- Alcohol
Red flags. If only I could have recognized them when they were first raised. But each one upon the other finally lined up like a stream of Buddhist prayer flags so bright and blinding, I couldn’t ignore them any longer.
I began drinking at the age of twelve. My sister, a few years older than me, was a gorgeous “Brown Eyed Girl” high school senior (four years after Van Morrison released the song) with a newly minted driver’s license. Let me say, first, I don’t hold anyone with whom I drank at a young age responsible for my own drinking. But getting a lift to school in my freshman year with my sister in a black 1965 Ford Falcon was just the opportunity I seized upon to begin my love/hate affair with booze. Chugging down Spanada under the porch of a nearby beach house before school became our routine. I certainly chugged. I remember walking around the halls of high school hoping no one would figure it out: A drunk twelve-year old freshman. I could have sworn one teacher saw right through me, and he probably did. Already, I was paranoid. Red flag.
Raised in a cult-ish religion, my role to become a wife at a young age was predetermined. I wanted to become a nurse. But that was a moot point, because we were taught that Armageddon was coming soon (in 1975), and once that happened, the need for nurses would be no more as God was going to heal the sick, restore the earth to paradise and we would live forever in Adam-and-Eve-Before-The-Fall-Like- perfection. Of course, God would have to destroy all the bad people first. But the point is, I was supposed to focus on knocking on doors, warning people of impending doom and being a good girl. Going to college was not in the equation. Young women were expected to become good wives and mothers and—especially—to be meek and mild. I became a wife at seventeen. One afternoon after my bridal shower, a few of us girls went to clean the apartment my now ex-husband and I were to rent. The drinking age in Massachusetts being eighteen back then, some one of my girlfriends was able to grab a bottle of wine at the nearby packie (Massachusetts term for liquor store). I did not drink a lot that afternoon. But I got sick. I was driven back home where my Aunt and Uncle from New Hampshire waited, along with my parents, for me to join them for a nice family dinner. I made an excuse (suddenly I’d come down with the flu!) and off to bed I went. Already, I was lying to people. Red flag.
Fast forward to that marriage in which a very young couple, ill-suited for each other and ill-equipped to deal with life except for the standard of perfection which our religion set, were joined. Drunkenness was a sin. But drinking was certainly not. Social occasions centered around meatball subs, wine coolers for the women, and beer (with nips of much stronger stuff) for the men. Large cookouts featured homemade wine. Then wine for me, and beer (with nips of much stronger stuff) for him after the second mandatory weekday-evening meeting at our congregation each week. Once a year we celebrated the Memorial—not Easter, as it was pagan—to observe the anniversary of Jesus’ death. Wine and unleavened bread were passed around and only a very select minority could partake. But being a good girl allowed me to store opened bottles of wine where they belonged after the memorial. And I partook. I remember how awful that wine tasted, but I partook most years in secret. Red flag.
I remember thinking how I could drink some of my friends under the table. As a 100-pound, 5’0” woman, that inwardly made me proud. But pride was also a sin. Near the end of our almost-ten year marriage, after having three beautiful boys, I decided to join my husband at our 10th high school reunion. I went in with anxiety and feelings of inadequacy. Skipping a year and jumping into the class of 1974, graduating a year early (so I could save more people from dying at Armageddon a year later), I was a wallflower in school. He was on the football team, knew everyone in his class, and he was quite the opposite of a wallflower. I knew hardly anyone at the reunion, felt everyone adored him, and I was completely out of my element. I drank too much and barely recall going to the restroom, dazed. I was certain someone had put something in my drink. I remember vomiting all over our beautiful new car. Next thing I remember is this: Waking up cold and outside on the brick steps of our home. My first thought: Who is taking care of the boys? I crawled up to our second-floor apartment and learned that my sister-in-law who lived downstairs had watched out for the boys. I went to bed. The more I told myself the lie (someone had drugged me, of course), the more I believed it. Poor me out on those cold steps! I was lying to myself and blacking out. Big red flag.
In 1975, Armageddon did not arrive, and in 1985 I left the religion. I knew I could no longer knock on doors warning people of the end of time. I realized this was the religion my father chose for me and not mine. I realized that my mother’s family—wonderful aunts, uncles, and cousins whom I was kept at a distance from because of the religion—would never be “destroyed at Armageddon” by a loving God. Because I was baptized at the age of twelve (even though the religion claims they do not let children become baptized until the “age of reason”), every single person I knew as a friend stopped speaking to me and stopped associating with me. Even family must shun those who leave. They must treat them as walking dead people, metaphorically speaking. This is all in the hope that the individual who has left will “see the light” and return. What I was told (and still hear through the grapevine almost thirty years later) is, “you will have no friends and you will be so lonely that you will come back.” Losing my relationship with my beloved father and sister was a crushing blow. Fortunately, I was embraced by my mother, and by mother’s entire family, and I was determined not to live a lie no matter the cost. But how would I make friends (other than with my mother’s family)? I was shy. When I drank, I was no longer shy. I would go out to bars and make friends! Problem solved. My husband and I also divorced in 1985, a mutual decision. After living the sheltered life I had (I was finally free!), going to bars seemed the natural choice. Solving emotional issues through alcohol. Red flag.
