Dealing with Death in Recovery

     Dad died on Christmas Eve holding my hand. I am truly at peace with his passing. He was sick for a very long time.  Some folks in the rooms have asked me, usually before a meeting, "How's your father?"

     "He's dead," I tell them. I don't know why that answer [seems to, an any rate] creates a bit of discomfort. Whether there is an afterlife or not [and I don't think there is one], my father is out of it now. He no longer has to force himself to function when it's easier to just allow the dementia to take over. He no longer has to deny arthritic pain or hide his ever-decreasing short term memory. He no longer has to fight to stay awake and interested in his surroundings.

     I've been at twelve step meetings where the topic was coping with the death of someone. When I experienced the loss of a grandfather three months into my own recovery [and was still a believer in divinity], I brought up that topic myself. The usual platitudes were offered to me. Y'll know the ones I mean...
          He's in a better place now.
          You'll see him again.
          Using won't fix the pain.
     and others which basically boil down to the same thing: The loss of someone near and dear to you is not permanent. It's a very long temporary, that's all.

I made this myself. You can save it to someplace in your computer and upload it to anywhere on the interwebz. I don't care. Credit and link back to here are not necessary. Copyright trolls are not welcome here. If you are one, go away now please.

     There is a hegemony of Christian cultures in the United States. That gets tiring to me at times yet quite frankly, I think there are worse kinds of religious cultures that could predominate. Yeah, modern Christianity has produced the Westboro crew and the fake healers [someone please explain to me though why it is that there aren't any modern verified reports of said televangelists via their g-d giving amputees new limbs. See: http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/  and
http://www.christianforums.com/t6986184/  and
http://rantsandrage.com/2011/05/01/god-hates-amputees/  and
http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/why_wont_god_heal_amputees.html  and
https://twitter.com/hashtag/godhatesamputees?f=realtime  to get the gist of my question]. I understand that a large majority of modern day Christians do not stand with the Westboro folks or with those preachers who are frauds. I'm saying that for all the good that modern Christianity has done, there is also some not so good. There are degrees and percentages of good and bad in all social, political, economic, religious, and bowel movements. 

     When people wish me a Happy Christian Holiday, I warmly wish them the same. When people tell me that they are praying for me or my dad, I warmly thank them. My believer friends are not out to get me, convert me, or inflict massive butt-hurt upon me personally by wishing me a Happy Christian Holiday or by expressing their concerns by letting me know that they are remembering me in their prayers. If I sneeze, a polite "G-d bless you!" ought not be a reason for a war. I'm too fricking old to fight every battle that presents itself to me. Some of those battles are not worth fighting. I leave some of the ones that are worth fighting to the younger folks coming up behind me. Because you see, I am old. I have to conserve my strength and energy.

     I've gotten off the main point of this blog post already. Didn't take long at all. Okay then. Nuff.

     I came into the rooms believing. Through the years, I've lost my faith and had to grapple with the realization that I am ipso facto an atheist. I tried to disguise this particular turn of events for a long time by hiding under the umbrella of some sort of quasi-pantheism or quasi-animism. There are either bunches of spirits around who really aren't gods or perhaps there is divinity in everything from cancer cells to cockroaches and beyond. When those things became too intellectually discordant for me to bear, I gave up. 

     As a non-believer with quite a bit of time abstinent from active addiction, I chose not to bring up my dad's demise as a topic at any of the twelve step meetings I attend. Why?

          1. I don't want to use over it.
          2. I accept death as permanent.
          3. I lost one person. My dad lost everyone.

     Here are a couple other reasons why I didn't bring it up as a topic:

          1. I have the benefit of a huge support system: my actual friends [not the many acquaintances] both inside and outside of the rooms, professionals, a few selected relatives, and hospice.
          2. Some folks in the rooms [just like some folks who don't need to be in the rooms] tend to discount feelings or distance themselves from uncomfortability by remarking upon the supposed transient nature of loss and that's simply not where I'm at. 
          3. A few people in the rooms tend to feed on other peoples' stuff. I'm not into, "Oh you poor thing! How are you feeling? Are you alright?"  I'm way beyond that sort of thing.

I made this myself. You can save it to someplace in your computer and upload it to anywhere on the interwebz. I don't care. Credit and link back to here are not necessary. Copyright trolls are not welcome here. If you are one, go away now please.

