Undressed

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Dear addicts, families and friends, dear stranger. Being born into a family affected by addiction is a heavy burden upon the shoulders of an innocent newborn child; I suppose we all agree on that. Not so common knowledge is that there are far more addictions and addicts in this world than most of us are aware of, far more families affected, far more people suffering than we can by any means imagine. Many of those affected by addiction do not have a clue what is going on. They just know there is something wrong with them, their lives, or (seemingly) those around them, but cannot figure out what it is. it may take decades, even a lifetime, to discover an addiction, and sometimes they of course remain forever unrevealed - denial is so endlessly engrossing. We tend to think that addicts are only found in the gutter, smelly and with dirty clothes, nowhere to go. The fact is that only a small percentage of addicts are “street people”. A much larger percentage have a job, friends, a home and even a family. And they do seem to get along. They are referred to as functional addicts. with or without the surroundings being aware of it, addicts use their drugs (which may for instance be alcohol, gambling, work, food, sex, fanatic religion, cocaine, shopping - just to mention a few) as self-medication to ease the emotional pain from being affected by others or own addiction and addict behavior in earlier and present stages of life. Hand in hand with addicts, go the codependent, silently and often invisible to the surroundings in the sense that nobody knows they have an illness just as serious as the one the addict is suffering from. codependence is “simply” the addiction to an addict. codependents tend to be even more addicted to the addict than the addict is to their medication. Just like the addict needs medication for their pain, so does the codependent, only - their medication is the addict. From an emotional perspective, codependence can sometimes be tougher than the actual “ordinary” addiction. The addict is at least addicted to a substance or a matter. The codependent is addicted to a (probably highly unpredictable) human being. and where for instance the alcoholic can temporary ease their pain with a drink or ten, the heroin addict can escape with another injection, the gambler can flee into a casino while the overeater indulges in the contents of the fridge, the codependent is left lost each time the addict is under medication and hence unavailable - addicts do tend to flee or by other means create physical or mental distance between themselves and their loved ones, while carrying out their self-medication.

 

 

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How they (addicts and codependents) always end up together? Ask the specialists on human minds and bodies for details on the hardly controllable mental and physical mechanisms that make us fall in love; the fact is that the addict and the codependent always find each other. Our subconscious apparently has a magic - or should i say fatal - ability to pick the “perfect” match. Maybe it has to do with the survival instinct of the human race, and hence the (also subconscious) desire for having children as similar to ourselves as possible. Whatever, if an abuser is what our subconscious is hunting for, you can be damned sure it will find one. The same is true for the abuser as far as codependents (ironically also called non-addicted abusers) are concerned. A completely sane and healthy person would never fall in love with an addict, just like the addict would find that sane and healthy person extremely boring, and hit the road long before the party had even started. Once established, a non-recovered relationship between an addict and a codependent can never ever work, even though the desire to make it is present on both sides. why? Because hurt people hurt people. The addict and the codependent simply don’t know how to not hurt each other. No lessons were taught on that subject in the (boozy or otherwise sleazy) streets they came from. But they certainly did receive their lessons in blaming surroundings for their misery, and in never taking a closer look at themselves. That’s the key you might be looking for, that’s what every addiction is about - a temporary escape from pain in order not having to take a close look at oneself and change for the better.

 

 

 

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As indicated in the diagram (see CD booklet), every single abuser also suffers from codependence. This should come as no surprise; they certainly have the background for it intact. Additionally, those who suffer from one kind of addiction are likely to suffer from one or more other addictions too. so a cocaine codependent could be an alcoholic, a food addict, gambler, sex addict and shopaholic. (Maybe workaholism on top of it all would be desirable - for financial reasons.) That’s the bad news. the good news is that recovering from one of the addictions might make it easier to recover from others. And if one of the involved recovers, there is a chance the rest of the family - or at least parts of it - and maybe even friends will follow. The bad part of the good news however, is that recovering from one addiction often reveals others. Welcome to the jungle...

