Sidetracked

This blog needs to be about sex. But, like my life, it has constantly been sidetracked by my addiction.

I live with an emotional abuse and incest survivor. This fact colors every single day of my life. It taints and poisons the most basic and honest of my human impulses – love, affection, intimacy. I need to be growing in patience and love for my wife, learning how to meet her needs and open her heart. I need to be nurturing a place where she can redefine sensuality, in her own time, with someone who loves and cherishes her. This can't happen when she can't trust me.

Shortly after therapy uncovered my wife's abuse, I bought the book Ghosts in the Bedroom, subtitled “A Guide for the Partners of Incest Survivors.” I was desperately looking for help for ME, the guy who felt like a rapist every time he tried to make love to the woman he adored. Instead, one of the first things I read was that most survivors marry people with serious core issues like addiction. The author didn't know me, but he already knew I was an alcoholic.

I was frustrated and angry. I wanted to get to the part that told me how to FIX my wife so she would have sex with me. Instead, I read that our situation could not improve until I took care of my own core issues. I had to deal with my alcoholism before we could learn intimacy.

Here's why this made me mad: because I believed that my drinking problem was her fault. The reason I drank myself to sleep every night on the living room couch was that she was doing her avoidance thing: falling asleep in the kids' rooms, getting a stomach ache, suddenly remembering unfinished paperwork, getting stuck on the phone with a friend. (Her demons were remarkably creative.)

I began the journey of recovery, only to find it much more complex than I'd anticipated. My addiction was “cunning, baffling, powerful.” And it was permanent. I would either be actively working to beat it, or painfully succumbing to it, for the rest of my life. I also learned that it was not Linsey's fault. She could not stop it nor could she cure it. My addiction was, and is, mine.

I never really read beyond chapter three, titled “My Core Issues.” I had a book about supporting an incest survivor, a book that was supposed to help me be the kind of husband who could love her through her hurts and rebuild her understanding of intimacy. But I got hung up on the chapter about MY problems, MY addiction.

And that's what my life feels like. I am angry and disappointed in my marriage. My sexuality and my adoration of my wife feel like heavy, frustrating liabilities. And our progress as a healing couple is repeatedly trashed by my slips.

You might find it really arrogant for me to be complaining. I know I've been the bastard that keeps fucking up. I'd like to stop now. I'd like to allow the books and marriage therapy to work in our lives. There is no shortcut to get there, just a daily choice to stay sober.

[Photo by oba-bobalina under C.C.License]

Possibilities

They're cleaning out my grandparents' house – the rooms are full of boxes and the walls are bare. Grandma's a collector, of things beautiful or sentimental or remotely useful, so there's a lot to go through. The depression generation, or “The Greatest Generation”, according to Grandpa and Tom Brokaw, tends to save things that I would throw away. But they can only fit so much into their new “home”, an assisted living rental, so most of their stuff has to go.

Mom found a flower pot I made for Grandma in the fifth grade. Money was tight that year, so we bought a rainbow set of permanent markers and several white plastic pots, and did the homemade gift thing. We sat on the red brick porch of my childhood home and colored the pots together. To this day, I still get a little zing of excitement when I see a brand new pack of red and yellow and green Sharpies, like a kid opening a new box of Crayolas. Mom doesn't remember making the flower pots at all. She was me – parent of a ten-year-old, broke and overwhelmed, making the best out of what she had.

My Ashley is in the fifth grade, and I see her becoming a little person, moving out of my shadow and into her own world. At her age, I was organizing my desk and books and Star Wars collection, building my own little organized kingdom. I was winning piano competitions, composing music, getting straight A's, and making flower pots. I had my own clock radio and I set the alarm early so I could look handsome for school in my gray corduroy pants and button-up shirts. Like Ashley's, my world was full of possibilities. Like Ashley, I thought I was hot stuff. I knew I could accomplish anything.

