THIS THING CALLED SOBRIETY

THIS THING CALLED SOBRIETY

 

There was a palpable melancholy in the room when we noticed the empty chair, day after day, a void that seemed all the more regrettable since our company knew the risk. And the vacancy was all the more obvious yesterday that it spurred an hour's discussion on the evils of drug and alcohol addiction and how their siren  song is so tempting that we have to be on guard against it rearing its ugly head in our most unguarded moments.

It was Ralph who was absent and we should have known how likely this was to happen. He told us how frightened he was of this occurring. So agitated was he that he postponed needed hip surgery for years. And this forced inactivity caused him to gain so much weight over the years thus worsening the degradation of the hip.

Finally he consented to the hip replacement because the pain was so great that he had been reduced to a supervisory role, one which he loathed since he prided himself as builder of the first order.

So after the surgery proved a success and his rehabilitation proceeded without any major stumbling blocks, it seemed as if his prolonged consternation and reluctance was a phantom anxiety, more a matter of a mental fear than a reality.  But we were wrong and some saw the turn of the screw when they thought they noticed him slurring his speech when he finally returned to the rooms.  But Ralph denied the accusation maintaining that his sobriety had remained intact.

But yesterday after an absence of a week, the discussion in our "Living Sober" meeting turned to that empty chair and to Ralph's  sad absence. And, coincidentally, Manny's vacant seat too, a man who continued to struggle with his sobriety despite all the daily support that got from the men in the room.

Sentiments of worry about whether Ralph would find his way back to the meetings, whether we were at fault because we did not take his anxiety as seriously as it apparently was. And I, particularly, felt as if I had let Ralph down when I visited him shortly after his transfer to the rehab facility where he was learning how to walk again.

As Ralph and I talked, it was clear that he was frightened about his ability to get off the opiates that he was prescribed and as a result he held back on the pain medication so that his rehabilitation was more painful than it needed to be. And my advice to him was that he should take as much pain medication as prescribed so that his pain would not intrude upon his rapid recovery.

I mentioned that one of the problems with opiate addicts was their sense of heightened pain and that they were less sensitive to opiate analgesics than the normal population thus requiring greater doses than the typical patient. That if he under dosed himself he would get none of the benefits of the medication and all of the dependency problems both psychologic and physical. For if he did not take away the pain, all he would get were the stimulative effects of the drug without getting analgesic benefit. He would remember nothing but the fact that he would need more and more of the drug in order to gain the benefit. Psychologically this would be a set up for readdiction. But if he took the medication as indicated, much of the psychological component would be quashed and he could more consciously resist the drug's addictive properties when the time came for him to wean himself off of the medication.

As I explained this to him, he appeared to be relieved. Relieved of the necessity for vigilance, and finally getting permission to take the medication that he needed.  Whether he followed my suggestions is difficult to say given the outcome.

So I blamed myself, and I said so to the group.  But Max pointed out that as addicts and alcoholics, we must take responsibility for our own recovery. None of us can assume the role of mentor without a certain sense of powerlessness. That is, we are as powerless over the addict in getting him to stay sober as anyone of our families were for us in our own recoveries.  We had to take our recovery seriously.

The fact that this is a disease is no excuse for not putting in the mental energy to actually fight it.  The disease may drain us of willpower and the fact that AA says that willpower alone will not avail us any capacity to recover, is no reason not to try. We cannot stand aside and just say that this is a disease and therefore we play no part in our own recovery. That is patently false, for the treatment of this chronic disease as well as all chronic diseases.

We have to play our part, otherwise we would feel justified in blaming our lack of control over our diabetes on the treating physician.  And if we do not curb our appetite for fats and sugars we equally are undermining our treatment of our heart disease and hypertension.

Where does this lead the recently relapsed? Well, there are many options, but despair seems to lead some to the most radical choices. They go out never to return to the rooms and ultimately expire from the disease or, in the depths of their depression, choose to end their lives.

But how do we reconcile this, that a man who has lead a blessed existence after becoming sober can find himself only with two solutions, when neither to live or die seems like a reasonable choice. That choice being that if he lives he ultimately dies an addict or alcoholic, or taking the unreasonable choice of taking his own life.

After all, we are looking at someone who might find a permanent solution to a temporary problem. If he will only find that "other solution" to return to the rooms where he is missed so much.

So this morning Ralph returned with his head down, abashed at his behavior but with the possibility of personal salvation.  However, he was greeted with backslaps and handshakes and even a hug or two.  We delighted in seeing him. So many of us had worried that we would not see this day.

During the past four years, he used to credit his recovery to the look of love and appreciation on his children's faces. And while he was detoxing this time they visited him and in that moment he gained the strength to return to the rooms and start all over again.

He knew we all loved him and wanted for him to succeed. He saw how his children still needed him. And when he came back he said that he was sorry that his behavior  had so disappointed the men in the room.

But he had to acknowledge that it was the love he found in the rooms that finally gave him the courage to return and make another go at this thing called sobriety.

 

© res 3/14/2013