     The facts are simple. My father is dead. Through my direct advocacy, the caring concern of various professionals and other helpers, and hospice, my dad had a good death. He was kept as comfortable and as free from pain and anxiety as possible. I was with him when he died. Dad died holding my hand and smiling. I miss my dad however there is no way that I would want him to live any longer than he did given his failing brain and progressive physical debilitation. Dad is gone, yes. He left a lot of love behind. And that is truly awesome.

I made this myself. You can save it to someplace in your computer and upload it to anywhere on the interwebz. I don't care. Credit and link back to here are not necessary. Copyright trolls are not welcome here. If you are one, go away now please.

Follow Program Etiquette

      I walk into the room. The floor is already a mess even though the linoleum is less than two months old. The new paint is peeling where someone had ripped a taped sign off the wall. Dead mouse smell hits my nostrils. On the wax board in front of the room [a thirty two dollar wax board, sigh...group conscience] someone had scrawled the words Follow Program Edecate. I put my stuff down on the couch. I approach the wax board. The eraser has long ago disappeared. I wipe off the offensive words with a sleeve.

     Several years ago, some of the bleeding deacons decided that the new people who were now infiltrating the rooms in droves needed to be taught about what they referred to as "program etiquette." I thought that was a lousy idea. We already had chair people announcing things like don't cuss and turn off the cell phones [group conscience] at the beginning of each meeting. How many rules did we need here?

     Not to be denied, some of the folks from the district got together and began going around to different places and holding "workshops" on "etiquette." Yes, I went to one. One was enough. There was a slew of things that were offensive to the bleeding deacons:
          
          New people got up and down too much.

          They went to the bathrooms too much.

          They dared to leave the meeting to take smoke breaks.


          New people talked too much to each other during the meetings.

          They talked about day treatment, drug court, and other addictions when it was their turn to share.

          Some of them even left the meeting before the final prayer at the end.



          New people didn't understand anonymity.

          They talked about the meeting in the parking lot.

          They ratted on people to their counselors or to drug court.


     If these workshops had been renamed "Traditions Workshops" and the trads were presented as ideals to follow, I would not have had a problem. But the etiquette workshops were simply bitchfests with lecturers. Nothing good came out of them far as I could tell.

     I have a lot of time in. I've been abstinent for more than half my life. When I get up during a meeting to use the bathroom, I don't get the stares from the bleeding deacons. Kids have to ask to be excused from the room or from the dinner table. Adults at a recovery meeting do at times have to use the bathroom during the meeting. This should not be a big deal people.

     Yes, some of us are easily distracted. It ain't just the newcomers, folks. Yes, sometimes the room is too bright or too noisy or too smelly. Yeah, sometimes we need to stand up or stretch our legs a bit. If an adult wishes to leave a room for any reason, why is that anyone's business? Sometimes, a topic is hitting close to home and someone may need a break for that reason. Tobacco is an addiction, we are now told. If you don't smoke or if your smoking allows you to sit still for an hour without a cigarette, count yourself lucky.

     Is there a list of acceptable topics floating around that I haven't been told about? If I am worried or angry or think I will relapse over some person, place, thing, situation, organization, or other entity, isn't that fair game for bringing up at a meeting? "Hardly any recovery in this room," you say. I was told that if I thought something was going to cause me to mess up, that I could talk about it in the rooms. Whatever.

     There are a few more non-theists in the rooms than there used to be. The growing trend of young people who are un-churched is also reflected in the composition of people in recovery. Some of us choose to sit or stand during the final prayer. We don't want to be fake and say words that do not hold any meaning to us. Folks leaving before the final "amen" disconcerts me too at times. Bottom line: We don't have (all that much, if any) control over the behavior of others. I don't have to die on that particular mountain. Neither do you. A few people will leave before the end of meetings. Suck it up and deal with it. 

