Two Tiny Steps Forward, One Giant Step Back.

"My sober-for-years-but-not-in-recovery-for-long alcoholic, it seems like the minute I give them any encouragement or support, they take it like a "get out of jail free" card, and start to treat me like crap again. How do I give any positive feedback, when they just use it against me?"

Oh, have I been in this writer's place - and it was a mystifying landscape through which to travel. One of my alcoholics is just this way, and I have had to learn that any support or encouragement I give has to be non-personal. If I put anything of myself into it, this person will then see me as vulnerable, and go on the attack. When I'm around this alcoholic, I feel as I might were a tiger in the room with me, waiting for the slightest sign of weakness, always ready to spring. That tiger never sleeps.

If this person says, "I have been trying harder," and I reply, "Yes, I've noticed that and I'm very grateful, and you are a good person..." I've just bought myself some mistreatment at their hands, because they see that the way a tiger might see me strapping some steaks to myself, and then walking back and forth an inch from its muzzle.

Sober is not recovery. Sober is sober, and while I can be grateful for the sobriety, if I see it and recovery as all of a piece/the same thing, I'm going to suffer for that misconception.

With this alcoholic, when they say "I have been trying harder," I have to reply with something along the lines of: "That's great; working your program will benefit you and those around you," and leave it at that. I have to keep myself and what I think, completely off the table. They will often try to put me back onto the table with questions like, "You've noticed, right, you've noticed I've been trying harder?"

And here I'm going to pause for a moment and point out that just because someone asks us a question, does not mean that we must answer that question. If we have a fairly clear idea of what's going on, ie the alcoholic is looking for a way in through our boundaries, and we want to keep them safely on the other side, we can repeat our original reply, or format a new one: "I try not to gauge my recovery on whether or not other people are noticing it, I try to do it for myself, and my Higher Power."

This can feel uncomfortable when I'm new to it - perhaps I feel
as if I am "withholding" some approval being sought. And that is precisely why it works so well against me.

I need to stop, detach, and ask myself:  what's happening in this encounter? What happened last time we had a conversation like this? What was the result of me giving encouragement and support which included how I thought or felt, rather than a more generic kind?

If I begin to see a pattern emerging, I can talk to my sponsor, pray, reason things out with someone else, and choose how I am going to respond. I have the right to deal with this in the kindest way possible, which will permit me to retain my boundaries.

I do not have to accept any unacceptable behavior, under any label whatsoever.
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I just had an interesting conversation with another program member about this, and one point raised was: When I respond, am I expecting a certain result? I can trip myself up in this way, with this particular alcoholic, because I lull myself into believing that this time, it's safe to be more open. This flies in the face of reality, since it never has been in any other past conversation, why would I think it safe today?

Why? Because I'm in denial, and my expectations or desires that another person behave the way I want them to, are overriding my sanity for a moment. I want it to be safe, therefore I'm going to act as if it is safe.

Then when it turns out not to have been safe, who am I really annoyed with about it? I'm annoyed with myself; had I not tied that steak to my leg before walking up to the tiger, I might still have that leg as part of my anatomy.

So it goes. Live and learn. Some of us are slower learners than others.

Crosstalk, and Commenting Upon Someone Else's Sharing.

MrSponsorPants has a post about this today and it seems timely, as lately I've seen this same behavior demonstrated, on more than one occasion, by more than one person.

I find it excruciatingly uncomfortable to sit in silence while one member chastises another, under the guise of sharing. I'm intensely grateful that this was not done to me when I was new to program, or that if it was, it sailed right over my head. I was so full of self-loathing and self-disgust, that had anyone criticised me in a meeting, I'd most likely never have returned to Al-Anon. (Just considering where I'd be were that the case, gives me the willies.)

Meetings are meant to be a safe place for all, but as MrSponsorPants points out so well, we are sick people. He may be speaking more of alcoholics, but those of us who are codependent, are just as barmy in our own endearing ways.

Some meetings feel safer than others, because some meetings are more closely attuned to the Steps and Traditions of Al-Anon. I've sat in meetings where I felt that there were unspoken messages zinging back and forth across the table during sharings - and not gone back to that meeting, but found another one to attend. I've had enough of that sort of thing in my personal life, I'd rather find a meeting with a more comfortable feel for me.

