It is extremely frightening to face difficult truths involving ourselves and/or our precious loved ones. Of course it is! Did you ever watch the Investigation Discovery (ID) series "Evil Lives Here"? A friend of mine is connected to a producer of that series; currently, there are 166 episodes produced over the last 18 seasons since the show debuted in 2016. The common theme of Evil Lives Here has to do with spouses, siblings, parents, children, and other family members who have committed murder one or more times---with the facts of the case(s) presented to us through the eyes of the perpetrator's surviving family members. These brave people are the proof of the old saying "Fear doesn't stop death; it stops life." I don't know about you, but how would anyone answer the question "So, tell me about your parents?" when your parents were involved in a murder-suicide when you were just a kid. So, to live in denial, in real or imagined fear, and/or in active addiction is very easy for those of us who have had a complex and traumatic history with people we love(d) and care(d) about.
For any recovering addict, being able to live in and successfully navigate one's own truthful reality of "now" is a key component of remaining sober over the long haul. Instead of living in active addiction which represents (again!) the radical escape from reality---living in sobriety and recovery is the radical return to reality---and by our own day-to-day choice.
Today's blog post is about the importance of living in the reality of "now" even when it's so much easier to take that drink, watch that porn, gamble that $$, and do whatever else we do to escape from reality on demand...
Our own mental health status is one of the first realities/difficult truths that many of us spend a lifetime NOT facing and managing properly for our own sake. If you need clarity about what mental health problems look like up close and personal, all you have to do is pay attention to how you yourself behave when something happens that you yourself didn't want or asked for. Yes, it's that simple.
When we find ourselves unable to appropriately cope with unwanted changes in the people, situations, and/or circumstances we experience (and that make us feel hurt, angry, lonely, guilty, ashamed, confused, hopeless, powerless, sad, etc.).....we truly need to get genuine help for ourselves sooner than later.
What form that help takes can initially mean no more than going to the library and reading a book on your "issue" that you are struggling with. Or joining (for free) a support group related to your issue. Even churches these days offer generic "Celebrate Recovery" meeting sessions that last for several weeks and are routinely re-offered over an entire year. "Help" does not just mean calling up a psychotherapist's office with the intention of making an appointment---but hanging up because "I can't afford it". When people call me and can't afford me, I know where to refer them. There are plenty of excellent resources that offer high-enough quality psychotherapy for anywhere from $0-40 per session.
Remember, we cannot control anyone else's behavior. We can only control our own. We can attempt to encourage and attempt to motivate someone else to do the right thing...and we can emotionally support them...but this does not mean that he/she/they will for sure "do" what we want/hope/expect will be done. That's reality. And the same is true in reverse. Your bff could be on speed dial when you crash emotionally, but that doesn't mean you are going to do what's genuinely best for you when you don't feel like doing it! Hello! That's reality too.
By the way, when we act out inappropriately towards ourselves or others when something "not good" happens (event-driven), we are dealing with our own personality issue and/or potential personality disorder. In personality theory, the three broad categories to describe personality disordered people are as follows: (1) the "odd/eccentric" bunch, (2) the "dramatic/erratic" bunch, and (3) the "anxious/afraid" bunch. That's it. Those are the options as to how we roll in a very general sense when we are personality disordered. When we choose to keep ignoring what may be very obvious to others who know us well enough, it's only ourselves that we hurt and continue to damage the most.
Now imagine, because this is true for ALL of us, we have either a personality disorder to some degree and/or mood disorder and/or a brain disorder to some degree---and now we choose to "self medicate" by drinking alcohol, chasing tail (sex addiction), smoking weed, gambling, over-spending, eating too much or eating too little, working all the time, etc. etc.
When we act out inappropriately towards ourselves or others when NOTHING has happened to precipitate our acting out (NOT event-driven), we are dealing with our own or mood and/or brain dysfunction disorder. This is not the same as merely being "in a bad mood" when we are. Everyone had bad moods. But not everyone has bad moods when the days get shorter and darker in the fall/winter season. Not everyone has bad moods that alternate with "great moods" in the course of a single day, or week, or month. Inotherwords, a pattern of bad moods that has nothing to do with any specific "thing" that was said or done or happened....this is a signal that help is needed from a mental health and/or psychiatric professional.
And please don't get me started on ADHD. I know so many people who have it and yet deny having it. And they still wonder why they can't get sh** done in a timely manner ever? Wow.
So how is all of "that" as a lifestyle really going to address and work to appropriately treat that which isn't appropriately treated through addiction? Yeah. Bells and whistles time. Setting yourself on fire to make yourself believe you are "better" leaves you burnt to a crisp in the end. Being an addict is never an answer to what ails you mentally, emotionally, physically, and/or spiritually speaking!
So there's the 101 on what we so easily ignore (like everyone in every one of those Evil Lives Here episodes I referenced earlier initially did) which is put right before us in the way of "dsyfunctional patterns of behavior" that we experience ourselves and/or witness first hand.
