“Anne, I’m drinking too much. Every day I promise myself I’ll have less, but I end up drinking more! How do I stop?!”

That I have no idea how to answer that question makes me insane.

How did I stop? Progressively, over years, I began to drink more and more wine to the point I was drinking a bottle of wine a night. What was the reason I began to look online for support group meetings? What got me in the car and drove me to a meeting one day, that day? What made me drink the rest of the wine in the house that night, about 3/4 of a bottle, but not buy more? What made me go to the meeting again the next day and not have a drink that night? And the next and the next? And now it’s 17 months of next and next without a drink. How, how did that happen?!

Nothing changed in those two days. Nothing. I had no heartfelt request from a loved one to quit, no DUI, no gastro issues from early liver disease, no reprimand from work, no directive from a counselor or physician to stop. There were absolutely no consequences that served as a catalyst.

And I have no memory of any conscious decision or resolve to quit. I had no epiphany, no moment of enlightenment, no dramatic can-do, this-is-it moment. If a film were made of me getting sober, the film would open with expressionless Anne at a laptop, then cut to expressionless Anne getting into a car. End of film. I got into my car and drove to a meeting.

Is that all I have to offer friends, family, clients who ask me for help with addiction? “Get in a car and drive to a meeting” or perhaps more helpfully, “May I drive you to a meeting?”?

Ridiculous. I have a master’s degree in counseling. I specialize in addictions. With my smarts, my training, my exhaustive research, my experience, my devotion to consciousness, with 17 months of sobriety, that I can’t identify the difference between me using my substance of choice, alcohol, and not using it, makes me insane.

Photo by Nancy Brauer

In horrible experiments with dogs, a floor was electrified to shock. Having learned in a previous experiment that nothing it did could stop the shock, when the dog was put on the floor, it just laid down and took it. They call that learned helplessness.

I’m feeling like a dog on a bad floor at 17 months sober.

When animals perceive threat, they fight, flee or freeze. Believing one is worth saving is an instinct. Sh*t can happen that interferes with instinct. A moment’s doubt is wedged between seeing the saber tooth and picking up the spear. Am I worth saving anymore?

When I think of fighting or fleeing the threat that addiction posed to my very self, I feel exhausted helplessness. I am frozen. [Read more…]