The Freedom Room Podcast | Family, Alcoholism & Healing

In this episode, we discuss how alcoholism affects families and relationships. We share honest conversations about the emotional impact, healing, and moving forward in recovery together. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Hi everyone and welcome to the Freedom Room Podcast. It's great to have you all back with us. We're now up to episode five, which is absolutely exciting. Wow, are we really? Yes, it's just very exciting. So you're here with Camilla and Rachel. Hi. And today we're talking about families. Um basically we want to talk about you know what it's like for them when you're in recovery, what support we can be giving to them. Um, as we know, family and loved ones are impacted directly by our alcoholism and addiction. So it's a it's a big topic to cover, but we're gonna try. So, Rach, do you want to kick us off today? Sure.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

I think for me, the first thing I'd like to say is that um at first I didn't even realise that I was harming my family when I was, you know, actively drinking. Um, I thought that I knew my my children obviously um were affected, but I didn't realise how much I had also affected like my mum and my brother. I knew obviously I affected my um partner, who obviously um who was also, you know, there was a big factor of what he saw also. Um, but I didn't realise how much of say my mum and and and everybody and how much I hurt them and how much of a scale that I'd hurt them. Um and I guess in the early days I was very selfish, you know, um it was my recovery, but what I didn't realise is that they have to recover themselves as well, you know. Um I had no idea how much I'd harmed my partner, none whatsoever. I had no idea on how hurt he was. Um, it was all about me, you know, as as everything in recovery, as everything in when we're in active drinking, so very, very selfish. It was all about me. And that didn't change, nothing changed until I started working a program, you know. So my drinking was about me and my recovery was about me, you know. Um, which is not what I would recommend to anybody, you know. Um, I think recovery needs to be it needs to be family. It's you know, um, I still stand by that you have to put this before your family, you put your recovery before your family, which I know sounds harsh, and I'm sure there's a lot of people thinking, wow, that's a bit unfair. Um, just like I said to my sponsor when she told me to do it, and I told her that she was a not a nice person. Yeah, I told her to to do one, shall we say, you know, um, I'd put yeah, alcohol before everything. Yeah, my poor kids had come, you know, behind the stacking order of the bottle of vodka for so long. And then she told me that they still weren't at the front, at the forefront, you know, it had to be my recovery, and and I didn't understand that. I didn't understand that my recovery had to come before them. And the reason why it had to come before my family and my children is that for me to be able to get 100% better, for me to build myself up from this addiction, because addiction is huge. Um, for me to be able to build myself back up from this addiction, I had to take care of me and me only first. You know, there was lots of self-care that had to take place. Now, when when I came out of um treatment and I went into the big real world, you know, um, none of my family, there are um, there are like I don't know, is it a sister um to AA? So there's Al-Anonon, what would you call that? Another fellowship, a part of. So um, for people who don't understand what Alanon is, um, so AA was um founded by Bill Wilson and Bob Smith. Um, and Bill Wilson's wife, Lois Wilson, she started Al Anon. And Al Anon is for the friends and family of um any of an alcoholic. And you know, I say this a lot to all the people that come here on family sessions and they ask me, you know, um, how can you help me? You know, that the partner will say, How can you help me? Why does he do this? How do I behave? You know, how do I um deal with X, Y, and Z? And I can't answer that because I have never been that family member. I've only ever been the alcoholic, you know, um, and I will send each and every one of them off to Al-Anon. Off you go, go and get well. And I from what I've understood of Al Anon, they work in exactly the same way as AA, they do the meetings in the same way and they work the steps in the same way, um, but for them, you know, around them, and that's their recovery, and they need that recovery. But not everybody does go down that path. My partner, my family, none of them did. Um, but I always recommend it to people because the problem is, and and I'm sure my husband will agree with me, you know, he didn't like me when I was drinking, he didn't like me when I was in active alcoholism. But there's also parts of my recovery. He doesn't like me sometimes when I'm sober either, and he has to learn how to live with me sober. He's never he wasn't used to that. He didn't know what it's like to live with Rachel sober. Rachel doesn't know what it was like to live with Rachel sober, and and that took a really long time for the two of us to actually work out. Now, I didn't lose anybody in terms of, you know, I didn't lose my mum, my brother, my children. I did lose my partner for a while. We did break up, um, but he did come back and you know, we did go on to get married and have children and live a happy ever after. And um, but um yeah, so I'm not sure where I was going with that, with that stint, but um you know, I didn't have any understanding of how much that had hurt him and how much I, you know, had um played a part in that. And like and um yeah, I didn't lose anyone. Nobody stopped talking to me in my um, you know, which I'm sure if my mum had a cut me off or my brother had have cut me off, possibly I'd have got sober quicker. I don't know, but I don't change any of it, it is what it is. I don't know. Um, they were probably enabling me for a while there, I don't know. Um, but I was very lucky I didn't lose anybody in in um in my addiction when I was um in active alcoholism. I did lose the children in the sense of me not being there for them. I did lose them in the fact that there was that big gap because I was never actually really present, so I missed out on so much of their childhood. I was there, I was they could physically see me, but I wasn't there, you know. So I did lose that, but in terms of actually people walking away from me, I was very lucky that I didn't.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

