The farther I get from my last drink, the closer I feel to the human race — and that does not mean that I’m actively seeking out opportunities to be around people, outside of work. It doesn’t even mean that I really like people, in general. No; I’ve actually been struggling lately with giving in to my natural urge to isolate, maybe (sigh) a little too much. And it’s election season, and I live in a (gulp) red patch of Pennsylvania…need I say more?
The closeness I’m talking about comes from finally connecting to my basic humanity, underneath it all. Dialing down the frantic cycle of self-medication that snared me back in my late teens has led to a greater understanding of how that happened, or what the hell was really going on with the eating disorders, the overexercising, the alcoholism, the…how shall I put this?…attention-whoring? Swimming in the social media cesspool?
In any case, things finally got desperate enough for me to grab a life raft, and over the past five years, the “addiction” layers of my onion have gradually peeled themselves back, stripping away the most intense and extreme of my all-or-nothing tendencies and anxiety-driven coping mechanisms. The urgent, surface craving that once drove me to grab out for any kind of symptom relief has muted, morphing into a much deeper, sustained sort of internal longing for whatever life’s supposed to be about. And in turn, my body has, amazingly, settled into a kind of homeostasis — at least for that “one good week” each month before the perimenopausal tornado blows in and blows it all to bits. 🌪️💥 🥵
I think we’re in that week now, folks, given the fact that I’m able to sit still and willing to exert the effort it takes to herd the cats in my head into a reasonably coherent self-reflective essay.
It’s times like these, fleeting though they might be, when who I am, where I’m going, how I “relate to the infinite” or fit into the grand scheme…it all starts to make sense.
I’m reminded of the scene in “The Sopranos” where Dr. Melfi is trying to convince Tony not to quit therapy. He has said he sees no point in continuing to see a shrink because he’s stopped faceplanting in plates of gabagool, but Melfi knows that the absence of panic attacks is just the beginning of the work: “When we’re constantly not having to put out fires, we can delve into who you are and what you’re really after in your very brief time on this earth!”
I guess you could say I’ve shifted from recovering from my drinking problem to recovering from my human problems, which I stupidly put off dealing with in my younger years. And now, I sit here stewing in regular old ordinary personhood, finally reckoning with what I am destined to do.
Does this make me “normal,” at last? We therapists don’t like to use that word; it imposes objective judgments on highly subjective phenomena. Maybe… “unexceptional” works better.
And yes, Younger Me would’ve dove headfirst into the pit of despair if someone called me that.
“Regular” and “ordinary” were once the scariest things I could have possibly imagined becoming; the idea that I, the smart, talented, creative, athletic firstborn child who won awards in school might not be Of Great Importance To Humanity (and therefore totally worthless) drove me, in my emotional immaturity, running full speed into all those addictions.
I see this same trajectory all the time with my clients today. We’re so afraid that we might not be “A Big Star” who stands out amid the unwashed masses of humanity, according to socially constructed metrics for “success,” that we spend our whole lives doing whatever we think it takes out there to prove our worth, instead of turning inward to discover — and uncover — the exquisite, miraculous, unique light that is, in fact, only ours to carry. We are stars, in the sense that we are each one of a kind, yet all minuscule specks in a vast, black universe.
Another Sopranos reference incoming….
The unbearable weight of regularness is something all humans can relate to, whether we’re conscious of it or not. It’s in the comedown from the highs we chase, the middle ground between how far we’ve come and what’s still “not good enough,” the moments of stillness when we glimpse the great empty abyss of existence and remember how small we are, and realize that the go, go, go of our daily grind and the get, get, get of our drive for status are leading us all to the same place. AND, perhaps most relevant to my target demographic is the reality that being skinnier or wealthier or more of whatever you think matters does not, in fact, make you happier.
Shit, if that doesn’t terrify us enough to stomp the gas pedal and zoom right back in the rat race, blasting the stereo and shoving/pouring something in our mouth to drown, numb, deny that it’s “all a big nothing,” as Livia put it in another nugget of “Sopranos” wisdom.
A more mature version of me emerged when my addicted life became unmanageable and I was forced to start growing up, which meant slowing down, being still, and having the courage to stare into that abyss without jerking my head away and busying myself with some BS distraction. This version of me is starting to think that maybe regularness is something like godliness.
I mean, maybe letting go of having to be important and allowing ourselves to just be human is as close to “the infinite” or “the divine” as we can get here on Earth. To release ourselves from that race toward some made-up “heavenly” ideal and embrace the reality of whatever place we are in right now — good, bad, ugly, or worse, regular — might be the purest form of freedom we can find in a “civilized society” that’s constructed to keep us under control via fear-driven consumption.
Presence might be the hardest thing for modern humans to master, but I think it’s the only thing that really brings peace. And this seems like an appropriate spot to stick the famous sticky note from — you guessed it — The Sopranos…
Viktor Frankl called it “spiritual freedom,” the ability all humans have to choose how we approach each moment, each circumstance, or to choose the attitude we take toward our inevitable suffering. If I had to pinpoint one goal for “recovery from human problems,” that would be it.
Like all humans, I certainly have plenty more stinky onion layers still lurking under all the “sexy” surface dysfunction I’ve been writing about here since 2018. I’ve evolved into the more banal brand of dysfunction that comes with long-term sobriety, a midlife career change, and the dreaded Change of Life I must reluctantly lean into at age 46. I have transformed a great deal in the past five years, and yet, I am still stuck and suffering in a number of different ways. This makes me human. It also makes working as a therapist feel bone-rattlingly terrifying; I’ve often said I want to frame Pearl Jam lyrics and hang them on my office door as a kind of disclaimer:
I am lost, I’m no guide
But I’m by your side
I am right by your side
— Pearl Jam, “Leash”
Yes, my work is deeply meaningful, and personal, because at this point in my journey toward self-discovery, it feels like I and many of my clients are on the exact same page.
Isn’t it strange, that after I moved out of the drug and alcohol treatment niche and into a general private practice where my clients mostly don’t identify as addicts, I really feel like I started “taking work home with me” more than ever before?
It’s not that I’ve “forgotten where I came from”; my addiction is what led me into the counseling field with the goal of helping other addicts find stability and peace in recovery. It’s just that at five years sober, I recognize my alcoholism as a symptom of deeper issues that I’m now ready and willing to address. In other words, I’ve moved from “putting out fires” into the “regularness of life” stage of recovery.
Like I said, some 45 paragraphs ago, I just feel like more of a whole, complete, well-rounded human these days. And thus, I can relate to my current clients on almost every level. They’re mostly suburban middle-class folks, many of whom would classify as “the worried well,” presenting with anxiety, depression, work stress and relationship issues — the kind of painful realities that hit when you grow up and the worldly pursuits you thought would guarantee happiness do not deliver. Some are also struggling with trauma and grief, self-esteem, shame around body image, and serious eating disorders born out of unforgiving perfectionism and never-enoughness.
It’s eerie, how sitting across from them often feels like looking in a mirror! It can definitely get to be too much for my aging human meatsuit to handle — just ask my poor massage therapist!
Well, they say the opposite of addiction is connection, and this sure is one way of connecting. Figures that I would go through the 12 steps, which point you away from self-centeredness toward service to humanity, and then choose a path of service where I can show love to other people while also keeping them at arm’s length. I mean, two things can be true at the same time, right? The pursuit that gives my life meaning and purpose — namely, helping others feel less alone with their human problems — also makes me deeply cherish my time alone.
Jen Wielgus Journalism 