Friday, two days from now, I will reach the halfway point of IOP. Five weeks down, five to go. Part of me can't wait for it to be over -- driving to Merrifield at rush hour is no fun at all, and certain aspects of Pat's method aren't exactly suited to me. Last night, for example, the topic was "Spirituality" (always in caps), how we define it, and Higher Power, and what it means to us and our recovery, etc. I had to be honest and say it meant very little to me, and that I was fine with that. Science, I said, is my Higher Power, and when a doctor tells me that if I go down this road again I won't come back, that means more to me than any sermon. Pat seems to appreciate my honesty on topics like this; still, it's a bit tiresome.
On the other hand, going to these meetings gives me something to do, and I must admit I have come to look forward to seeing people, regardless of the setting. I imagine I will eventually make it to the Monday-night SMART group, and even hit the Unity Club again for AA once IOP ends, just for something to do.
Tonight we were engaged in the de rigeur "awareness exercise" when a lightning storm struck. Whatever beneficial effects I may have gotten from it were instantly obliterated by the headache that lasted the rest of the night. I have mentioned my brain injury only sparingly in the group, since that's incidental to my presence there. Besides, I really don't like discussing it very much.
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Rehab group so far
Yesterday marked the end of my 4th week of Intensive Outpatient rehab, meaning I'm a week from the midway point. This consists of attending a group counseling session three times weekly for three hours, during which we may be given Breathalyzer and/or drug screens (urine tests). By the end of Week 2, I was already fourth in seniority; two guys successfully completed the 10-week program while several others, whom I never met, left for reasons which Patricia, the "facilitator," did not specify. Every week a new person, almost always male, joins the group, which now numbers 10 or 11.
When I began only one other guy, Brad, was there for opiates -- the rest were alcoholics. Now the balance is roughly 50-50. I am a "switch hitter" in that I was both drinking and drugging, and a couple others say they probably fall into that category as well. One guy, Brian, is a former heroin user who lately began snorting Ritalin to such a degree that he is now living in a home for recovering addicts. He has a wife and four small children. Another, Greg, became hooked on Oxycontin (also Brad's drug of choice), although unlike Brad he evidently came upon the pills legally. Last week came Tommy, a life-long junkie, and just this week the first girl, whose name escapes me at the moment, joined us. She too is there for opiates.
A few new alcoholics have joined too, both on their second attempt at sobriety. The first, whose name I also forget, had seven years' good behavior, was "working the steps" in AA, and was even sponsoring a few people. But he hurt himself while training for a marathon, and rather than get the injury treated decided to "let nature take its course" by letting the body heal itself. Unfortunately, nature in his case also included drinking. And only yesterday did we meet Doug -- like most first-timers he didn't share much of his story, other than to say this was his second time around.
Relapse is never far from the surface at these meetings. Toward the end of one session, during which the AA guy told about his fall from grace, Brian was noticeably agitated. "I really didn't like today," he said, "hearing stories about people relapsing scares me." It didn't exactly help that he had downed about four caffiene-laden energy drinks that afternoon. Still, he wasn't the only one in the room wondering if the same fate awaited us: confident former hopheads heading blithely into a minefield of our own making, doomed to reconvene in a room like this, a few years from now.
When I began only one other guy, Brad, was there for opiates -- the rest were alcoholics. Now the balance is roughly 50-50. I am a "switch hitter" in that I was both drinking and drugging, and a couple others say they probably fall into that category as well. One guy, Brian, is a former heroin user who lately began snorting Ritalin to such a degree that he is now living in a home for recovering addicts. He has a wife and four small children. Another, Greg, became hooked on Oxycontin (also Brad's drug of choice), although unlike Brad he evidently came upon the pills legally. Last week came Tommy, a life-long junkie, and just this week the first girl, whose name escapes me at the moment, joined us. She too is there for opiates.
A few new alcoholics have joined too, both on their second attempt at sobriety. The first, whose name I also forget, had seven years' good behavior, was "working the steps" in AA, and was even sponsoring a few people. But he hurt himself while training for a marathon, and rather than get the injury treated decided to "let nature take its course" by letting the body heal itself. Unfortunately, nature in his case also included drinking. And only yesterday did we meet Doug -- like most first-timers he didn't share much of his story, other than to say this was his second time around.
Relapse is never far from the surface at these meetings. Toward the end of one session, during which the AA guy told about his fall from grace, Brian was noticeably agitated. "I really didn't like today," he said, "hearing stories about people relapsing scares me." It didn't exactly help that he had downed about four caffiene-laden energy drinks that afternoon. Still, he wasn't the only one in the room wondering if the same fate awaited us: confident former hopheads heading blithely into a minefield of our own making, doomed to reconvene in a room like this, a few years from now.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
The Addict Mind
Been awhile since I wrote anything here. I have not attended another AA meeting, not that I was particularly turned off by the one I attended, I just don't have much time and between brain injury group and rehab group I am kinda grouped out. I do want to attend a SMART meeting (a sort of secular form of AA), but the only meet on Monday night, and the past two Mondays I've been too tired to go. It will happen, maybe next week.
