Is This Rock Bottom?

The latest tragedy that just happened to me, is this finally rock bottom? 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

It's time again for Doc Jock, your addiction lifeguard podcast. I am Dr. Jock DeBerker, a psychologist, licensed professional counselor, and addiction specialist. If you are suffering from addiction, misery, trauma, whatever it is, I'm here to help. If you're in search of help to try to get your life back together, join me here at Doc Jock, your addiction lifeguard, the addiction recovery podcast. I wanted to be real clear about what this podcast is intended for. It is intended for entertainment and informational purposes but not considered help. If you actually need real help and you're in need of help, Please seek that out. If you're in dire need of help, you can go to your nearest emergency room or you can check into a rehab center or call a counselor like me and talk about your problems and work through them. But don't rely on a podcast to be that form of help. It's not. It's just a podcast. It's for entertainment and information only. So let's keep it in that light. All right. Have a good time. Learn something and then get the real help that you need from a professional. You have to quit your drug of choice when you're about to lose the thing or you have lost the thing, the one thing that you didn't want to lose. That's really what it comes down to. And that idea of loss, like what did I have to lose? sometimes people will go to their grave you know I mean we see it in the news all the time people who they overdose who knows I was just watching a clip on a reel of Robin Williams is talking on a it was a guest on a talk show and he was talking about the use of propofol and he had had to use propofol for a surgery that he'd had. And the person brought up propofol and said, well, you know, that was Michael Jackson's drug of choice. And Robin Williams said, that's like the worst thing you could possibly do. It's like using propofol is like using, I forget what he said. But anyway, he was just alluding to the fact that Michael Jackson had hit bottom with the use of propofol at home. It's like using a sledgehammer to kill ants, I suppose. But the idea of, like, I'm hitting bottom. Some people hit bottom, and then there's another bottom, and then they're bouncing from that one to the lower bottom to the next lower level and the next lower level. So the bottom has a basement, and the basement has a subfloor, and the subfloor has a crawl space, and the crawl space has an interior... room that's also a basement you know and and other people just hit the bottom once they bounce they hit boom that's it and they're done but it's usually always around the one thing that they didn't want to lose and the concept of the hitting your bottom is something that is kind of foreign to people who don't have addiction because they to them it makes no sense that this person is doing these these drugs of choice and destroying their lives. And they're watching addiction attack them and dismantle this person and their life and the people around them. So why do I have to hit bottom? And where is that bottom? And does it stop then? And what if I go back to usage? Does that mean that I didn't hit bottom? Well, yes and no. So I wanted to explore that with you on this journey of recovery in the DocShock multiverse of podcast arena of recovery podcasting that goes on everywhere. So let's talk about your bottom and what does that feel like and what does it look like? And for people who don't have addiction that may be listening to this, and I know some of you don't, you just have a loved one who has addiction, the idea of a bottom is... Like I said, it's the thing that you're going to lose or you have lost that is one thing too many. It could be financial. It could be legal. It could be your health. It could be relational. It's hard to say. I have all kinds of extremes that I deal with in that. And the extremes range from destruction of a marriage, destruction of a relationship between parents or siblings. Sometimes it's freedom. By freedom, I mean incarceration. So they're either thrown in jail or they're incarcerated in a prison. I have an acquaintance. I want to call him a friend. I think he's a friend. Stephen Snook. He's a great pastor. He does pastoring on live streams on Facebook. He's a really great guy. Stephen Snook is an ex-con. He served, I think, 20 years, I think. His bottom was that, incarceration and solitary confinement for a large part of that time, apparently. That was his bottom, and he had a turning over of himself and found God and became a pastor. I call him a street pastor, but he's like a prison pastor, and he pastors from his pulpit. Other people have lost their health. I have a horrible incident of a young lady who was 24, and she got a hold of a cocktail of drugs that ended up taking her out and put her in a coma for weeks. She had multiple strokes, and she has... Very, very little short-term memory and not much long-term memory for the rest of her life. That's a handicap. I can't even imagine that kind of loss. And so, you know, you divorced. You lost your freedom. You lost your health. Maybe you ended up as an alcoholic and you've had an amputation of a foot or a leg because of the diabetic condition that you've created through that. Or cirrhosis of the liver and you're constantly on