I accomplished something this month. I directed a musical. Into this task I poured everything I know about arranging music, staging transitions, working with artistic people (not easy), scheduling rehearsals, audio and lighting and video projection, publicity. It was my magnum opus, so far, and it turned out absolutely incredible. We drew the highest attendance our church has ever seen for a single event, and everyone seemed thrilled. What I was most proud of was this: a few people who have never really connected found their place to shine, and truly became a part of our church family. That's what it's all about. That's why I work at a church – it's more about the people than the art.

Then I took a week off, and instead of going back to all the recovery meetings I'd been missing, I slept and tuned out. So halfway through the week I used, which shouldn't really be any surprise. I spent a month ignoring my sobriety, suppressing my anger and resentments until the show was over. What did I expect? If you've been reading me for a while, you might be sick of my broken record life story, but not as tired of it as Linsey. She asked me what I would do different this time, and I didn't know what to tell her but this: I have to keep doing the right things, even after the first couple of weeks. I can stay sober when I'm go to meetings and pray, when I do my step work and my reading. I can't when I don't. I'm grateful to be back.

[This post also at TheSecondRoad.org]

Entwined - Me and My Codependent

I relapsed. I was prescribed Vicodin for a back injury and I thought I could handle it. I was proud that I told my wife immediately about the prescription, gave her the bottle and let her dole out the pills. But I started banking them, saving them up and taking handfuls at the end of the day so I could get a little rush.

Years ago we volunteered with a foster child, a tough one who stayed in the highest security group homes. They'd give him his little cup of anti-depressants and anti-psychotics and then check under his tongue to make sure he'd swallowed, rather than pulling the pills back out and selling them on the group home black market. If I ever have an injury severe enough to justify something more than ibuprofen, I guess that's what I would need.

During my Vicodin time, me and Linsey had a huge fight, and I went on to a couple nights of porn and dextromethorphan, and that's all I really want to say about that. If you've read my blog before, you know I've struggled to find “long term sobriety”, but I'll keep trying.

There's been so many other blog-worthy things going on, but I've been avoiding this place because, well, you know – just didn't feel like saying “relapse” again. So now that it's out of the way...

I'm learning about codependents. I'm beginning to understand my wife, and the way that we work together, two parts of a twisted machine. It occurs to me that I've been frustrated for years when I watch her defend the drug-addled antics of her family. As a card-carrying addict, it is so very obvious to me when somebody is using.

When we met my brother-in-law Jason at a restaurant this weekend, everyone was excited about his birthday except Jason, who was so stoned that he didn't even know it was his birthday. He told us the stories, all true, about his road-rage fist fight (he put a guy in the hospital), the nerve damage, the prescription morphine. His ex, the one that he's sharing the house with until they're evicted, told us he's seeing two different doctors (who don't know about each other) and taking eight pain-related prescriptions.

Jason recently admitted he's an alcoholic, but he's not working any program. He's “trying to stop drinking”, but he's currently going through a separation, losing his kid, losing his house, already lost his job, has uncontrollable rage, and is on eight different painkillers. I love him, my heart breaks for him, I want to be there for him when he's ready to get help, but let's call a spade a spade – he's in active addiction. My wife kept explaining to me at the restaurant that he's just on a strong prescription, and that's what was causing the profuse sweating and inability to make eye contact or complete sentences.

No wonder she's put up with me so long.

I believe any knowledge, any perspective-increasing glimpse, is progress. Have I benefited from Linsey's tendency towards denial? Yes and no. I'm still living at home, I keep getting “second” chances, she's showed me patience while I've continued to work. I am not giving up on me or us, and I've learned from each of my relapses. (Lesson #47: No Vicodin, no matter what.) But I know what Jason needs to hear right now: We love you and we want to help. Let's go to a meeting together. I know what it feels like to be trapped in your world. Not denial. Not justification.

Besides the obvious, this has been a great few months. I've felt joy – real joy – more than I have in a long time. It's like it just bubbles up, out of nowhere. My sponsor says it's because I'm really working the steps and making progress. He says you can't really explain the inner workings of the black box, but when you put good stuff in, good stuff comes out.