In the last place we lived, meetings were few and far between, so I didn't have a choice, I had to learn to tolerate whoever attended, and "love them in a very special way." I grew because of it, in a way I wouldn't have, if I'd only ever attended meetings in which I felt relaxed and safe with all the members.

I learned that those who are critical are often lonely in their pain, and that this criticism was modelled to them in their family of origin by being directed at them from the time they were tiny children - this made me more able to see past the facade, to the person crouched behind the barricades, lobbing grenades over their heads in a furious attempt to keep all at a safe distance.

As my friend Wilson once said, "Happy people don't act that way."

Some folks can grow and change, and some can't ever take the first step onto the ladder across the crevasse - their fear is just too great. It isn't up to me to decide how they should behave, although I will do, and then catch myself. I try to be warmer to those people, in an effort both to live my program, and to make the meeting feel safer for them, as well.

Why Should I?

"But why should I be the one to change? Shouldn't it be the alcoholic who changes? Why me?"

"Why you? Because you can't change other people."

I fought that truth for a long time.

I accepted many other truths Al-Anon offered, but that one - I just did not want to believe that "... all my efforts had been for naught, that I'd been doomed to failure before I've ever started, that it had been completely hopeless all along, that ..."
My first sponsor interrupted this litany of misery, to ask me, "Is there any other way you can look at this?"

We had many of these conversations sitting at her kitchen table; I did a lot of staring out the window at the trees, when I didn't want to make eye contact. That question, as did so many of her questions early on, brought me to a confused, somewhat resentful, silence. I hadn't a clue where she was heading with that question, and felt miffed that she had interrupted me while I was in full, self-pitying flow.

She smiled at me, and asked, in her crisp British accent, "How about viewing it as a gift of freedom?"

A gift? A gift?

This woman, to whom I was entrusting my most personal thoughts and feelings, was, obviously, barking mad. It was the only conclusion I was able to reach at the time.

I replied stiffly that I didn't quite understand how alcoholism could be viewed as a gift of freedom. I can just see myself, bristling at any suggestion that my thinking might be flawed, or confused, or self-defeating - I took offense very easily back then. I often drove home from these sessions with my first sponsor with nothing in my mind but anger and indignation -  she had said this, and that, and didn't have any sympathy!

The latter was true enough, sympathy she didn't have; empathy she dished out in generous helpings. When my self-pity and martyrdom receded enough that I once again began to be able to register anything apart from my all-consuming problems, I understood that she lived in much the same circumstances I did, but with considerably more peace and serenity.

Back to this "gift" nonsense. I sat in silence while my sponsor explained that what I could see as a gift of freedom, was the understanding that I couldn't change anyone but myself. Since that was the case, and it was an exercise in futility, I could stop trying to change my alcoholic first husband, and instead, learn to live my life fully and serenely. Wasn't that wonderful?

I eyed her dubiously, and made some sort of accepting murmuring noise, which, in hindsight, she must have recognised by my rigid posture and tight-lipped expression, that I didn't believe, or accept, for a nanosecond.

My desperation kept me coming back to Al-Anon meetings, and reading Al-Anon literature, and eventually, my desire for recovery overwhelmed my resistance, and I accepted that I couldn't change anyone but myself.

It is a gift of freedom - I let things go which would have obsessed me to the exclusion of all else, which would have caused me hours, days, weeks of angry chewing-over.

I can't change the alcoholic. I can't change other people. So, let it go, then. Instead, I can choose to play in my garden, paint, sew, walk the dogs, read a good book, spend time with friends, work upon changing myself.

Don't take even one or two steps down that lonely road - notice it as I'm passing, but shrug and keep walking towards my serenity - that's my goal.

Being Stuck.

A new member to Al-Anon, a woman who has embraced program heart and soul, and is making huge leaps and bounds, corralled me the other day after a meeting, and asked, "Have you ever been stuck? I'm finding I'm stuck on something the last couple of weeks, and I'm getting really angry and frustrated with myself about it."

I grinned at her. "A couple of weeks, hmm?"

She nodded, and seemed a bit embarassed, saying "I know it's a long time,  but ..."

I asked, "Have you got a minute? I'll tell you a story from my 4-5th year in Al-Anon."

"Oh, good, were you stuck, too?" she asked.

"I was; I was thoroughly stuck. Completely stuck. Welded in place, you might say."

