Hi again. Well, I started writing. What a relief! I’ll say more about that in a sec, but to make it slightly relevant to this blog, let me tell you what I just learned about “choice.” Last post there was a great dialogue about the “choice” model of addiction. I ended my post arguing that the choices addicts make are highly irrational, based on biases and attractions already inscribed in the brain. Thus….we need to think about making choices in a new way, a way that has nothing to do with logic.
So writing is an intentional act, right? Sitting down to write something, whether a book or an email, is a choice people make. It’s clearly not a disease, it doesn’t happen unconsciously, and it involves deliberation, planning, and so forth.
In that way, writing is something like the decision to take a drug or a drink. And it’s also something like the decision to quit — choosing not to take a drug or drink. (though it’s always harder to choose not to do something than to do something — because the goal is not right there in front of you)
My choice to sit down and write involved a great deal of anxiety, self-scolding, reflection, and many many attempts before I actually pulled it off. Sound familiar?
I had to sneak up on myself. And that’s very often the way addicts manage to quit. I had to 
wait until I wasn’t concentrating. It was too difficult to sit down and force myself to write, to stare myself in the face. Rather, I was en route to doing something else, making dinner or something, when I stopped at my computer and wrote a few sentences on the fly. Very little deliberation, actually, in the moment of doing it.
But that was enough. An hour later I stopped by my computer and started to revise the….ONE PARAGRAPH. There’s already one paragraph on the screen! I wrote that. And it’s not too bad. Paragraph 2 flowed from paragraph 1, as you’d hope, and since then it’s been easier and easier.
So here was a deliberate and important (to me) choice that changed the direction of my life, the way I spend my time. And I had to be clever, resourceful, sneaky (toward myself), not staring myself in the face — in order to make it. The parallels with quitting are obvious. And the choice to take drugs is not unlike the choice to quit, in that it can happen on the fly, without really focusing on what you’re doing.
The coolest thing I noticed is how the activity of writing grew on itself. Once I had one paragraph on the screen, I felt that I could do it. I felt that I was finally moving. Then the second paragraph was so much easier. And thirty years ago, my second week of recovery was a lot easier than my first.
By the way, this is all about the emergence of self-trust, a topic we discussed in some detail several posts ago.
To say that addiction is a choice is to say very little. The same goes for recovery. Choices come in many shapes and sizes. The crucial thing to remember about making choices is that they usually involve a mixture of deliberate 
intention, situational factors, unconscious processes (like biases), emotional readiness, and momentum — that sense of moving forward. Some choices, including the choice to quit drugs, depend a lot on momentum. Which is why it’s so hard to get started, and why it’s so useful to sneak up on yourself, don’t think too much, just do it, then let nature take its course (with a little help).
Informed by unparalleled neuroscientific insight and written with his usual flare, Marc Lewis’s The Biology of Desire effectively refutes the medical view of addiction as a brain disease. A bracing and informative corrective to the muddle that now characterizes public and professional discourse on this topic.” —Gabor Maté, M.D., author of In The Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction
Hey Marc
We practically apply this in our programs by asking people to commit to short periods of time when starting or re-initiating non-using activities. Whatever they feel is manageable. For example, journaling is an activity we encourage. How long? 5minutes a day. Or 1. That soon grows because the inertia to get going with 5 minutes in mind is a lot easier than the inertia required to say, write for an hour, or record the day’s activities. And once that inertia is overcome, momentum builds rapidly. In a similar way, join group for 15minutes…. and soon they have spent the whole day here!
As you say, we need to often creep up on recovery. The small goals reached create the momentum to reach the big goals. That’s why I like the approach of gradualism in recovery.
Also, and perhaps this is a topic on it’s own, but we have touched on it in the discussions around ego depletion, recovery is about what you do, not about what you don’t do.
That’s great to hear, Shaun. I can see how effective that approach can be…well, clearly — since you combine the writing with the quitting: both sides of the analogy I am using.
I think the same “gradualism” can apply when people relapse. Instead of making a huge deal about it (which I think is pretty standard in 12-step programs), try to just keep going. Like standing up and casting off after a fall when you’re skating or skiing. Intense self-examination very often gives rise to self-criticism and self-contempt, which tend to make you too paralyzed to move at all.