That's what I'm focusing on. And those nagging little signs that foreshadow a slip.

[Image by happyjester32] [This post also at The Second Road]

Switching Addictions

I'm addicted to Snus. Stupid little tobacco-ish pouches being pushed by 7-11's for people like me, who want the zing of nicotine without the social stigma of smoking or spitting. Reviews talk about them tasting more like candy than tobacco, but they'll give you mouth cancer all the same. I recently discovered that my (sober) alcoholic cousin shared my interest in the little pouches, so I told him how I like to stuff two or three in my mouth at the same time. After all, the American version contains only 6g of tobacco versus the Swedish 24g.

Pretty clear indication that I need to amp up my efforts. I'm looking for comfort in the wrong places, leaning on chemicals instead of truth, people, program, and my Higher Power. When my cousin quit, cold turkey, a couple of weeks ago I thought I should do the same. I later found myself digging the discarded little tin out of a trash can full of, among other things, dog shit. I thought of Charlie in the first season of “Lost” digging through an airplane toilet where he'd hidden packets of heroin. I also thought of this video by 80's sketch comedy troupe “Kids in the Hall.”

Goodbye Charlie

The hardest thing about losing Charlie was handing him over to the receptionist in the pet emergency room. He was cold and unresponsive, wrapped in a towel in my arms, and didn't even look back at me as he was whisked away through a door marked “Employees Only.” I was wet and cold from the rain, but he wasn't. I'd been rubbing his little body in the car, driving with one hand, and telling him, “it's okay little buddy, just stay with me for few more minutes. We're almost to the doctor's.” It was midnight. I never saw him again.

Charlie was a “replacement dog.” Just before Christmas we lost our beagle of eleven years. (I'm still not ready to post about that one.) We rescued Charlie from the pound shortly after. He was a spindly tan chihuahua, with dark eyes and a head too small for his body and ears too big for his head. He lived in our home for only eighteen days. He felt it was his right to sleep on top of my head, so I learned to push him aside and let him burrow into the crook of my neck.

He was sick the last couple of days, and James yelled at him when Charlie threw up in his lap. Charlie ran into my bedroom where I was resting, hopped up next to me crying, and nuzzled under my chin. He'd already been in trouble for his house-training mistakes, and this reprimand was just one too many. Despite the messes, that was a good day.

Wrapped in a white towel, Charlie looked helpless and even smaller than he really was, like some kind of Eastern European war orphan, pale and worn and quiet. The x-rays were inconclusive, but the vet knew something was seriously wrong with his abdomen. He was in excruciating pain. I signed papers and left him overnight for a series of x-rays as barium was passed through his system.

What is it about crisis that wakes all my demons? Driving home in the early morning hours was an exercise in choosing to stay on the narrow path. The streetlights and the rain colluded to excite my senses and I felt those familiar tingles of the illicit in that forbidden hour. It is good to know that ultimately I chose not to add the sickening lost-ness of relapse into the unavoidable chaos of that night.

I was deep in a confusing dream or nightmare when the phone woke me up at 4:30. Charlie had “coded” three times, and did I want to continue with life saving measures? “Well, yeah, I guess” was all I could come up with. What do you say to that? Ten minutes later I was finally off of hold. The vet, who had been mostly positive and very competent, was now hoarse and breathy. Charlie's heart had started, but his brain was probably gone. It was time to let go.

I spoke with a friend in recovery the day before Charlie died. We discovered a mutual secret: that during the rocky chapters of our marriage, when affection was running dry, our dogs helped fill in the gap. Sometimes meetings and books and phone calls just can't measure up to that warm furry snuggle, to hearing another soul breathing in the darkness. If you're not a dog person, I'm sorry if that's weird for you, that's just the way it is.