She looked at me with hope in her eyes, and asked, "For how long? A few days? A week? As long as me - two weeks?"

I smiled at her, and told the unvarnished truth: "I was stuck for six months."

She looked at me, startled, then began to laugh, saying, "Two weeks seems quite reasonable, all of a sudden!"

I can recall that time very clearly, because it was the most frustrating period I've had so far, in Al-Anon. I had reached a point in my recovery, where I needed to let go of some past happenings in order to move forward, and I just couldn't seem to do it. I had discussed it with my sponsor until we both felt like screaming when I brought the topic up - we'd sat in her kitchen one day, trying to do as she suggested, and "approach it from another angle, to see if it looked more palatable from that viewpoint," and after a few more revolutions, we were both feeling hot, frustrated, and tired.

We decided to let it go for now, and I'd sleep on it, and see if things looked different the next day. Later that night, I was lying in bed, wondering - was I going to be unable to progress any further in Al-Anon, because I was stuck on this one point?

I decided to think of something else, or I'd never get to sleep, so I began thinking about my dog, and how grateful I was to have her in my life. I was drifting in that heavy dozing state just before sleep, then - all at once I was wide awake, and starting to laugh.

I'd been thinking about a walk my dog and I had taken, when I was visiting my sister. We'd gone to a little park near the house; I liked it for the small stream running through it, and a picturesque bridge spanning the stream, more for show than necessity, since the stream was only a few inches deep. There were two metal posts about two feet apart, sunk into the concrete at each end of the bridge, perhaps to block access to motor vehicles.


My dog was a mad retrieving fiend - sticks, balls, fetching anything at all made her sublimely happy. That day, she'd found a fairly small willow branch, which was probably 5-6 feet long, with a tuft of greenery at one end, and was happily trotting along, carrying it. When we reached the bridge, she couldn't get onto the bridge because the willow branch was wider than the two metal posts. She tried and tried, then backed up, splashed through the stream still holding the branch, and tried to get onto the bridge from the other end, with the same result.

It was so funny at the time because she'd been fixated about "getting onto the bridge" and had lost sight of the purpose of the bridge - to cross the stream.

When that memory floated into my mind that night, and I sat up in bed, wide awake and laughing, it was because I had realised that I was doing precisely the same thing in my program - becoming fixated upon the process, to the point of losing sight of the purpose.

I had become so stuck in my steely determination to get onto my particular bridge, and being unable to, that it had never occurred to me to try wading through the stream, or -  putting down the stick I was clutching.

Al-Anon shows me that I always have options. When it's getting dark, and I can't see my way forward, maybe I just need to brush the hair out of my eyes.

Please Define "...giving understanding and encouragement to the alcoholic."

That phrase comes from the "Suggested Preamble To The Twelve Steps" and the entire paragraph reads:

  "Al-Anon has but one purpose: to help families of alcoholics. We do this by practising the Twelve Steps, by welcoming and giving comfort to families of alcoholics, and by giving understanding and encouragement to the alcoholic."

I know that when I came to Al-Anon, the very idea of giving anything to the alcoholic stirred my resentment. I felt that he'd already received all of me I had to give, and wasn't entitled to a molecule more. I sometimes think of my resentment as a glass filled to the brim, with only surface tension stopping it from spilling over, which I was trying to carry through my daily life. I couldn't concentrate on not spilling a glass that full, and still move through my life with any awareness - the glass became my only focus.

Various dictionaries define understanding as being tolerant, aware of someone's feelings, being sympathetic, or co-operative.

Was I sympathetically aware of my alcoholic? No, no, no, not on your life. Was I cooperative? Not likely. I was intransigent, I was mulish, I was resistant, and I took nasty pleasure in being so - in this way, I vented some of my anger and resentment. In hindsight, I can see where I must have been a very tiring person to live with, always scheming to manipulate.

I had no tolerance left in me for him. And I didn't care at all about his feelings.

"Encouragement" is defined in various dictionaries as giving someone support, confidence, approval, assistance or hope.

By the time I entered Al-Anon, it had been quite a few years since I'd given my alcoholic anything even remotely approaching approval; on the contrary, I disapproved of almost everything he did, thought, felt, or expressed. I disapproved of him in every way humanly possible, and didn't hesitate to let him know it. Assistance? Given only grudgingly, with great lashings of complaint and self-pity.