Exactly…. When someone relapses the question is: “are you still in recovery? If yes, then move on.”
My own recovery had many minor slips in the early days, but I have a date that I see and saw as the start of my recovery. So for me the question is never “how long you been clean”, but rather how long you been in recovery. Although, I must say, I no longer define myself as being in recovery! The 12-steppers would freak at what I have said here, but so be it!
When you get on a train from A to Z, you may get off at M, but if you get back on the train you are still moving closer to your goal.
Another great analogy!
Bingo.
I disagree though with one bit – I view addictive behaviour as various manifestations of some underlying mental health issue.
Perhaps this is why I still view myself in recovery though, as I know that if I do not keep watch on myself, something else may creep up. Something that prevents me from achieving what I want in life. Even if it is only eating pasta and no vegetables.
The side of me that cared so little about myself, that drove me down to where I was 19 months ago, will always be there ready to grow if i do not look out.
Which is also why I liked what you said about encouraging writing diaries. When I slip up, fail to make meetings, do not follow through with projects etc – when I look back through my journal I always see indications that I am not paying enough attention,even if all I read is that I have not found the launderette.
That bit of me will hopefully become less dangerous over time – but as said on this thread many times – you just keep going on and on, and gradually those behaviours become less obvious a choice, and then even an instinct.
I agree that addictive behaviour can be due to the self-medication of an underlying mental health disorder, but not always. And I certainly viewed myself as in recovery for many years, with exactly the same fears that you have given voice to.
It is only recently that I feel I have kind of reached a place of transcendence. Personally I no longer feel that the “recovery” identity holds much value for me. That too was a gradual process – kind of organic rather than contemplated, a natural result rather than a desired goal.
But, I do indeed try to keep a mindful eye on where I am at. Just like we all should, substance use history or not!
Shaun, great comments that I can actually relate to! I attended a 12 step program for many years and learnt a lot about how to cope with life and all its ups and downs, but I now consider myself to be recovered from my addiction. I still use the program (although i no longer attend meetings) to help me cope with feelings I would have once used drugs over, simply because, for me, that works. At the end of the day once I learnt I had choices, I made them. Including those I made in the “early days” when I relapsed. I believe now, that, because I was taught by other recovering addicts, that I had options/choices and they had proof those choices led to a better way of living, I was able to trust in them and myself and make the necessary changes. It gave me the momentum I needed to keep going and today the program I live by continues to give me that same momentum, which in turn, allows me the gift of choice.
Great posts. Thank you.
Jo.
I love this post.
I tried, or thought I was going to try, so many times to stop using. I bailed out of four rehabs that I packed whole suitcases for. The fifth I went to with only two changes of clothes. I spent 9 months in full time treatment that time, and I am now nudging towards 19 months clean.
When I think of that small rucksack I took, it is pretty clear that I never decided to get to where I am now, when I got on the train. My recovery I have begun to see is a daily process. Something inside me is growing slowly.
The link to writing is very powerful. I have written and written every day over the past 19 months. Every time I sit down to write it becomes easier, and I love it. Part of the enjoyment of writing is the fact that when I look back over the past gazillion words I have written I am proud, and I find confidence.
I also see a narrative in what I write that makes gradually makes sense of my life, that allows me to take pride in the mirror.
I had some very difficult medical news to deal with recently. Thinking about it, the fact I had no cravings at all is astonishing. I did however write and write and write to work through it.
I used addictive behaviour to run away from life, and I use writing to find life. I use it to work out what is going through my head, and who I am at each moment.
Anais Nin – who I have been writing about – said this “It is in the movements of emotional crisis that human beings reveal themselves most accurately.”
When I first read that, I was annoyed. I thought she was talking about behaviours that I displayed in active addiction. As I slow down and read it though, I think she is talking about something very different – about writing. There is too much in this to say. She wrote this in her diaries and this is a link that says so much more.
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/09/20/anais-nin-on-writing-1947/
The other thing with writing is it can allow you to connect, when you are ready to be honest, and find support as I do, so much, from this blog.
wow thanks for the link…what fabulous engravings!!
