So yes, I've lurked this week. I'm a veteran 12 step program person - Alanon. That's the one for people who supposedly don't have an addiction themselves, they/we just happen to love or care about or obsess about a person who does have one. So I know the lingo, I know the ropes. But this is different; I've been shocked by the men with whom I have lurked.
Alanon saved my life a few years back, it truly did. I had surrounded myself with so much alcoholism, some I believed by unwitting choice, some by genetics. I was a mess by the time I first stumbled in; my dad had died of cirrhosis, a cousin lost by 40, my marriage unraveled, an understanding that my older sister was a way-down-the-line alcoholic. She would be dead at 51, but we didn't know that quite yet; there was a little bit more blessed ignorance on that one.
So I became an Alanon devotee, and it worked. You can regain your footing, you can let the alcoholics go, you don't let their disease/crap/'ism' dominate your life. Then you can turn back to your crap. Then something else happens, the dirty little secret. There creeps in a smugness. We are subtle about it, or we think we are - if we have any awareness of it at all, the creeping smugness. We wrap the smugness up in kindness, in sympathy, in tolerance, in coo-ing recovery type noises. But it's there. Smug. They, the alcoholic/addict/gambler/eater - they are screwed up - I'm fine. At the end of the day, when we are privately honest with ourselves, we'll acknowledge our belief that our emotional health would have been intact had we not been forced to associate with the alcoholic/addict.
Of course, I had sought out some of them - not the sister or the father or the cousin, but the others; I had sought them. I have come to understand that this is my crap; they are symptoms of my mess. This I learned from lurking in men's meetings. Phone meetings; I figured they'd never know. And there, on those lines, were healthy recovering men. Far healthier than me. Far healthier than I had guessed men could be.
So I lurked. I stayed muted. They'd never know. I was stunned. With that latent smugness of mine, I have grown so accustomed to thinking of addicts/alcoholics as flawed, as less than. These were the men who were the bane of my existence, the ones I tolerated, loved, hated. These meeting men were different. They were breathtakingly healthy. Their spiritual life is on more solid ground, their emotional health stronger, more honest. They had come to terms with their shortcomings and compulsions in ways I never had. They are searingly introspective, deeply committed to living the fullest life possible, they have firmly put into the number one priority slot: their health and the health of their relationships. These are not the men who pass through life just putting one foot in front of the other. They aim higher, far higher. They aim at happy, joyous, free. They aim for a shame-free life, eradication of self loathing and self destruction. They choose health and they choose the work it takes to get there. They are heroes.
Alanon saved my life a few years back, it truly did. I had surrounded myself with so much alcoholism, some I believed by unwitting choice, some by genetics. I was a mess by the time I first stumbled in; my dad had died of cirrhosis, a cousin lost by 40, my marriage unraveled, an understanding that my older sister was a way-down-the-line alcoholic. She would be dead at 51, but we didn't know that quite yet; there was a little bit more blessed ignorance on that one.
So I became an Alanon devotee, and it worked. You can regain your footing, you can let the alcoholics go, you don't let their disease/crap/'ism' dominate your life. Then you can turn back to your crap. Then something else happens, the dirty little secret. There creeps in a smugness. We are subtle about it, or we think we are - if we have any awareness of it at all, the creeping smugness. We wrap the smugness up in kindness, in sympathy, in tolerance, in coo-ing recovery type noises. But it's there. Smug. They, the alcoholic/addict/gambler/eater - they are screwed up - I'm fine. At the end of the day, when we are privately honest with ourselves, we'll acknowledge our belief that our emotional health would have been intact had we not been forced to associate with the alcoholic/addict.
Of course, I had sought out some of them - not the sister or the father or the cousin, but the others; I had sought them. I have come to understand that this is my crap; they are symptoms of my mess. This I learned from lurking in men's meetings. Phone meetings; I figured they'd never know. And there, on those lines, were healthy recovering men. Far healthier than me. Far healthier than I had guessed men could be.
So I lurked. I stayed muted. They'd never know. I was stunned. With that latent smugness of mine, I have grown so accustomed to thinking of addicts/alcoholics as flawed, as less than. These were the men who were the bane of my existence, the ones I tolerated, loved, hated. These meeting men were different. They were breathtakingly healthy. Their spiritual life is on more solid ground, their emotional health stronger, more honest. They had come to terms with their shortcomings and compulsions in ways I never had. They are searingly introspective, deeply committed to living the fullest life possible, they have firmly put into the number one priority slot: their health and the health of their relationships. These are not the men who pass through life just putting one foot in front of the other. They aim higher, far higher. They aim at happy, joyous, free. They aim for a shame-free life, eradication of self loathing and self destruction. They choose health and they choose the work it takes to get there. They are heroes.
Lurking there - it was humbling, disturbing, inspiring, a little scary, slightly embarrassing, and I am going to do it again.
Aren't I ridiculous.
Aren't I ridiculous.
photo by daustin@sandcarveddesigns.com
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