Putting The Pieces Together

Chaz Comments on “Outside Help”

13 Nov 2010 1 Comment

by Shel in Alcohol and Other Drugs, Depression, Emotional Health, Recovery, Sober Living

We were honored by a comment from Chaz at Chaz Recovering, one of the best recovery blogs out there, in our opinions.  He adds the following to the previous article. (Used with his permission.)

Hi Shel… thanks for this. I concur.

I have often heard said by many 12 step members that “The Program” is all we need. To them I would suggest, “speak for yourself”.

I was about 2 years sober and making good progress in recovery when it became very noticeable that I was frequently severely blue and moody. My wife asked if I would please consult a doctor. I was at the time under the care of a General Practitioner who specialized in addiction recovery. His main medical advice was participation in AA or other relevant 12 step program.

He did an initial assessment for physical damage due to drugs or alcohol and then monitored for about a year, but after that, he mainly directed us to 12 step. He essentially acted as a co-sponsor with medical knowledge to many of us.

So who better to take my blue funks to than him? This doctor is extremely cautious to diagnose depression to any of his patients because so many come to him claiming depression and requesting prescriptions. Which he feels is the natural thing for a recovering alcoholic or addict to do.

So he wisely refered me out for a second opinion to concur one way or other if I was truly suffering from clinical depression and if medication was the best approach for me. This referral landed me in the office of a wonderful psychiatrist who also mainly works with addicts/alcoholics, and he himself is one of us, having been sober some 20+ years.

He too was cautious to dispense prescriptions for anti-D’s. Again, chemical reprieve is what most addicts and alcoholics are knowingly or unknowingly wanting. So his approach was to exhaust all non-chemical approaches first. This led to a wonderful set of sessions on Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. The outcome was an amazing lifting of the sad and anxious feelings that plagued me for most of my life. I practice CBT to this day and have the most amazing reprieve from sadness and worry that the rooms of AA were never able to give me.

Who knows what the originators of AA meant when they wrote the original material? We do know that the landscape of our culture has changed dramatically since the 1930′s. Each of us needs what we need. And frankly, I do not see that it is the rightful place of any AA member to tell another what he/she needs or doesn’t need medically or psychologically.

Some are well-intentioned. To be a little more blunt, some are busy-bodies. Some need to be needed so they dispense advice to feel important. AAs are all works in progress and a lot of us are still pretty sick. AA is there to help us get sober. Any other benefit is a bonus. So I caution AA advisors to stick to AA advice.

For me, my dysfunctions are multi-faceted. So I will seek recovery in the same way.

Ciao.

Chaz