Hi Mimesis. Of all your excellent points, the one I’m most taken with is the one about creating a narrative. We tend to think of a choice as a moment in time or a single act. But it’s much more like a fork in the road. Or the first few words of a brand new story. The choice point is always a new beginning, and the narrative builds from there on. A new chapter.
Of course, habit is still a very powerful thing. Choices — including the “movements of emotional crisis” can be pulled back to well-worn habits, left-overs from previous choices. The narrative you build might be a repeat of a narrative you’ve already played out a thousand times, as is the case with addiction. But it doesn’t have to be. Sometimes the rocket has enough momentum to escape gravity….and then it’s free!
I love the idea of a new narrative. I have started to write my own without really realizing it. Very powerful idea. Can”t wait for my next morning pages session!
Good Grief Marc– such drama
I have images of you creeping up on your computer and circling that paragraph like a condor eyeing a bunny.
As you point out stopping something is far harder than doing it. So instead of looking at as this huge hundreds of pages task, break it down into small pieces.
Like how do you eat an elephant?? One bite at a time !!
I do have another idea here you might find even more helpful that needs a little more thought . So later
How about doing para 2 today ?? lol
I wrote paragraph 2 an hour or so after paragraph 1. That’s the point! Yes, I snuck up to my computer and typed a few lines when it wasn’t looking. But once I saw those words on the “page” it got easier. Right away! In fact day 1 yielded 4 paragraphs.
Since then I’ve written a chapter and a half!!!
My first college professor made a system called the 8-pack method of brainstorming, write everything you can think of on the subject. Drink a beer, Bud Light in his opinion was the best beer, to maintain one’s electro-lites…not advocating just saying.
As you can tell I am not of the XA dogma, refrain from all intoxicants, however. I seem to be able to have two beers (wine) or three or one without dying or being institutionalized ow whatever else rubbish one hears from the XA’rs. Maybe i am not a “real” alcoholic. Not trying to prove or disprove either.
Good to hear you relapsed on the writing thing…or would it be lapsed? A question is it really much of a decision to do something which you are contractually bound to do? Or allows one to eat/live well?
What else could you chose to do with that time which can never ever be bought back?
I know … I know…
peace.
Kevin, these are all good points. I too have been known to have a glass of wine next to my keyboard. Most useful for marking papers!
But as to the contractual obligation, that brings up a very important issue. I recently read a philosopher’s essay (Marc Slors) about how intentions work. I’ll post about it, I guess next time.
The point was this. Choices take place virtually independent of our momentary intentions, as shown in various experiments. But distal intentions, the intentions you have about future choices, are powerful determinants of what you end up doing. You want to fly to New York next month, you better make the choice now. Once you have your ticket, moment-to-moment intentions won't matter much. Sooooooo, the way we end up making desirable choices is by directing ourselves in advance, even obligating ourselves, well beforehand. Like signing a contract, buying a ticket, getting rid of all the wine and beer in your house, or telling your doctor that he should not give you any more pain medication because you get dependent on it.
Slors calls this “self-programming”. I think that’s exactly how we end up beating addiction.
intentions…my new meditation…thanks!
Hey Marc,I find it great to wake to your blogs,that said I was kinda thinking this is not right till I got to the end where you said(with a little help). Thats how I thought I was going to quit drinking. I threw my beer out and said to myself my life is going nowhere with this stuff. Three days later my brother found me in my house on the floor,when he took me in to the hospital, they told me I went into a siezure that my body needed the alcohol.So as you said with a little help I have had the best 2 years of my life.Keep writing looking forward to your next book THANKS
Hi Paul. Yeah, when I said “with a little” help obviously that was tongue-in-cheek. Sometimes we need a LOT of help. In fact the moment of choice is really just a new beginning. Then comes the work of keeping going.
See the excellent comment by Mimesis, above, about choice as narrative.
