And yet, here I am, aged. Kids will be kids, ever in the present, but the older you get, the closer you come to understanding the fickle pickle of Time. How it crawls at an uninspiring job, how it races at a roller rink. Pick your own, those are mine. How many times did I stand at the edge of the skating rink and beg for just one more lap pllleeeeaaaaase mom please, two more, three more. And how infinite time must have felt for her as she sat there and watched me zoom around again and again, music bopping, lights dancing, the acrid reek of concessions hot dogs in the air. Interminable!
So you will have to take my word for it when I say that the last five years have been the longest and shortest of my life. I have experienced highs no drug could mimic, and I've weathered lows beyond my imagination. Losing my job of over fifteen years was a part of it, and in any other timeline would have been the headline, but it was a minor blip in comparison to the real challenge. I am grateful that the timing worked out the way that it did -- being "made redundant" (chip chip cheerio, that's how the Brits do) earlier might've been too much for me to handle...and staying there longer would have been, well, interminable.
Five years and a little over two weeks ago, I was working from home (as I often did), laboring over an email meant to deal with author mismanagement that had led, inevitably, to author meltdown. I was stuck, unable to find the right words for the circumstances, and something terrible was creeping up from inside. I had experienced many panic attacks in my life at this point, so was keenly familiar with the symptoms. At first I believed that this godforsaken email was sending me down the same path. Heart palpitations, labored breathing, feelings of impending doom, all check. But the tunneling was severe, my hands were icy, and something at my core just felt...wrong. I felt poisoned. I felt short-circuited. The systems were going haywire.
I called a car service and signed off from work. From the chair, to the door, grabbed my purse, grabbed the keys, locked the door, on down the hall, into the elevator and down down down, I floated. Just floated. I was here and not here. It wasn't exactly the same as feeling faint, but in the realm. I'd never experienced anything like it. The drive was swimmy and hypersaturated. Everything--the trees, the cars, the people--seemed threatening and close. The urgent care center was mercifully empty. I sat and waited and thought about what I was going to say. I had a feeling I knew what was wrong, but wasn't sure if I could say the words out loud.
Ten months before, I'd suggested there might be a problem to my fleeing doctor. He'd already addressed the one thing I'd come in for, so he was irritated that I was bothering him to ask another, unrelated question. He said, I don't know, I don't know, I think there's information on the back of your insurance card. Then he was gone and I was sobbing alone in the little antiseptic room.
But before that, and certainly after, well steeped deep in a drunken hole, standing half in my kitchen, smoking, I'd certainly whispered the truth to myself. I would lean into the doorframe, lips close to the paint, and whisper it, a tiny secret: I'm an alcoholic. It would hang in the air for one hot moment, almost real, then I'd shake it off, stub the cigarette, and find my way back to the living room to continue drinking. Easy to ignore the nagging voices when you drown them in wine. Which I did, every night, for years.
The first time I tried to ask for help--the busy doctor--I stammered the question about whether or not rehab was covered by insurance, tears in my eyes, and broke down as he left with his unhelpful advice. The second time I told anyone the truth about my drinking was that day at the urgent care center, the poor medical assistant, who had to wait out my braying sobs to get to the core of what I was saying. My blood pressure was way too high--188/98--and policy required that they call up an ambulance to take me to hospital. By the time I talked to the EMTs, the fourth and fifth people to hear the truth about my drinking on that day, I was no longer sobbing, just crying. One of the EMTs asked me how much I drank. When I told him, he made a face and said, "That's not so bad. My mom drinks about the same." Which led to an uncomfortable end to our vaguely friendly acquaintance. When I waved goodbye to them at the hospital, I still felt scared...and he looked troubled. How much is too much? Who decides?
