Hi everyone,
One thing that I realized when I attended various support groups in the past such as AL-ANON or recovery groups in the past was that everyone in the group seemed to have grown up in my household. Parents and family who were problem drinkers and how consistent the negative impact had on each and every person in the group. It's truly quite amazing because as I listened to everyone's story it was a mirror image of my own. Although we're all born with a blank slate the process of defining who we are as a child is so heavily influenced by what we see and learn at home. We learn all sorts of toxic ways to deal with situations and interacting with people and the sad thing is we didn't understand or have a choice in the matter because we looked to our parents to help us define what was right and wrong. Invariably what we learned was wrong and as we grew older we surrounded ourselves with friends who supported this skewed sense of self-concept and self-belief. The feedback we received from them helped to define this concept and we carried this forward to all aspects of our lives. In many cases this concept was sense of unworthiness and undeserving of acceptance. I firmly believe this environment gave birth to the Addictive Voice that fuels the fire for alcohol abuse. After years of sadness and anxiety we discoverer the calming relief of having a drink to escape the reality of our situation. As time progresses we build so many associations in our mind from so many different directions and before you know it every situation can become a trigger and, being trapped in the center of this storm, we struggle to find our way out. Yet we know deep down inside there is something desperately wrong, that we are hurting ourselves but we've lost the capacity to believe in ourselves and listen to our intuition about what is right for us. Combine this with a legitimate psychological challenge such as OCD, low-grade depression, etc and\ or common stresses in our life such as job dissatisfaction, divorce, loss or loneliness and we find a habitual escape through alcohol consumption because it is the one thing that provides consistency and relief. It's a vicious circle that creates a vortex that seems to draw us in and gets stronger as we approach the center.
I spent the weekend with my parents at the wedding I had to attend. It was a beautiful occasion and I'm really happy I chose not to drink and began to establish the idea with them that I do not drink anymore. I've accepted this myself and, just as I was taught by certain members of my family to believe the craziness I've described above, it is now my time to turn the tables and teach them that drinking is not a part of my life and they better learn to accept it.
Parents and family have such a strong influence on our sense of self. By day 4 I found my father was beginning his old games of trying to make me feel inadequate and stupid and I could feel the toxicity of our relationship and the past creep back into the moment. Fortunately I didn't bite and stepped back as observer to take a more positive and respectful way of dealing with him. You can't fight with someone or make them feel bad if the other party chooses not to play the game. Learning to deal with situations in a mature, constructive way and setting boundaries for self-respect is a big challenge but if you maintain a calm, consistent tone and rely on assertiveness that these boundaries cannot be breached it will go a long way to protecting yourself from getting sucked into that vortex of alcohol abuse and the subsequent self-recrimination that follows.
Week 3 begins and I'm inspired in my resolve that I'm finally listening to my real inner voice, the one that knows what is best for me and has my best interests in mind. And don't hesitate to share your
