- Drugs
Aimee M, a former cheerleader for the Los Angeles Lakers, works as the business development manager for Conscious Recovery by CLARE Foundation. She has her master’s degree in psychology and is in the process of completing her doctorate. She has a different perspective on recovery than most people whose story you will read. Her perspective is not only based on her professional experience but also her experience being involved in a toxic relationship with an addict. I recently had the pleasure of spending some time with Aimee to interview her about her experience.
What got you involved in this field? When I was a Laker Girl, a friend introduced me to our shoe sponsor. I started dating that individual after I was off the team and doing work with my choreography company. We had been dating for about 8 months, and he introduced me to GHB. At that point I was in love with him and was blinded to the fact that his use would continue for the rest of his life and, if I continued to stay with him, the rest of mine. Our relationship became more serious, and we got married. The stress of deciding to start a family or not forced me to make the decision that we needed to go get help together or I was leaving. He said, “F- you, you can leave.” He’s still not in recovery.
Since we’ve been divorced, he’s been hospitalized two or three times, he’s had a family intervention and he went to treatment for a day. I haven’t spoken to him in over a year and a half. It makes me sad every day, because he’s still someone I care about very much. I just had to take care of myself, because I was really sick. I was sick in the relationship. I was very depressed, had lost a lot of weight and was extremely codependent. We were just feeding off one another, and I knew I needed to get help for myself.
What happened next? As I started to separate myself from the situation, I decided to go back to school and learn more about psychology. I wanted to learn more about my past and why I was attracted to such a toxic situation. I became interested in addiction studies, because I wanted to understand his addiction and why having a family wasn’t enough. Why he chose the drugs over me. As we know, it’s a family disease, and I definitely was an enabler. When I left, I was helping both of us. Whether he chooses to get help or not is up to him. In the end I took care of myself and am in the process of becoming a clinical psychologist to hopefully help others.
Do you go to Al-Anon? Not so much anymore. I’m in psychoanalysis, so I go to therapy twice a week which I’ve been doing for about five years. I’m in group therapy as well. I definitely have a therapeutic community. I’m not involved in the 12-steps, but I think they’re very beneficial. Recovery is different for everyone. People ask me if I’m in recovery, and I say, “What’s your definition of recovery?” I definitely consider myself in recovery. Recovering from a toxic relationship and recovering from a lot of trauma. I’ve re-learned intimacy and re-learned really connecting in a relationship.
What would you say to someone who’s in a toxic relationship, who needs to get out, but doesn’t know if they can, doesn’t know how they can and doesn’t know if they want to, because it’s become familiar to them? Al-Anon was really helpful for me in that situation. That was really something that helped me decide whether to stay or whether to go. Someone close to my ex’s family happened to be in the Al-Anon group that I was going to, and I’ll never forget when she said, “Aimee, you’ll either decide to stay or you’ll decide to go. Neither one is better than the other. It’s your decision.” Having a family member be that supportive was really wonderful, and there were so many other wonderful supportive people who let me tell my story and just kind of work through it on my own. Having that supportive environment was something that gave me strength to make those tough decisions. I really think that having my therapist there was the added support that really supported a lot of the growth and change I’ve made over the past few years. I would tell somebody to check out Al-Anon, find a good Al-Anon meeting. Seek therapeutic services as well.