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of us has to accept final responsibility for his or her own action or inaction. It is up to each
individual.
After you have examined the various possibilities, consulted with friends, and considered the pros
and cons, the decision to get and use professional help is ultimately your own. To take or not to take
disulfiram (Antabuse), to go into psychotherapy, to go back to school or change jobs, to have an
operation, to go on a diet, to quit smoking, to take or disregard your lawyer's advice about your
taxes these are all your own decisions. We respect your right to make them and to change your
mind when developments so warrant.
Naturally, not all medical, psychological, or other scientific experts see exactly eye-to-eye with us
on everything in this booklet. That's perfectly okay. How could they? They have not had the
personal, firsthand experience we have had with alcoholism, and very few of them see as many
problem drinkers for as long as we do. Nor have we had the professional education and discipline
which prepared them for their duties.
This is not to say that they are right and we are wrong, or vice versa. We and they have entirely
different roles and responsibilities in helping problem drinkers.
May you have the same good fortune in these regards that so many of us have had. Hundreds of
thousands of us are deeply grateful to the countless professional men and women who helped us, or
tried to.
24 Steering clear of emotional entanglements
Falling in love with your doctor or nurse or a fellow patient is an old romantic story. Recovering
alcoholics are susceptible to the same fever. In fact, alcoholism does not seem to bring immunity
from any known human condition.
Sorrow is born in the hasty heart, an old saw goes. Other troubles, including an alcoholic bout, can
be, too.
During our days of bottles, cans, and glasses, many of us spent a lot of time concerned about
intimate personal ties. Whether we wanted temporary partnerships or a long-term "meaningful
relationship," we were often preoccupied with our deep involvement or noninvolvement  with
other people.
A great many of us blamed our drinking on lack of affection, saw ourselves as constantly in search
of love, drinking as we prowled from bar to party. Others of us apparently had all the emotional ties
we needed or wanted, but drank anyhow. Either way, alcohol certainly did not ripen our
comprehension of mature love, nor our ability to enter into and handle it if it did come our way.
Rather, our drinking lives left our emotional selves pinched, scraped, bent, and bruised, if not pretty
firmly warped.
So, as our experience shows, the first non-drinkmg days are likely to be periods of great emotional
vulnerability. Is this an extended pharmacological effect of the drinking? Is it a natural state for
anyone recuperating from a long and severe illness? Or does it indicate a deep flaw in the
personality? The answer doesn't matter at first. Whatever the cause, the condition is one we have to
watch out for, because it can tempt us to drink faster than the eye, head, or heart can realize.
We have seen such relapses happen in several ways. In the early relief and delight of getting well,
we can whip up enormous crushes on new people we meet, both in AA and outside it, especially
when they show genuine interest in us, or seem to gaze up at us in admiration. The giddy rapture this
can bring makes us highly susceptible to a drink.
An emotional opposite can also be the case. We may seem so numb that we are almost immune to
affection for a while after stopping drinking. (Clinicians tell us it is common for people to have no
interest or very much ability in sex for many months after stopping drinking but that problem
straightens itself out beautifully as health returns. We know!) Until we are assured that the
numbness will pass, going back to drinking appears an attractive "remedy," which leads to even
worse trouble.
Our shaky emotional condition also affects our feelings toward old friends and family. For many of
us, these relationships seem to heal promptly as we pursue recovery. For others, there arrives a
period of touchiness at home; now that we're sober, we have to sort out how we actually feel about
spouse, children, siblings, parents, or neighbors, then reexamine our behavior. Fellow workers,
clients, employees, or employers also require such attention.
(Often, our drinking has had a severe emotional impact on those closest to us, and they, too, may
need help in recovering. They may turn to Al-Anon Family Groups and Alateen [see your telephone
directory]. Although these fellowships are not officially connected with AA, they are very similar,
and they help nonalcoholic relatives and friends to live more comfortably with knowledge about us
and our condition.)
Over the years, we have become strongly convinced that almost no important decisions should be
arrived at early in our sobriety, unless they cannot possibly be delayed. This caution particularly
applies to decisions about people, decisions with high emotional potential. The first, uncertain
weeks of sobriety are no time to rush into major life changes.
Another caution: Tying our sobriety to someone we are emotionally involved with proves flatly
disastrous. "Ill stay sober if so-and-so does this or that" puts an unhealthy condition on our recovery.
We have to stay sober for ourselves, no matter what other people do or fail to do.
We should remember, too, that intense dislike also is an emotional entanglement, often a reversal of
past love. We need to cool any overboard feeling, lest it flip us back into the drink.
It is easy to consider yourself an exception to this generalization. Newly sober, you may earnestly
believe that you have at long last found real love or that your present attitude of dislike, persisting
even into sobriety, means there always was something fundamentally wrong about the relationship.
In either instance, you may be right but just now, it's wise to wait and see whether your attitude
will change.
Again and again, we have seen such feelings change dramatically in only a few months of sobriety.
So, using "First Things First," we have found it helpful to concentrate first on sobriety alone,
steering clear of any risky emotional entanglements.
Immature or premature liaisons are crippling to recovery. Only after we have had time to mature
somewhat beyond merely not drinking are we equipped to relate maturely to other people.
When our sobriety has a foundation firm enough to withstand stress, then we are ready to work
through and straighten out other aspects of our lives.
25 Getting out of the 'if' trap
Emotional entanglements with people are not the only way we can get our sobriety dangerously
hooked to something extraneous. Some of us have a tendency to put other conditions on our
sobriety, without intending to.
One AA member says, "We drunks* are very 'iffy people. During our drinking days, we were often
full of ifs, as well as liquor. A lot of our daydreams started out, If only...' And we were continually
saying to ourselves that we wouldn't have gotten drunk if something or other hadn't happened, or that
we wouldn't have any drinking problem at all if only..."
We all followed up that last "if with our own explanations (excuses?) for our drinking. Each of us
thought: I wouldn't be drinking this way...
If it wasn't for my wife (or husband or lover)...if I just had more money and not so many debts...if it
wasn't for all these family problems... if I wasn't under so much pressure...if I had a better job or a
better place to live... if people understood me... if the state of the world wasn't so lousy...if human
beings were kinder, more considerate, more honest...if everybody else didn't expect me to drink...if [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]