Hi Marc
Not math….arithmetic.The difference being I can add columns in my head (to the amazement of bank tellers averywhere…almost like a party trick) but math..no way,as i cannot identify shapes (geometry)
Enough of that. I have found that it is not the first week (or para) that is tough.At that point your self-loathing, discipline etc are at their peak. You have had months or years to beat yourself up over the addiction/habit and they explode that first week making it much easier to follow though.
zit is the second week of month where the danger lies. The mind is constantly churning out excuses and rationalizations “I can manage just one pretty please” and the the cycle begins again.
I call it “the moon and stars lining up” where you had a good OR bad day,you find yourself at a party and that “just one” mindset sneaks up and bites you in the ass. It can happen after 1 month or 20 years of subtlety, but usually not the first week when you are sitting at home white-knuckling your way thru some crappy movie (personal experience,watched every shitty horror movie ever made), it is very hard for that thinking to sneak up on you when quitting is all you are thinking about 24/7 anyway (if you include dreams).
Where it comes to writing (i am a 1500 word article guy I can’t imagine organizing a book) Sitting at the computer is hard but for me it gets ts worse from there. But unlike you big hitters I don’t get my own editor.
JLK
PS That is why AA (not 12 step) is so important…constant reminder thru ritual) ha ha could not help myself
Hi Everone
Sorry for the bad spelling (zit, subtlety instead of sobriety). That is why I need an editor. Marc I don’t don’t suppose you’d mind…..?
JLK
Hi John. It’s true, the analogy with addiction breaks down as you get past the first week or the first month or the first year. Once your writing is well launched, there are not many evil spirits waiting to spring on you, or tempt you, to give up just one more time, to stop writing and feel the relief of it. And indeed your white-knuckling is exactly what didn’t work for me with paragraph 1. Though I must admit that some days are still very hard, even now, a couple of weeks into it. (see Paul’s comment above) Some white-knuckling is required.
So….being relaxed is not quite the goal, or the answer. Rather, the goal is momentum, building up new habits that continue to grow and sew their own seeds, a new breed of ivy to take over the wall.
What this has to do with math I can’t imagine. Oh yeah, the “captcha”. And my editorial services are far too expensive to even consider.
Marc,
A certain editor is very happy you have outsmarted what an old writing teacher of mine used to call ‘the shitbird’: that old crow in your brain that gives voice to your most negative self-evaluations and most self-injurious impulses, and whose “function” is to keep you and your ego safe from anxiety, risk, humiliation, the judgments of others, failure, exposure, etc. etc.
Write away! Your post is inspiring. I just heard about an on-line writers group where people commit to writing and posting something every day for a month – and no one is obliged to or encouraged to respond, since the point is simply committing and being witnessed by others who have made the same commitment. This seemed like a briliant idea to me, for the reasons you discuss in your posts. It is a way of tricking yourself out of your pre-emptive defenses, privileging the commitment over the desire to stay safely within reality-as-it-has-been, Or, as our former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld so memorably termed it while obfuscating the failure to find WMD in Iraq, ‘the known knowns.’ And meanwhile creating an environment in which it is safe to produce, play, stumble, succeed.
Please give this editor my best regards. Her spirit often hovers here, sometimes on the side of commit-therefore-do-it, sometimes among the spooky whispers of risk, humiliation, judgment, and so forth. Sometimes just a benign and friendly visitation.
But yes, I outsmarted the shitbird. Partly by locking myself in the pillory of exposure — one reader recommended I get off my ass and start writing — and partly by starting to write when no one was looking. I’m particularly proud of the second strategy (er, impulse) because it allowed me to sneak past all the vigilant spooks, “the known knowns”, the scrooge of procrastination….and get to it.
Thanks again, Marc! My recent learning (and unfortunately, experience–not with anything relapse-ish or with abuse potential) about medication sensitivity and kindling really have changed my views on addiction, addiction treatment and why we do the things we do. I’m not sure I will ever view the “choice” model quite the same again.
Unfortunately, such updates come at the least opportune moments. I hope things have settled down.
Certainly, but I should have clarified. I just mean that having learned about medication sensitivity it throws everything into a different view that’s much “bigger picture”. If there’s a problem metabolizing any chemicals or pharmaceuticals, it leads to problems with any drugs/pharmaceuticals. I’ve met addicts who enjoy using, or are medicating something, and others who don’t even seem to know what the hell they’re doing. Talking lately to people with severe sensitivity, some who have been addicted some who haven’t, well, they don’t know which direction is even up once they ingest most pharmaceuticals. I’m in that category as well. Anything from a thyroid med to certain antibiotics. It just makes you wonder if some of the people struggling with addiction are not even able to make a choice at all.