     Breaching of anonymity is a problem but it is not only the newcomers who do it. Some people who should know better call up drug court personnel and rat out the mandated people. This one goes to the bathroom too much. That one comes a few minutes late. The other one is sleeping. These two are seeing each other secretly on the side. And so on. The professional staff at drug court are at fault for listening. So maybe new folks in treatment are in the parking lot talking about what happened at the meetings. Is that any worse than those of us who know better going home and telling our spouses who was there or what was said? Different from a gang of recovering people in a restaurant talking about other recovering people? More terrible than the rumors going around concerning who picked up again, who slept with who, or who is getting a divorce? Awful-er than snitching to drug court? We who have been there have a responsibility to follow the spirit of tradition twelve as well as the letter.

     This is not an us versus them thing. This is not a newcomers against bleeding deacons recovery. We have a responsibility at meetings. We are the ones who can gently take people aside and explain some aspect of a tradition. We are the ones who can help a chairperson out by asking for quiet. We are the ones who can practice celebrating the new people instead of verbally attacking them for not "following program etiquette."

     Cell phones are an annoyance everywhere. The abrupt ringing is a problem in movie theaters and classrooms as well as in meetings. Cursing is something that may offend some of the older folks. As for the rest of your shitty rules, stuff them.

     We have no business directing when someone may take care of their bodily functions, take a cigarette break, or leave a room. We are not prison guards. We are not the be all and end all. When we fail to be polite and respectful of newcomers, we add another notch to the belt of problem behaviors in the rooms. One of these days, most of us will wake up and find ourselves dead. Those newcomers that you deplore will be left to carry on the message. What legacy are you leaving them?

sapphoq itching for a coffee and more

          
          

     

Platitudes

     Yes, I have an elderly parent in hospice. He has been dying in pieces for over a decade. Now, it seems death is closing in on him.

          Hospice prevents religious nutcases working in the healthcare field from keeping terminal people alive long after natural death would have occurred. 

     Yes, I am an atheist with long-term abstinence from my addiction. I came into the rooms of recovery believing. Investigating creation myths from around the world for a Spanish class report got me thinking. I discarded the dregs of my past fundamentalism at last. I was free. Atheism has granted me a peace that I had never experienced. Thinking and evaluating were no longer enemies. Logic became a friend.

          Learning how to construct rational arguments and how to avoid cognitive errors are worthwhile endeavors.

     Yes, I am angry. I reject the twelve step idea that anger is somehow worse than any other emotion and should be stifled. There are no gods big enough to rearrange the anger that is inherent in human experience. Nor do I want that anger to be surgically removed. Anger has become my truest friend.

          Anger is my truest friend but not my only friend. My anger informs me that there is an opportunity for change within my community and the world. Why are you so afraid of your anger?

     Yes, I have been grieving my parent and his many loses which his neurological condition has taken. And the things that family members have robbed him of. No one deserves what he went through.

          When you inform me that you cannot possibly help out in any way because you are "too busy" to talk on the phone or to answer e-mail, that is not a conversation. Financial affairs really can be managed from a distance. Dialogue is needed, not monologue interrupted by occasional demands from you to send you some paperwork. Piss off.

     Yes, I reject the notion of the "disease concept" of addictions. Addiction is a condition with multiple etiologies which is treated by quasi-religion and pop psychology. Step right this way folks. Some [usually male and monotheistic] god of your understanding will fix it for you as long as you are willing to be fixed. And allow the good professionals enveloping you to "counsel" you on how to be compliant. You will be grateful. Deviance is suspect.

          Compliance is not an indicator of successful recovery. Cookie-cutter recovery has nothing to recommend for it. If I wanted pop psychology, I'd read a pop psychology magazine. Much cheaper than engaging in what passes for treatment these days.          

     Yes, I have re-written the twelve steps so that I can remain in recovery. My life is worth far more than the words of a dead man. That's just how it is. 

          I reject the notion that your god believes in me in spite of my unbelief. That's silly. We need more scientific research in addiction and in truly individualized treatment of folks seeking recovery. As atheism expands, more options will become available to those of us for whom pseudo-religious programs do not fit.

     Yes, there are thirty three medical causes of dementia. Some of them are reversible. Others are not. When your elderly parent is receiving hospice services, it is a pretty clear indication that recovery is not in the offing. 

          Offering me your hope that we will all be united in a fantasy heaven does not alleviate the reality that I am dealing with. Telling me that he may miraculously not die quite yet is cruel. Asserting that your god has a divine plan is bullshit.

          Lewy Body Dementia is terminal. Period.