Nuggets of Wisdom from Sober Living

[RN0441]

Rn. I do not believe fear means you do not have faith.

That would be blind faith.

Is this what son means he expects you to bring to the table?

Faith is complete trust, usually g-d.

He feels confident but of course I question everything. And reading this about Albie's son is heartbreaking. She thought he was living his life with "meaning and purpose" as mentioned in her signature and isn't that what we all want?

I know the hard work starts when he leaves the structure of his program. Gulp.

 

[toughlovin]

Oh albie I am so sorry for the downward ride on the roller coaster. Your son sounds like mine. I can totally imagine my son doing the same thing. Please let us know when you hear more as I worry about him with you. My hope with my son and I do believe this is that with each rehab and bit of recovery he gets a taste of what life in recovery could be like and wants it more....hopefully at some point the pull of recovery will be stronger than the pull of the drugs.

 

[RN0441]

A director at a program that my son was in some time ago that I really liked and respected said that the very first time they enter treatment a seed is planted and each subsequent time the seed is nurtured.

My son's seed sure had a lot of nurturing!!

The man that said that got sober on his own. No rehab ever. He said he just literally woke up one day and said "I am done" and that was it.

 

[Copabanana]

Albatross. Is there any word yet about how or where son is? How are you?
____

RN. M is a lifelong alcoholic. While he quit drinking for 19 years he resumed when he came to this country.

He was drinking when I met him. One year later, something happened with us that made him deeply ashamed. He stopped drinking the next day and in 8 years has never drunk again. He believes that it is a question of will. Of deciding. That there is nothing easy about it, but doable, when it is decided.

It seems that our children's motivation to stop depends upon whether it is located in some short term goal or problem, or whether it is about who they are and choose to be. And the awareness that the choosing to be who you are will continue for the rest of their lives, just like for every one of us.

This really puts things into perspective for me. This is not something that happens to them, as participants, not something they undergo but the conscious choice to exercise a muscle that they must continually exercise, because they choose it. And if they choose to not exercise, for a time, it is the awareness, that they can resume. At any point.

I do not know what is the answer, or even the question, but it really, really is entering my consciousness, that it is not my question or my answer either.

Some of us have been writing about loving them from a distance, without conditions, without expectations, without an agenda. In my case that is not possible right now because my son wants to inflict pain, because I am not engaging with him in the way he wants, in terms of responding to his needs, or feelings.

I do not know how this will go, our story. But for right now I will focus on my own. Which has been flooded and sunk, by my focus upon his.

 

[Albatross]

Good discussion.

Thank you so much for asking, Copa. He is all right. Just on a bender. He is making all sorts of grandiose plans for a geographical cure. Seen this movie before.

I told him we love him and urged him to get help. He needs to be the one to ask for it.

 

[Triedntrue]

I am glad he is ok.

 

[Albatross]

Albatross. How is your husband doing?

Has son mentioned at all any sense of conflict, or regret, or awareness of what he is doing?

It is almost strange that there is no distress.

Copa, you are a good friend. Thank you for asking.

Son has not contacted us in any way, shape or form. We know his status only via word from his friends in sober living, who are trying (in vain, so far) to convince him to return.

I am sorry for my cynicism, but no distress is not strange. There is no distress because son hasn't run out of money yet. When he does, he will express all of the above.

I understand he is on a bender. I understand what selfish @$$&^%$ drunks can be.

But to not even THINK to let SOMEONE know he was OK?

I mean, we had an officer show up AT OUR DOOR and tell us son's car was found submerged in 10-12 feet of water, with no sign of the driver.

Had we not been able to get into his apartment -- had he not left Messenger open -- we would have no idea of his status.

And at no point that day or since has son ever so much as thought to contact us.

No response to our messages, no acknowledgement, no nothing.

So Hubs and I are sad and disappointed, of course, because we thought he was "getting it."

We are relieved, of course, because he is OK.

We are numb from the scare we had.

