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i had just read and replyed to diva's post last night and thought i'd go read then sleep. but as i was turning off the tv the host and the guest were discussing the mel gibson thing and the disease. so i sat and watched the segment. the host apparently is a recovering(?) alcholic and spoke from that point of view. and one thing he said that seemed to stick with me is that regardless of being "under the influence" an alcoholic is still responsible for the aftermath of their actions. and the guest said once real recovery begins then they do take responsibility for their actions. i am paraphrasing. another thing was the guest went into the genetics and history of the disease, which was interesting but right before it went to commerical the guest said that actually the alcoholic brain is more evolved.....which the host made a joke out of and the guest didn't get to finish why he thought this. man, i bet every alcoholic that saw that last night will be justifying their behavior not only with the disease but now they are "more evolved"! watch out alanoners...i've heard this argument come out of my a's mouth!
Wow I never heard that one before! I don't know if it is possible for an alcoholic brain to be more "evolved"?? That is a weird one. I know from experience that my brain (after drinking and using for 23 odd years) is pretty much like a sieve a lot of times. I have no short term memory and cannot remember a lot of events during my adult life when drinking that others can.
Anyway, yes, I have heard strange things coming out of my A's mouth also. He actually said that maybe his HP had a plan for him to be at the bar, "Helping" other people there!!! LOL. I laughed at this and he got mad of course.
I have a theory on alcoholics, well some alcoholics anyway. In my case the many many alcoholics I have met, both active and in recovery, are highly intellegent people a few I am sure are border line "genius". My "A" is extremely intellegent, he just has extremely poor coping skills. (Not excusing him) So my theory is that highly intellegent people may be prone to addiction of some kind. (I could be wrong, hehe wouldn't be the first time)
So maybe if the guest would have been allowed to finish he thought, he would have made a really good point.
Yours in recovery,
Dolphin123
__________________
"Today's problems can not be solved if we still think the way we did when we created them" -Albert Einstein
One does have to admit, it takes a lot of skills to talk one's self into thinking that what they are doing is acceptable... to 'evolve' doesn't always suggest a positive connotation..
I have heard alkies say things like, "I got really good at justifying everything"... Alcoholism is a very very neurotic illness, where the A feels the need to manipulate events, control situations, justify actions, make everything 'look OK on the outside' (until it all comes crashing down).. anything to protect the drink ... this all take s a lot of skill... albeit, not too positive of skills... kinda like a 'cockroach can adapt and evolve in order to survive it's surroundings'.... LOL
The host was right: when an alcholic commits to sobriety and commits to working the 12 steps, the reality is that they have to completely own how their behavior affected others. It caused harm, just like our behavior caused harm (thus the point of the 8th/9th steps). When we judge the alcholic to say "They owe me amends, they should do X, Y, Z to show they are sorry" what we are really saying is that "When the alcholic is in his disease (or acting out of his disease), I am hurting, and it reminds me of other times s/he was acting out of his/her disease. I feel, at this time that if they really wanted to show remourse for their disease, they would do X, Y, or Z." But the key to amends in AA is two fold: the direct amends (usually a) this is what I did to hurt you; b) this is how I can prevent that from happening again today; c)what I did was wrong, and has no excuse; d) what do you need that would set right the wrongs I have committed against you?); and the living amends (now that I have sat down with you, expressed my feelings about my wrongs and expressed my understanding that I caused you pain, I will live out my commitment to never cause you that level of pain again and to honor the requests you made to me when we spoke). The living amends are the "rubber meets the road:" is it that something to the affect of "Dad, don't ever relapse, or I'll never speak to you again"? Is it, "Mom, if you ever relapse I will never let you see your grand kids so help me god"? These are reasonable statements--the alcholic's behavior has devastated the family, destroyed lives, and it's important that the alcholic know the limits.
As for advanced brains, the AA literature suggests that most alcholics are highly intelligent, but cites that they find themselves, well, sensitive to it. They "over think" the daily day to day livings. For example, "Why did the lady at the check out counter not smile at me? She must not like me. She must hate me. She must know who I really am. She must...." Whereas a "normal" person would say "That poor woman at the check out. She must be absolutely exhausted, standing there all day, being abused by customers. No wonder she didn't take the time to chat."
And as for the nonsense that comes out of an alcholic's moulth, Always consider the source of a dirty river.
