Since today is not only St. Patrick's Day, the biggest drinking day of the year, but also my 20th anniversary of sobriety (yah!! Except for the one-night relapse in college but I don't count that), I wanted to talk to Patrick about dual diagnosis, since he is also a recovering alcoholic.
I asked him this:
I'm intrigued by your recovery from addiction and how that colors your perception of mental illness. Awhile back I interviewed Dr. Ken Duckworth, medical director of NAMI. He helped me tremendously understand the culture clash between recovery from alcoholism, the AA way, and recovery from a mental illness. Said Duckworth: "In the substance abuse culture, the person is generally viewed as the agent of the problem, and they are held accountable and have consequences for their relapses. In the mental illness culture, the person is often viewed not as the agent of the problem, but as the victim of their illness. We tend to hold people a little less accountable for bio-chemical processes." As you did your research, did you run up against that clash yourself?
Patrick replied:
Yes, the idea was that we alkies sort of brought this on, whereas schizophrenics had it done to them. I think this question opens up a big philosophical debate that depends on one's point of view. I tend to come down on the side that says while no one is to blame, ultimately we are responsible for our own recovery.
My family is a portrait in dual diagnosis. We are a study in the intersection between recovery from the experience of hearing schizophrenia's voices and recovery from the experience of hearing alcoholism's voices. I began to wake up to my alcoholism in my mid-twenties, a good five years after my sisters tumbled into what is considered the most severe form of mental illness. So my frame of reference for "insanity" was a bit skewed from what most people have in mind when they see the second of the twelve steps up there on the wall for the first time. The suggestion that there was something that could "restore us to sanity" really troubled me because it implied that I had "schizophrenia."
I got an immediate resentment because, as I looked around the room, I did not see what I'd seen on the psych wards. I saw no one talking to invisible friends. I saw no one twitching and drooling from the side effects of meds. So in my mind, I saw no insanity and felt the second step mocked my sisters by not taking them seriously. This resentment kept me out on the lash for another twenty years, basically.
Meanwhile, the booze made me forget about my problems in a way no therapist could. And then it stopped working, my medicine turning on me. The mounting paranoia, and the anxiety was making me snap, the cocaine induced psychosis, seeing imaginary cops in trees, on my knees literally staring through keyholes looking for cops. Mad stuff that shot me to the moon and left me there.
So when I finally made it back in, I believed I was myself insane. I no longer had issues with the verbiage.
I could finally see that the very issue that fueled my drinking problem--my resentment at losing my two sisters to schizophrenia--was the very thing that was pushing me off the edge of sanity myself. When I saw that, I came to a screeching halt.
"Stalking Irish Madness" only breezes over those years because I felt it was off-topic from schizophrenia and did not want to make this book all about me. That said, I did learn a big lesson that helps me each day. And that is the notion that mental illness may differ for each of us, but mental wellness is largely the same. However we get there--and yes, we are all heading back to the shore from different points at sea--is ultimately a matter of how we swim with these voices in our heads. Whether they are the voices that tell the "alcoholic" to have a drink, or the voices that tell the "schizophrenic" to take his own life, we all have voices.
Your average, ordinary, bog-standard alkie like myself hears the first-person voices of the superego that we all hear. My sisters hear these voices, but they also hear third-person voices. They hear full conversations and this puts their experience outside the medical model. If we are honest, then it's clear that even the most well screwed on among us struggles with voices of one kind or another--voices of self doubt or regret or guilt or despair or envy or anger or the thousand forms of fear that comprise the human condition.
The important thing is that we are able to acknowledge the power of the voices in our heads, and that we feel free to talk about the voices in our heads. We need to share with each what the voices are telling us if we are serious about mental well being. We need to manage our voices so that they don't manage us.
It's the wisdom of the ages--a problem shared is a problem halved. Or as Jesus said, whenever two are gathered in my name. We need each other, obviously. Stars are born of other stars.
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I know this sounds like "easier said than done" but I am 60 years old and at least 40 was spent in and out of alcoholism and drug addiction. I been through it all the AA, the rehab, nothing really worked until I made the right decisions. Yes, God has alot to do with it. When you let him live inside of you, thats when you know you are on the right path. It didn't happen right away there were many relapses, but every day is one day at a time. Just knowing there is someone on your side that wants you to succeed keeps you alive. When you see other people die by using drugs and drinking themselves to death, it should start to make you think of why we are here in the first place. We are here for others not for ourself. It's not about you or me. There is a blessed life, please trust God. Don't let the father of this world (Devil) lie to you and make you believe you can't have a great life. He (Devil) is here to "steal,kill, and destroy you." john 10:10 Before long those demons will quit chasing you.