Some good news and some bad news on the whole rehab thing. The good news: While cleaning out my endtable this weekend I happened upon an old bottle of morphine. I was really hurting, as I have been ever since leaving the hospital, so a brief bit of pain relief would have been welcome. But the consequences would have been substantial: not only the guilt associated with failure, but the prospect of being kicked out of the rehab program at Fairfax Hospital. I shared the incident with the IOP group tonight; the substitute facilitator (Patricia was out sick) said a failed urine test would probably have resulted in me being sent to the 4-day program, meaning inpatient care, screwing up my schedule with Marielle, not to mention higher cost, etc. All for a pill that probably wouldn't have done much for my pain anyway.
The bad news: I yielded to temptation and bought a pack of cigarettes yesterday, rationalizing that smoking helps with my headaches. They do to some extent, but the real reason, I suspect, is that smoking is substituting for more immediately harmful addictive behaviors. I really don't know. I didn't really have the kind of craving for opiates that the addicts in my rehab group describe. Nor for that matter did it even occur to me to stop by the liquor store, which is right next to the pharmacy where I picked up a prescription (and the pack of smokes).
I have smoked on and off for about 30 years, mostly off. The first time I was 20, and it was almost divine intervention. I was working construction one summer in Richmond, Va., an environment where the "smoke break" is practically mandated. Plus, my roommate at the time, and Indian named Pradeep, had a friend working at Phillip Morris, then as now one of the largest tobacco companies in the world. As a weekly perq, PM gave every employee a carton of cigarettes whether they smoked or not. Pradeep's friend did not, so he gave the carton to us. Soon we were drowning in Merit 100s! Whether by force of will, or by lack of free cigs, I gradually quit the habit after leaving Richmond, although looking back I don't think I quit altogether for several years. In any case, I was not a pack-a-day type.
Most recently, around 2006, I found a pack of Marlboro Lights in my daughter Krista's room. For some stupid reason, I thought it would be interesting to see what it felt like to have a cigarette again, even though by that time I hadn't smoked a cigarette for at least a decade. Stupid decision. Still, it did seem to make my headaches more bearable. I began to smoke maybe 8 to 10 cigarettes a day within a few months, and continued until about 6 months ago. That's when I began to notice a burning sensation in my throat, which I feared was cancer ... or something. I quit cold turkey and went to my doctor who told me it was probably acid reflux (I didn't tell him I had smoked, like the genius I am), and he told me to take Previcid. The problem went gradually went away. As I had done a number of times by that point, I stopped smoking, on the assumption that this would be it.
For now I will focus on the positive. I haven't had any interest in drinking since crashing and burning last month, and I'm pretty sure I never was truly addicted to pain killers in the first place. But hearing the alcoholics in my rehab group talk about relapsing after many years of sobriety, I know better than to get cocky about this kind of thing. One month is nothing. I went five years without drinking after my accident, and look what happened.
Some good news and some bad news on the whole rehab thing. The good news: While cleaning out my endtable this weekend I happened upon an old bottle of morphine. I was really hurting, as I have been ever since leaving the hospital, so a brief bit of pain relief would have been welcome. But the consequences would have been substantial: not only the guilt associated with failure, but the prospect of being kicked out of the rehab program at Fairfax Hospital. I shared the incident with the IOP group tonight; the substitute facilitator (Patricia was out sick) said a failed urine test would probably have resulted in me being sent to the 4-day program, meaning inpatient care, screwing up my schedule with Marielle, not to mention higher cost, etc. All for a pill that probably wouldn't have done much for my pain anyway.
The bad news: I yielded to temptation and bought a pack of cigarettes yesterday, rationalizing that smoking helps with my headaches. They do to some extent, but the real reason, I suspect, is that smoking is substituting for more immediately harmful addictive behaviors. I really don't know. I didn't really have the kind of craving for opiates that the addicts in my rehab group describe. Nor for that matter did it even occur to me to stop by the liquor store, which is right next to the pharmacy where I picked up a prescription (and the pack of smokes).
I have smoked on and off for about 30 years, mostly off. The first time I was 20, and it was almost divine intervention. I was working construction one summer in Richmond, Va., an environment where the "smoke break" is practically mandated. Plus, my roommate at the time, and Indian named Pradeep, had a friend working at Phillip Morris, then as now one of the largest tobacco companies in the world. As a weekly perq, PM gave every employee a carton of cigarettes whether they smoked or not. Pradeep's friend did not, so he gave the carton to us. Soon we were drowning in Merit 100s! Whether by force of will, or by lack of free cigs, I gradually quit the habit after leaving Richmond, although looking back I don't think I quit altogether for several years. In any case, I was not a pack-a-day type.
