these conditions that are, at best, baffling. 

Currently, my loved one has barely any life at all.  Each day is excruciating torture due to physical and mental conditions. This person has tried treatment after treatment to no avail.  It breaks my heart when every day is the same nightmare for this person.  I cannot give up hope that he/she can truly live, love, laugh and dance again. I am astonished daily at the number of people in this country that are experiencing this same nightmare with us. We cannot let these lives that could be full of promise and joy fade without a fight.  We have to band together, families and sufferers and push forward.  We must demand better.

The Crazy One

In the past few weeks, I have felt myself reverting back to that uneasy label that lurks in the back of my mind, waiting to come out when I am not feeling strong or when I am feeling so completely and utterly different from the rest of the world.  The label 'the crazy one' is probably one that I gave myself in my teens when my emotions and despair were so extreme that I almost died.  Perhaps it was a label that came from being hospitalized at 16. There is nothing like the diagnostic and somewhat paternalistic environment of a mental hospital to reinforce that 'crazy' label.  I remember coming back to school after that hospitalization feeling like I carried a scarlet "C" for crazy.  For years after, I felt like family members tiptoed around me, that I was someone to be watched and shielded from the world. Internally, this label kept me from reaching out for help, from expressing who I was and sometimes left me walking around feeling like I had something to 'prove' in this world; to prove that I was strong and not 'crazy'.

Somehow in my late teens and 20's, I found myself  in a relationship with someone who deeply reinforced my feeling of difference, who made me feel like I was 'nothing', who made me question my own reality and everything around me. As most good abusers do, this person was skilled at making me feel like no-one else would love me, that I was internally flawed.  No matter what he did to hurt me, he could always it turn around and make it my 'fault'.  This person knew how to keep the focus on himself while at the same time making me feel like nothing, like my world was only him.  I remember the only times of 'joy' I had in those years in my 20's were when I could get away from him. When he was not around, my young daughter and I could be free for a bit and I actually could feel connected to her and to myself away from him.  My relationships with others, who helped me reflect my beauty back to me probably saved my life.  Without them, holding me up and pushing me forward, I may not have made it through this crazy time when my world was 'him' and 'I' was often completely lost. 

Recently, I was embroiled in some drama that involved close family members and extended family members who do not know me at all.  This drama involved my close family members defending each other against attacks by some 'not so nice' extended family members.  The interesting part of this 'drama' was that, in spite of the fact that I was just expressing my feelings, an extended family member wrote one of my close family members expressing concern about my emotional state!! Additionally, I was attacked by another extended family member(same family) for one of my blog posts that basically just expressed the facts of the situation while expressing how I felt about that same situation.  Somehow all of this gave me that 'uneasy' crazy feeling.  In the instance of the blog post, I felt that someone was completely shredding 'my character' and I questioned and re-read all of  my communications with this person, trying to find my 'craziness' to see if he was right.  In the case of the other family member who sent the 'concerned' e-mail, I reverted back to questioning my own sanity and wondering if I was indeed, 'just too sensitive'. 

I realized that that family drama triggered those old feelings in me; feelings that were prevalent throughout my teens and 20's.  Somehow when dealing with extended family members that had no empathy for my feelings and made me feel like nothing, I found myself 'back' in that relationship where I learned to feel like I was 'nothing'. Expressing my 'truth' and my 'anger' had once again turned me into the 'crazy one'; the one who was just too emotional.  Luckily, now I have enough awareness and self esteem that I know not to buy into another person's ideas of who I am.  However, it is sometimes difficult to escape from those body memories that come up unbidden when triggered by narcissistic people.  There is just something so mind-blowing and utterly confusing about people who have no empathy, never take responsibility for their actions, and always make the other person 'the bad guy' or the 'crazy one' when they are backed into a corner. 

It took me a long time after that long abusive relationship in my 20's to regain, or even find a self beyond him.  It also took me many years to recover from a hospitalization in my teens that made me feel like the 'crazy' one, that instead of giving me skills and self esteem, gave me shame. As I learn to speak out from my heart and be more of who I am, I realize that some of who I am may make some people uncomfortable.  But, for those who choose to attack me for those feelings or express faux concern about my 'mental state', there is absolutely nothing I can do but ignore them.  Some people are just not worth interacting with.  No matter how hard I try to wrap my head around a person's behavior(particularly a narcissist), it will always be impossible to understand.

It is somewhat easy to distance oneself from toxic people, but it is not nearly as easy to distance oneself from a society that is full of 'expectations' of 'normalcy'.  These expectations shame and exile those of us who may seem 'out of the norm', sometimes driving us underground to isolation and even death.  If we are lucky, we find others like us and realize that we are beautiful in all our craziness.  We are able to share and give back to the world.  If we are not lucky, we are often exiled(with varying diagnoses) into groups of others who are dysfunctional and lost, only to struggle through life unfulfilled and sad.  In order to change all this we need to learn to embrace our 'crazy' selves and be exceedingly gentle with them.  When we meet someone who may seem 'different' or maybe even a little bit 'crazy', we need to open our hearts and minds and listen.  For me, strength comes in finding others walking this path of growth and authenticity.  If we can learn to embrace our differences, band together and reach out, perhaps us 'crazy ones' will begin to change this sometimes baffling and cold world.  We can harness that we which sets us 'apart' and pierce through the crazy making world of  'normalcy' and create a better world.