I had no hope left in me, so I had none to give. I felt quite annoyed with the idea that I should give him anything at all. Shouldn't he be giving to me?

I had a bit of difficulty with the idea that it is what it is, and if I am to live with any sanity, I must accept that, and go from there. What would happen in a perfect world, might be a nice topic for a half-hour's daydream, but as this isn't a perfect world, in the end, this does me no good.

I had further difficulty with the idea that I needed to begin to be tolerant, accepting, loving, encouraging and understanding in the face of his continuing to drink,  that I did this for my own self, first, so that I could gain back my self-respect.

I slowly came to the understanding that for me to live comfortably within my own skin, I need to give the alcoholic understanding and encouragement, and then let go of the outcome of this giving.

I don't hold it out, still firmly gripping it with one hand, and my other hand stretched out to see what I'm going to get in trade.

I hope this helps a bit.

What Should I Do?

I hate that question. I don't have an answer for anyone but myself, and many times not even then. I had one of these conversations recently, in which the questioner kept asking that, and I kept refusing to give advice, until both of us were rather frustrated.

This wasn't the kind of conversation in which another member of Al-Anon is asking that rhetorically, as a way to get the ball rolling in a discussion of options and choices, and what exactly do they they want, or what do they hope to achieve; this was a "tell me what to do" conversation.

I couldn't tell him what to do, it's not up to me. I've been in program long enough to feel a distinct shiver of unease when another person tries to pass off the responsibility for their choices into my hands. I do not want to be the person who said "Do This." when it all goes to hell in a handbasket, and this person comes out loaded for bear, looking for the idiiot who told him what to do when, as it turns out, it was the exact opposite of a wise choice.

This precise situation would have, pre-program, satisfied my controlling instincts to no end; I'd have been delighted to give my opinion in great detail. It would have been a good ego buzz.

Working my program has taught me that when someone else begins to try to get me to make their choices for them, I need to re-examine whether or not this is a healthy friendship. I'm not talking about the odd question asked here or there, I'm talking about that feeling one gets: it's almost as if they show up at your house with a moving van, and start carrying stuff indoors with just a cheerful smile and nod as they go by.

I'm more than happy to have conversations in which I try to offer any help I'm able to allow you to examine your choices in detail, but I don't want to adopt anyone, and I don't want to be anyone's guru. I'm too fallible. And let's be honest, lazy.

Twelve Step As A Different Culture.

Yesterday, I had an interesting conversation with a woman I respect; we were discussing the way new friends who are not in a Twelve-step program, can find those of us who are, disconcerting. People who have seriously worked their program for a long time are different - we don't play the usual conversational games, we are much more upfront about our own faults, (that in itself can be decidedly unsettling) we don't gossip or criticise - my friend said, in a tone of dawning realisation, that Twelve Step almost sounds like a different culture.

I loved that. I think there's a great deal of wisdom in that remark.
When I look back upon difficulties I've had, communicating with new friends who aren't in a recovery program, and the problems which arose, that lens of "different culture" makes it all make sense.

I'll never forget a meeting I attended, during a trip to the city centre south of here, about 15 years ago.  A man spoke of coming to the meeting for the first time, listening in a bit of a daze, then going up to someone after the meeting, and using his usual conversational gambit, starting to gossip about a person at the meeting, whom he recognised from work.  He was gently stopped mid-sentence by his listener, who lovingly reminded him that we don't gossip or criticise one another.

He made us all howl with laughter when he recounted standing there wondering what kind of "goody-two shoes these idiots were?" He'd grown up in a family where slicing and dicing was the way you survived - the most vicious won. He'd married into another family with this culture, and all of his friends were this way.

He spoke movingly of how strange it was for him, to be in meetings, learning that pretty much all of his behavior was unacceptable, and yet to feel loved, even so. To feel that the same people who were stopping him as he began to criticise a third person, were greeting him with genuine joy in their faces when he walked into a meeting.

Al-Anon meetings can feel like a foreign country to newcomers; I pray to "Let it begin with me," so that I may be a warm welcome to those who may be exhausted from their travels, suffering the recovery equivalent of jet-lag, and for whom a smiling face, a
chair pushed back to widen the circle, and a silly joking comment to bring laughter and a little bit of comfort, feels like a warm bath of love.

We all need it, we all crave it. Let me be a person who also gives it.