That early evening I got an EKG and a chest x-ray. I talked to one doctor, several nurses and technicians, and it was determined that I wasn't having a heart attack. I asked if they had any idea what might be causing the symptoms. They said that in this case they could only tell me what wasn't wrong with me. Apparently nothing in the blood tests alarmed them much, either, though later tests would confirm both kidney and liver damage. I was set free. I clung to that non-diagnosis like a life raft. If the doctors that checked me out didn't see anything wrong, then I must be fine. If the EMT's mom drank just as much as me and he didn't think it was a problem, I couldn't possibly have a problem. I went back home and went back to my old ways. I promised myself I would skip nights, drink less, try to wean myself back--not off, oh no--but back to the "socially acceptable" level of drinking. For funsies, NYC party party, after work drinks with the girls kind of thing. I wasn't broken, just a little out of whack, maybe.
For years, the NYC social life I'd know had fallen away. I rarely met friends for drinks anymore, rarely went to happy hours. When I did, I would drink club soda with lime, bide my time, then flee within an hour, annoyed that I had to surrender my real drinking time to keep up appearances. I'd tried imbibing at happy hour in the beginning of my descent, downing a couple of beers over a couple of hours, then making the hour long subway ride home to pick up drinking in earnest for the rest of the night, but found that the buzz would die and I would just end up tired and angry. A wasted high. So, seldom attendance and soda and lime, please. My objectives were hardwired and clear. I would leave work before six, make my way home, and drink until I had to go bed, usually midnight, sometimes one. On the days I worked from home, I would only commence drinking after I'd signed off from work for the night, relying on my ability to refrain from drinking during work hours as a clear sign that I was not an alcoholic. I would drink all night, sometimes beer, sometimes liquor, but more than anything red wine, usually cabernet sauvignon. I was a steady customer to a local, family owned liquor store who delivered without judgment, even when I answered the door looking like the actual crypt keeper.
The last year I imbibed in alcohol, they sent over a $100 case of wine as a thank you for my business. I was overwhelmed by their kindness and profusely thanked the person who delivered it. Then I stood there alone in my foyer just looking at it, realizing I could tell no one of my good fortune. No one could ever know. There would be far too much explaining to do.
On a Sunday night about two weeks after my ambulance ride and brief stay at the emergency room, I was attempting to have a "dry" night when the same symptoms started rolling in. I knew immediately that it was the same thing as before, the Phantom Ailment. I called the car service and told them to take me directly to Lutheran hospital. Within five minutes of checking in, they had me hooked up to the EKG yet again, the quiet bustle of 9pm Sunday at the ER filtering around me. I stared up at the ceiling, tears flowing, alone in a row of beds. It never occurred to me to call anyone.
Again, I cried every time I talked to a doctor, walked through my symptoms, spoke the truth about the amount of alcohol that went into my system every night. This time around, Lutheran decided to give me the full ramalamadingdong: echocardiogram, stress test, the whole nine. All told I was there for just over 24 very long hours, mostly waiting to be rolled to the next test. I spoke to several doctors over the course of the night and day, each one coached in kindness that was evident but appreciated all the same. Each time I talked about it, my tears were less severe, I was more forthcoming, and the picture was getting all the more clear.
The last doctor was a psychiatrist, a beautiful African-American woman with perfectly coiffed hair and flawless makeup. She was gentle and kind. We talked for a while. Finally she put her hand on my arm and said the words I was waiting to hear, "I think it's time. I think you know it's time. Are you ready to do this?" My eyes filled with tears and I nodded, lips in an ugly twist as I fought sobbing yet again. I finally managed to sputter out a yes. She gave me a slip of paper with name and number on it and told me she'd called ahead and that they would expect to hear from me the next day.
After I was discharged, a ghoulish, resentful part of me took the reins. I got home and poured a big glass of wine. I drank as much as I could that night. By definition, I got drunk, but it was a shitty drunk, an exhausted, thick, stupid drunk where it felt like there was a fist grinding into the back of my neck and my skin felt tight and brittle. The next day, September 9, I showed up to my rehab intake hungover, chaste, and terrified. As I answered her questions, all I could think was how foolish this was, how it would never work, how I would fail, and what a loser I was for being there in the first place. The self hatred was flowing freely and flooded out every rational thought in my brain. I knew only one thing for certain: There was no way I could do this.
