SURVIVING THE GRIEF OF RECOVERY
Linda Ross Swanson, M.A., C.T.
Linda is a nationally certified Thanatologist (death, dying and bereavement counsellor and educator).
She holds a Master’s in Applied Theology, a Diploma in Pastoral Care, and an Associate Degree in Mental Health. She owns a small Grief Counselling business.
Additionally, Linda is a 22 year recovering alcoholic. She lives in Portland, Oregon, USA with her husband, David.
What do people recovering from alcohol and drug addiction have to grieve? They just quit drinking/using. They need to suck it up and show some backbone like the rest of us.
According to society, recovering from an addiction is not a credible reason to grieve. People in recovery do not construe it as legitimate either. Yet, all the substance abusers I’ve known, including myself, have experienced emotions related to grief: shock, denial, anger, guilt, sadness, depression, loneliness, hopelessness, numbness, and more.
According to the well-known Thanatologist, (death, dying and bereavement counsellor and educator), Dr. Kenneth J. Doka, “Disenfranchised grief, is the grief that persons experience when they incur a loss that is not or cannot be openly acknowledged, publicly mourned, or socially supported. The concept of disenfranchised grief recognizes that society has sets of norms—in effect, grieving rules –that attempt to specify who, when, where, how, how long, and for whom people should grieve.” He reminds those of us in recovery, and also those who work, mentor or teach in the recovery field, that there are inherent losses and consequent grief when someone lets go of their addictions.
Alice W. is a formerly homeless person recovering from heroin and meth addiction. After seven years struggling for survival, she’s had enough. Alice is now 42; her bottoming out came at 35 years of age after enduring a stroke in a tent that was pitched in one of the U.S.’s homeless tent cities. That day it was pouring down rain and she was alone. Her partner was out trying to scour their drugs for the day. Alice fell asleep and when she awoke, she found her left side paralyzed, and she was unable to speak. She had to hold the roof of the tent up with her right foot to keep the rain from drowning her. Even if Alice’s partner had offered to take her to an emergency room, she wouldn’t have gone because there was a warrant out for her arrest for a traffic violation. It took two weeks before she could walk or talk coherently.
At long last, Alice W. went into recovery and began mending all the bridges she’d broken. She joined Narcotics Anonymous; found a sponsor, joined a church, and through the grace of God established affordable housing in one of the Single Room Occupancy (SRO), clean and sober hotels in her city. So what happens now that she’s clean and sober, adequately fed, safely sheltered with a promising life ahead of her? It goes something like this:
As a woman living on the streets, Alice was particularly vulnerable. Hypervigilance became her middle name. She’d developed 360-degree vision for no one was trustworthy. Most sleeping occurred in the daytime because evil serpentines the streets, the alleys, and the cubby holes at night. Fear was her companion. Finally, Alice enters the world of recovery, saving herself from herself. Housing is found for her, as well as all required medications, clothing, and food.
So, when Alice closes the door of her apartment she finds everything quiet. Still. There is nothing outwardly to fear, and hunger no longer nags. Alice lies outstretched on her bed, and it truly is HER BED. Almost giddy, she thanks God for these blessings. Then, night comes and with it-- the haunting! She is no longer in an excitable state worrying about her physical safety, but something else disturbs her peace of mind. Memories march through the doorway and into her being. Grief and remorse fill every nook and cranny of the room.
When on the streets, Alice didn’t have time to think of anything other than her next fix, food, and a place to sleep. Now everything is taken care of, and she no longer needs or wants a fix. The appalling drama that had been her life begins to rewrite itself-- page by page. Where’s Alice’s new script? Her character only knows how to play out the tragic and the terrible; only knows how to fear. In this new way of being, Alice is forced to act in fresh scenes a moment-at-a-time, an hour-at-a-time, a day-at-a time. It’s different than before, but the intensity of fear remains. Alice must hold tight to her friendships with other recovering heroin addicts. She must clasp hands with her Narcotics Anonymous sponsor, and attend N.A. meetings. If she doesn’t, she might use again.
At times, she wanders into the confessional at the Downtown Chapel, less to unload her wrong-doings, than to simply talk to her favorite priest. He manages to affirm her every time she visits and this makes her feel better. Still, she struggles daily with mental illness, thoughts of using, and the tremendous unresolved grief in her life. Lately, the longing for her deceased mother has intensified.