But mostly we are just really angry because the way it looks right now is that he's been biting his tongue for a year until his charges were dropped, playing whatever role was expected of him to get through the program, so he could go back to being what he really wants to be. And all the people who rallied to support him don't even register on his radar.

 

[Copabanana]

But mostly we are just really angry because the way it looks right now is that he's been biting his tongue for a year until his charges were dropped, playing whatever role was expected of him to get through the program, so he could go back to being what he really wants to be. And all the people who rallied to support him don't even register on his radar.

This is infuriating.

Albatross. Is it not possible that he was fooling himself? That he was just as seduced by the idea of recovery and that he was recovering, as everybody else. People play roles, that they do not necessary feel to be guile. I acted one way at work and quite another at home. Both are true, depending upon the circumstances.

The part that would make me bitter is the complete lack of considering this impact on you and his Dad. His cluelessness as to his betrayal of everybody who believes in him and wants him to be okay.

Have his friends in sober living actually located and spoken to him?

My son is like that with respect to money. He is one person with money in his pocket and another without. The former is arrogant, entitled and indifferent. The latter is humble, diffident manipulative and a liar.

I guess I am mad because it gives me a little bit of pleasure to write that it feels good to have distanced myself from him for now, so I do not have to deal anymore with this Jeckyl and Hyde. These guys have to begin to integrate their own personalities, and the only way this happens is that they suffer. I hate typing that too. But there seems to not be another way.

I am glad you checked in Albatross.

 

[BusynMember]

They really do not think about us. We want them to because of all the time we invested and invest thinking of them. But if they cared about our feelings they couldnt do what they do. It would not be possible. Theirs actions show us what matters. Not us.

They need to quit the drugs first. Some adults lack empathy and never care about us, which is the saddest for us of all.

 

[Littleboylost]

Well. So much for those nuggets. Son is in the wind again. He came over for dinner last night and seemed fine -- eyes clear, well dressed, seemed to be feeling positive about things, etc.

The police showed up this morning to do a well-being check. His car was found submerged in a body of water a few counties over. No sign of a driver or passengers.

Hubs and I drove to his apartment and got the landlord to let us in. Son had not been home. I could see from his computer that he had arranged a get-together with a drugging buddy, and that he has been planning his departure to head west again. He even mentioned that he got to have a good last visit with his folks before he took off. Wow.

Our best guess is that he and his buddy got together and somehow the car ended up in the canal. Not surprising, given how drunk they "sounded" in their messages. They were probably so impaired they decided they'd deal with it in the morning, but the police beat them to it. Phone off. No response from his "friend."

Two days ago he had his charges dismissed, so I guess without a hammer over his head this is what he wants.

Here we go again...

I am so very sorry to hear this news Albie. My heart is with you.

 

[Albatross]

They took him back. He is going to restart the year-long program. He refused their offer until the money ran out. Now I guess that offer looks pretty good.

I expect this is nothing more than "3 hots and a cot" to him until he can get some money together. He's badmouthed the program basically since he graduated. But now that he has no charges pending, I'm sure he will keep his mouth shut until he can afford to get his car back and take off again. Never thinking of anyone but himself.

We packed up his stuff today because he got kicked out of his apartment. I guess I could have let the landlord put it on the curb, but it's a lot of brand new electronics he bought with the money he'd saved. So in that sense at least I don't have the heart to cut ties completely just yet...

The landlord of his sober living apartment texted me and said that after something like this happens, most of the time the family is no longer involved and he has to clear the apartment himself. So he thanked me for doing it. I guess I'm not the only mother who is wondering how and why this happened.

At this point I have no desire to see or speak to him. I expected a relapse -- that's part of the recovery process. But I didn't expect this. I don't know how I will get past it, or if I ever will, or if I even want to try.

 

[toughlovin]

Albie,

Hang in there. One day at a time is for us too. You do not have to make any decisions about how you are going to feel or react to him in the future.... just stay in today for now. I am glad they took him back. For now he is safe and hopefully he has learned something. Protect your own feelings and self and dont have any expectations. This is his journey. You do not need to see him until you are ready to....

