Who is Responsible?

Folks over the years ~

The good, the bad and sometimes the very ugly

have come to Detox and Addiction treatment doors.

Fortunately, good has far outweighed bad and ugly.

Active addiction fostered, enhanced or created

unacceptable behaviour and unsavoury circumstances

unreliable qualities and for some - criminal activity - petty to unspeakable.

Some are just flat scary or maybe only unlikable.

In community, keeping a healthy distance may be warranted.

In a health care setting, it is not ours to turn away

or snub our noses at them.

(An aside:  There are many with those same traits that may never have touched a drop or a drug.)

And are those, whether active in addiction or recovery,

responsible for any wrongs they may have wrought?

Definitely and of course.

But, what does it truly take?

to care for those seeking sobriety

to keep a community safe from 

the behaviours of active addiction.

Such a complex problem ~

There is no one ‘type’ of person that has 

heart disease or cancer

diabetes or lung disease

addiction or alcoholism

There may be some sort of similar genetic make up

(five genes are involved in the disease of addiction)

creating similarities and propensities,

but who is really responsible?

Of course, there is the oft heard excuse:

I’m an alcoholic - that’s why I _________

I’m an addict - that’s why I ________

So who is responsible and when does that responsibility start?

Behaviours and attitudes gleaned from 

infant to child, 

teen to adult

culminate in the belief that “It’s just the way I am”  

Aha!  our parents are responsible..........no?

Our characters may have been influenced by our upbringing and 

how we thought about responsibility, 

but in the long run, individually, 

we are each responsible 

for the development of our attitudes and our behaviour.

“Eventually we all have to accept full and total responsibility for 

our actions,everything we have done, and have not done.”

~ Hubert Selby Jr., Requiem for a Dream

Direction

Where do I go from here?

I’ve been to this place before more than once.

Heard dreadful, vicious words

Revolving door and frequent flyer

Rubbie, skid row bum and drunk

Bar fly, drug fiend, and souse

Junkie and needle jockey

Just plain no good

Addiction

Believing and knowing that 

at least one of them was me

and always would be to someone

Trying to 

stand on my own two feet

clear my mind of trash and debris

scrub my heart clean

fit in

Feeling like

someone that shouldn’t be

didn’t deserve to be

yet wanted to be

knew I could be

Erasing past deeds

memories firmly attached

an impossible task

becoming renewed in the face

of labels and brands

Where do I go from here?

To the end of each step

doing the next right thing

Proud

of who I am

of who I am becoming

of what I am doing

Because this is a place

that I’ve been before

A launch pad to living the life I now choose.

“The great thing in the world is not so much where we stand,

as in what direction we are moving.”

~ Oliver Wendell Holmes

A Letter to Bernie

Hi Bernie,

How are you and what’s it like in the great beyond? If your mom and dad are there with you, please give them my best. I think of you often when I’m at work at Detox. You were one of my very first patients in Chemical Dependency. Later we worked together while you went to Texas Tech and got your Master’s in Education and following that we worked together again - you as one of the counselor’s and educators, me as one of the nurses.

Two of my favourite memories of you are the first time I took care of you and later on something you shared with us at the treatment center where we both worked.

As my patient you were stubborn and arrogant, unwilling to even look at the types and amounts of pills you were taking. Mention of your dad just put your back up because you were ‘never going to be like him’.  And you weren’t ~ he died of lung disease, but was sober and had been sober for many years. In those early years you knew nothing of relapse, and maybe didn’t really believe it could happen to you. And so, you unfortunately relapsed after a long period of clean and sober time and died of this nasty, horrible disease of active addiction.

We were all so proud of you at the treatment center. In between the time you were my patient and your too early death, we watched you go through a chemical dependency treatment program, graduate university obtaining a Master’s in Education, and returning to where you had begun your journey - but this time as one of the counselor’s. Your time as a counselor surrounds the second memory. It was your belief, and I concur, that all recovered folks in the early years of sobriety are ‘flaming co-dependents’ and have a lot of work to do to repair relationships. You worked well with patients and their families bringing them hope and help, directing them to the supports that they required to maintain their lives when they had chosen sobriety.