In his book, Grief Counseling and Grief Therapy, William Worden states we must complete four tasks to resolve our grief. I believe they apply to anyone stepping into sobriety:
1) Accept the reality of the loss— The death of our using self, and the love vs. hate relationship with our drugs of choice. We must bury our desires and acknowledge that we are addicts, which is the death of our denial. We feel bereft of our crutches, naked, exposed and vulnerable. There are other deaths, that of our drinking friends, who must be dead to us for the sake of our sobriety.
2) Working through the pain of grief--- The pain of our withdrawal physically and psychologically. We mourn the loss of our addiction
3) Adjust to an environment in which the deceased is missing. - Learning to live without our crutches.
4) Emotionally relocating the deceased and moving on with life—being open to new relationships.
Just as saying goodbye to a loved one, there is a big hole in us when saying good-bye to our dependencies. To fill the hole, and prevent relapsing, we must develop activities that enhance our recovery, staying away from those who are using and investing in relationships with people who don’t use or are in recovery programs. We can then begin to give back and to share the grace which we’ve been given. We need to use the time we spend drinking and drugging investing in, as recovering folks say, the next right thing.
My husband, David, a recovering alcoholic, knows the devastation of grief. His only son, Jeremy, died when he was just four-years old. David also understands the grief involved in letting go of alcohol. When I asked him to describe the connection between grief and recovery, he shared these powerful and important insights.
When we let go of drugs and alcohol, we grieve the death of ourselves. Everything we were ceases to be. With the learning aptitude of a young child, we must consciously recreate ourselves. We must give up all the people we thought were our friends and our support system. Drinking and drugging took twenty-four hours a day. We were either looking forward to our next drink, actively using, or suffering from the effects. Once we’re sober, what are we suppose to do with the time that we formerly occupied abusing? We have to replace it with something.
We grieve the active part of drinking/drugging. When hung over, one is less apt to spend time in self-reflection. When actively drinking, we projected our craving on to the next time. We were always planning when and where. This also leaves little time for self reflection.
Grieving the rituals of addiction is tough too. We spent time courting, anticipating, raising the glass, feeling it’s effects, now that time is empty. The hard part is, we’re left with ourselves, and we can no longer avoid introspection. It’s difficult because it is not our standard operation procedure to live a day at a time. This is something we must learn. Once we’re sober, we’re way down the road thinking, Oh, my God; I can never have a drink/drug for the rest of my life! What a grief that is! It takes a tremendous amount of support and effort, and all the strength we can summon, physically, and emotionally, to see ourselves through the initial part of sobrity.
Not only that, when we’ve been sober for a while, we expect life to get better. In many cases, it gets worse because we are engaged again. We are forced to self-reflect. Grief is not something we choose to do, but it’s no longer optional. When we were drinking, we could always drown the thoughts. Now, when we’re sober, we are catapulted into self-loathing, regret, grief, fear. We become self-reflecting 24-seven. There is no escape from it. We lack an identity. That’s big.
Until we deal with our feelings, we can’t begin to heal and build the self-esteem we lacked in the first place. We must build our emotional house on rock rather than on our drugs and/or alcohol. Even regret has some choice involved depending on our worldview. But, grief comes no matter what. No one escapes grief. It’s right up there with love and hate. It’s universal and comes from a multitude of losses not just the death of a loved one.
12-Step programs provide the recovering person with rituals and guidelines to follow, meetings to attend, prayers to recite, and NA/AA phrases to chant. By attending support group meetings with people who share our experience, we feel acceptance, empathy, compassion, companionship and hope. All of which, helps us to open up and share our own stories. Eventually, in 12-Step meetings, we voice our grief and shame, our love and gratitude. We can measure our progress by celebrating milestones along the way with thirty-day coins, ninety-day coins, one-year coins and so forth. We celebrate 12-Step birthdays (sobriety anniversaries) with our families, and friends in recovery.
As recovering-addicted-grievers share their histories and stories in meetings with others of similar experiences, they learn they aren’t much different from one another. We all make mistakes. We all suffer losses. We need reassurance that there is life after loss, human or otherwise. We need to reinvest our energy into a life without the presence of our loved one or abusive substance. It is then and only then that we reap the benefits of peace of mind, clarity of vision, optimism for the future, and can begin offering our services to our less fortunate brothers and sisters.
So, what do people in recovery have to grieve about? Everything! But, the great news is that healing is a certainty because we’ve surrendered our will and our lives over to the God of our understanding; we have our 12-step support community, and best of all, we have one another.