AA DOES WORK,IF YOU LET IT,I ALWAYS BELEIVED IN GOD.THE GOD OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH,AA INTRODUCED ME TO GOD 'of my own understanding" A GOD THAT IS MY DAILY FRIEND AND COMPANION,THAT WAS IN 1977,AM 81 NOW,STILL A PRACTICING CATHOLIC,BUT YEAH,WHAT AN AWSOME GOD I HAVE,HAVE WORKED WITH MENTALLY ILL FOLKS FOR YEARS,SOME CAN BE HELPED BY MEDICATION,SOME COUNCELING,OTHERS JUST HAVE TO LOVE AND PRAY OR THEM
I, too, hear voices and have for years. My voices are cops - real cop voices from the 911 center and the Sheriff's department here in Chattanooga, Tennessee. I recognized their voices during psychosis. (Long story) I can totally relate to looking for the cops. And I can relate to that Schizophrenia is MADE.
You have to voice your opinion and deal with the stress. Medicine does not always work with everyone. I have been on medication, twice, now. The first time because I was scared and the 2nd time because I was soooooooooo angry at the cops. I was on medication the first time from 1997 to 1999. I went back on medication in 2005 to 2007.
You have to look back at your life and see what happened, how you felt, how they made you feel and compare it to how you feel today. I have looked back at some really scary traumas and try to turn them into something that I can deal with, whether find something funny that I could have said or done, or something like that. You have to to deal with it. You say, laugh at a trauma? It depends on the trauma and I am only talking about MY traumas. Somethings you can not laugh at like death, etc. and threatened death, in my case, was not funny then, but, now I can look at the situation for what it really was. Something somebody says because they want to coerse you into doing something. Long story and that is why people don't understand unless it has happened to them. We all are different and we deal with things differently.
Some things still trigger me, but, mostly now I am upset that people do not understand and sometimes I think that they don't want to understand what us "mental" people have to deal with.
So tell your story over and over and over and to anyone that will listen. It will not only help you, but, it will help people to understand, too.
Sharon Anne Goodner
I am a 36 year old woman who can relate to this story. I was diagnosed with depression & panic disorder six years ago and I am an alcoholic. In September of 2008 I voluntarily admitted myself into a residential rehab facility because the self medicating had gotten out of control. I tried to manage too much for way too long and I ended up trying to take my own life. I'd like to say that from the moment I woke up in the hospital everything was different but that's not the truth. It took alot of work, prayer, perserverence, and faith. My life has completely turned around. I rely on God today. We work as a team and because of that I have hope today. The voices that I hear are different now. I was on the bus awhile back and I was getting frustrated with not having a car and I prayed. Moments later the bus driver stop for a man in a wheel chair and the voices in my head said, "Continue to be humble and walk or take the bus... because you can." And "Be grateful for what you have" Since then, I have been bleesed with a car and much more. I love God and AA and mostly the fact that "I never have to go through anything alone ever again" :)
there is a definate link between alcohol and depression/anxiety - I can relate to the woman above re self-medicating. Everyone in my family drinks to excess. I did not drink for most of my adult life. I was diagnosed when I was 50 with anxiety disorder/panic attacks and depression. I did not think I was depressed..........good job, great kids, good husband...but I did have anxiety and panic attacks.
Shortly after starting the meds (less than a year) I left my husband, moved to another state, took a drastic cut in pay and had less time with my children. We made it through (without alcohol) until 2 years ago. I suddenly started craving cigarettes and dry wine. I told my doctor and he said this was a sign of dopamine deficiency from all the seratonin reuptake antidepressants I had taken. I tried to get off the meds with no success. I keep drinking to excess and I have gone to one chapter of AA which I did not care for at all....maybe just need to find a separate group, I have felt suicidal, been in 3 day dry-out and then dry on my own for 10 days but started drinking again first sign of conflict......I think this blog is great because in reading the personal info shared in the privacy of my computer it helpd me see there are others like me out there. Have a wonderful day to everyone who reads this.
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