Do I Love an Addict (Part 1)
Do I Love an Addict (part 1)
First of all, the term addict in our society has a very negative connotation. It comes part and parcel with an image. The image is largely stereotyped from movies we have all seen. When we hear the word addict, the image we see is one of scruffy figures, sneaking through dark alleys or holed up in bathrooms with syringes. The image we see is winos in the street with paper bags and we fancy we can even smell the noxious fumes. The image we see is chairs flying, fists hitting, & Marlon Brando in the streets yelling “Stellaaaaaaa.” We see these images when we hear the word addict, and we wonder why no-one wants to admit they have the sickness of addiction. Certainly when my fiancee said many years ago that he thought he had a ‘problem’ (nice word, same image) I recoiled at the very thought.
So what does the term addict really mean. It simply means someone who is addicted to a substance. It could be alcohol, some illegal drug, or some legal drug. We also extend the term addiction to encompass gambling addictions, sexual addictions, food addictions etc.. But for our purposes now, let’s just focus on alcohol and drugs. With alcohol and drugs, being addicted means that of the 10 trillion cells in a person’s body, that person has more cells that are addicted than cells that are not addicted.
This leaves a wide range of varying degrees of addiction, as you might imagine. We go from the person who has just tipped over the scale and has 5 trillion and 1 addicted cells, to the person who has 10 trillion addicted cells. Addicted cells, by they way, never revert to normal cells and remain addicted for the life of the cell. So when you think of our stereotyped image of the addict, you can probably see that he or she is more on the side of the 10 trillion addicted cells, than the 5 trillion and one. The more addicted cells you have, the more the substance runs your life and the more you become a slave to it. Hence the more down-and-out you look.
So what does an addict look like before he or she becomes Marlon Brando yelling Stella in a dead, unhearing alley? Truthfully, there are as many ways addicts look as there are people in the world. But there are also lots of commonalities. I can only tell you my experience, and later the experiences of others. Perhaps these will help you to see early on that your loved one has a problem. Then you can get the help you need for your life. This may or may not cause your loved one to do the same, but it certainly will help more than it hurts. And at least one of you will have a better chance at health and happiness.
For me the way it started was with lots of little petty arguments. I never saw them coming, and I never connected them to alcohol. It seemed in these arguments that I was forever being blamed or accused, and I was trying to defend against a losing battle. So one sign that addiction may be around is if you feel yourself defending all the time over nonsense and trivialities.
Had I known to look I might also have noticed that the arguments in those days tended to happen after a few beers, and they tended to happen on the weekends. Had I known I might have connected that a lot more drinking was occurring on the weekends. So if you notice more arguments as an evening or weekend rolls on, that could be a sign. You should ask yourself, has my loved one been drinking, smoking, etc. etc.
Now as for sings of intoxication, with Dave, there was never a slurring of speech. There was never a blurring of the eyes. He had in those days what they call a very ‘high tolerance’, and he could down a lot of alcohol with very little outward sign. Later as I was educated and able to perceive the signs I would notice a slight glossiness of his eyes- almost imperceptible, but it was there. And there would be just the tiniest of muffling of his speech. Now you would need to know Dave very intimately to see these signs, and even the average family member would never have known the difference between a sober Dave and a drunk on 8 beers Dave. Unless he or she knew that he tended to get very argumentative and sensitive- which nobody knew as it easily passed as just a bad mood.
So another thing to look for is just a recurring bad mood in someone on a regular basis.
Now this seeming not intoxicated peculiarity about Dave allowed for another oversight. For ten years I marveled at Dave’s sleeping habits. The man could jump out of bed at 6 am, fresh as a daisy. He always took a shower and he always looked and smelled good. But I wondered that he could jump out of bed that early and be on his way without a groan. But then at 6:00 at night, when I was just getting going, he might well be found asleep on the couch. And you truly had a better chance of ‘seeing God’ than you did of waking Dave up once he had fallen asleep. I used to struggle to get him to go to bed.