I realize this hits a relatively small portion of the population, and the addictive response is still the addictive response. Still, it makes you wonder. I wonder, actually, what you know about this effect, considering how much you know about the brain and addiction.
Not much, unfortunately. But I think this is an important insight. At age eighty-something my father lost a fair bit of cognitive control and was seen as developing dementia. Fortunately, what he was experiencing was a fairly common reaction of elderly people to Dalmane, a sleeping pill. He spent several days in hospital and was examined closely by three doctors — and nobody had a clue. Until several weeks later when a GP figured it out. He’s been perfectly fine ever since.
I just bring it up due to the “choice” topic. I’ve read quite a bit of Robert Whitaker’s works these last few years but didn’t want to delve too much into that side of things. However, it’s hard to ignore. Not even sensitivities, but reactions such as the one you mention with your father, which are almost too common to be under the sensitivity umbrella. Many people react so strongly to any meds with those properties, from benzos to SSRIs to old anti-psychotics (two very old anti-psychotics are used in the U.S at least solely as anti-emetics), and frequently the side effects are considered entirely separate medical issues. It seems odd and far-fetched–unless you read through endless posts on medication boards and sites like Whitaker’s, not to mention various other sites on effects of these medications, where a different picture starts to emerge. A picture frequently related to addiction, too, if not the standard picture of people who should be able to know the difference but keep using over and over again for the reasons usually explored here.
Apologies, I don’t mean to drag this thread off track, it’s just where my focus is lately. I’m glad your father’s case was resolved so (relatively) quickly! That’s sort of where I was headed, in more cases than I ever believed I’d read about doctors remain clueless and the patients spiral into hopelessness and disorientation all while being told that medication is helping them. Anyway, I don’t want to go “full crusade” on this issue, I just was wondering if it piqued your interest as well.
I believe that addiction is not a choice but something one is born with and thus cannot help having. The choice part is deciding whether or not to use a drug but then also understanding the choice. An irrational choice is no choice at all, instead such a random chain of events is chaotic and unpredictable at best. I’ve read about some scientific experiments which have shown that the actual moment in time that we are conscious of making a decision is in fact preceded by a previous subconscious decision in another part of the brain several milliseconds earlier. This means that what we believe to be a self-imposed action is only an observation of what was always meant to happen.
But irrational choices are NOT unpredictable. As you say, the upcoming action is already in process in your brain before it ever becomes “conscious” or “intentional” (in the moment). And that takes place, not milliseconds, but seconds before we actually do the deed! (e.g., press the button)
Whether we call this fate or not, and whether it means addiction is hard-wired in the personality, are big questions….for another time.
Marc, I just love how you describe the writing process. It’s exactly like that for me. I absolutely dread sitting down and writing a new blog post, and now I’ve been invited to contribute a new chapter section to an upcoming book. Even though I’m a good writer, each time I have to write something it instills fear and anxiety. Sheer dread. But somehow I always get it done — and I do it by sneaking up on myself. I jot down an idea whenever it comes to me, in the middle of whatever else I’m doing. Ideas build on each other, slowly an outline takes shape, more and more ideas come, and after a few days, I’ve suddenly got 2,000 words or more.
A great analogy to quitting an addiction. Perhaps this is why the “one day at a time” idea works so well, even if one is not an AAer. Sorry not to write more about addiction and choice here. I could go on and on about that. But I was just so excited when you defined my writing process so accurately. (I think choice is also based on what we perceive as rewards — however skewed — that have worked in the past, and also on the feeling of futility an addict gets when the prospect of quitting forever just seems too daunting.)
Thanks, Charlie. I’m glad it resonates. And yes, it fits with “one day at a time”. Sitting down to write a few words or sentences is a whole lot easier than sitting down to write a chapter. The analogy to quitting holds perfectly.