the verge of destruction of your liver. Or maybe you did destroy your liver and now you've got to be on the liver transplant list. That's terrible. Or how about the loss of job, which has a cascading effect financially on you and you become homeless. You lose everything. You become dependent. You become a dependent of somebody else because of that loss of job. Respect in the workplace. Maybe you're not employable anymore. I have clients in the past who've been medical doctors and lawyers who could no longer practice because they lost everything. Pilots have that problem. They might lose their ability to fly for the rest of their life, and that's their profession. So loss of career. or respect within that career. You have to rebuild your life that way. Then there's just loss of money. You know, if you're gambling or maybe you, again, because you've lost employment, now you lose money, right? So that's a double hit. But maybe you had to spend thousands and thousands of dollars for something. your own freedom for court costs, attorneys. A DUI today is like$10,000 to$20,000 typically. Or maybe you ended up harming somebody else and you got personally sued in a civil suit for injuring somebody because of your drunkenness. You hit somebody with your car and you injured them. And now you have to pay them$500,000 in restitution for pain, suffering, and injuries that you caused them. Or maybe you killed a child that you ran over. These are just horrible things that you get to. And what is your bottom? Well, maybe that is your bottom. For some people, that's not the bottom. They've got to go through a series of those things before they get there. Some people just go to their grave, suffering loss after loss after loss, and they just continue. And that's when addiction has got a stranglehold on your soul. That's a spiritual warfare that the enemy is waging against you and your soul. Sometimes it's respectability. There are unfortunately numerous examples now of people who have high respectability type positions in our society. They're pastors, they're lawyers, they're lawmakers, they're celebrities, people who have tremendous amount of stature within our society and their addiction it takes that away like they lose those things because of their addiction some people recover from that some people don't and you know I can give you many examples Robert Downey jr. is probably the best one that comes to mind immediately is Robert Downey Jr., the actor, and terrible drugs and alcohol. It was eight times he ended up in court for being picked up and charged with various things related to his addiction. And he's gotten his life back. He's clean and sober. And he was able to rebuild his career. There are people that don't, and we all know them. We all have friends who are like that. It's sad. I have quite a few friends, actually, who are no longer alive because they succumbed to their addiction. Their bottom didn't seem to have an end. And it's frustrating when you're observing it. But if you're living it, the thing that the enemy does, addiction, attacks you It takes everything away first, then kills you. That's the progression of it. It may take a year. It may take 20 years. But it will happen. It takes everything away from you. All the things that I'm talking about, slowly over time. And it's quite frustrating to just stand by and idly and watch it happen. I am, as a profession, in a position where I help people tackle problems those problems, right? I'm with them in their fight with the enemy. And I've devoted my professional career to that and helping them. And it's sad when they get to the point where they are losing everything. But if you're suffering from addiction and you're facing one of these losses, how do you know that this is the bottom? When people come into my office and they sit down and they tell me their stories, they're usually very bad. There's all kinds of things that have happened to them. Molestation, physical attacks, suicide attempts, murder attempts, things that have happened to them. That's not their bottom, right? Because that's what got them the toehold of addiction, the foothold. Addiction got in there because of these problems that went untreated or unaddressed. by professional help, like seeing somebody who's a counselor. And so that foothold gets in there. But the idea that this happened to me, and I don't understand why. I'll tell you, addiction is an isolation game. Addiction isolates you from the herd. It identifies you and then isolates you. And so usage usually is with nobody or maybe one other person who is also in the grip of addiction. So like heroin addicts, a lot of times they have to have a network because you've got to get your supply. But I've noticed in the years I've been doing this that heroin and opiate drug addicts, fentanyl, heroin, they tend to at least pair off. So they always have to have somebody that can help them. them get into the addiction and maintain it. So in my area, driving from Northern Virginia to Baltimore is a local pastime for people who have opiate drug addiction. And so they have to have somebody drive while they're shooting up in the car driving home. So they'll travel in pairs, but many times it's individual. With alcohol, it's very individual. With food, gambling, pornography... shopping it's individual that's one person doing it in isolation so when you hit your bottom nobody's