Lorna and I had the best stream of consciousness chat yesterday about Lake Co peeps including one very interesting fellow that I recently met. All of our families have been high (and low) rollers in the tiny pond type of mentality that is society in a small southern town where most money is inherited and blown without a second thought to the starving children in Africa, or even the ones next door. We were both raised with family, though not slaves, servants that were handed down over the generations. Ours was Miss Rosie who wore a paper bag on her head from time to time. There was scads of money involved and it's all gone now but for a time, our families were the upper crust. Post WWII was a good time for most everybody and that's when a lot of women ventured into the workplace for the first time to pay for all that shiny "stuff" that came with an economic comeback. There were bridge and garden clubs and one generic that was simply "the woman's club" of Dyersburg, of course. My great grandfather Oscar Hamilton was a grocer on the side of town next to the railroad tracks which is now known as "shady" on a good day. KW Rogers was the owner I believe. He walked to work from Pate street and my great grandma Ethel was known to stand on the porch yelling at him as he marched toward real life and away from her uptight self.
I love Alternet because I like reading other sides to a story and the piece that caught my attention today addressed the issue of addiction and the dismal success rate for 12 steppers. Now before anybody gets offended let me say that I'm one of them on several issues and so far I'm functioning but only because I have a good support system and a solid knowledge of the rehab process. Addiction when seen as a "disease" is paid for by (you guessed it) big insurance usually. If somebody uses in response to a shitty life, for example, company dollars pay for that treatment. If not, the government(s) and private donors finance centers that usually run 4-6 weeks in length. Now that's a reasonable period of time to be working a program but the trouble comes when the recently reborn addict hits the streets again and finds the same triggers as before: i.e. friends who use, shitty job/marriage/financial situation/etc. Ninety meetings in 90 days is a nice thought but it usually doesn't work with the whole getting re-integrated picture. Seasoned addicts will tell you that there's a "character defect" behind every addiction that will still be there when the using stops, and they're right. Only I prefer to play Pollyanna and see it as "bad situation" that is a reason to get sober or at least get a grip. Back in the 80's when I attended my first meeting of CoDA it was held in the classroom of our very own inpatient treatment center that was for 2 weeks because that's all insurance would pay. That went away pretty quick with intake and rehab shifting to the private sector. A friend of mine who knows the ropes chose her own detox place and headed to Memphis to a recovery center where she promptly came back to the 'burg and did what she had been doing before. Court mandated programs are a hotbed of who can get what from whom and most of them don't give a damn. The success rate for addicts is about 10% on a good day and the court monitoring of these folks costs a lot in drug testing and staff $$$$$. I believe it's a diversionary tactic, and it doesn't work too well but it's better than jail. Booger's mama is a graduate of said program and I'm mighty proud of her because lawwwwwwd! that girl has some stories. Life is a destination and so is recovery. One day at a time.
Talk therapy is essential to healing every sort of emotional trauma that feeds addiction including PTSD from any kind of violence whether it's sexual assault or war. I've been in therapy off and on for 27 years and I know myself well enough to know when I'm gonna' need some face or phone time. Rod is my "here's the thing" guy who has been with our family since the first divorce and knows the whole deal. EAP paid for the last round and then cut me off because I wasn't in "crisis" anymore. Umm, yeah right. I still owe him too right next to propane guy and the florist and all will be paid eventually. It's the new me, you know. I stopped by a gallery on Court square yesterday and visited with the owners asking about terms and whatnot. One I've known all my life and the other is a local that I had never met. Like I told my friend Jayyyroe, I'm ready for something different 'cuz the day job is killing me.
Don't worry~Be happy
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