Charlie died of a a perforated bowel. Despite his penchant for chewing, there was nothing detectable in his intestines, and I was told it was probably from a defect that existed before we even adopted him. All I heard was this: there wasn't much else we could have done. It was just his time. He was a gift and a joy. Thanks, my little friend. I really do miss you.

Snow Day, Delayed

Linsey got mad when I told her. I think I need to be home tomorrow. I promise we'll find another day to go to the snow. I could have just kept my mouth shut – been a good dad, a good husband. We were driving home from the office Christmas party, where I'd been a good employee and a good pastor, so why quit now?

On the other hand, a couple of days ago I was melting into the couch, summoning just enough energy to operate the mouse so I could play Chuzzle on PopCap.com. (Don't worry, I'm not getting any endor$ement kickback.) Pretty much being a sloth, you know? And Linsey's buzzing around the house, doing laundry and bills and dishes, and she says, “I'm glad you're listening to your body.” Which means “I'm glad you're relaxing.” And she was serious! At least I think she was...sometimes our conversations sound like that episode of The Simpsons:

Disaffected youth #1: Here comes that cannonball guy. He's cool.
Disaffected youth #2: Are you being sarcastic, dude?
Disaffected youth #1: I don't even know anymore.

Hyper-irony rules!

We did find another day to go to the snow. It's become a tradition: We drive to the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway and ride it up the mountain for a few hours of snow and breathtaking nighttime views of the surrounding desert. No mountain driving, no snow chains, and a chocolate shake from Bakers Drive-Thru on the way home. (Again, no endorsement kickback, just an attempt at local color.) Every year I tell James not to worry because they've fixed the cables and none of the aerial trams have fallen out of the sky for at least a month. He always says, “You're lying, dad. You're just making that up.” But I know that somewhere deep inside, I've made him just a teeny, tiny bit nervous, and this is the fun of being a dad, right?

So I followed through on my promise to reschedule the family snow day, which makes me feel even better about “listening to my body” the first time around, and insisting on down time. I relapsed during Christmas of 2008, because I did the good pastor/dad/husband thing until I was dead inside, resentful of everyone and everything. I'm committed to taking care of myself during these times that I tend to blow it – namely Christmas, Easter and vacation. After the snow thing Linsey just asked me to try and tell her earlier next time, so she wouldn't feel so disappointed. I'll try. But sometimes you don't know you're wiped out until you're in the middle of things.

Which is, I guess, what happened here on my blog. I just needed a break, and I took it. A heart-felt thank you to all of you who checked in on me and made sure I was okay. I am, I think. I'm sober, doing things one day at a time, trying my best to balance crazy-Christmas-program-times with chuzzle-on-the-couch times. And I'm grateful for both.

This post is also at TheSecondRoad.org

Ninety Days

It's late and I'm tired. But I'm going to try something that I've not really tried before: Structure.

Since it "works if you work it" and I used again yesterday, I think it's time to work it.

To the four or five people who read this blog and know me personally, I haven't told everyone yet that I'm starting over, again. Tonight I told my Friday night group and my sponsor. And now I'm telling you. That's all I can handle for today.

So without fanfare or drama or swearing or crying, this is my plan, based on the suggestions of those wiser than me:

Ninety meetings in ninety days.
A phone call a day, to my sponsor or another friend in recovery.
Continued service in my Tuesday and Friday meetings.
Daily quiet time that includes each of these things: reading from my recovery bible, reading from recovery literature, written step-work, prayer, and my daily inventory.

These are the things I am going to do whether I feel like it or not. (What a concept!) I must do them because I can't stay sober without them, and if I don't learn to stay sober, I am going to lose my family and my job. I am going to lose Linsey, and I adore Linsey. She is the joy of my life.

Of course, there are many other pieces that I need to fit into my life. It helps me to be here in blogland most days, either posting or reading your blogs. I am overwhelmed at your kind and helpful comments and your encouragement. So I'd like to try to post most days for the next few months. (To do this, I probably need to post slightly shorter, less cerebral posts.) I want to spend more time with my kids. I need to eat better and get off the couch more. These are all important, but not as important as the non-negotiables listed above.

