[I Was Naked]
When I Wrote ThisAddiction 101
2007-09-08
My name's Jon. I'm an addict. And this is what addicts do. You cannot nor will not change my behavior. You cannot make me treat you better, let alone with any respect. All I care about, all I think about, is my needs and how to go about fulfilling them. You are a tool to me, something to use. When I say I love you I am lying through my teeth, because love is impossible for someone in active addiction. I wouldn't be using if I loved myself, and since I don't, I cannot love you.
My feelings are so pushed down and numbed by my drugs that I could be considered sociopathic. I have no empathy for you or anyone else. It doesn't faze me that I hurt you, leave you hungry, lie to you, cheat on you and steal from you.
My behavior cannot and will not change until i make a decision to stop using/drinking and then follow it up with a plan of action.
And until I make that decision, I will hurt you again and again and again.
Stop being surprised.
I am an addict. And that's what addicts do.
From www.soberrecovery.com
My girlfriend sent this to me tonight. She's simply been distraught from her breakup a month or so ago from a guy who loves his poisons more than himself or her. I could only empathize, knowing that her ex husband, is the exact same way, his choice though is alcohol.
I'm his only friend. Strike that. I was his only friend. I'm done though. The one thing that separates us is I have a breaking point. There's a part of me that regrets that the anticipation of seeing his son again on his weekends won't happen now. I've been looking forward to it, and I know I've done more than I should to make his room ready for him at his father's new place. But I can't keep evil him in my life, which is how he gets at around beer 15 of the day. It's always the same story, I'm the whipping post, then the apology the next day.
As I used to tell my girls that I nannied, "Don't apologize, just don't do it again, otherwise you aren't sorry." They, as three and six year olds at the time, grasped the concept. Unfortunately he at forty two won't.
I love the addicts who claim AA can't help them. "Been there, done that" or the "I'm a professional drinker, the army taught me."
Ok granted, I lived in a military arena for a while in North Carolina and yes, besides drinking, procreating was number two on the list. Well, they've got a little pill since the 60's to cut down on the population, how about a pill to sour the taste of it all?
I know that it isn't really feasible, as the addict would just adapt to the new flavor to feed their habit. But there has to be something ingenious skulking in the cerebellum of someone out there, who can turn off the addiction part of the brain and stop those synapses from firing. Think of how productive our society would become as a whole, without the functioning alcoholics slogging into work the next day, trying to deal with half a hangover and get their job done. Crack alley would empty out and real estate values increase as crack houses turned into coping houses. HIV incidents would decline as there is a direct correlation between substance abuse and AIDS, physical abuse would cease and we could finally cancel COPS and I'd get some sleep in the middle of the night because that damn theme song wouldn't wrench me from my dreams. The ramifications boggle my mind as there truly would be a ripple effect and addicts would have to seek counseling to deal with their coping issues.
"Pipe dreams" she thinks ironically, as visions of hookahs and opium dens come to mind as she types the phrase. But there are so many addictions to so many things, but they all are driven by the brain. But sometimes you have to fight fire with fire, or at least change the addiction to a healthy one.
My thinking kind of has a George Orwell feel to it, imaging this world without its vices. Kind of makes my head spin, like it did as a child when I thought too long about what would be out there if the universe ceased to exist. Yep, even back then I thought too much.
Utopia? Hardly. But a lot less pain and hurt for the people who are on the receiving end of an addicts attention. As I spoke to my girlfriend this morning, once more trying to help her through this, she had heard from her ex boyfriends sister, also a recovering alcoholic. They have the same mantra as taught them in one of their 12 steps, that they have to come to that awareness on their own. I retorted that was fine, and true, but I hated the people with the "Let go and Let God" attitude kick in. Too much of a cop out. We care because we are human and we would blame ourselves if we thought there was something we could have done to save them that we didn't think of to try. But tonight, as I listened to his drunk voice again on the phone, I made him tell me why he chose to over imbibe tonight, (yeah try to make a drunk accountable) he pushed me right out of his life.
Mediation tomorrow, and he's going to try and nail her for the last six years for income he thinks she has from selling candles or some such nonsense I know she hasn't done anything in at least 4 years. His court ordered child support is $20.00 a day for his 14 year old son. Not enough to feed him three squares. I love these people who think that just because the money goes to the parent, it isn't benefiting their child. He hung up on me several times, so I left the voice mail about letting it just be about his son, he's mad because she doesn't want his friendship six years after the divorce, "too little, too late" in her opinion. I'm taken to task as I attempted to counsel him to just leave her alone, she was in a bad place. However, no one wants to listen to me, so instead he's making a very poor drunken decision to dredge crap up that was settled long ago.