What seemed like a solution soon became a big problem. A long list of things I did that I would never have contemplated sober. Short-term relationships. Starting and quitting new jobs. Being fired from one. Being around dangerous situations and people who did not have my best interests at heart. Always broke, always borrowing money. Deciding with my ex-husband that my boys would be better off if I had them on the weekends. After all, I had moved into an apartment, and my ex-husband and second wife lived in the house the boys were accustomed to—with their aunt, uncle and cousins downstairs. My ex-husband’s second wife was home during the week while I worked and she was wonderful with the boys. It seemed convenient. Between my ex-husband and me, the arrangement was meant to be temporary. But as my life spiraled out of control and my ex-husband divorced and remarried again, the situation seemed hopelessly permanent. I wanted my boys back full-time and I regretted situations they were in that were now beyond my control. I’m grateful I limited my partying to the times when the boys were not with me. But I was still out of control. One morning I awoke from a blackout, bruised. I vaguely recalled being in a parking lot the previous night with my boyfriend-at-the-time. I sort of recalled walking into a parked car in a parking lot. Perhaps that’s how the bruises were acquired—but I was terrified at the very thought of not knowing for sure. Anything could have happened the night before—or any other time I’d drank for that matter. This time, I saw the flag.
I called AA. I told them my situation. It was suggested I attend a meeting that day. But I can’t be an alcoholic at my age, right? I asked. The woman on the other end of the phone assured me that no one could say for certain whether I was an alcoholic but me. But she made it clear there was no minimum age to attend AA. My best friend arranged for someone to take me to a meeting that night. I wanted to go in with a bag over my head. There were people there I knew! I was so afraid of my ex-husband finding out. I thought I would never get my children back if people knew I was in AA. On the contrary, going to AA was the most courageous decision I could have made, the first step in a process that gave me back to me first, gave my children back to me secondly, and gave me a life second to none. A life I wished for, but had never dared dream about until I got sober. Until I got better.
Life sober was not without its fits and starts. Alcoholism is a cunning disease. It will tell you you can have just one. It will convince you you can find a way to drink in safety when you’d already proven otherwise over and over again in the past. At nine months sober, I dwelt on that false premise and decided I didn’t need AA. I would not drink wine. I would not drink too much. My new course of action (controlled drinking) lasted about four months. The second-to-last time I drank, I ended up vomiting and on the floor in the bathroom of a friend’s house. Everything was spinning. We’d been having a pity party about life at work. I only knew to do one thing. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. I called my best friend again. I will never forget her words: Cindy, why do you keep doing this to yourself? I raised my white flag and surrendered (well, actually, it took one more time, but those words sunk in). I realized I was not a victim, but it was my choice to be drunk or sober. And enough of what I’d learned at AA had given me hope.
I jumped back into AA with both feet. I went to one or two meetings a day for the first year. I made the coffee at meetings. Some days, I got a cup of coffee and sat in my car in front of where a meeting was to take place hours later. I would sit there until my AA friends showed up, because I knew it was a safe place. If I drove around, I might go to a packie. I joined an AA group, got an AA sponsor, and later, I sponsored others. I told my story. I went up and got my milestone medallions as if they were Olympic gold medals. I passed my medallions onto others. I took my boys to meetings if they were with me when I needed one. I married a wonderful, AA-supportive man. The boys came back to live with my new husband and me. I wrote my story of before-and-after AA in poetry. Poetry had been a love of mine since I was very young. The booklet (illustrated by that best friend who got me to AA) was used in homeless shelters, Salvation Army programs, and a few copies were even purchased by the bookstore at the Betty Ford Clinic. The illustrations are of a wine glass slowly turning into a podium at an AA meeting. There are butterflies representing freedom. One of those is tattooed on my right shoulder.
Twenty-five years later, my boys are grown and have the benefit of seeing firsthand what gifts sobriety can give. I have five grandchildren who only know me as a sober, present Grammie—my most honored title in life. I am still writing (and publishing) my poetry. I am publishing others’ poetry. I am teaching poetry workshops. My dream of going to college has been realized—not in nursing, but with an AA in Social Sciences and a BFA in Creative Writing. Next year, at fifty-seven, I will receive my MA in English and Creative Writing so I can teach poetry at the college level. This year, my husband and I will attend my 40th high school reunion sober. We may just go with my ex-husband and wife whose friendship and “mutual Grammiehood” I treasure. There is not a day that goes by in this challenging, amazing life full of friends and family—who love me for me and not for my religion—that I am not mindful of those red flags, grateful I raised the white flag, and forever indebted to AA and sobriety.