I'm worried about a friend of mine. We've been friends for 15 years, and he periodically disappears and reappears and goes to rehab and gets okay and then descends into madness again. I'm pretty pissed, actually. I'm tired of losing people I love. It's funny, the people who come in and out of your life, who maybe at the time don't seem that significant, but who do have a pretty big impact.
I think addiction is selfish. There, I said it. My father was an alcoholic, and while he never laid one single hand on me in anger, it stole a part of my relationship with him. As close as we were and as much as we shared, I can't imagine what our complete relationship might've been, had that not been a part of him. I have had other issues with family addiction, which are not currently my story to tell, but they steal parts of me. The addicted person has no concept of their effect on other people, and I know this is a part of addiction, but that weakness makes me so angry, that I have a hard time coming to grips with it.
I've grappled with my own issues; I'll be the first to admit that I am nowhere near perfect. Alcohol has caused problems for me in the past, and I recognized it enough to metaphorically kick my own ass and pull myself out of it. I would never want to cause pain or suffering to anyone I love, and that is the thing that keeps me most grounded. I think that I don't and will probably never understand true addiction because I can't fathom picturing those who I love most so worried about me that it makes them sick or truly alters their lives.
It's funny the things that seemed commonplace or "okay" 10 years ago are most assuredly not okay now, when you have families and spouses and mortgages and responsibilities to consider. I have and do love some people that have deep roots in addiction and self-destruction, and it's literally like being stuck between a rock and a hard place. You don't want to turn your back and think you could've done something differently, but in truth, there's nothing you, singularly, could do to change a course of events.
For over 10 years, I've harbored a guilt that an ex-boyfriend I had reconnected with killed himself because I didn't answer a call the weekend that he shot himself. I thought it was cool that we were friends, but we needed to understand distance and what that meant, and when I didn't answer his call and was told 2 days later that he killed himself, I lived with, and partially still live with, the nagging thought that it's my fault, that if I had picked up the phone, I could've changed something or said something. If guilt were a talent, I could rock it at Miss America..srsly, I have a gift generally bestowed to the Jewish.
My point is, no one can make anyone do anything or choose a path or decide their fate. I am so worried about you, J.C., and I want to literally kick you in your ass, but you have to decide, in the words of the immortal Morgan Freeman (well, Stephen King, really) "Get busy living or get busy dying." For real. People with the talent that you possess are bound for greatness, you just have to find that opportunity, and I swear if you come out of this, I will cry with joy and punch you in the throat. I feel the Yosemite Sam anger rising....
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