Obituaries and Famous People (Requiem 13)

In recovery, you hear about the 'jumping off' place. It's the crossroads of two paths. One is the path where you are sick of drinking and using. You are sick and tired of being sick and tired. The other path is where you are sick of being sober. You just aren't getting life while sober. It's too hard. The intersection of these two paths is a horrible place to be. What do you do when you don't want to drink or use, but you don't want to be sober either? A lot of people choose the terminal solution. Whenever I see somebody under the age of 30 in the obituaries with no real explanation of what happened, my mind goes to the jumping off place. I'd been there many times. Each time I'd been there, I looked at my options. Drinking and using might kill me, but suicide would kill me for sure. And so each time I drank.

Okay, so you can only go through rehab so many times before you have the obligatory 'rock star in rehab' experience. I had mine while in the hospital after being given the ultimatum. Respecting his anonymity - I'll just say that he was the bass player of a big hard rock band. A band that some of my friends listened to. He was detoxing on his way to the famous rehab facility on the old Osmond sound stage. One or two of the people in there were pretty clingy to him. I felt sort of bad for the guy. I imagine he was used to the hanger's on, but I wasn't. You hit bottom and decide to do something about it. You're at a low spot in your life and you have people that want you to tell them about how cool it is to go on tour. Bless his heart though, he took it in stride. I had a couple of chances to play guitar with him when Katie brought my guitar, Jenny, in. One day he made a comment to me about musicians. He finished it with 'But you're a musician, you know'. Nothing like bonding with a rock star to start sobriety out. When he transferred out, he even gave his cell phone number out. I took it and gave him mine, but I'd played this game before. I didn't expect him to call me and I KNEW I wasn't going to call him.

When you're in rehab, the sense of camaraderie is tremendous. Like you are a group of explorers planting your flags together - 'This is where I take my life back". Spend 28 days or even 7 in close quarters with complete strangers and you get to know them pretty quickly. Especially when you count all the time spent in groups talking about feelings and the things that surrounded your drinking and using. A lot of us haven't had any relationships like this before, so we think we are forging these lifelong friendships. Sometimes we do, but mostly people fade away. I stayed on the outskirts of recovery, but I kept coming back. Of the 30 people in the first rehab I went to over 5 years ago, I know of exactly 1 person that stayed sober. (Jen E) And this after the promises of sobriety. The signed books that say 'This time will be different. I know we'll stay sober'. In my experience, if you still see 1 person in 5 still at meetings even 90 days later it is above average.

At the same time, a girl I'd been in another hospital with came into this hospital. I didn't remember her (it had been a bad detox), but she explained that we had hung out at the other hospital. When I went from this detox to another hospital for the 28 day spin dry, she followed me. Her name was Caylee. Like me she was to continue to struggle. I guess I should have known she would have a hard time after being in 3 different rehab programs with her. One day I saw her and her mom on the A&E program Intervention. I want to be careful to say that I wasn't ashamed of her. That's not how I felt. I just felt sad. Sad and tired.

I collect obituaries of people that I've known in rehab/recovery that have died. One day after a meeting about a year ago I went up to a newcomer named Andrea and talked to her. We had a five minute conversation about recovery and what was going on in her life. I went home and went about my life. When I went back to the same meeting the next week, people were talking about Andrea. She had overdosed a few days after I spoke with her. I clipped her obituary and added it to my collection. These experiences take their toll on you, so that when you hear about a friend that 'went back out' to drink again you mentally detach a little from them. Because you know that one day you're going to be reading their obituary.

I think I'm bringing up these friends to make a point: a drunk is a drunk. Whether they have toured the world and made millions or if they live day to day, hand to mouth. I feel just as honored to have known Caylee or Andrea as to have met my rockstar friend. When I hear about a Lindsay or a Mary Kate being in town going through rehab, I always wonder what the big deal is. I've got friends that are sort of fame whores that way. They'll go an hour out of their way to go to a meeting where someone famous is. I'll take an hour with my sponsor Kim over an hour with Lindsay or Mary Kate. Any day.