I don’t think there’s a lot more to say, but check out Lisa’s comment above, and also that of Mimesis. There are a few writers hovering around here. I wonder why?
This kind of ties in to what I heard in meetings about keeping busy. I’ve heard stories of people who got laid off or retired and relapsed because they had nothing to fill the time. Bet someone has researched that! When your life centers around drinking and that’s gone then you have to find other things to fill the void. For me, I was like a little kid discovering the world. While I was drinking alone in my room life passed me by. Then I was out there in it, living instead of just existing. The more interests I pursued, the more full my life became, the less important drinking became.
That’s just what happened to me….and many others. I guess that is a big part of the “momentum” that carries us forward after the initial fork in the road. And indeed, without that, we are highly vulnerable to relapsing.
Marc, it would seem that sneaking up to something, acting as if doing it doesn’t really matter, seems to get the ball rolling because it’s skirting around the following: our perfectionism and sense of commitment to that which is of utmost importance and meaning. Bottom line, if we act like doing or not doing this thing doesn’t matter, then it reduces the paralyzing fear we have if we take it head on as being as important as it really is.
Did you ever notice that the people who seem to get the most done are people who are not perfectionistic? They don’t mind jumping in and doing things in a somewhat half-assed way, or, a perfectly fine way. Someone like me, a perfectionist, would call the way they do it “half-assed” but then look how much more they accomplish than I do. Relationship between perfectionism and addictiveness?
Fear. Fear of things mattering. Because if/when we don’t accomplish what we’ve deemed as so important, we have failed, most likely at the thing which is keeping us sane and sober. So it’s easier not to start. Or stop. Until not starting or stopping becomes less easy and becomes the harder choice.
Your words precisely echo Lisa K’s comment, above. Great risks are sometimes best taken with a minimum of reflection — hence my diving picture at the bottom of the post. Paralysis is another kind of momentum that also grows on itself.
I’m a perfectionist too. You might have noticed. Do you see a lot of typos in my posts and comments? I even correct typos in emails to….well, anyone. As to the link with addiction: I think it is one kind of link, underwritten by anxiety mostly. But there are other points of entry as well.
So glad to hear whatever it was that really worked that it did. I suspect that there are about as many ways that one approaches a given task as there are approachers. Surely that pertains to the choice of stopping a destructive behaviour.
NOw heres my idea. If you want to write a really important book about choice you might consider this issue- one I just plain can not get my mind around.
The addict knows and has learned all about the the problem he has. Hes learned lots of tools to help make the choice to stop . He knows CBT and all the irrational thoughts and beliefs. He knows all the lousy reasons to keep using . Yet !!
Theres the emotional self that keeps driving him to make that choice to use yet again, or keep using, or use again after a period of abstinence.
What are the neuroscience mechanisms at work here. HOw do we better manage emotions in this area where they can be so strong. And make the cycle of addiction so hard to break for those few who just cant seem to get there inspite of trying everything.
That in my opinion is what we working in the field need to know – and until we do we wont have a complete package of self or group or therapist based methods to help the whoe addicted population succeed.
I completely agree. I’ve talked and written about two well-studied mechanisms — ego fatigue and delay discounting — that demolish the naive assumption that there is a steady state from which we act on (sometimes) attractive goals. There are others. And yes, they all have to do with emotion. Emotional states, and the cognitive mechanics that accompany them, and the neurochemical matrices that underlie them, shift constantly, like tides.
We are starting to understand a fair bit of the neural side of this picture. A lot has to do with the way the brain uses dopamine and changes in synapses that result. But there are subtler issues, like how we imagine a future state (good? bad? ugly?) that are still completely unknown to neuroscientists. Some of the current research on molecular changes in brain cells may help us get there.
I took a Self Management class as a young man (it didn’t take) and one of the tools was termed “finding an entrance.” An example,the only one that did really take,was to wash the sink if you needed to clean the kitchen.Just plan to do the sink.You can see where this is going.I overcame my sloth by just doing the sink and then came the counter and your on your way.This worked for me in recovery many times.Many.I was good at bouncing back.But then when I was feeling much better I would decide that this notion of not being able to control oneself when there were so many indicators that I was clearly the “Captain of my soul” was simply nonsense.I would fall.I was often “wrecked by success” until I began to accept myself as a failure.I did just that for many years but today at 61 I am 3 years clean and don’t have to concern myself with any lurking success to destroy me.I woke one day over 3 years ago in a hospital and that day a corner was made.I have not had a desire since.Choices;they are a bitch! Glad you found your entrance Marc.