September 10, 2014 was my first true day of sobriety. I haven't had a drink--or a smoke--since. Some days I can't imagine how I got here, but more often I can recall all too well what it was like to get through it, how fucking hard I fought, and I've got to take a breath and just bask in it. There's no victory dance, no one's going to run a flag up a pole, we're never going to close down the set, pack it up, and call it a day. I will have to remain vigilant for the rest of my life, but by degrees far less challenging than before, back in September of 2014, October, November, and on. I mean, it took months just to acclimate to the night. I would sit in quiet terror, unable to focus, unable to function, my appetite shot, sometimes just shaking. I told my rehab counselor that it didn't seem like withdrawal so what the hell could it be? Because it's nighttime, sweetie, she said. You drank all night every night, you don't know how to be. You lost your best friend and you associate that comfort with nighttime. I spent those first nights thrumming and humming, waiting for the world to end, the comfort of alcohol and cigarettes never far from my mind. These days, I can go for weeks without thinking of either at all. They just don't have the same terrible influence and charm.
I was the only "voluntary" at out-patient rehab. Everyone else was court ordered and functioning at different levels of resignation or Big Mad. Many did not think they needed to be there, some were definitely correct. While it was a dysfunctional arrangement (they told me at the end of my stay that my involvement taught them that they needed to separate the involuntaries from the voluntaries) I learned a great deal and gained vital skills to combat the lingering challenges of alcohol addiction. While the rest of the participants were annoyed (or dismissive and unimpressed), I delighted in learning that criminal thinking and addict thinking were very similar. Some of my biggest takeaways:
Your Addicted Brain Is Not Your Friend. It is forever trying to get the candy. It wants the candy. It needs the candy. It will lie, cheat, steal, and hurt anyone who gets in the way of that, including you. Now, this makes sense on a physiological level, considering what alcohol dependence does to your brain and, frankly your whole system. Remember the Phantom Ailment? Once I started getting myself back, I also came to the conclusion that I was a whole person, worthy of being treated as such, and dumped that shit doctor, Mr. Running for the Door, triple booking his patients, wait for 2 hours to see me Mr. Bullshit doctor. My new doctor, also Lutheran affiliated, went over my charts and confirmed what I suspected but was never confirmed until that moment: Alcoholic withdrawal. Because my body had decided that drinking for only six hours a day was no longer acceptable. It wanted more. So it really was a breaking point for me: Either get sober or start dying in earnest.
The physiological side of alcohol dependence is serious (in withdrawal, you can actually die--seizures, etc., it's messed up) but the psychological part is insidious and scary as hell. One of the things they drilled into our heads is to stop focusing on the failure. It's a common fear. What if I relapse? Then I've failed and I'm an even worse piece of shit than before. Woe is me. Might as well drink until I can't feel and maybe stop breathing. This! Right! Here! Is your BRAIN trying to GET THE CANDY. It works the same for smoking, too. I've smoked a cigarette, I've failed, fallen all the way off the wagon, oh look the wagon is already too far from here where I sit in this pity puddle, might as well have another. And so on. You can apply it to any vice, really. Didn't go to the gym, missed a day, already I'm a loser, might as well stay in bed today, too. And tomorrow.
They taught us to take the power away from the act of relapsing by saying it loud: I will relapse. I WILL RELAPSE. So what. It doesn't make me less of a person if I do. And it's not an excuse to wallow in it, which is what BRAIN is trying to get the addict to do. This probably sounds scary to loved ones standing on the outside looking in, but it shouldn't. This is the addict controlling the problem instead of the problem controlling addict. We're taking away its magic. It's still there--always will be--but it's not capering in the darkness, beckoning us to give it up, you know you can't last, you're a weak nothing who would feel so much better if you just had a drink.