My feelings are so pushed down and numbed by my drugs that I could be considered sociopathic. I have no empathy for you or anyone else. It doesn't faze me that I hurt you, leave you hungry, lie to you, cheat on you and steal from you.
My behavior cannot and will not change until i make a decision to stop using/drinking and then follow it up with a plan of action.
And until I make that decision, I will hurt you again and again and again.
Stop being surprised.
I am an addict. And that's what addicts do.
From www.soberrecovery.com
My girlfriend sent this to me tonight. She's simply been distraught from her breakup a month or so ago from a guy who loves his poisons more than himself or her. I could only empathize, knowing that her ex husband, is the exact same way, his choice though is alcohol.
I'm his only friend. Strike that. I was his only friend. I'm done though. The one thing that separates us is I have a breaking point. There's a part of me that regrets that the anticipation of seeing his son again on his weekends won't happen now. I've been looking forward to it, and I know I've done more than I should to make his room ready for him at his father's new place. But I can't keep evil him in my life, which is how he gets at around beer 15 of the day. It's always the same story, I'm the whipping post, then the apology the next day.
As I used to tell my girls that I nannied, "Don't apologize, just don't do it again, otherwise you aren't sorry." They, as three and six year olds at the time, grasped the concept. Unfortunately he at forty two won't.
I love the addicts who claim AA can't help them. "Been there, done that" or the "I'm a professional drinker, the army taught me."
Ok granted, I lived in a military arena for a while in North Carolina and yes, besides drinking, procreating was number two on the list. Well, they've got a little pill since the 60's to cut down on the population, how about a pill to sour the taste of it all?
I know that it isn't really feasible, as the addict would just adapt to the new flavor to feed their habit. But there has to be something ingenious skulking in the cerebellum of someone out there, who can turn off the addiction part of the brain and stop those synapses from firing. Think of how productive our society would become as a whole, without the functioning alcoholics slogging into work the next day, trying to deal with half a hangover and get their job done. Crack alley would empty out and real estate values increase as crack houses turned into coping houses. HIV incidents would decline as there is a direct correlation between substance abuse and AIDS, physical abuse would cease and we could finally cancel COPS and I'd get some sleep in the middle of the night because that damn theme song wouldn't wrench me from my dreams. The ramifications boggle my mind as there truly would be a ripple effect and addicts would have to seek counseling to deal with their coping issues.
"Pipe dreams" she thinks ironically, as visions of hookahs and opium dens come to mind as she types the phrase. But there are so many addictions to so many things, but they all are driven by the brain. But sometimes you have to fight fire with fire, or at least change the addiction to a healthy one.
My thinking kind of has a George Orwell feel to it, imaging this world without its vices. Kind of makes my head spin, like it did as a child when I thought too long about what would be out there if the universe ceased to exist. Yep, even back then I thought too much.
Utopia? Hardly. But a lot less pain and hurt for the people who are on the receiving end of an addicts attention. As I spoke to my girlfriend this morning, once more trying to help her through this, she had heard from her ex boyfriends sister, also a recovering alcoholic. They have the same mantra as taught them in one of their 12 steps, that they have to come to that awareness on their own. I retorted that was fine, and true, but I hated the people with the "Let go and Let God" attitude kick in. Too much of a cop out. We care because we are human and we would blame ourselves if we thought there was something we could have done to save them that we didn't think of to try. But tonight, as I listened to his drunk voice again on the phone, I made him tell me why he chose to over imbibe tonight, (yeah try to make a drunk accountable) he pushed me right out of his life.
Mediation tomorrow, and he's going to try and nail her for the last six years for income he thinks she has from selling candles or some such nonsense I know she hasn't done anything in at least 4 years. His court ordered child support is $20.00 a day for his 14 year old son. Not enough to feed him three squares. I love these people who think that just because the money goes to the parent, it isn't benefiting their child. He hung up on me several times, so I left the voice mail about letting it just be about his son, he's mad because she doesn't want his friendship six years after the divorce, "too little, too late" in her opinion. I'm taken to task as I attempted to counsel him to just leave her alone, she was in a bad place. However, no one wants to listen to me, so instead he's making a very poor drunken decision to dredge crap up that was settled long ago.
This time I know my phone won't ring in the morning. I took a firm stance which I've done from the start on the side of his child. Not her, not him, but you do what you do to be the best parent you possibly can be. Mistakes are understandable, we're only human. Retaliation against your ex because you finally decide to acknowledge you were wrong years after the fact doesn't garner you absolution. Or a shot of Absolut for that matter. I can only hope in the cold sober light of day tomorrow he rethinks his actions.
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