by Dr. Dan Bochner (
http://www.drbochner.com)
“All sins tend to be addictive, and the terminal point of
addiction is damnation.”
—W.H. Auden
It’s the addict’s most important relationship—their relationship
with the bottle, the pipe, the pills, or the needle, and often their
relationship with food or sexual activity. Remember what it feels like
to fall in love? There’s that crazy chemical attraction. You can’t think
of anything else but seeing your lover. You feel like you’d do anything
for your love. You feel like you can’t sleep or eat without thinking of
them. You let everything else go. Your work suffers. Studying hardly
matters. You spend more time out. Your friends and family have far
less influence than usual. Even those who have always been there
for you, or those who you know count on you for everything, can
sometimes take a back seat to a great love. The addict’s relationship
with their drug, whether it’s beer, cocaine, heroin, pharmaceuticals,
food or sex, exactly mimics a crazy love affair.
Sometimes people develop this love for their drug slowly. At first,
they don’t quite trust the relationship. They know it feels good, but
they know they’d better be careful. They’ve heard that drugs can be a
devilish mistress. On the other hand, your drug could be just the thing
that lets you relax enough to deal with your day. It just takes the edge
off or gives you that little boost. But slowly you need it a little more
and you start to trust. It’s not a big deal just having a little more. You
deserve it, just like you deserve to be with someone who makes you
feel calm or strong or smart or fun or attractive. How could it harm
you to have a bit more? Who cares what it costs? If others don’t like it,
they don’t even have to know. Or the hell with them, you can be with
anyone—that is, you can do anything—you want!
Soon, you trust your drug more than you trust anything else. After
all, you know it well. You know what to expect from it, and you know
how it makes you feel. You feel you have control over it. You use
it when you want. When you need it again, you know where to get
it. Unlike a human being, it’s reactions seem perfectly predictable.
There’s no reason to miss your drug, or to feel like it might let you
down. It’s not like a lover who might turn to someone else or who
might not answer the phone when you call. You always know where
to find it—that is, as long as you have access to it. If it’s hard to get,
though, you still know there are things you can do to get it, even
if those schemes could be uncomfortable or slimy or perhaps even
illegal.
Some people experience love at first sight, or sip, or puff, or snort,
or draw. It’s as though the addict and the drug were made for each
other—a match made in heaven (and ready to burn). The addict can
look at their drug and say “you . . . complete me!” With this kind of
addiction, you see the happy couple together everywhere, although
you don’t always know the drug is there. When they’re together the
addict is happy and confident and maybe even excited or, on the other
hand, calm and at peace. That the addict is coupled is much more
obvious when they’re fighting with their drug. Then, the addict is
petty, ugly, mean, and/or pathetic. But they’re less likely to be seen
when they’re at odds with their drug because the addict withdraws and
won’t be seen by anyone but close family members (if even them).
The addict sees the relationship with the drug as just the way to
escape the pressures of everyday life and society. With the drug the
addict can be wild or just let it all go. “No one’s going to control me,”
the addict says to the drug (now a buddy) . . . and the addict and the
drug are perfect rebels together. They sneak off to be together when
they’re expected to be nearby. Yes, together they’re bad, but in a way
the addict thinks is “cool.” When they’re together, an addict and his
drug can accomplish anything and can act any way they want. No one
can stop them, and they’d better not try.
In the relationship between an addict and a drug, the sex is out of
this world . . . if only it weren’t just a bit like masturbation. The addict
feels as though in control of the whole situation, and the orgasm
comes off impeccably every time. The addict knows every nuance
of his drug—just the right way to romance it, the perfect caress, all
the right spots, all the right moves. The addict fondles his drug and
cuddles and coos. It’s so sweet it almost makes you sick. Sometimes
the addict likes the romance and the anticipation of making love.
Sometimes it’s just a quickie—the perfect release. Either way, the
sex is great. There’s the love, the desire, the intermingling of souls.
There’s also make-up sex after a dire row. Even though you can count
on your drug kicking you like it doesn’t care if you’re crap, almost
as though it’s delivering the most perfect affront that only your most
intimate companion could know, you can count on achieving that
mind-blowing rapprochement within the inevitable reconciliation. In
fact, the make-up with one’s drug is just that much better, much like
make-up sex, because the addict has been kicked like crap. After the
big fight, there’s the struggle over what to do, and then a kiss to make
up . . . and then wild make-up sex, the pattern repeating every day like
clockwork, perhaps making it just that much more compelling than a
real relationship.