Addiction Is More Than Substance Abuse. It changes you. You become a darker version of you, a sicker, sadder, paler version. That's my story. For others, they break laws, hurt people, they brawl, they destroy. Most of my destruction was inward. One of the major signs that a person may be abusing is LYING. To yourself and to others. No one in my life had any idea what was going on and that was by very careful design. I lived far out in Bay Ridge and never invited anyone over. I certainly never admitted to the level of my drinking and laughed along with everyone else at the hee haw drinkity drunkity jokes in movies and television. I dated no one during my abuse for fear that they would discover or impede my secret (nothing was more important), and for the darker fear that I would find someone like me and we would drink ourselves into the mire. Except for work and yearly jaunts home (where I white knuckled it for a week then fled back to NYC and my wine), I was isolated. My face started changing, too. It seemed to spread, dull. My skin was thin and flawed. The pigment on my lower legs got spotty and dark from liver malfunction. I gained an enormous amount of weight.
People knew something was wrong. They just didn't know what was wrong. I lied when I needed to lie. I deflected when I needed to deflect. My life grew gray and opaque. My ability to feel anything was stunted and still. I won't go into detail, but when I think back to the worst of it, my heart breaks for that person. It was me and it wasn't me. The suffering was immense, immeasurable, deep. While it was apparently frowned upon to get too personal, one of the counselors told us a story about his own journey on one of my first days in the program. He'd been using a cornucopia of narcotics, running the streets, thieving and using and getting up to no good. He had potential, had teachers who told him he'd had potential, but had squandered every opportunity to run with his boys and get high. It had gotten bad, he wasn't running the drugs so much as the drugs were running him, and he'd finally gotten caught red handed. He told us that once the handcuffs clicked, all he felt was a rush of relief. Thank God, this is over. I can rest.
Like, what?! Right? But I sat there gobsmacked because I felt that so hard I could barely breathe. It changes you. You get pushed so far adrift from what you were, and it's so insidious how it happens, how more and more equal less and less and suddenly you're not having fun so much as medicating to keep from flying to pieces. I would watch shows like Lock Up and think maybe it wouldn't be so bad...I could eat that meat/bread/vegetable cake they serve in solitary. Sure! Yes! Because there would be a lock on the door and I would have no other choice than to sit there, sleep there, keep me away from my vice there, and rest. Just. Fucking. Rest. Because abusing breaks you down at every level: physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually. I believed I would've happily eaten the Solitary Cake if someone would just save me from myself.
It's Not a Competition. This is a sad one. Because some of my fellow participants couldn't get past that, either to win the prize (Biggest Boozer?) or prove that they shouldn't have to be there in the first place. Everyone's "bottom" is different. And some people have to hit different depths multiple times until they either get help or die. The human animal is far too complex to ascribe one set of rules to apply to every single individual. It's not a "you must be this tall to ride this ride" kind of ride. This loops back to the Addicted Brain Who Hates You lesson -- because an addict's brain can and will convince the addict that she is totally fine if her behavior mirrors someone else's, even if it's just measured in liters and everyone can ignore that Bob seems fine, has a clean house, good job, etc. etc., while the addict is licking dust off the floor under the bed and contemplating ending it all. But we drink basically the same! Kind of! Believe me, when that EMT seemed to pshaw my alcohol intake, I suckered onto that like a beached fish to a splash of water. Gimme gimme gimme -- I will take anything. Just tell me I'm not broken.
But I was. And I don't need anyone else's validation to know that. I was there. Despite my flaws, and the millions upon millions of brain cells I cabernet sauvignoned into oblivion, I'm pretty smart. I had a serious problem and needed help.
Last but Best: Clarity Is REAL. You've heard people say it. They go to ashrams or church or 7-11 and stare at the fluorescents and Get Clarity. You've certainly heard people in recovery say it. Just like you've heard "one day at a time." Ugh, right? But Lord Almighty is it different when it happens to you. One day at a time sounds tedious, stupid, and simpleminded, but it's a fact, Jack. Primarily because I became so very cognizant of the passage of time. Those first months were slow, slow slogs of merciless sobriety, steely splinters of sun, counting every breath, awake all night, shaky all day sobriety, man. It sucked so hard. But I would get through it, tick it off the calendar, one more day. Those days, one day at a time, were earned.