 

 

 

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So removing all gambling machines in a country - like they have now (2007) done in Norway - may be fine for the sake of morality, but without treating the underlying cause for gambling addiction, the gamblers will either keep on gambling somewhere else to cure their pain, or will find some other way of self-medication - i guarantee it. and since we are speaking of Norway, I think the ones who are running this country (as well as many of its inhabitants) may have failed to realize that happy people are people who are not continuously watched over and told what to do. by the way, in case you did not know, the Norwegian drinking culture is completely accepted, and in large groups of the population considered completely normal, to drink till you drop every Friday and Saturday night, and a truly successful party is the one after which you wake up and remember nothing, with a black eye and a complete stranger by your side. I’m not saying it never happened to me, nevertheless I find it sad and alarming. A weekend is a period, lasting from Friday till Sunday, that is an undeniable fact. Hence, I think no other country in the world can match this country’s amount of periodic drinkers. Well, maybe the Russians in a way (but then again, they are smart enough to never stop, which eliminates the relevance of “periodic”). Cheers, prime ministers and associates, it’s Friday.

 

 

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When addiction is present in a family, a close look at the family tree is likely to reveal addiction(s) in most of its leaves. the addiction may occasionally seem to skip a generation or two, giving the impression that there are those who miraculously escaped where everyone else did not. however, these “miracles” still - silently and of course unknowingly - seem to pass their predisposition for addiction on to coming generations. the disease of addiction is maybe the sneakiest and slyest there is in this world, always finding its way, like a virus that knows exactly how to survive - even under difficult conditions - and do its job; silently infect its victims.

 

 

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So if there is addiction of any kind present in your family or among your friends, my suggestion is to gain as much knowledge on the subject as possible, both about the addict track and the non-addict track, whether you believe to be affected or not - and ASAP. in my opinion, introducing a subject in the later years of primary school, teaching to recognize and deal with addictions, would be the most effective weapon in the battle against this unpleasant and unpredictable collection of diseases, and save thousands - or even millions - of unhappy lives and destinies. but who will make the politicians understand that? Most of them are addicts themselves - workaholics. and i believe - directly translated from as we say in Norwegian - many of them don’t spit into their glasses either. Cheers again.

 

 

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It may sound wild and completely insane: you could have a happy life, but depriving your children of their happiness, raising them to become addicts and/or codependents, even if you think you are unaffected. If reading this makes you angry, i claim your children are in danger. And to make you even angrier, take this: the most dangerous person in a family is the one who is always there - without even being asked - to help everyone with everything. Sorry. And love sometimes means shutting up or staying away, allowing others to make and learn from their own mistakes and tidy up their own messes, instead of always being around, doing things for them which they could and should have done themselves, and/or solving their every problem, often before it even occurred. And speaking of love, it also means to clearly and consistently signal unacceptable behavior.

 

 

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True happiness, the one that money can’t buy and others can’t give you, the one you need to choose for yourself, has this peculiar and not always obvious characteristic: it goes hand in hand with acceptable behavior, and simply will not and cannot go hand in hand with the opposite. the better the behavior the greater the happiness and the worse the behavior, the greater the unhappiness. We seem to be facing a linear curve. behavior can be decomposed into a large number of components, each of which can again be decomposed - and so on. There is not enough space for the decompositions here, so I would just like to mention honesty as a sparkling example of these components, and claim that none of us are sicker than our lies or unpleasant secrets. But no healthier either. And children don’t do what you tell them, but what you show them. your attitudes and behavior will be reflected in their minds and spirits, and if you didn’t learn healthy attitudes and behavior where and as you grew up, there is not a chance in hell you will a) know that without being told or b) be able to teach your children.

 

 

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It is my firm belief, that in this world, you find no friendlier, healthier, happier and more mentally stable people than truly recovered addicts. There is so much to learn for each and every one of us, addict or non-addict, from the methods they used for recovery. They were smart and lucky enough to find that elusive key, and grab it before it was too late. They accomplished the “impossible”, fought their way out of a childhood that went wrong, got themselves a new and healthier upbringing, and learned to live again - my congratulations, deepest admiration and warmest regards to you all.