I'm not just an addict. I know there's something here worth saving.

Unreachable Pie

I'm in that familiar post-relapse conundrum. A poisonous emotional mixture that's usually buried is now very accessible. I know for a fact that these emotions were already bubbling up; my inability to handle them contributed to my relapse in the first place. And once I start using, everything I've been suppressing comes spilling out in an orgy of self-pity and resentment. So it is with the alcoholic. The Big Book nails it on this point.

When I'm healthy and sober, I sometimes find it difficult to pinpoint exactly what I'm angry about. That is not my problem this week.

On the other hand, I'm pretty much in the doghouse, for lack of a better phrase. I screwed up. Right now seems like the absolute least appropriate time to bring up the things in my marriage that I'm mad about. I mean, what kind of a jackass complains about his sex life after relapsing for the umpteenth time?

I broke the trust of someone who has some pretty serious trust issues to begin with: an incest-survivor. For Linsey, the “survivor” part meant becoming a full-fledged adult somewhere around the age of eleven, and building walls that are tall and strong and impenetrable enough that no one would hurt her again, ever. As I've said before, look at us: The untrusting and the untrust-worthy. What a pair.

And yet, here we are. And once she says “I miss you and I want you again,” we get back to work. “Work” is the right word. I used to think about how awesome it would be to go to sex therapy, and come home with sex assignments. That's the kind of homework that you can look forward to, right? Not so much. Turns out it's mind-games, tedious conversations, passionless high-effort encounters, and triggers upon triggers, like walking through a mine-field. And once in a while, if the stars align just so, when we least expect to find nirvana, we stumble into a tenderness that is mutual and full of warmth and excitement. Just often enough to remind us that it's possible, that we're not chasing after a mirage. Just often enough to whet my appetite for more, and to make me realize how truly hungry I am for her.

Restaurants sometimes display your dessert choices using artificial models of apple pie a-la-mode and Boston cream pie behind a glass counter. They know how it works: You might be planning on saving that extra money or avoiding a few calories, but a convincing enough vision of a decadent hot fudge cake just might change your mind. Of course, when you order, you're not served a foam rubber, plastic and spray-paint concoction, but the real thing. At this point, only an actual dessert would satisfy your appetite.

I am married to a woman who is beautiful and charming. She makes me laugh like no one else. I am also married to an incest survivor. I'm tired of staring through the glass at my dessert.

[Photo by DigiDi under C.C.License]
This post also at TheSecondRoad.org

One More Do-Over

Been sailing some choppy seas of late. Despite my failure to post here, I've stayed well connected in my recovery circles. I've had to – the beast came back.

I'm not looking for pity or shame. You poured out compassion and good advice when I slipped last month. I can't tell you how much I appreciated your words. I guess I just wasn't really ready to listen. Even though I stopped using, I spiraled down further, into depression and self-destruction. Then I used for a week. Then I asked for help and stopped it again.

I scared people who care about me. Their focus shifted from “How can we keep Eli from using?” to “How can we keep Eli alive?” At this moment, I don't have a clear picture of what the hell happened. From where I stand, it's a blur of DXM and lies, razor blades and adrenaline, porn and cigarettes. But no tears or screaming. Just a muted and futile and desperate attempt to run far away from home, only to end up right back in my living room, dizzy and afraid.

I'm alive and breathing, and I'm facing the right direction. I've spoken to the people who know me best and I'm listening to their counsel. I'm taking it one day at a time, and trying to rebuild from where I left off. I have a few basics that I'm holding on to. One of these is that I'm not going to kill myself. I'm just not. My dad asked me to stave off any self-destructive thoughts by picturing my own funeral, and my kids crying. That seems to be working for now.

