Stuff just pops into my head, and sometimes I find words to express about something from long ago.  I don't know what triggered it today, but - I found myself thinking about a conversation I had with my cousin 10 or more years ago.  This was a cousin I had never actually met - one of many offspring of an uncle that I only met late in life.  My brother attended that uncle's funeral and exchanged emails and addresses with many of my unknown cousins.

Anyway, I got something of an introductory email from this cousin.  Being second youngest in a large family, his opinion of his father was about 180 degrees opposed to that of his older siblings.  This didn't surprise me much; my uncle was a religious fanatic who had bouts of heavy drinking interspersed with periods of sobriety throughout his life.  He never attended AA or any 12 step program to my knowledge - he did ask me a lot of questions about it, and tried to convince me that if I believed in God I would be "cured" and not need "those meetings" anymore.

So that's the background.  In response to my cousin, I told him some of my story, my own father's alcoholism and my subsequent alcoholism and recovery.  It was something like I would tell in an AA meeting - I considered it to be "experience, strength, and hope" all the way.  Of course in email some things are hard to convey.  My cousin's response was not what I expected.  His opening line, or close to it was to declare that my life was utterly FU and that both of us were the unfortunate product of our family's "shame based legacy" as he put it.  Seeing as how he was a grownup, and very well educated, I was kind of startled at the negativity of it all.  I wrote back and said no, it's not like that at all - yeah, I came from an alcoholic home, I did my own drinking.  I have learned a new way of life -- I'm not condemned to die an alcoholic death like my father, or spend the rest of my life in misery blaming other people for my troubles - other people who are dead and buried, and can't come back to set things right.  How convenient that I have a defenseless scapegoat for not only my past, but my present and future as well!  I told him that I rejected that idea, and that even IF my parents and/or upbringing made me who I am, today I can choose to be something else.

The response was something to the effect "Your life is FU.  You don't know it, but it is".  He proceded to quote several big name "self help" gurus I was familiar with.  The ones that are long on diagnosis but short on recovery.  The ones whose livelihood depends on *keeping* people in the disease.  I'm SO grateful that I discovered AA and Alanon before being exposed to this stuff.   But one does not need a pop-psych guru to live in the disease - we can do it all by ourselves.  And I did follow in my cousin's footsteps through my teen years and early adulthood.  I knew that my life had been corrupted and it was someone else's fault - I knew I'd never be happy. 

I got occasional glimpses that I might be wrong.  Because I had literally given up on happiness, the deck being stacked against me, I set out to make my misery as comfortable as possible.  I sought material things and status and whatever would feed my ego.  Then I had an experience sort of like a stock market crash.  I had put all my eggs in the ego basket, and someone else was carrying it.  That person dropped my basket, broke my eggs, and then stomped on the shells.  I was devastated - I was lower than a cockroach, and everyone around me who witnessed this now knew the truth - I was worthless.  Then something astonishing happened.  Those people around me picked me up and set me on my feet.  They loved me, in that moment.  They were not 12-step people... just human beings who took time out from their own pursuit of material and ego to set me back on my feet, and tell me I was ok. 

I had a period of peace of mind after that experience that lasted for several weeks.  It was as if all of the warring factions in my head were all sitting down at the table to work together.  Unfortunately, I wasn't ready for that life yet.  I didn't have a program, a teacher - I wasn't religious.  I wasn't able to keep the feeling.  It was some years later that I walked into the rooms of AA, and found that same love once again.  I felt like I had made peace with my enemies - most importantly, the ones in my head.  But of course that was just the beginning.

Sometimes I wonder about my cousin, if he has ever found any peace.  I still have never met him.  At the time, it was obvious there was nothing to talk about with him.  One thing my family has is ego... all of us have it.  I've thought about looking him up again, but I don't know what I'd say.  I guess I'm just curious to see if someone a *lot* like me, right down to the DNA, who has thought himself into a corner, can think his way back out or maybe have an experience like mine to change him from living the disease to living recovery.

Barisax