Last night I had an epiphany as to why I have such a hard time making decisions. Please indulge a little trip down memory lane for a moment. (Think 1974.)
I was perhaps 6 years old and my mother and grandmother had taken me shopping for a new set of school clothes. When it came time to pick out shoes, my mother suggested one pair -- Huckabees, I think -- and my grandmother suggested another -- Buster Browns. I was put into a state of crisis. I felt that I was going to please one of them and hurt the other's feelings based on which pair of shoes I chose. I tried them both on, walked around in them, kept saying how much I liked them both, and in the end, would not choose. I forced them to choose for me. (I ended up with the Huckabees.)
Fast forward to the period 1990-1998. During this time I was in a relationship with someone whose emotional fortress was so thick as to be impenetrable. By about 1994 I knew it was a lost cause. By 1996 I knew it was over and started "trying" to end it -- but I did so by passive-agressive means. I didn't have the courage to make the decision to end it. I made things so miserable for both of us over the next two years that it finally reached a boiling point and he finally had no choice but to leave. Again, I would not choose; I forced him to make the decision.
Again and again throughout my life, I have not been able to make a decision. When faced with a choice, particularly one that involves another person's feelings, I weigh the options and go back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, until I am dizzy and almost insane. Now is where this begins to tie in with my alcoholism. Having a drink would help to calm that frenzied oscillation in my mind for a while. It wouldn't help make up my mind; it would just offer some temporary relief. The drink would wear off, the hangover would end, and the waffling would pick up where it left off. And how did I "make a decision?" By a mental toss of the coin, I'm afraid. Basically, it went like this: whenever I got so sick and tired of the insanity, whatever direction I was leaning in would be the choice I would make, for better or for worse. Yeah, that's a great way to make decisions.
In my hypno session last night my therapist took me back to that day shopping with my mother and grandmother when I was facing that crisis. I had to choose to disappoint one or the other of them, and please the other (or so I thought). This time I got to do it differently. This time, I looked carefully at both pairs they suggested, but then went and picked out a pair of my own and said "I want these shoes." My mother and grandmother looked at each other and at me and just smiled and we all started laughing. I realized that my fear of hurting their feelings was all in my head. And I took control of the situation and made a choice all on my own, letting them know that I had a mind and a voice of my own. Now I need to carry this into the rest of my life.
I share this with you because recently I've been faced with another very personal decision that involves (potentially, in my mind at least) hurting another person's feelings. As I've struggled to make this choice, I've grown more and more tense over the last couple of months and I have become less sure of what I really want. I have been caught up in a whirlwind of thought and emotion and rationalization and fear and anxiety -- and that's not a good place for an alcoholic to be. Over the last couple of days I have felt like my head was just going to explode. I wasn't craving a drink, thank God, but it occurred to me that these were the exact feelings that made me want to drink in the past. I'm sure we all have our own private neuroses that we carry around with us, but the feelings they trigger in us (fear, anxiety, sadness) are universal -- and they give the monster room to get into our heads and start working on us.
A drink won't solve anything. It won't help me make a decision. It won't make the problem go away. It won't make the other person's feelings NOT get hurt. It won't do a damn thing except send me down the road to destruction. I'm glad I realize that now, but I tell you, the pressure sure builds up and is more noticeable when I'm not taking drinks to "blow off some steam." I'm glad for that pressure. It's showing me where the real work needs to be done.
Thanks for indulging me.
~ Mike
I was perhaps 6 years old and my mother and grandmother had taken me shopping for a new set of school clothes. When it came time to pick out shoes, my mother suggested one pair -- Huckabees, I think -- and my grandmother suggested another -- Buster Browns. I was put into a state of crisis. I felt that I was going to please one of them and hurt the other's feelings based on which pair of shoes I chose. I tried them both on, walked around in them, kept saying how much I liked them both, and in the end, would not choose. I forced them to choose for me. (I ended up with the Huckabees.)
Fast forward to the period 1990-1998. During this time I was in a relationship with someone whose emotional fortress was so thick as to be impenetrable. By about 1994 I knew it was a lost cause. By 1996 I knew it was over and started "trying" to end it -- but I did so by passive-agressive means. I didn't have the courage to make the decision to end it. I made things so miserable for both of us over the next two years that it finally reached a boiling point and he finally had no choice but to leave. Again, I would not choose; I forced him to make the decision.
Again and again throughout my life, I have not been able to make a decision. When faced with a choice, particularly one that involves another person's feelings, I weigh the options and go back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, until I am dizzy and almost insane. Now is where this begins to tie in with my alcoholism. Having a drink would help to calm that frenzied oscillation in my mind for a while. It wouldn't help make up my mind; it would just offer some temporary relief. The drink would wear off, the hangover would end, and the waffling would pick up where it left off. And how did I "make a decision?" By a mental toss of the coin, I'm afraid. Basically, it went like this: whenever I got so sick and tired of the insanity, whatever direction I was leaning in would be the choice I would make, for better or for worse. Yeah, that's a great way to make decisions.
In my hypno session last night my therapist took me back to that day shopping with my mother and grandmother when I was facing that crisis. I had to choose to disappoint one or the other of them, and please the other (or so I thought). This time I got to do it differently. This time, I looked carefully at both pairs they suggested, but then went and picked out a pair of my own and said "I want these shoes." My mother and grandmother looked at each other and at me and just smiled and we all started laughing. I realized that my fear of hurting their feelings was all in my head. And I took control of the situation and made a choice all on my own, letting them know that I had a mind and a voice of my own. Now I need to carry this into the rest of my life.
I share this with you because recently I've been faced with another very personal decision that involves (potentially, in my mind at least) hurting another person's feelings. As I've struggled to make this choice, I've grown more and more tense over the last couple of months and I have become less sure of what I really want. I have been caught up in a whirlwind of thought and emotion and rationalization and fear and anxiety -- and that's not a good place for an alcoholic to be. Over the last couple of days I have felt like my head was just going to explode. I wasn't craving a drink, thank God, but it occurred to me that these were the exact feelings that made me want to drink in the past. I'm sure we all have our own private neuroses that we carry around with us, but the feelings they trigger in us (fear, anxiety, sadness) are universal -- and they give the monster room to get into our heads and start working on us.
A drink won't solve anything. It won't help me make a decision. It won't make the problem go away. It won't make the other person's feelings NOT get hurt. It won't do a damn thing except send me down the road to destruction. I'm glad I realize that now, but I tell you, the pressure sure builds up and is more noticeable when I'm not taking drinks to "blow off some steam." I'm glad for that pressure. It's showing me where the real work needs to be done.
Thanks for indulging me.
~ Mike
) Maybe I'll have something to add to the subject later.
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