I was greatly saddened when I learned of your death after all of the work that you put into your recovery and the recovery of others. The manner of your death was so very unfortunate, but the good that you did in the years before your relapse was profound. Just know that lessons that you taught me from that beginning stubborn arrogant individual and later on, from the counselor are still used and shared by this nurse.

Thanks for all that you gave to me and to others,

Take care,

Susan

“Relapse is part of the disease of addiction. It’s something that’s 

going to literally slap them in the face when they walk out the doors.”

~ Nicole Lockhart

Recognition

You don’t recognize me

he said

I know your blue eyes

she said

Clean and sober five years

he said

I know your broad smile!

she said

This is my wife and son

he said

Your family’s happy again

she said

I told you I’d come back

he said

You promised that you would 

she said

Thank you for kindness and respect

he said

You put your life in my hands

She said

Recovery from addiction adds day upon day

he said

You took your life in your own hands

she said

“You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.”

~ Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince

Flying Free

Happy endings are possible

Tragedy and death not the only outcome

Songs of blue skies not dark skies tell of so much more

Back to school

Off to work

Raise a family

Learn a trade or profession

Expand education

Participate in and support community

At the beginning

the word ‘addiction’ sinks like a stone 

into a heart broken, beaten or bruised

in great waves of shame and sadness

when the meaning is in no doubt.

Years of detox and treatment

all for the others and others and others

gathered bits and bobs here and there

knowledge and lessons

connections and health

Is it easy? Not so much ~

shedding set habits and old friends

like skin that has clung too long

finding new habits and new friends

feeling lost and alone

clarity of thought a frightening stranger.

Can it be done?

Sure thing - change occurs

at different paces over time.

with commitment

with intention

full benefits of living differently dawn slowly

“Since we cannot change reality, let us

change the eyes which see reality.”

~ Nikos Kazantzakis

Dreams and Secrets

Dreams and Secrets

Bill sat back in his big armchair and closed tired eyes scrunched under bushy brows and a furrowed forehead. His back ached, his whole body hurt somewhere - everywhere. He was worried. Not worried about pain as much as he was worried about a part of his past that threatened his life today.

No one knew. Not even his wife of 45 years. He had carried a secret from another time, another place when he had a really big problem with heroin. The big ‘H’ is what they called it. He  hadn’t thought it was that bad, but he knew then that he had to stop before it did get bad. And he had promised himself that he’d never use needles so he did stop when he was tempted. He had been 25 years old and had dreams to chase. After putting the heroin, and most of the alcohol, down he never looked back. The years had been good to him - and dammit - he had been good to the years he had lived.

At 25, the word addiction was being used all too frequently around him in the small mountain town where he lived. To his knowledge there had been no drugs addicts in his family. Drinking was limited to occasional after dinner wine and for gatherings on weekends. He became the black sheep and was slowly being edged out. Edged out of the town and out of the family.

Now here he was, 75 years old. Not rich, but comfortable. A good wife, wonderful kids and even more wonderful grandkids. But he was too tired to be the family man that he had been. He missed that. A lot.  There was always a wedding or graduation or something to celebrate. If he took enough pills he could manage and with a drink or two he might even enjoy it. But it was the pills..the pills...

He dozed off and dreamt of that time long ago when he had started chasing his dreams. The excitement and maybe even a bit of glamour now and then. Then the dream shifted ~ he was old, twisted and wracked with pain while he shuffled frantically through piles of papers for prescriptions and pills......prescriptions and pills.....

“William! You’re dreaming. Whatever is the matter? You were mumbling something about pills and prescriptions.”

“Sarah?..... Oh, nothing, just a bit of heartburn after that great meal we had with Joe and Beatrice. You know how heartburn gives me bad dreams ~ I was dreaming of those wonderful new anti acid pills and trying to find the prescription the doctor gave me. Here, help me up and I'll go find them.”

Bill pasted a smile on his face, kissed his still lovely wife on the forehead and smoothed her gray curls. “You’re still my girl, you know.”

“I know, sweetie, let’s shut out the lights and go to bed. You look so tired and sore tonight.”

“Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets.”

~  Paul Tournier