there to see it unless you overdose in which case you're going to wake up in a hospital if you're lucky so nobody's there to see it so you don't get any real immediate feedback on hey man this is this is this this is bad so you just kind of muscle through it i mean that's what i did i hit multiple bottoms on my journey and um Each one seems like it would have– as I think about it or as I've told my story in the meeting rooms, the look on people's faces when I tell them some of the things that had happened to me that I did, it's kind of disturbing and shocking. And I'm thinking, well, that's not even the worst. So it's kind of like– When you're experiencing it, people who suffer from addiction are really good at being able to just kind of experience the suffering and not really shrug it off, but just kind of muscle through it. I don't know how else to describe it. And if you're an addict, you know what I'm talking about. Stuff happens and we tend to ignore it. We just kind of keep moving forward. The enemy wants us in that grip of addiction. And so it you know, we convince ourselves that it's not that bad. There's a wonderful book called Moments of Clarity written by Christopher Kennedy Lawford. And Chris Lawford was the son of Peter Lawford, the Rat Pack fame guy, and Carolyn Kennedy. And He wrote this book and it's full of, I don't know, like 20, 30, 35 little short multiple page chapters. of people's stories of clarity, the clarity that comes through the suffering of hitting bottom. And they're quite interesting. It's an older book. It was published in 2009. I'm not even sure it's still in publication. But it's really interesting when you read the book and you read about people's suffering, the moments of clarity through these stories of complete hitting bottom. and Katie Segal and Richard Dreyfuss. There are actors in there. There are also some business people. Some people who are, I think, politicians, he tends to move towards people who have notoriety for one reason or another. They have their notoriety. And so it makes it really interesting because you think, oh, these people are privileged. They have money. They have power. They have influence. They have fame. So perhaps they can be better served with care. They have access to it. Well, they really don't, right? Because they're just us. Everybody who suffers from addiction is just a person, first and foremost, and they suffer. And some people suffer well and can handle it, and others of us can't. And so it's the ones who can't. They hit that bottom. I don't know what your bottom is. You may not know what your bottom is. I don't know that anybody can tell you what it's going to be. But it will hit you, and it will be the thing that's like a bridge too far. And whether you're waking up in a hospital and you're looking around and you've got a tube down your throat and you can't talk and somebody's standing there crying, or you wake up in jail and you're laying on the floor in a drunk tank lockup, getting dragged out into court wearing an orange, or in the case here, orange and white striped jumpsuit, where you're shackled because you're in court and you're shackled at the legs and the hands and you're being... brought out and it's humiliating. Um, some of my clients have these experiences that are just awful. They're life changing, hopefully. Um, but the bottom is painful. Okay. And so this, in this book, moments of clarity, and I highly recommend it to anybody who's working on recovery because it's very enlightening. Um, the idea that my suffering is, um, as bad as I can tolerate now, and I can't tolerate anymore, and I'm done, is one that is echoed in every one of these stories in this book, but for different situations, different time periods, and different drugs of choice. But the universality of the messaging is that I just realized I can't do this anymore. I just can't. I also was... reading the book Scar Tissue and Anthony Kiedis, this lead singer for Red Hot Chili Peppers, that book, oh my gosh, it's like 400 pages long. And I, you know, he, I don't know who wrote it. It's, it's somebody else wrote it, but it was him basically just, just long, tell my story, uh, kind of thing from a, like a speaker meeting that went on forever as he's telling these continuous bouncing around on the bottom from the age of like 16 until he finally got clean and, and his partner in crime flee the bass player from red hot chili peppers and the same thing. And the, the, the exploits of, you know, sex, drugs, and rock and roll at its extreme. And they survived. That's what's so amazing is that the numbers of people that hit their bottom and survived, I'm so proud of them. And if you have hit your bottom and you realize you've hit your bottom and you survived, I'm proud of you for surviving, okay? But you can't put your guard down. The enemy's waiting for that. And he's waiting, as we say in the AA rooms, he's waiting in the parking lot doing push-ups. staying in shape, waiting for you in your moment of weakness to come back and attack and take you out. And so if you've hit your bottom, honesty is the first step. Like, honesty, I've actually hit bottom. Man, that's not where I wanted to be. I didn't want to be in this place. I didn't want to be homeless. I didn't want to be... in this accident. I didn't want to be in this jail cell. I didn't want to be in this hospital bed. I didn't want to