Recovery is a process of which for some of our kids there are many iterations. I know that is true for my son. I have no idea at this point if my son will ever truly be in recovery..... but for now once again he seems to be on track again and doing better. He actually starts a job tomorrow and so I am just glad today for that.

In the meantime do things you like to do, live a life you can enjoy.

TL

 

[Copabanana]

Hi Albatross. I am glad he is back there. It makes it that much more clear-cut for you. In that he will have to affirmatively and sober-mindedly choose to leave the program knowing full well and with clarity what he is choosing. One could say he fell in the canal this time. Next time he will dive in.

Two questions.

Where did he get the money he saved to buy the electronics?

What happened...this...in the way that it happened...how is it different or worse than what you accepted a "regular" or expected or acceptable relapse would be?

I am not being cute here. Each of us here knows what we felt when we read what happened. I edited my first post several times to remove evidence of my extreme reaction.

Let me first write this. (Sorry. Am on cell.) Everything you have written about your son in the past has made me think of him as at heart loving, good, kind and decent.

That said the relapse to me, was special in these ways:

The canal. The plan. The set up. The meal. The deception. The unawareness and indifference that resulted in your being made his victims. The predatory quality that enabled the con.

But this is my point. Are these qualities, these behaviors not part of the disease? Or if one wants to reject the disease concept, are these qualities not a manifestation of going astray? Of losing touch with one's core, real self.

Which makes this all the more tragic.

I am tearing up here. My father was a depraved alcoholic. But as a small child I remembered him to be the most loving of fathers. I felt him to be a prince, really. In my memory. You see, my parents divorced.and for a long time I had only my memories.

Over the years he became so depraved that when I was 27 I never saw him again. I could not tolerate how degraded I became around him. He grew to hate me.

In these many years since he left, I believed that my sense he was a prince was a fantasy.

You see. In this post I am seeing, it may not have been.

Oh the places we will go. (I say, facetiously.) Our lives take us on journeys. Like an escalator in an airport. And unless we get off. And stay off, we may arrive into horror.

Your son, a good person, for now seems hell bent to step back on. How many times he will do so is unknown.

I guess I am writing that to me a relapse is a relapse. This was a doozy. Yes. But the horror is the elevator.

I am asking myself here the question. At what point does a good man (our parents, our sons) become changed by the degradation into which he steps? Do they ever become bad men? Like I felt my father became.

Am trying to find in my own heart that belief that my father was a good man. Because as long as my heart holds that turning from openness to bitterness and hurt and despair, I too have gotten on the airport elevator, with him.

It is hard to accept I have given over such a large and vital part of my heart, for nearly my whole life.

I am sorry Albatross.

 

[Albatross]

TL, thank you for that, and for pulling me back from my insistence on certainty. I know better, or certainly should know better by now. There is no certainty. There is only today.

Copa, I am sorry about your father. I am so sorry that his disease robbed him and you of the man he could have been. He made the choices he did, and you paid the price, and that's what he hated. The realization that he couldn't beat it and you paid the price. It wasn't you he hated.

I've said before that while I believe active alcoholics and addicts are real jerks, the recovering ones are some of the coolest people I know. If I were more religious and believed in the forces of good and evil, I would believe that alcoholism/addiction is how Evil keeps mankind's potential under wraps, by preventing some of our most promising from reaching their fullest.

Copa, your question about what sets this relapse apart is a good one. Now that t.l. has gotten me back into a steady state, I will try to pin this down.

In the past he has made active, targeted, (clumsy) attempts to terrify and horrify, usually to punish or manipulate us into doing something.

The difference this time is that although he didn't target us, he knew we would be terrified and out of our minds with worry, and he did NOTHING. Less than a month after this grand, prodigal-son-style reconciliation and celebration, and less than a week after his charges were dismissed.

So the thing that kept him sober was not the strength of the bonds he felt toward his family. What kept him sober was the charges hanging over his head.

The thing that brought him to the surface was not any sense of obligation to his family. It was running out of money.

I expected a relapse. What I didn't expect was for him to so quickly forget and disregard the people he's spent the last year claiming he wanted to make amends to.