Active addicts by the way, are pretty much 100% dealing with an undiagnosed and/or improperly treated major mood, personality, and/or brain dysfunction and disorder/issues.
So let's take a look at how things can go way south in a person's life when involving process addictions. A process addiction, by the way, is what a person repeatedly pursues some behavioral "process" to feel better fast. Gambling is a good example, because the vast majority of gambling addicts describe the whole experience of gambling as being a lot like Christmas morning, if you can wrap your brain around that one.
And since the advent of online gambling has blown the roof off of casino gambling for those who can't/won't/don't make the effort to physically get themselves inside a casino to gamble---the industry has experienced a massive boom and shift both since online gambling was first legalized in 1994. Back then, they couldn't track incoming revenues as we do today, but after the first four years in operation, there were already 700 internet casinos online with revenues generating $835+ million dollars. Many industry experts claim that figure was actually closer to $1 billion dollars at that time.
In 2025, there is some disagreement as to how much the worldwide online gambling industry generates; estimates range around $110-120 billion dollars. By 2035, that figure it expected to more than double to $256 billion dollars.
Who knew people like you and I had so much money to blow on online gambling eh? Yet as I have worked with gamblers throughout my career, I do have to say that the process of gambling, be it online or in person, offers its devotees something that no other addictive process does: HOPE for life-changing rewards. And not just chump-change level rewards, but huge rewards like winning the Mega Millions lottery. Needless to say, if you love risk taking---gambling is the process addiction of choice for you! Low effort...with potentially very high rewards attached!
The typical "at risk" gambler loses approximately $3,000 a year through their own gambling habit. Problem gamblers, on average, lose $16,500 a year. Hard core gamblers will lose anywhere between $50-100,000 a year gambling.
In all cases, a person just doesn't "stop" gambling because he/she/they have been threatened with separation, divorce, or home foreclosure. Gambling as a process addiction requires that the gambler attend 12-step support groups (Gamblers Anonymous), obtain individual psychotherapy, and practice abstinence one day at a time. Nobody just "stops" gambling because they have lost their job, or their spouse, or their home, or their friends. Gambling ends because the work is being consistently done to live one's life in recovery from this addiction with a genuine commitment and focus on abstinence.
By the way, the vast majority of gambling addicts are also dealing with a major mood disorder like Bipolar I or II and/or the "dramatic and erratic" type of personality disorder because....because those dopamine rushes that accompany stimulant-based addictions is beyond intoxicating to those of us who know how "good" mania and a manic mood shift can feel from the inside out.
The next difficult reality I have witnessed repeatedly over 22 years of practice has to do with loved ones, typically parents and/or adult siblings, who do not acknowledge or address the cognitive and/or physical changes going on within him/her/them that are significantly affecting that person's own quality of life and/or their ability to even "do" their life appropriately.
Of course, this type of thing most often occurs as a result of the "onset" of something that changes brain and/or physical functioning in a negative direction. Such negative changes can occur as a result of a fall, or an accident of some kind where the brain and/or body take hits that don't improve over time.
Here's my take on this issue of "What do we do about mom/dad/uncle/aunt/granny/sister/brother.."? When a person can't successfully pursue and complete their own activities of daily living (ADLs), they just lost their vote as to what happens to them in the way of "assistance needed" on a day-in and day-out basis. I am not being a cold-hearted beotch as I type this. I'm being realistic. Unless you, by your own choice, are still a medical professional willing to take on the day-to-day tasks of making sure your loved one gets dressed, gets showered, gets fed, gets their meds, gets to the toilet, etc. etc.---you are creating for yourself and your loved one both a more at-risk situation that can make current matters worse. Just sayin'!
Besides the fact that both the "patient" here and the "carer" here are going to be suffering from tremendous stress and all that goes with it---do you wonder now why it is so easy for these folks to become active addicts if they aren't already? I mean, reality dictates that senior citizens these days are more addicted to their pain medication than ever before in the history of pain management! Not to mention those who are diabetic and still drink alcohol....or smoke weed...or ingest weed gummies like candy. It's easy to do when one's real life reality literally bites.
Helping someone who can't get up, dress up, and show up for their own life is an act of loving sacrifice. Yet there are professional carers, rehabs, assisted living, and memory care facilities that exist to prevent people from spiraling down into the abyss of active addiction whether they be "the patient" or "the caregiver". Choosing sobriety and recovery is always part of the big-picture solution here...
Ultimately, to remain sober and in recovery is to face whatever it is we need to face and then work to solve and/or resolve the real life problem(s) we have. Being wasted doesn't solve anything, and it certainly doesn't resolve anything either. We all have our daily load of personal responsibilties to do and manage. When we don't or won't...we create an environment for ourselve that leads right to lapse, relapse, or worse.
Don't be in denial. It doesn't suit you. Live in sobriety and recovery and watch how "truly" better your life will become!
Until next post.
