The Family Disease
that I have...
I come from a long line of alcoholics and, like my ancestors who preceded me—I too have the disease. Whether by genetics or environmental upbringing or both, this is my struggle to overcome as well, to work toward recovery and a sober life.
I think it’s a combo, to be honest of both the nature and the nurture (or lack thereof as well as life’s hardships).
I carry intergenerational trauma and I know that my relatives were depressed and anxious in a time where there wasn’t xanax. Alcohol, however, was there. And in abundance.
Sadly, even though I lived in a different era, even in the 20th century, anti-anxiety pills still aren’t as ubiquitous as alcohol.
I also know that my PTSD and CPTSD have nudged me and allowed for an easy path for me to pave, as I looked to alcohol to abuse—to numb, to self medicate, to sleep.
I have hesitated to use the phrase before, the “I’m an alcoholic,” statement.
I think it’s more than just because it’s not great to admit and rather embarrassing, but also, by extension—
It’s something that associates me with my dad. And admitting this is also associating me with him and with his disease, with everything that hurt me about him and made it hard for our family when growing up.
My mother always told me to be careful because it runs in the family. She even forewarned me that I would be attracted to other children of alcoholics—you’re going to be drawn to each other, she said.
Even my father, though he left no suicide note, did write to me the following, upon giving me a wine coupon:
“You can do with this what you want. Whatever you do, don’t abuse it. You saw what it did to me.”
I was the only one who received a note.
I have often wondered why, over the years—
I wasn’t an every day drinker like he was when he wrote that.
Still, he must have felt or recognized something in me that he saw within himself—probably the ways in which I drank to self soothe during the pain of my divorce.
I am the child of an alcoholic. And I am the descendent of many, many alcoholics.
And I am not someone who has or can have just one drink. At points I have, then commending myself, which is not normal behavior to have to do that.
I can drink and I can drink a lot, especially for someone of my little size. I don’t get hung-over because of my genetics.
And because of the pain of my story, my genetics, and my ways of soothing myself, I have developed an unhealthy relationship with alcohol and to over-consume alcohol:
I am an alcoholic.
Admitting something like that is humbling, for sure. Especially because I think about the 14 year old Danielle who was in Awareness Theatre and how she would be so disappointed in me and how I know that and have to say that now.
But —
I also think that 14 year old Danielle could not even begin to conceive of what would happen to her and her family in the years to come.
I don’t use this—you don’t know my pain—as an excuse—I am responsible for my abuse of alcohol.
I do think that many addictions develop as a result of trauma and too much pain that we don’t know how to address.
However, in the abuse of a substance, we exacerbate our own suffering and prolong it and compound it.
This has too often been my story. It is time to change my story as I work steps and get to know more about how to address my own abuse of the substance.
So much of my life’s work and my journey is in healing what was passed to me, in where I came from.
It’s not a part of my story I am especially proud of, but it is real and it is my truth.
I have the family disease.