Most recently, around 2006, I found a pack of Marlboro Lights in my daughter Krista's room. For some stupid reason, I thought it would be interesting to see what it felt like to have a cigarette again, even though by that time I hadn't smoked a cigarette for at least a decade. Stupid decision. Still, it did seem to make my headaches more bearable. I began to smoke maybe 8 to 10 cigarettes a day within a few months, and continued until about 6 months ago. That's when I began to notice a burning sensation in my throat, which I feared was cancer ... or something. I quit cold turkey and went to my doctor who told me it was probably acid reflux (I didn't tell him I had smoked, like the genius I am), and he told me to take Previcid. The problem went gradually went away. As I had done a number of times by that point, I stopped smoking, on the assumption that this would be it.
For now I will focus on the positive. I haven't had any interest in drinking since crashing and burning last month, and I'm pretty sure I never was truly addicted to pain killers in the first place. But hearing the alcoholics in my rehab group talk about relapsing after many years of sobriety, I know better than to get cocky about this kind of thing. One month is nothing. I went five years without drinking after my accident, and look what happened.
Thursday, May 3, 2012
So many groups ...
In addition to the TBI group I've attended for the past dozen years or so, I am now obliged to attend Intensive Outpatient (IOP) group therapy meetings, which are held 3 times a week, 3 hours per meeting, over 10 weeks. As if that weren't enough, in response to some not-so-subtle prompting from the IOP group "facilitator," Pat, I sucked it up a few days ago and went to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting.
I've been resisting this, not because I don't think it helps alcoholics (it certainly does), or that I'm not an alcoholic (I probably am), but because of the evangelical nature of the literature I've seen. I spent most of my childhood getting God shoved down my throat; I no desire for any further administrations of a deity I don't believe in. Nevertheless, I can't really knock something I haven't actually tried, so it's off to the Unity Club, a sort of multipurpose rehab facility in Falls Church, for the AA Beginners' Group.
I get there a few minutes before 7 pm. The small booklet Pat gave me doesn't say which room the Beginners' Group is to be held, so I consult a bulletin board at the top of the stairs. The group is in R1 ... wherever that is. So I walk into a large banquet hall and ask a lady if this is R1, and she nods her head. I take a seat near the back and wait for the meeting to begin, whatever that entails. At a large square table in the middle of the room a 60-ish man clears his throat. "Hi, I'm Mike and I'm an alcoholic." "Hi Mike," reply the 20 or so people seated in metal chairs on either side of the table, with one row against the back wall. Mike speaks in an Irish brogue that is instantly compelling and disarming -- he grew up in County Claire and took to drink there before coming to the United States as a young man -- but his story is pretty horrifying. Lost his job, lost his friends, lost his family, all to booze. Finally, after many years of trying to straighten out his act, Mike came across a former lush who recommended AA. That was over 20 years ago, he says, and he still can't say he won't go back to drinking, which is why he keeps coming to these meetings.
After Mike is finished, everyone in the room says something, but I don't catch what it is. Then it's time for Jim, a smaller man about the same age, begins to speak. His tale is, if anything, even more lurid than Mike's. Practically any mind-altering chemical known to mankind Jim has ingested, injected, snorted, inhaled or swallowed since he was a teenager. Numerous relapses, incarcerations and marriages later, Jim is another AA success story. Clean and sober for a decade, he, like Mike, keeps coming back to remind himself that no alcoholic or junkie is ever truly cured.
"Thank you for sharing." That's what the people are saying after Jim's tale of woe, just as they said after Mike's. One mystery solved. Now here's another: right after one alcoholic finishes his/her spiel, the next pipes up, as if the whole thing were choreographed. Did they decide on the speakers ahead of time? Do AA members share a Hive Mind? In any case, the stories are growing familiar (job, friends, family), with variations in drink of choice and number of relapses. I can see how these stories provide what psychologist term "validation" for the other members, but they don't really apply to me. I didn't lose my job over alcohol (I was already on disability). I was never drunk in front of my family; my wife didn't even know I drank. As for friends, they gradually fell away in the years following my auto accident, so I can't blame that on drugs or alcohol either.
Chips are a big deal with AA it seems. A 30-something woman whose name I failed to note rises from her seat at the center table with Mike and Jim and asks who in the room has completed a month of sobriety. A guy in the front row in front of me raises his hand, and the woman produces a chip from a large Tupperware container and presents it to him, with a hug thrown in. Applause. On to the two-month achievers, and so on. After this portion of the program, a basket is passed around, and I'm kicking myself because Pat (who leads my intensive outpatient group) told me that AA asks for a $1 donation. I, naturally, have left my wallet in the car.
