The first step towards recovery for any addict is to admit that they’ve no power over their addiction. This can be a very hard concept to grasp, since we all like to think that we’re in control of our lives and that we’re free to make choices that’ll affect the outcome of whatever it is that we’re doing.
Clearly, we all need to decide whether to get up in the morning or to turn off the alarm clock and go back to sleep. We make decisions all the time, and so admitting to ourselves that we’re powerless doesn’t absolve us from responsibility for our actions.
However, even though an addict might try to exert some day-to-day influence over whether or not they pick up a drink or a drug, ultimately they’ve no control over the fact that sooner or later they will revert to their addictive behaviour.
Not only that, but when they do indulge in their chosen vice, they’re powerless over the outcome. Sometimes they might escape with relatively minor consequences, but on other occasions it can be traumatic.
Understanding the nature of our powerlessness around addiction is vital for making a good recovery because if we admit that we’ve no control, it means we’re prepared to ask for help – and no addict recovers without help.
Here’s a true story that illustrates the nature of powerlessness very well. Many years ago, during the period when I was drinking very heavily, an American company offered me a very good job as a salesman. They asked me if I’d be willing to set up an operation for them in the UK. I accepted, and the next thing they told me was: ‘We need to train you, so we want you to come over to the US for a conference.’
At the time, I had a terrible fear of flying and would usually get totally plastered whenever I was on a plane. But I thought to myself: Don’t worry, this time it’ll be different. I’ll just have a few to calm my nerves and everything will be okay.
Sadly, when it came to the big day, everything was not okay: far from it. I arrived at Gatwick Airport full of good intentions. I was due to fly to St Louis in Missouri before flying on to my ultimate destination in St Paul in Minneapolis. Before leaving home I’d dosed up on a considerable quantity of tranquilizers, but as I settled into my seat on the plane I was still determined to arrive in the US in good shape.
After all, I knew that my new employer would probably take a very dim view of things if I arrived with a hangover, or worse still, drunk. Then, as we were sitting on the tarmac, the cabin crew made an announcement: ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we regret to inform you that, due to a dispute with cabin staff, we will not be selling alcohol on this flight…’
My heart sank. Ten hours without a drink! Then, just as I was about to panic, they made another announcement that was music to my ears. ‘However, we will be serving complimentary alcoholic drinks from the galley.’ Yippee! In my mind, everything was now going to be okay and I proceeded to help myself to large gin and tonics. You can guess the rest. I can’t remember anything of the flight from about halfway across the Atlantic onwards because I got so drunk.
The next thing I knew I was waking up in a hospital bed in St Louis in the middle of the night. I was several hundred miles from my destination, and the clock was counting down to the start of the conference. I had a bloody gash across the top of my head that had four stitches in it. ‘You had a bit of a fall,’ was all the nurses told me. To this day I’ve absolutely no idea what happened, but I assume that I was so drunk I was carried off the plane and thrown out of the airport during the stopover in St Louis.
I decided to discharge myself from the hospital, but it was 4 a.m. and I didn’t have a clue where I was. I didn’t even have any US currency in my wallet, as I’d intended to change my British pounds upon arrival. Eventually, I made my way back to the airport, where I managed to borrow $100 from a traveller’s charity in order to pay for a taxi.
I finally arrived in St Paul, a day late, and sat in the conference hall with a big plaster on my head. That evening, all the other delegates went down to the bar at the local hotel, where they mainly drank Coca-Cola. Anxious to ease my hangover, I started tucking into the Martinis and got drunk again.
I woke up the next morning with another hangover and didn’t make it to the conference building until 10 a.m., two hours after everybody else had arrived. As I entered the hall I could sense everyone in the room turning towards me and wondering who this nut was who’d joined them. I felt terrible.
Amazingly, I managed to keep the job, but I’d made the worst possible start. Despite my best efforts to drink sensibly on the plane, and to make a good impression when I arrived, I’d had no control over whether or not I drank, nor over the outcome.
Stories like this are common among problem drinkers: their alcoholism often flares up at the worst possible moment. Sometimes they might manage to exercise some restraint, but it’s really down to the luck of the draw. Every time you drink you’re dancing with chaos and the outcome is beyond your control.
Only by eventually seeking help was I able to tackle my booze addiction, and the first step was to admit I was powerless around alcohol.
Most private clinics, like the One40 Group and the most effective treatment centres around the world, along with self-help fellowships, agree that the most effective method for tackling addiction is via a 12-Step recovery programme.
The exact format of the steps can vary slightly from group to group: for example, the 12 Steps used by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) are worded slightly differently from the versions used by Narcotics Anonymous or Overeaters Anonymous. But the principles are the same. They all state that the addict must make a series of lifestyle changes that are designed to clear away the baggage from their past and enable them to live a life that’s clean and honest.
At the heart of the programme is the idea that recovery involves a ‘spiritual awakening’ in order to reconnect with our fellow human beings while seeking guidance from a power greater than ourselves. This may seem like an abstract concept, but the steps involved are enormously practical, and most importantly of all, they work.
The first ever 12-Step programme was published in 1935 in the USA. It’s inception happened almost by accident when an alcoholic stockbroker from New York called Bill Wilson met a surgeon called Dr Bob Smith in Akron, Ohio. It’s a very famous story.
Bill was in town trying to salvage what was left of his career. He was worried that he would blow everything by getting drunk again, so he decided to seek out the company of a fellow alcoholic to discuss his predicament. His inquiries led him to the door of Dr Bob, and the pair sat down together and talked for many hours.
