Expert: Joseph Lee O. - 6/12/2008

Question
Sandy is 39. Left her husband and 4 young kids 3 years ago while in rehab for another alcoholic.Has since kept going downhill. Been in several rehabs and does really well and gets out and starts drinking again within a day. She was picked up by a felloe AA member who has 14yrs sober. He has done this to 4 other women. They have all disappeared from the AA fellowship. Sandy is in love with him and doesnt see the pattern. He wont have anything to do with her when she is drunk. She gets sober,phones him and he says to come on over. She drinks everytime before she goes there and he chucks her out. She got out of a good rehab last saturday , phoned him and drank before she got there. She has been drunk since then. I know I cant enable her but I love her and just want her better. Do you have any suggestions.She always says I cant do this anymore and goes voluntarily into rehab and this same pattern is just repeating itself. She is university educated, her boyfriend is supposedly an ex Hells Angel. I told her to try and spend 1 year helping herself and then if she still wants him in her life I would support her in her choice but at this time he is using her and I wont accept him. What should I do
Thanks
Barb

Answer
Greetings to you, Barb.

You have written:

>> She always says I cant do this anymore and goes voluntarily into rehab and this same pattern is just repeating itself.

First, that is because absolutely nothing is actually being done about her alcoholism.  She is being told she cannot drink safely, and she is being “encouraged” (in whatever way or ways) to live without drinking.  However, and while still in her natural state, she is completely incapable of staying away from alcohol.  Here is an excerpt from “The Doctor’s Opinion” in “Alcoholics Anonymous”, the book:

“[Alcoholic men] and women drink essentially because they like the effect produced by [a few drinks of] alcohol.  The sensation is so elusive that, while they admit it is injurious [or ‘dangerous’ to do that since they always go out of control once they get started], they cannot after a time differentiate the true from the false.  To them, their alcoholic life seems the only normal one.  They are restless, irritable and discontented [while sober], unless they can again experience the sense of ease and comfort which comes at once by taking a few drinks - drinks which they see others taking with impunity.  After they have succumbed to the desire again, as so many do, and the [physical] phenomenon of craving develops, they pass through the well-known stages of a spree, emerging remorseful, with a firm resolution not to drink again.  This is repeated over and over, and unless this person can experience an entire psychic change there is very little hope of his recovery.” (Dr. William D. Silkworth, 1935)

Rather than telling your daughter she needs the “entire psychic change” or spiritual transformation the doctor has mentioned, the treatment centers are simply telling her to keep trying to quit drinking and to keep coming back when she fails ... and sadly, that same problem is rampant throughout today’s AA.  It will be very difficult to find someone capable of sharing with your daughter the original A.A. message, but that is her only hope.  She needs someone to help her understand what the “chronic” part of alcoholism is all about and how to find for herself the permanent solution shared in “Alcoholics Anonymous”, the book.

You have written:

>> She was picked up by a felloe AA member who has 14yrs sober.

I have seen that kind of “I’ll help ya, Baby” nonsense many, many times through the years, and that kind of sick cycle is nearly impossible to break until the “victim” finally begins to realize he or she is getting absolutely nowhere other than closer to death.  Maybe you could quietly ask Sandy whether she has ever met anyone else like herself who cannot stay sober ... then tell her you have just heard the original A.A. message in the actual book is for people like that.

>> I know I cant enable her but I love her and just want her better.

You will not be “enabling” unless you help her avoid the consequences of her drinking.  Alcoholism is not literally a disease, but it is a condition over which she has no power at all.  Do not ever give her money for anything, but there is nothing wrong with inviting her over for dinner once in a while to be sure she at least eats.

>> I told her to try and spend 1 year helping herself and then if she still wants him in her life I would support her in her choice but at this time he is using her and I wont accept him.

He might actually believe he is truly helping her by only allowing her to come around when she is sober, and he might even say she is the one trying to use him.  For sure, however, he does not have the first clue as to what kind of help she really needs ... yet she is drawn to the attention he either gives or at least promises her.  I would suggest you say nothing more at all in relation to him, and that you simply try to quietly focus on helping Sandy understand her alcoholism.  You could begin preparing for that by reading “Alcoholics Anonymous”, the book:
http://www.aa.org/bigbookonline/en_tableofcnt.cfm (PDF format).
And of course, I will gladly help you begin to understand what you read there and to answer questions you will certainly have.  In simplicity: Think of someone who is allergic to strawberries and keeps eating them anyway.  There is nothing that can be done about the physical “allergy”, but something surely must be done about the “mental obsession” (or “insanity”) related to eating them at all.  That is the deal of alcoholism: She cannot control her drinking once she starts, and she cannot remain sober once she stops ... and I highly doubt anyone has ever told her that entire story.

Please know you are always welcomed to write,

Joseph Lee O.
Email: leejosepho@hotmail.com
Forum: http://xsorbit28.com/users5/restored/ (new)