Thanks, Chris. This is one version of a refrain I often hear. I’ve also quit quite a few times. The goal seems to be getting rid, not only of the habit, but of the desire. Or else developing a very strict dialogue with oneself.
I’ve also heard a lot of people say that their bottom-line wish is to no longer desire whatever it is. Many of these people, like you, finally get to that place, because the image of “doing it” becomes welded onto images of the suffering that usually results. Or else because it really does get boring. It would be ideal if people reached this stage far younger than age 60, but many of us are incredibly slow learners.
Again so much in here I relate to. It brought me back to the link with writing as well. I fight every day almost from my recovery. I am a creature of habit, I have to make sure that the impulse to use is always linked into the consequences it had in the past. With the waste and the pain. I have to remember that my over arching desires in life lie elsewhere. I think this is why writing and diaries and narratives and blogs are so important.
I have posted from the site before, but it is well worth reading
http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2013/10/17/ok-plateau/
“When you work regularly, inspiration strikes regularly.” – after that I was hooked [on the article].
Hi Marc, aka Dr. Lewis,
Please keep on writing books. I loved your book when I read it last year and
I came back to this blog a couple days ago when my sister’s re-addiction became apparent. I shared it with my mom and dad.
I think the self-trust, the new narrative, the “Something inside me is growing slowly,” that Mimesis commented about, is being nurtured in my sister by the love and compassion she feels coming from us – mom, dad and me.
I think in the past it’s been a strong dynamic of her shame and our judgment. Just when I’m finally about to understand her – with your book being one of the books that gave me incredible insight – and start to show real love and compassion, this is when she begins to leak out her true strengths, little signs that she wants help, or that she is helpless and is seeking answers. I can’t help but think that perhaps the love burned through her tremendous sense of shame that she’d molded into a shield of armor so that we couldn’t reach her.
And also now she has a seven year old daughter and being stuck up in Nowhereville, California with a deadbeat property and painkiller popping husband is finally able to see that the rental property that she is spinning her wheels to “own” can go back to the bank, and she can make moves to move closer to us and start a new life.
Of course, she can’t be pressured or rushed, that is what I am finally realizing. We need to keep our compassion burning and almost be the coach that points out to her, reminds her what she herself has been saying about what she wants to do.
That’s just what feels right.
Finally, I think the fact the difference between her “hitting bottom” or whatever you want to call it ten years ago and now also is the fact that my brother died in a plane accident five years ago. Our family has suffered trauma. Somewhere my sister must realize that my parents should be spared of losing another child – they are in their seventies and my sister is 48.
Thanks for keeping your comments open to let people who are moved by your work put our stories into the mix. It is so helpful and I am relieved to finally feel that I have a way to understand why we use – to expand our awareness and to numb our distress.
I just bought “In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts” and feel that your work and Gabor Mate’s work is just so important to our understanding and compassion that will help us build a new society as this old, defunct one crumbles.
Thanks again,
Wendy
Hi Wendy. Well I think that the old defunct society took a very satisfying kick in the gut with the madness of the Republican party finally being exposed for what it is — given last night’s news. But…down to business.
Your comment conveys a lot of the chaos and confusion that seem so typical for the families of addicts. There’s the love and concern — that’s obvious — the sense of helping and the frustration of not helping, all bundled together, the sense of your sister’s pain and her reasons for using, also the sense of her courage, and then there’s the concern you feel for the rest of your family….and the inevitable word “should”. That word just can’t be avoided, no matter how much empathy you feel for your sister. And probably some of your confusion has to do with the bruised interface between caring and for someone and judging their self-destructive behavior. And wondering how you can respond in a way that’s sensible and honest without eliciting more shame.