The connection the two men made had a huge impact on them both – and most importantly of all, Bill managed to avoid getting drunk. This seemingly minor event led to the creation of Alcoholics Anonymous, and the story is recorded in some detail in what’s become known as The Big Book of AA.
It’s important for me to be clear here that I’m not a spokesperson for Alcoholics Anonymous, nor am I willing to say which particular fellowships I attend, since anonymity is a strict condition.
The meeting between Bill and Dr Bob was actually a seismic moment, because it’s the most famous example of an alcoholic admitting that he’s powerless and reaching out for help. The idea of one alcoholic talking to another in order to work through their mutual problems has become the mainstay of group therapy – it’s something that almost every leading treatment centre uses today as an effective tool for tackling addiction.
The reason I believe that it works so well is because when one addict talks to another addict in order to share their problems, it creates a limbic connection between them that’s very spiritual. I call it ‘limbic WiFi’ because that’s exactly what it feels like.
When addicts are together they realize that they’re not alone in their predicament, and this is greatly beneficial. Human beings are social creatures with a natural need to interact with one another. I believe that when two addicts share their troubles it can have a very calming effect on their limbic system.
The sixth sense that I spoke about earlier in the book allows them to instinctively bond with each other – the old proverb ‘a trouble shared is a trouble halved’ is very true. It’s also a great way to empty the contents of the Shame Sack that most addicts have been carrying around with them for so long.
The 12 Steps refer to a ‘higher power’ and ‘God’ in several places, but if you’re agnostic don’t let this put you off. It refers to a God of our understanding, so this doesn’t necessarily mean a strictly religious interpretation of the word.
I’m an atheist, and for me, the word God stands for ‘group of drunks’. (I don’t mean this disrespectfully: I genuinely believe that the higher power at work within a recovery process is the power of the group’s members to help one another.)
Of course, if you have a more traditional religious understanding of God, then I fully respect that too. The point about the steps is that they’re flexible to interpretation and they can work for everybody, regardless of faith or creed.
The Big Book of Alcoholics Anonymous (which I strongly urge you to read if you have a drink problem) explains the 12 Steps far more eloquently than I can, so I won’t list them here. You can find them on the AA website, and you’ll need to refer to them directly if you wish to follow the AA programme.
In most 12-Step programmes (not just AA’s) the first few steps involve admitting that we’re powerless over our addiction before coming to believe that a power greater than ourselves can help us, and then deciding to turn over our lives to the care of that power.
My personal interpretation of the first three steps is to summarize them as follows:
By this I mean that step one is simply admitting that I can’t beat my addictions on my own. Step two, however, is a way of saying that, together, we can do it, and step three is a commitment to work through the programme together to achieve our goals.
Most people choose to do the 12 Steps with the help of a ‘sponsor’ from a self-help fellowship, which is the way I’d recommend anybody to approach them. A sponsor is a recovering addict who helps you through your own recovery.
The subsequent steps can help to prepare us to clear the wreckage of everything that has happened to us during our addiction. This means recognizing our part in anything in the past that has caused us shame and guilt. In order to do this we need to look back over our lives, and document all the harm we’ve caused through our addiction by writing it down.
This can be a very intense experience as it inevitably involves going over lots of painful old ground in order to make a ‘moral inventory’ of ourselves. In practical terms this process involves writing things like: ‘I was selfish and drank all the time, causing immense damage to my marriage.’
Once we’ve done this we need to unburden all this mental baggage by sharing the information with another human being. We also ask God (as we understand the word) to remove our ‘character defects’.
There are also steps that are designed to help us make amends for our past, while also maintaining a healthy lifestyle away from our addiction. Whenever possible, these amends can take a practical form. If you’ve harmed somebody as a result of your addiction, your sponsor might recommend that you apologize to them in person (provided this doesn’t do more harm than good).
On other occasions, you might decide to make amends in a symbolic way, perhaps by making a donation to charity. This process is as much about you as it’s about other people – and the best advice I can give is that your own conscience will guide you towards where you need to take practical steps to make amends.
As a general rule, if you feel bad about something you’ve done in the past, you need to pay attention to it and get some advice about how to lay your demons to rest. The person with whom you decide to share your wrongs is a matter of personal choice, but most people opt to do it with their sponsor. However, it’s the act of telling another human being that’s important, rather than the identity of the person you confide in. A friend of mine simply picked a contact number from a list of self-help meetings and called a stranger out of the blue!
By working through the steps, an addict experiences a great sense of unburdening. The results of making amends are very therapeutic, and the benefits to our mental wellbeing can be enormous if the process is done with belief and enthusiasm.
The overall effect of the 12 Steps amounts to a spiritual awakening, whereby the addict finally feels equipped to face up to the trials of life without having to resort to drink or drugs, or take part in any other addictive process.
The concluding steps are what I call maintenance steps, and these involve prayer and meditation. You may wonder how somebody like me, who’s an atheist, can take a step that involves prayer, but for me it’s simple. Prayer is simply asking for help, and since my fellow addicts are my higher power, it is them I turn to. Meditation is simply listening to the answers.
The point I’m making is that the steps are very subjective, and you can find your own way of working through them with the help of another person. They’re suggestions for how to improve your life.
If you wish to lean more about 12-Step recovery programmes, many of the support groups listed in Appendix 2 of this book will be able to assist you. The steps may seem very strange at first glance – and some of the language is slightly dated – but I can assure you of one thing: they really are effective.
Note: The 12 Steps I refer to in this chapter first appeared in the book Alcoholics Anonymous, published in 1935 by AA. However, nothing I’ve said here about the steps has been endorsed by AA; instead, the views expressed are my own personal interpretation of them.