As far as my addictions, I'm spending my time working my program and enjoying the good things that are in my life. (Mainly my chihuahua.) I have this complicated mess of marital problems, psychiatric loose ends, and addictive coping mechanisms – and I'm trying not to think too hard about any of it. Today, I see it basically like this: My marriage has improved, but like any journey of the human heart, there are wounds that run deeper than I can bear. These are my triggers. I have a right to call it like it is: we've got a long ways to go. At the same time, I must develop the tools and resources necessary to respond to these triggers without self-medicating. That's my job, my side of the street.

Today my wife and I kissed again. We aired our feelings, gave them the space they needed, and owned up to our shit. And I know that my story, especially this month's events, makes a mess of the lines we are supposed to draw in the addict-codependent relationship. I've read your posts. I've read of those who are staying, those who are leaving, those who are in agony as they try to find the right path. All I can relay is where my road has taken me. My Linsey is here, and I am here, and today we chose again to walk in the same direction.

Drugs - The Good Kind

This is not what I thought it would feel like to be 35, I told Linsey. She asked what I meant: Did I think I'd be the Composer in Residence for some college orchestra? More successful, career-wise? A better dad?

Not really more of anything, actually. The only way I knew to say it was, I thought I would be less lost.

The weeks after a relapse, even a quickly aborted one, are inevitably brutal. I've screwed up my brain chemistry: things that should feel good feel bland, things that should feel bad feel excruciatingly painful. Food for thought next time I get a “bright idea.”

But this one goes deeper. In this chapter of my life I find myself haunted by some of my more tenacious demons. Sometimes my sobriety feels like a game of Jenga. I think all of the pieces are there, that my stability is secure, and by a mistake of omission I pull a cornerstone. Each time the tower falls, I relearn the importance of vigilance.

I can learn much during this post-relapse period, as I tear away the band-aids that my addiction has plastered over my wounds. When I manage these hurts in healthy ways, I am prone to forget they are there. (I guess that's called healing.) But when I wake up from my addiction, there's a unique opportunity to look at whatever I was running from. What void was I filling with all the wrong things?

So I'm realizing that I've been a little sloppy in treating my depression. First, the usual caveats: depression is not an excuse for my relapse. And I'm not suggesting psychiatric treatment as a substitute for a rigorous 12-step program - depression and addiction are not the same thing. But, in my life at least, they feed into each other, in a wickedly symbiotic manner that leaves me no option but to face them both down, unflinchingly and relentlessly.

A week after I used, I left one of my regular meetings feeling supported and encouraged. I don't know what happened on the way home that night, but the bottom dropped out of my world. I took off my seat belt and took my van past 110 mph, praying to be killed in an accident. I'm either too chicken-shit or too grounded to ever follow through, so I talked myself down from the ledge and went home and called someone. I'm proud that I picked up the phone that night. People came over, we talked, I felt loved. After they left I carved myself up with a razor blade. I've been doing this for years and I never talk about it, because to talk about it seems self-important, like a “cry for help.” The silence has not served me well, so I'm ending it.

Obviously there are pieces of my relapse in that night, shards of guilt and shame and self-loathing that are achingly familiar. There is also a kind of narcissism in any self-destructive act. But I know that there is also a component of under-treated major depressive disorder-recurrent that I cannot afford to minimize. I know this for a fact. I know it because I've been on and off medication for all of my adult life, and I know what the “brain chemistry” part of depression feels like. I know what if feels like to be properly medicated, and this isn't it.

Towards the end of my college years, I gave a composition recital. I also tried to kill myself. My acceptance at that point of the inescapable roll of prescribed psychotropic medications in my life was tinged with sadness. I feared that if I medicated the blackest parts of my mind, the colors would fade as well. They did not. During this time, I fell in love with a child and lost her, and every shade of compassion and heartbreak I experienced was vivid, sharp, saturated. I composed the most honest and moving pieces of my career, all while under the treatment of a psychiatrist.

I guess the “recurrent” in my depression diagnosis was true. I guess it's time to put in some more work on that front.

[Photo by size8jeans under C.C.License]

This post is also at The Second Road.