Not much more to say than that. Except that I suggest you read Janet’s memoir on the Guest Memoirs page, called Immortal Pain: Loving an Addict. You will recognize a lot of common ground. Also, maybe you’ll consider submitting one of your own? We don’t hear enough from the families of addicts. That’s got to be part of the mix.
Thank you for your response, Marc. You nailed it. The whole family takes a bruising from that violent shifting back and forth between empathy and judgement. It’s exhausting!
After a night of mostly sleep, I’m going to drive towards where my sister is. She and my niece, her husband, and the dogs – only the first two had been invited to stay – arrived last night at my parents’ place. I’m not sure I’m going to see her. I’m going to call my parents and assess the situation. I am driving that way to be closer in case I’m needed and so I’ll also have the option of joining my teenage daughter and her friend in Santa Cruz and then hearing her play music at the pumpkin festival up the coast.
What I am preparing to say to my sister – in person or on the phone – is basically this:
I’m worried about how her daughter/my niece has been traumatized by her situation
and think that the best place for her where she won’t be traumatized is to stay with Mom and Dad (her grandparents, my parents).
I think that by talking about “her situation” as just a generality, I can avoid the blame shame game. Given the way things have come to a head since my last post, I think the main focus is to help my niece be safe and hope my sister will follow by choosing to stay and get help.
I had read Janet’s “Immortal Pain: Loving an Addict” on the Guest Memoirs page before and it really helped to read it again. I would like to share my family’s story, just need to see where the real life plot takes us first.
Thank you again Dr. Marc for your attention to this community. I am learning so much and it’s amazing what you have started. Makes me want to go back to school and learn some real neuroscience so I can engage in the discussion on that level as well. (:
Sorry, Wendy, but I need more of a plot-line. What on earth is going on? What’s the main risk to your niece? Drugs, family, or both?
Please feel free to share whatever you’re comfortable with… But I for one feel I missed something…..like when you go out to get popcorn and you come back to your seat, and you know that you missed something important.
And please post a comment after Janet’s memoir, just so she’ll know someone was helped by it.
This community is wonderful. I’m the one who’s grateful.
Hi Marc,
Wow, it’s hard to tell the basic storyline when you are living it and it seems to have so many pieces to it but maybe that’s just because we feel ripped apart.
The basics are that my sister and her husband drove from Nowhereville to the SF Bay Area with their daughter, my niece, who is now safe.
In between the time of writing my first and second comment, my sister’s drug use and paranoia that goes with it got worse and we were really frightened for my little seven year old niece. My dad drove seven hours – he’s 75 years old – thinking he was going to come and rescue her and her kid – from what, I’m still not clear. My sis and her husband were saying people were coming in and out of the house through a window at night, my sister said she thought she had been attacked. It was completely confusing and it wasn’t clear if this was the drugs or the situation that getting the drugs had put them in.
So basically the two of them did the right thing and brought their daughter to a safe place, to our parents’ house. Not sure what is next, but I know that my niece is safe for the time being.
Not sure what my sis will decide but I’m going to try my best just to keep up the love and compassion and encouragement to her to get some professional help like through a program.
I will post on Janet’s memoir. Thank you
Hey Marc
Choice is a difficult one for many when your mind is so consumed with using. Is your choice or freewill really capable of making those decisions? I mean our brain becomes some what dysfunctional in making rational decisions while under the influence. Our priorities are focused on our choice drug and it seems all or most other decisions are unhealthy. I did however use the “fake it till you make it” because I was not getting anything out of my choices early on, until I accumulated many healthy choices did I come to believe “Hey” this might work. I believe their is a certain point that came in my substance abuse when I became dependant on it in my everyday life that I was incapable of making healthy choices and just kinda had to fling it hoping what I was doing what was right. I knew right from wrong but could not weigh the consequences of my actions.
This is the big problem, Richard. I’m not sure where the idea got started that choice is a rational thing. It isn’t. It’s highly influenced by preferences, biases, recent events, context, and of course emotions. Faking it until you make it seems like a great suggestion. Because when you’re using frequently choice is dominated by habits of thought that don’t have a chance to normalize. Just stopping for a few days already makes choice a lot more flexible — something that can work in your favour.