Finally the Hive arises as one and joins hands (I was apprised of this too), and I manage to skirt the folding chair in front of me while taking the hand of a woman to my left and a man to my right. Mike says some words I can't remember, then leads the circle in the Lord's Prayer. It's been years since I've said it, and even longer since I've meant it; I just stand there, mute and awkward, holding hands with two perfect strangers, dying for it to be over. The prayer ends, then both my hands are jerked up and down while the Hive declares "Keep coming back! It works if you work it!"
It is 8 pm. I head for my car and fish out a buck for the till, but when I return for the room the woman keeping the money is gone. Jim tells me I just saved a buck. "Make it two next time," he says. We talk a little about the Fairfax Hospital rehab program, where I am at present. He has good things to say, even though it didn't quite work for him. Pretty much what I'd say about AA, although you can't really tell based on one meeting.
I've been resisting this, not because I don't think it helps alcoholics (it certainly does), or that I'm not an alcoholic (I probably am), but because of the evangelical nature of the literature I've seen. I spent most of my childhood getting God shoved down my throat; I no desire for any further administrations of a deity I don't believe in. Nevertheless, I can't really knock something I haven't actually tried, so it's off to the Unity Club, a sort of multipurpose rehab facility in Falls Church, for the AA Beginners' Group.
I get there a few minutes before 7 pm. The small booklet Pat gave me doesn't say which room the Beginners' Group is to be held, so I consult a bulletin board at the top of the stairs. The group is in R1 ... wherever that is. So I walk into a large banquet hall and ask a lady if this is R1, and she nods her head. I take a seat near the back and wait for the meeting to begin, whatever that entails. At a large square table in the middle of the room a 60-ish man clears his throat. "Hi, I'm Mike and I'm an alcoholic." "Hi Mike," reply the 20 or so people seated in metal chairs on either side of the table, with one row against the back wall. Mike speaks in an Irish brogue that is instantly compelling and disarming -- he grew up in County Claire and took to drink there before coming to the United States as a young man -- but his story is pretty horrifying. Lost his job, lost his friends, lost his family, all to booze. Finally, after many years of trying to straighten out his act, Mike came across a former lush who recommended AA. That was over 20 years ago, he says, and he still can't say he won't go back to drinking, which is why he keeps coming to these meetings.
After Mike is finished, everyone in the room says something, but I don't catch what it is. Then it's time for Jim, a smaller man about the same age, begins to speak. His tale is, if anything, even more lurid than Mike's. Practically any mind-altering chemical known to mankind Jim has ingested, injected, snorted, inhaled or swallowed since he was a teenager. Numerous relapses, incarcerations and marriages later, Jim is another AA success story. Clean and sober for a decade, he, like Mike, keeps coming back to remind himself that no alcoholic or junkie is ever truly cured.
"Thank you for sharing." That's what the people are saying after Jim's tale of woe, just as they said after Mike's. One mystery solved. Now here's another: right after one alcoholic finishes his/her spiel, the next pipes up, as if the whole thing were choreographed. Did they decide on the speakers ahead of time? Do AA members share a Hive Mind? In any case, the stories are growing familiar (job, friends, family), with variations in drink of choice and number of relapses. I can see how these stories provide what psychologist term "validation" for the other members, but they don't really apply to me. I didn't lose my job over alcohol (I was already on disability). I was never drunk in front of my family; my wife didn't even know I drank. As for friends, they gradually fell away in the years following my auto accident, so I can't blame that on drugs or alcohol either.
Chips are a big deal with AA it seems. A 30-something woman whose name I failed to note rises from her seat at the center table with Mike and Jim and asks who in the room has completed a month of sobriety. A guy in the front row in front of me raises his hand, and the woman produces a chip from a large Tupperware container and presents it to him, with a hug thrown in. Applause. On to the two-month achievers, and so on. After this portion of the program, a basket is passed around, and I'm kicking myself because Pat (who leads my intensive outpatient group) told me that AA asks for a $1 donation. I, naturally, have left my wallet in the car.
Finally the Hive arises as one and joins hands (I was apprised of this too), and I manage to skirt the folding chair in front of me while taking the hand of a woman to my left and a man to my right. Mike says some words I can't remember, then leads the circle in the Lord's Prayer. It's been years since I've said it, and even longer since I've meant it; I just stand there, mute and awkward, holding hands with two perfect strangers, dying for it to be over. The prayer ends, then both my hands are jerked up and down while the Hive declares "Keep coming back! It works if you work it!"
It is 8 pm. I head for my car and fish out a buck for the till, but when I return for the room the woman keeping the money is gone. Jim tells me I just saved a buck. "Make it two next time," he says. We talk a little about the Fairfax Hospital rehab program, where I am at present. He has good things to say, even though it didn't quite work for him. Pretty much what I'd say about AA, although you can't really tell based on one meeting.
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