Your childhood friends are still there. They laugh, and they can relate with you about memories that make you shake your head. You actually brag about how who was the most encapsulated individual. Yet years later, you see them prospering, having children, finding their wives that enrich them, making a plantation, and moving beyond the evil that had captivated them at the time during their youth.
They have moved on.. Why haven't you? Well they weren't alcoholics, although (some some danced with the devil alongside you) You were, and you are! What was a memory to them, is a lifestyle for you.
Some of my beloved friends of my youth are alcoholics, but they decided that they were tired of the pain. I sit here and contemplate whether they are stronger than me or if they just found the woman (or the mental clarity) that makes the world a better place without addiction.
Alcoholics search for a patch to bandage their pain. Some find religion, some find music, some find awareness, some find that they are lost, and some just don't find it.
Personally, I feel lost. Looking back in my life, the realization sets in that I am a middle aged man now (37) and most of my friends that I have known have looked themselves in the mirror and decided to take the wise path. They have came to a crossing point, and have chosen joy. What makes me different?
Weakness? No! I am not weak! I will run a marathon, I will do 500 situps in one "sitting" (did that), I will do anything in that realm! What I can't do is turn down alcohol (if I have been drinking in a setting). It makes me sad and the demons inside me know that. Every alcoholic has a weakness that they can't control. Each are different.
I yearn for what some have, yet couldn't imagine living without what I have. It's hard but it's a love/hate relationship. Loving alcohol is great! It is horrible at the same time. You can love alcohol, but you have to be ready to sign over your soul. You have to be ready to admit that feeling bad, hangovers, distorted feelings, loss of ambition, physical ailments that may come, and crying yourself to sleep is worth the humiliation that you put yourself through.
Who wants that? Millions..... Sad to say.....
3 comments:
You can quit. I'll prove it. If your daughter was kidnapped and the kidnappers told you that if you drank one drop of alcohol she would be killed you would quit immediately. If I told you I would give you one million dollars to not drink for 6 months, I have no doubt you would do it. So what it boils down to is choice and having a strong "Why". You have to make a decision.
I want to talk about 2 words that are essential for any alcoholic to quit. They are commitment and decide. Committment is doing what you said you would do long after the feeling you said it in has left you. The sad fact is that most Americans know nothing about committment. Just look at the 50% divorce rate we have, or the gym membership holders that don't go to the gym. Without committment there can be no recovery. Now let's look at the word "decide". Similar to the word homicide and suicide as they all share "ide". Suicide is the death of oneself, homicide is the death of someone else and decide is the death to all other options. When you make a committment and decide to follow through with it nothing can stop you but you. The only difference between a successful marriage, a new year resolution kept, or a successful business and an unsuccessful one is who decided and committed and who didn't. The great thing about life is that time will either promote us or expose us. As a recovered alcoholic I have been on both sides of the fence.
I appreciate your blog in my own attempt to try to 'understand' alcoholism as a disease and how the mind of an alcoholic operates however, being on the receiving end of an impulsive and, manipulative alcoholic I can't help but feel utterly frustrated reading your posts, particularly this one!! What I get is that you just love the feeling of being drunk; just as a druggie loves the feeling of their high. It's so sad. So, so sad. It's particularly painful to watch and I hope you realize just how painful it is to the ones that love you, especially when alcoholics often have moments of 'sober greatness'. I think I may have to resign myself to the fact that it is not worth my energy to even try to understand and to move on and find happiness. I have endured so much pain trying to live alongside a self-destructive alcoholic. Enough is enough.
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