As time progressed, that cloudy gray life started to gain color. I once told my therapist it was like I'd been living my life looking through a dirty window, everything skewed and apart from me, muffled and remote. Imagine what it was like when the color started seeping back, the window warped and thinned, then blew away like some wisp of cellophane. I never want anyone to know that darkness, but clarity? Full-color Clarity? I wish it on everyone. And yes, it can hurt, like when I realized that while I tried my best to keep my alcohol abuse away from my family, it still snarled out of me in not so subtle ways. The last few times I went home to visit during my abuse phase were prefaced with increasingly hostile emails to "just let me relax" and "don't grill me about how I look or what's going on with me," and a blanket excuse that work was so stressful and I didn't want to be hassled, etc. because it would only make it worse. These emails were semi-hysterical and clearly desperate. And basically screaming that something was very wrong with me and I was being manipulative as hell to frighten away any nosy nancy business. I actually remember the moment I got clarity on that one. It was in rehab and our counselor was talking about manipulative behaviors that addicts and criminals similarly employ to get what they want. I sunk into my chair, deeply embarrassed, never realizing until just that moment how terribly I'd behaved. At the time I wrote those emails, even during the "sober" hours, they seemed maybe a little curt, but that was all. What a difference clarity makes.
And of course clarity hurts when you get to the core of the Why. It's different for everyone. There's no need for me to get into it, but I will say that while it was painful (and humiliating, and infuriating), it was ultimately liberating. More importantly, these revelations laid the foundation for the self worth I have now. I'll never say I'm "grateful" for the reasons (fuck them and the bowlegged horses they rode in on) but I'm grateful I came out of it alive...and changed for the better.
Clarity. I was deep under, depressed, opaque, and fading. I was miserable. Then sobriety, the fledgling, dappled light of clarity. And one day I broke a candlestick and felt something I'd never felt before: Unbridled Joy. Even now, almost five years later, the memory of that day gives me goosebumps. I'd only just found my iPod Shuffle (it is tiny and I lost track of it constantly) and had hooked it up to some speakers to see if they were working and worth keeping. They were garbage speakers, tinny computer speakers with barely a hint of base, but I hadn't listened to them in years and figured I should test them before chucking them. While navigating the twisted cables and pushing the click wheel on the Shuffle, I somehow managed to knock an old, glass candlestick to the floor. Months before I would have flown into a fit of rage, but I just went and grabbed the Swiffer and started to sweep. Then Mary J. Blige's "Family Affair" started playing and something happened. I felt music. I felt Music. With all my feelings. Not stunted, dulled, depressed non-feelings, but real, live, genuine, CLEAR feelings. I danced, I Swiffered, I sobbed, and I cackled like a freakin LOON, round and round. The neighbors probably thought I'd finally blown my circuits but I couldn't stop. It was Glorious. I was overwhelmed. And for the first time in that shaky start of it all, I felt full up. Joy joy JOY. Rediscovering music was transformative.
I had a lot of little moments and big moments in those first six months or so, and from time to time something will still get to me and I'll have to stop and smell all that Clarity. It's transcendent, you can't force it, and it rolls in when it wants, but hot damn does it ever make it worth it. The last big moment was sitting by the lake looking out over the Tetons just shaken to the core that I was there, really there, and I had gotten there all on my own, clear headed, sober, and a functioning adult once more. And of course I cried. There was a time I believed with all of my heart that there was no getting out of that hole. I would just drink until something changed, lost my job, out on the streets, God knows what...or they'd find my body and it would just be...over. Big deal.
That was five years ago. FIVE! At once so long ago and yet just yesterday, depending on the day, the memory, and the varied and unpredictable levels of clarity. I am deeply proud of these five years and I am grateful for the support I've received from my family and friends in the aftermath of all my revelations. Those first confessions were difficult, even terrifying, but I received nothing but love and kindness, which was exactly what I needed. In those first days, those first confessions to medical professionals trying to help me, I never would have believed how far I have come, how much happier I am, and how easy it is to talk about my past alcohol abuse. One fucking day at a time, man.