As t.l. said, I don't have to make my mind up today, and I can hope that maybe the pull of his addiction will weaken a little more as time goes on. But for right now, for today, I feel like maybe it's time for me to just accept him the way he is, accept the choice he's made and stop trying to build on something that isn't there.

I also wanted to add that I've doled out a lot of advice over the years, and especially over the last year. I feel pretty foolish about it now. I want to apologize to everyone on this board for any certainty or readiness to assume things I had no business assuming.

The "nuggets" of wisdom that started this thread are good ones, I think. I didn't come up with those; they are from the guys who actually live this stuff.

If I'm not on the boards for awhile, it is because I am regrouping. I thank all of you for your support and advice over the years.

 

[Copabanana]

he knew we would be terrified and out of our minds with worry, and he did NOTHING.

Albatross. Do you not think he was drunk and the farthest thing from his mind was you guys, and the effect upon you. I would think he would be in active and desperate denial to the consequences for you and your feelings.

So the thing that kept him sober was not the strength of the bonds he felt toward his family. What kept him sober was the charges hanging over his head.

This must be true. I keep trying to find a response to counter it and I cannot. I do not think my own son is motivated in the least by his love for me, mine for him, or any sense of obligation or responsibility.

I have the fantasy that my absence will motivate him to choose in such a way as to restore our relationship. But I know this is a fantasy. This story, yours, reinforces this for me.

Tl models an appropriate and realistic stance, for me. The only expectation being decent conduct towards her. Keeping him at a distance, in terms of insulating his poor behavior and discouraging his dependency. Support and counsel, as he asks for it, to the extent that makes sense. Insisting upon his independence and self-responsibility. Willingness to keep in the game with him, without conditions. She does not personalize it, and have skin in the game in terms of her own emotional needs.

Not one of these things am I able to do.

 

[New Leaf]

Oh Albie, I am just catching up. I am so sorry for all of this, what a terrible, scary, sad, mad thing.

The police showed up this morning to do a well-being check. His car was found submerged in a body of water a few counties over. No sign of a driver or passengers.

I don’t even know what to say about this. What an awful thing to go through.

He even mentioned that he got to have a good last visit with his folks before he took off. Wow.

Wow indeed. I don’t know how these kids do it. I really don’t. I’m sorry Albie.

Phone off. No response from his "friend."

Geez, at least a call to let you guys know he is okay?

I do not understand our children. I do not understand our lives. Maybe I do not understand life itself. If such a thing can happen.

Me too, Copa.

We have to believe that this was the real him in the program. To have faith he is in there, still That this person who he really is will reassert himself. That this is one part of him. Only. Only what one part of him wants.

I hope this for all of our adult kids.

That this is a marathon and the need to guard ourselves, our essence and stay in our own lives, lest we be spent.

Agreed. It is a marathon. Runners train hard to be prepared, the same holds true for us.

What kind of person does stuff like that? I hear what you are saying, Copa, and in his mind I guess he thought he was being kind, by seeing us before he left. But that's so cruel.

It is cruel, Albie, what an /$$.

Oh albie I am so sorry for the downward ride on the roller coaster. Your son sounds like mine. I can totally imagine my son doing the same thing. Please let us know when you hear more as I worry about him with you. My hope with my son and I do believe this is that with each rehab and bit of recovery he gets a taste of what life in recovery could be like and wants it more....hopefully at some point the pull of recovery will be stronger than the pull of the drugs.

