understandingaddiction

Bonnie St. John is a champion snow skier and well sought out  motivational speaker. Big deal, except that she has one leg and grew up in snowless  San Diego.  In a documentary, she tells the story of winning a bronze medal.  She was the fastest skier coming into the event, the winning time to be the average time of two runs.  She was skiing fast with good time when, almost to the finish, she wiped out on a patch of ice.  Thinking the race was lost, she managed to get up hoping to just to finish the race. To her surprise, she finished with the bronze.  As she analyzed the event, she learned that every single racer wiped out in the same spot; every single racer had only one leg and she came into the second run with the best time.  In that moment, she realized the difference between the bronze and the gold medal winner was not in not falling, but in how quickly each got up.

Sometimes, it feels like life is knocking you down time and again.  My patient, AJ was venting out the other day.  After years of drug abuse, he finally made it to one year of recovery.  “Abstinence is over rated.”  He says.  “I can’t win for losing. I was that close to using.” He proceeds to talk about getting picked up on an old warrant for unpaid child support on his now adult child. He spent the weekend in jail until the matter could be cleared. He was indeed paid up but the warrant was never lifted.  After his release, he found out he and his room mates had been evicted from their apartment because of some neighbor complaint.  He spent the night under some stairway in pouring rain.  Wet and dejected, he wallowed in the mire of life’s unfairness. He pondered. “What’s the point in being straight?” On and on he went.  ” My life is like one of those closets in your house.” He said.  “You know, the one that you open and a whole lot of stuff just come spilling on down.”  I reminded him. “You are here and you are clean, aren’t you?”  After some thought he replied, ” Yeah, but that’s because in the past, whenever I used because I was mad, I just felt more miserable after wards. Using would have made everything much worse.”  “Hold that thought.” I said.

Like Bonnie St. John, AJ was clearly learning from experience.  He just did not know it yet. Faced with getting knocked back down, he used his recollection of how it felt after each relapse to choose a different response.  He chose to get up quickly and move on.  One painful experience, one positive choice,finishing one race at a time.

Skiing offers life lessons in overcoming addiction.  First you accept that falling is inevitable so you can prepare for it.  There can be a patch of ice underneath beautiful white snow.  The best laid plans go awry.  Beloveds leave. Catastrophes happen.  You remember the first lessons in ski school.  You learn how to fall so you do not ski into a tree or fall off a cliff and you learn to get up so you don’t freeze to death.  Then, you learn to cushion your fall so you don’t hurt too badly.  You learn to take the hand that’s offered to you even if it is a little hand from a five year old skiing with no poles.  You open yourself to your Higher Power, or listen to a friend whose opinion you value. Help abounds.  You just have to pay attention and be open to receive.  In time, you spend less energy nourishing your hurt and your pride.  You get up quickly and you finish the race.  You move on  and you are all the better for it.