The Art of Loving an Addict
by Carol Northfield
(formerly Carol N.)
Copyright © 2011 Sturdy Grace Press
Smashwords Edition
License Notes
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of the author. Find this ebook at Smashwords by clicking on the following link:
http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/CarrolStrain
"Well worth the price. The author shares her story and gives excellent advice with compassion. "
– coachkatey, reviewed on Smashwords, March 17, 2009
"An insightful read. Enjoyed very much. As real as it gets."
– Norman Williams, reviewed on Smashwords, January 21, 2011
Contents
Trying to Do Everything on My Own
How I Learned to Take Care of Myself
~~~
I carry my unforgiveness like a stone, cold and hard
In my chest where my heart should be. My anger
A boulder I push before me, up the long, slow toil of my days.
Quietly, patiently, stone turns to
Ash and gently drifts away on the wind.
~~~
It has been said that addiction is a victimless crime, but those of us who love those people who happen to have become addicted to one substance or another know better. Not only is the addict himself or herself a victim of the disease, but the lives of those who love them are deeply affected by the chaos and devastation generated by one person’s addiction.
If you know you love an addict and you haven’t yet found your way to sanity, this book is written for you. If your life seems unpredictable and chaotic, it may be that you love an addict without knowing it. This is written for you, too.
The disease of addiction is devious and secretive. For years, my husband was an addict and, though I thought I knew him, I did not know of his addiction until he confessed to me. All the while, my life continued to get more and more out of control and I did not know why.When I finally learned the truth, I was vengeful and terrified, anxious and exhausted and filled with grief. I was convinced I needed to take immediate action. Surely I should throw the bum out. But in the months since that time, I have found my way back to a peaceful and orderly life and even a good marriage again. I have the same job, the same husband. On the surface my life looks very much the same, but it is fundamentally transformed. My grief, my rage, my terror and despair have washed through me and left me a changed person, and in many ways I have changed for the better.
This story is not intended to be all of the help you’ll need, just a guide to steer you toward some long-term solutions. Whether or not you choose to stay with your addict is up to you, but like it or not you’re going to need some help either way. This story is an account of what worked for me, some of which might also work for you, a little something for you to hold onto until you get through to the other side.
It was a fine spring day, some twenty-six years into what I thought of as an open and happy marriage, that I first learned of my husband’s addiction to painkillers. My first reaction was a sympathetic, "Aw, honey, we’ll get through this together." Little did I know.
For weeks something had not been right with him, I could see that. I thought he had the flu or something worse. Whatever it was, it seemed to hang on and he was really suffering. s sick as he was, he continued to go to work every day, but he would come home exhausted, his normally ruddy complexion literally gray. I wanted to take him to a doctor, but he refused. What was worse, he refused to talk with me about it. This was simply not the man I thought I knew. I nagged until the truth came out.
And the stark truth was this: He had become addicted to painkillers and was trying to quit by himself, in secret.
I spent most of the next few weeks simply numb. My mind, my heart could not comprehend the enormity of what was happening with him, with me, with us. This man, the father of our children, my husband, had lied to me, not once, but over and over and over again. It seemed to me a massive betrayal of everything I held dear.
One warm afternoon during those weeks when I was stopped at a traffic light in heavy traffic the weight of that betrayal hit me suddenly and squarely in the chest. I involuntarily sobbed, then wailed, right then and there. People in cars near mine turned to stare at me in surprise and pity, but the wailing came from somewhere deep inside of me and, once started, would not stop. Fury quickly followed grief with despair hard on its heels. I hope never to have to experience that particular cocktail of emotions again.
For months, maybe years, before my husband’s confession, things had not been right in our home, though the changes had been gradual and I had been unable to pinpoint the cause. My response had been to work harder and harder–at my job, at trying to keep our home tidy and presentable, at paying our bills–but nothing was working as it once had. My husband seemed distant, and our once joyous lovemaking was a remote memory; I suspected he might be having an affair but could find no evidence. Our home, formerly my haven and a piece for me of heaven on earth, had become a living hell, though I was hard-pressed to say why.
From time to time, I would break out in severe hives that my doctor blamed on some mysterious allergy or perhaps stress. I think now that at some level I knew that something was terribly wrong although I was not conscious of what that was. There were some fairly obvious reasons for my stress-related ailments that I could point to, but none of them–singly or collectively–seemed sufficient to account for the degree of confusion, terror, and despair I was feeling.