TL, I think this is a good way to view it. A seed planted. If my daughter evades jail by going to treatment, ready or not, at least she will be able to hear things. Even if she fakes it. It has to permeate somewhere.
One can hope.
My quote thingee is not working again. Albie, you don’t have to to apologize for anything. You have been a blessing with your wisdom and support. I understand your need to regroup, but I have to tell you, I will miss your voice here. A lot.
Much love and hugs
Leafy

 

[Triedntrue]

I understand that you are discouraged and hurt by your sons behavior. I also understand that you need to regroup and need time to recover from this blow to your heart. Your sons mistakes are his to own up to, and he may or may not do that. But do not diminish your role in helping people on this forum. All of us are free to take what we need and leave the rest. You have guided and supported so many of us with kindness and generosity of spirit. Take some time if you need it but remember that many will support you if you need that as well. I just want to say as well that someone i know betrayed his children his family and lost everything to drugs and alcohol at one point . He was in his 40's when he turned his life around. His kids have forgiven and he has a wife who supports him and a successful buisness. There is always hope. I saw the difference in him when he was out of control and i dont believe he targeted those he hurt he just didn't have the strength to care about anybody else. He is a loving and kind person now.

 

[toughlovin]

I cant figure out how to do the quote thing with my ipad.... so just responding here.

My sense Albie... is that the family connection and support has been important and has had an influence.... but the pull of the alcohole/drugs is stronger or was at that moment. I think that is what addicts deal with at times, the pull of the substance is more important than anything else and that includes family. I think part of recovery is somehow changing that. So it is really important to not take your lack of priority in that moment personally.

And Copa.... thank you for your kind words. I have many moments where I am not clear headed believe me. I just had an awful experience the other day dealing with a clerk somewhere over a tax bill for a car my son no longer has telling me I was enabling him. Maybe I was but it really was none of her business.... although I did decide not to pay the bill. LOL.

 

[RN0441]

Albie

Don't feel foolish about your advice. It's so hard to see the forest for the trees when we are in the thick of it.

I, for one, have gotten great advice from you and what happened to your son does not change that one iota.

My son has been sober for a year now but he is in a program and HAS TO BE. Of course, we forced him into it but he could have left (and go where - but so be it).

I told him last week on the phone that I was having a terrible time trying to sort out my feelings about him coming home in November. We moved to a new state and he has a wonderful opportunity to start over. I told him that I did NOT UNDERSTAND HOW someone could give up everyone they love and everything they LOVE for a drug. I just don't get it. HOW.

Crickets on the phone. He had no answer for me. He then said that maybe I'm not supposed to understand. We may never understand this but maybe we have to be at peace with that. I don't know but I will continue to struggle with this.

 

[Copabanana]

He then said that maybe I'm not supposed to understand.

I think this response is kind of wise, RN. And mature. I don't think HE understands. It is like Albatrosses son. They kind of just elevate or descend to another plane which defies understanding, but on that level they want to be there.

I think that is why it takes so many tries, because they keep being unable to resist the allure. Kind of like sirens' songs with Ulysses. Who had to have his crew tie him to the mast. The lure was too great.

I have been out of contact with my own son for about 6 weeks, with only very sporadic contact by text. Today he called to ask if I had gotten mail. I think it was a pretext.

Anyhow, when I checked the mail I texted back, I had not.

He sent a message back that kind of jarred me. He texted:

Remember. I made this decision to find myself. My higher self...

I wrote back: Those are powerful words, J.

And then I began to worry. You see there is NO CONTACT with him that is safe for me.

I worried that, what is he thinking, that he can find his higher self by looking real hard on the street, or by taking a drug? So, I began to panic.

And so unable to help myself I texted back this:

Usually ones higher self is achieved in the course of living life, looking at reality, evaluating what is needed and taking responsibility. A higher self is achieved through sustained practice and decisions and rededication. It is not found like you would find a dollar on the street. A self and life is created, not found, from living well which comes from thousands of choices.

And then I added:

Unless you mean g-d. G-d is always there. And does not require finding, either. Just opening. I believe g-d is all of our higher selves.

And I offered to give him names of books if he was interested, and mentioned I was enrolled in an online Hebrew class.

You see. I keep falling in it. Any communication with him, is too much for me. I cannot bear to have it revealed how he is living and thinking. I cannot bear his reality, and that it become mine.

I can see why I kept him close. However horrible it was I had the illusion that there was safety. With him away, there are no illusions at all. Just the most horrible sensation of falling. My own falling, as much or more, than his.

People. I am going to post this in a new thread.