With all that fighting, however, after a while there can be regret.
Things start to feel a mess. Life seems to be falling apart. Just like in a
chaotic love affair, the drug gets blamed for the behavior of the addict.
“I’m not happy because of you,” the addict says, blaming the drug
because it takes up too much of the addict’s time or because it entices
the addict to be lazy or mean, or because it spends too much of the
addict’s money. Maybe the regret begins in the disdain felt from others
or because the addict’s family seems to be hurting. Regret might even
include some minimal level of taking responsibility, and could even
appear to include true self-reflection, but typically the addict is far
too fragile to tolerate maintaining a responsible view. Responsibility
is interpreted by the addict as blame, and quickly turns the addict to
blaming everyone else.
Nevertheless, because of the regret, the addict tries to leave the
drug. The drug doesn’t like it, and protests. It screams in the addicts
ears and claws at the addict’s intestines. Like a scorned lover, the drug
alternately allures the addict and then, if the addict tries to resist, gets
pissed and slashes the addict’s tires or tries to break the windows out
of the addict’s home. The drug might actually appear to give up at
times, but the addict, not fully understanding the vulnerability within,
is lonely and an easy target for a return to the torrid love of the drug.
If only the drug somehow gets to see the addict somewhere
unexpectedly. The drug doesn’t want to be left, and feeling abandoned,
will do anything to get the addict back. It can be tricky, and though the
addict in recovery tries like hell to take things one day at a time, the
drug slyly seeps through every crack in the addict’s recovery armor.
Every difficulty during the day, every memory of what’s “cool,”
everyone to whom the addict is attracted, happy times, sad times,
conflict and resolution, everything . . . absolutely everything leads the
addict to the drug. And for some inexplicable reason, all memory of
misery from the drug is so easily forgotten. Where recovery requires
responsibility that the addict interprets as taking the blame, and thus
other people are hard to face, the drug soothes and tells the addict that
all is well. The addict is supremely vulnerable and desperately needs
the perceived love of the drug. Most of the time, thus, the breakup
between the addict and the drug is short, or at least not permanent,
no matter how much regret the relationship might have previously
generated.
So now I speak to you. Yes, you! You the addict, or you, the person
who is in a relationship with the addict, yes, I am speaking to you. The
relationship with the drug is the only relationship that really matters to
the addict. You, the addict, you know this is true. You are thinking so
much more about your drug than you are about your loved ones. You
just can’t wait till you meld with your lover (the drug) again. Is there
any person about whom you feel like that? You, the person involved
with the addict, you do not have a relationship—at least it should be
clear that you have no relationship while the drug is still cheating with
your lover. The addict is not there for you. The addict is there for the
drug. If the addict is with you, then you have something to do with the
drug, or are tolerated as a necessary sideshow. You, the addict, fess up,
you’re not even really there with your lover. You’re wherever you need
to be where you know you’ll get your drug. If your lover will let you
use the drug, or maybe even help you use it or acquire it, of course
it’s okay with you to have them around. But you, the person who
thinks you have a relationship with the addict, what do you think will
happen when you challenge your love’s relationship with the drug.
The addict may try to convince you to stay. The addict might tell you
how desperate they are that you not abandon them. They might even
betray the drug for the moment in seemingly heartfelt repentances.
But most likely, the addict will leave you before they leave the drug.
To you, the addict, you must realize you can have only one true
love. You should not expect your human lover to understand your
relationship with your drug any more than you could expect them to
understand if you were courting their best friend. To you, the human
lover, please don’t understand your addict’s dalliance with the drug.
Your understanding merely makes you a chump who is aiding your
addict’s infidelity. To you both, if you do truly want to be together,
there is no room for this drug or any drug in your relationship. Where
there’s any addiction involved in relationships between people, every
day into the future will remain in vigilance to overcome the drug’s
incessant seduction. To you both, please, please, if you are in a
relationship where there has been a relationship with a drug, you must
understand, addiction is the relationship to remember.
Hi everyone, I'm a psychologist and author of two books, the first
entitled The Therapist's Use of Self in Family Therapy was published
10 years ago, and the second entitled The Emotional Toolbox: A
Manual for Mental Health is available in its entirety on my website,
http://www.DrBochner.com (nothing for sale there nor any advertising,
just a good resource).
Topic: Addictions: The Relationship to Remember (Read 437 times)
July 02, 2009, 01:13:15 AM