Because my father was dying of a lingering illness, I made frequent and sometimes lengthy trips to my parents’ home during this time. Each trip to their peaceful Midwest home made clear to me that my own life on the West Coast had gradually become quietly insane. How had that happened? I thought of myself as a normal, competent person. Where had I gone wrong?
The worst of the insanity for me was our ever-mounting debt. We had refinanced our home’s mortgage three times to pay off credit cards, and the mortgage on our modest home had grown each time so that the monthly payment had become a staggering sum. From time to time I would insist that we cut up our credit cards, but my husband found ways to use his nonetheless, and the total balances continued to escalate until they were once again over their maximum limits. I blamed our rising debt on our two sons’ college expenses and looked forward to the fast-approaching time when they would be fully self-supporting. However, that time came and passed and our financial situation continued to deteriorate. Each February or March when we calculated our annual taxes, I would look at our total income and wonder why I wasn’t experiencing prosperity. It seemed to me we made plenty of money, and as far as I knew we didn’t spend lavishly. I thought I watched every penny go in and out of our bank accounts. Why was there never enough money to pay for everything?
My husband and I have had a peaceful relationship from the very beginning and even during this slow descent into hell we never fought. I know now that he simply did not want to talk with me or anyone about what was going on with him, and I was just too busy to pay attention. After all, we had three young adults living with us, all of them in and out at all hours because of school and work and friends. Our youngest son, his girlfriend and our niece had all moved in with us At about the same time. Although I had had misgivings from the very start about this arrangement and only the fact that I loved them all made it even tolerable, I had said nothing when they moved in and continued to say very little about it the entire three years they lived with us. I have since learned that those of us likely to end up with alcoholics or addicts often strictly suppress our own fondest desires. My desire in this regard was for an orderly home. I told myself my needs were petty and that my desire for order would have to wait. We were helping these young people get a good start in life, after all. Weren’t their needs more important than my desire for tidiness, after all?
Trying to Do Everything on My Own
When I took the time to think about it, I told myself my marriage’s lacking love life was due to overwork, at least in part. Both my husband and I were working at demanding jobs, and there was not much left of either one of us at the end of each day. He was working–or so I thought–at least seventy or eighty hours every week. It was only later that I would learn that a good bit of the time when I thought he was working late, he was driving all over the county trying to obtain on the black market the increasing number of pills he needed to get through the following couple of days or so. For my part, when I wasn’t at my job, I was constantly cleaning, gardening, watering the lawn, shopping for groceries, cooking, paying bills–or worrying about not being able to pay the bills. It was all I could do to maintain our older home with very little help from anyone else who lived there, despite my frequent protests.
At one point, I began posting a list of the regular chores that needed doing on the refrigerator, and things got a little better. But only a little. Dust still collected in the corners, the refrigerator and pantry filled with foods I hadn’t purchased and would never in a million years touch, clutter accumulated on every available surface. I suppose it was understandable that I was completely distracted from what was going on with my husband.
My world had begun to crack apart in earnest on an August morning in 2006 when my husband called me at my desk at work to tell me he had been fired. I thought he was joking at first. This man who worked so hard could not possibly be getting fired! But it was true. It would be four months before he went back to work, and when he did begin working again it would be at a dramatically reduced income in another industry. This was the third job he had lost in four years. Each time, it took him longer and longer to get back on his feet. I was baffled and bewildered by his behavior during these years, not to mention embarrassed each time I felt the need to explain the situation to friends and family and creditors. Where was the hard-working, ambitious man I had married? What had happened, I wondered, to take away his former sense of purpose?
The bills quickly piled up, but month after month, I found inventive ways to stay on top of things. My husband seemed oblivious to the impending crisis, told me not to worry, things would work out. Hadn’t they always before? I was beside myself with fear and panic. Why couldn’t he see what was so obvious to me? I felt myself to be on a rushing train, headed for an enormous brick wall. My world felt less and less sane with each passing day. I began to feel isolated from people I cared about and who I once believed cared about me. I felt such shame that I had no desire to share my feelings with anyone, not even my closest friends. I began to think of myself as different from others in some inexplicable way.