I am also deeply grateful for the NYU Lutheran Medical Center (now renamed NYU Langone Hospital) for their kind, patient, and thorough care (and after care). The Resource Counseling Center was vital for those first months of sobriety. They taught me how to manage my trickster brain and supported me through every whiplashing stage of early recovery. My therapist, who will remain anonymous here, took up the reins after rehab was completed, and set to work on many of the deeper issues that required excavation, study, analysis, and care. I'd drop her name here if I could, but it wouldn't be prudent. All I can say is that I hope every person seeking therapy gets someone as amazing as her. I don't regret leaving New York, but it was damn hard to leave her expertise, guidance, and excellent treatment behind.
This should never be necessary--Universal Healthcare NOW NOW NOW--but I am incredibly grateful to my company at that time, whose coverage of drug and rehabilitation treatment totaled 100 percent. Read it again. One Hundred Percent. I remember standing at reception at the Resource Counseling Center, having just turned in my first pee cup (yee haw), sick to my stomach with worry over the bill. How would I pay for this? How bad was this going to be? I was drowning in debt and barely able to pay my bills every month. I was crossing my fingers that the money I saved on wine and cigarettes would cover the expense. When the receptionist told me that it was covered, I genuinely did not understand her. I asked her to please clarify. She looked at me patiently and stated that my insurance covered the cost in its entirety. I would not need to make any payments, ever. I said okay, thanked her, and headed for the elevator, eyes filling with tears. God knows there were so many tears and a lot of anguish and fear, but those happy tears? When you just weep for joy? Incredible. Because here's the thing that's been getting better but still has a very long way to go: Stigma. The amount of shame so many of us feel is impossible to explain. There are plenty of understandable reasons why addicts are judged and shamed. I get it. I was a child growing up around alcoholics. Addicts hurt people, often in ways that leave permanent scars, inside and out. Many, many scars. At the very best, it is a big joke, the capering grotesque, smeared lipstick, Meredith Palmer, Arthur, Ozzy Osbourne snorting ants kind of joke. But at the very worst? We are stupid, destructive, Evil. Lock em up, throw away the key. And the sodden drunk, bruised and reeling, will agree that everyone would be better off without him. It is, after all, a goddamned depressant. Some will never recover. They will abuse and hurt and steal and wallow until they finally succumb. Everyone knows someone, many of us know generations of someones, one right after the other, sucked down into the abyss. But there are people like me, too. Not entirely a demon, worthy of some absolution, and one chance (if not many) to crawl out of the depths and back into the light. With help, of course.
I cannot express to you how I felt sitting across from Connie in HR (last name redacted, but some of you will know) and telling her what it meant to me to learn that our company covered drug and alcohol rehabilitation entirely. It was a moment in time, so I can't speak for later, when we branched off to another mothership and then changed altogether from a merger, but at the exact moment I needed that support, it was there. No words can honor it.
Before I sign off, one last thing: If you think you are in trouble, seek help. There are resources, and it doesn't cost anything to do some research. Start online--there are plenty of websites, articles, and even quizzes to assess if you are in need of help. Don't be scared. I know that even this step can seem too difficult to bear. There are various symptoms of alcoholism and alcohol abuse (not exactly the same, but both can and will receive treatment)--you don't have to have all of them to qualify. For example, in my case, I
- craved alcohol,
- drank alone and in secret,
- lied about my drinking,
- felt ashamed of my drinking,
- put my drinking above everything else,
- had to drink more to achieve an "acceptable" high, and
- drank to deal with stress and drown out issues I didn't want to face.
Some believe that you have to drink every waking hour to truly have a "problem" but that is just not the case. Remember, not a competition.
Leave your shame behind and face your challenges head on. Be honest with yourself. Don't live in fear of failure or relapsing. You are worth saving.