be in this mental institution. I don't want to be in this courtroom. I don't want to know that attorney's name that I'm paying thousands of dollars to. I didn't want to know him. I didn't want this. What do I do? Well, you know what? Surrender to your recovery. Stop being so arrogant. Stop being prideful. Stop lying. to yourself I can handle this no you can't I can get through this no you won't I don't it's not a problem yes it is you know these are the lies and and as quickly as I'm answering those lies that I'm you know fictitiously stating as if you'd said it is as quick as they can come the answers of no that's not true and so reality is what it is it's not something else you're not living some other life It's not, you know, and we all play pretend in addiction. We all pretend like everything's fine. It's not really a problem. I'm not really bothered by this. It's all pretend. You are terribly bothered by it and horribly afflicted with a condition. So judgment and self-loathing and criticism is something you probably live with every day as an addict or have if you're in recovery. But You live with it every day and that's part of the lie. So it's time to stop that part of it. Stop the lie and be honest for once in your life. Be honest, be truthful with yourself so that you can raise your hand in that meeting and say, I need help. Like I need help. Or you can pick up the phone and call that therapist who specializes in addiction and recovery and say, Can I see you? And don't go in and do what many of my clients do, which is try to just create a fun house mirror of reality. Like everything's fine. It's like, well, then why are you here? Stop lying. Be honest. You're hurting. You're in pain. It's okay. It's okay. You can help that, but you can't help somebody who won't admit that they have pain because And do it in a place in a way that is safe to do it. And that's why I'm suggesting, really, that you go to rehab or you find a counselor that specializes in this. The thing that I hear in my practice is, and I'm not saying this as a self-aggrandizing statement, you don't judge me. You don't criticize me. You're not attacking me. I'm not. I'm a truth teller. And the truth hurts, but it's not critical. And it's like, hey, you're failing, but let's change that. And you've got to find a person that can do that with you. And it's not going to be a friend. It's not going to be a co-worker. Those people have subjectivity in their relationship with you. It's got to be objective. So you've got to find somebody that's a third party that is not, you know, you're telling your history to the very first time. But But the honesty is where you get there. So is this my bottom? Man, I just can't do this anymore. And I'll tell you, you know what? From a Christian perspective, when you hit bottom, that's when you call out for help. Like, please help me. And when you make that statement, when you say that, when that incantation occurs, like, please help me, I surrender, I give up. What you're doing is you're surrendering to the correct force, right? God doesn't really want people to die and suffer contrary to fictitious popular belief that how can God let that happen? Man lets that happen because man has free will. But when you say, please help me, I surrender. What you're doing is you're surrendering not to the enemy. You're asking for help. And that clarity in that moment will get you to where you need to go. It's not gonna happen until then. So the honesty part of it is I'm done. Like I'm finished with this. And I don't know what rebuilding looks like. I don't know what recovery looks like, but I certainly know what destruction and addiction looks like. And when you move away from addiction and you start moving towards recovery, it's a process, man. It's a year and a half to two years. I keep saying that over and over on these podcasts. It takes a long time. For some people, it takes longer. I've had people I've worked with for five years before they get there. Other people get it a little quicker. There's no timeline for it, but there is an absolute in the completeness of the recovery, right? So if you hit bottom, that's where you start. That's where recovery starts. If you think that, you know, losing this or losing that didn't, you know, you still kind of feel like, I could still, okay, all right. That's fine. There are people like me that will just be there and still be waiting for you, but we're there. You just have to reach out, but you have to be honest to get there. So you'll know when you hit bottom because you've had that moment of clarity as, as, uh, Christopher Lawford said. So that's it for this episode of Doc Shock, your Dixon Lifeguard. I hope you got something from this podcast. If you did, please subscribe and hit the like button on your listening platform. If you'd like to reach out to me and want to show some love and give me some cash to help support this podcast, please, I'll take any help I can get. I love doing this and it's a real passion. That's why I do it. But all the help matters. And please, if you subscribe, that means something to me too. And I appreciate you listening. But if you're in need of help, please go get it. Don't suffer addiction all the time. Go to rehab. Go to a counselor. Get some help. So that's it for this edition of Doc Jock, Your Addiction Lifeguard. And until next time, this is Doc Jock saying, see ya.