I tried to talk with my husband about what I thought was the most practical of solutions: We needed to sell our home, to get out from under our burdensome mortgage payment, cut our losses and get on with our lives. But during this time he would not hear of selling our home. He argued vehemently: What would the kids do? Where would they live? And didn’t I love our home as much as he did?
Of course I loved our home, and I cared about the kids, but they were all in their twenties and fully capable of learning to live on their own. Besides, I longed for sanity, for peace of mind, an orderly life. Such a way of living seemed to me to be so out of reach.
Despite all of the turmoil, I still looked forward to spending time with him. I figured we were going through a passing situation that would work itself out in time. I would drive home from work imagining having a nice quiet evening with him, just like in the old days. Then he would meet me at the front door with a too-bright smile, a too-hearty "Hey! Hey!" in greeting. I would pull back in revulsion from his embrace then chide myself for doing so. I didn’t understand my disgust at his greeting; I would ask myself, wasn’t he already going through enough with being out of work, or, later, with having to learn a completely new job? Why would I want to add to his misery? Wasn’t he really trying? I must have known at some level even then that he was flying high, though addiction never once crossed my conscious mind until he confessed. I’ve learned since that denial is one of the hallmarks of this disease; it occurs in us, those of us who love the addict, too.
Eventually, some weeks after his confession to me, my husband got himself into a twelve-step program, found a sponsor, and began his journey toward recovery. This story is not his story, however, but my own, and I’d like to share with you the turning point in my recovery. Here’s an excerpt from my journal written after we finally decided to sell our home:
"Today, we painted our bedroom, the last room in the house we’re going to paint before we start showing the house to sell it. Mostly, right now, I’m exhausted. My hands are sore from scrubbing, scraping and holding a paintbrush. My forearms are scratched and bruised from gardening and from moving furniture. But it’s my heart that is most weary. I’m almost too tired to cry, but I am oh, so sad.
"I have loved this house. I thought I was going to stay here the rest of my life. I pictured us growing old together here. Now, I don’t know what the future holds.
"The house is in complete disarray. Not one piece of furniture, except for this bench under the window where I am now sitting, is in its right place or even its proper room. Everything was moved so that the carpets could be cleaned yesterday, and the furniture from the living room, dining room and study are on the deck. Our bedroom furniture is stacked against the walls in the dining room and the study waiting for the paint on the bedroom walls to dry. I’m waiting for K-- to get home from his meeting to help me put the mattress, at least, somewhere we can sleep tonight. The disorder around me feels almost normal, and that scares me.
"I am angry, frightened and lonely. I feel betrayed and hurt beyond belief. My heart is full of grief. I have never felt so utterly alone. A few months ago, I thought I was married to my best friend, but all the while he was lying to me, over and over again, hiding money to support his ever-increasing habits."
(My husband’s addiction escalated during a time when his earnings were dramatically reduced and we desperately needed the money he was using on his habit just to manage our household. The bills were falling further and further behind and creditors were calling constantly. It was a nightmarish time.)
"How could he have been so selfish? I knew we had some problems, but I thought that things would work out; they always had before. Now that I look back, though, I can see the signs I hadn’t seen before. Each time he lost a job it was someone else’s fault and it took him longer and longer to get back on his feet. I was starting to feel embarrassed about all the drama, if nothing else."
And here, the handwriting changes significantly, becoming larger, bolder, indenting the page:
"So, I thought I was sad today, about having to sell the house, about losing my illusions around my marriage. But mostly, I’m just pissed! I am so f’ing angry I cannot stand myself. I have been trying not to be angry, to be a good wife, to be a good person, not to jeopardize his recovery. But what about me? Who cares about me? What do I do with all of this anger, this deep, deep well of rage?"
The next evening I wrote:
"What I ended up doing after I wrote the last entry was to get up and start putting my home back in order. It was late, I was exhausted, but I was also angry, and I used my anger to fuel the physical labor I chose to undertake. I wanted nothing more than to go to bed, but the bed was in pieces and the mattress and box springs were leaning against a wall. Even worse, there were other pieces of furniture in front of them so that I had to move those pieces first before I could even begin to drag the mattress to the bedroom and flop it on the floor. And before I could do that, I needed to remove the drop cloths from the bedroom floor and peel off the blue masking tape all around the room. When I first started, the tasks before me seemed insurmountable, but I tackled them anyway.