Um, and I guess that's where it's really beneficial for people to hear different stories. Absolutely. And this is, I guess, where you and I are great because we've got two different stories, and so you know, for Rach, didn't her her partner stuck around for me, my didn't, you know. I my marriage ended because um for a number of reasons, but one of which was you know, my addiction and and what happened with that. Um, and a couple of family members did stop talking to me, um, which was also a very big catalyst for me to get well. So it's interesting when you can not compare the two, but when you put them alongside each other, you can see that there is different experiences for everybody, and we just have to roll with it, don't we, as a people in recovery.

SPEAKER_00 8:03

Absolutely, you know, and to look at those people that we love and see the pain that we caused, see that pain that we were so oblivious to, you know. When I looked into my mum's eyes and saw that pain of what I had caused, um, I just say when I was actually in active alcoholism, I had no idea. No idea. I just thought I was hurting myself. Yeah. Yeah. And and as a mother, we we can now we can both, you know, oh, do we both get that, you know? Yeah, you can't see me rolling my eyes through a podcast, but she is.

SPEAKER_01 8:37

It's it, I think it's probably one of the most painful parts of of that recovery. Um, what we what we inadvertently and and almost unconsciously put our children through. Yep, absolutely. Um, but I guess that's you know, you you think about being an active addiction is you know, it's it's a mental illness. Like we're not, you don't think straight, you don't think properly, you don't have a clear train of thought. So, you know, a lot of those behaviors that happen when you're drinking, you know, that's not necessarily who that person is at the core. Absolutely not. You know, we are not that person, but that doesn't make it any less painful for those loved ones that are surrounding them because they don't know that it's not us.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

They see us, they see our mouth moving when we say those things that we don't mean. They see our behaviors because it's in our body. Yeah, it's us that they see. And that brings us then on to um, you know, like with my children, moving forward to when I got well, and and they have watched me for the last 10 years living a sober, clean life, you know, and that isn't just about not drinking, that's about the way I am as a person. My children, when I was drinking, would see me put bricks through people's windows, they would see me banging people's heads off of concrete floors. That's what they saw. In recovery, they see a person who isn't going to shout, who, you know, and this didn't come overnight, but they see people who wants to get better, somebody who is trying to live a decent life, somebody who is not breaking the rules, somebody who is not breaking the law, somebody who is conscious of what she is doing, you know, somebody who doesn't want to hurt somebody. And that is not what they saw when I was drinking. And that to have that live in amends over a course of 10 years, I am instilling something into my girls that I'm not even trying to do. Just by watching me live and live a life of recovery, they are learning a way of living, you know. Um, and that is why I don't beat myself up for the past, because without my past, my girls would not get that now, and it has made them stronger people, most most definitely has made them stronger people, and they've got they have now got to watch what it's like to live an honest way of living, you know, a decent way of living, uh a way of recovery, a way of living life on life's terms without being so angry at the world, you know, um, of me not being selfish, of me not being stubborn, me of thinking about other people, and all of that stuff has come because of recovery, you know. Um, and that is just a living amends every single day. And that's my way of saying to my girls who watched all of that, that's my way of saying to them, I'm sorry, this is what I'm doing to say sorry to you today, and they know that that's what that is, you know, because obviously they're older, they understand what I'm doing, you know. I mean, um obviously they're 20 and 21 now, you know. Um, and you know, they haven't seen me have a drink for almost 10 years, you know. Half of their life, half of their life. Harrison, who is eight, has never ever seen me have a drink. That is a miracle. That's a blessing. Yeah, yeah. Um, Harrison had to go to um see a um pediatrician this week, and um, she asked what mum and what does mummy and daddy do? And um, so he she he told them what daddy does, and then he said, Mummy stops people taking drugs and drinking alcohol. He went and he looked at me and he went, That's right, isn't it? And I was like, Yes, darling, that's right. And she looked at me, she went, Are you a social worker? I was like, No, I'm not a social worker, but the fact that Harrison at eight years old knows what I what I do. Harrison knows what Alcoholics Anonymous is because he has come into the office with me to you know to and he has heard me talk to people on the phone. He has come here, he knows that mummy stops people drinking and doing bad stuff, and that is just amazing. And he doesn't even know yet why I do what I do. That'll be an interesting conversation.

SPEAKER_01 13:13

Yes, well, thankfully we've got a bit of time to build up to that, right? Oh, hell yeah. I've got a little bit longer than you, but yeah, still we've got to build up to it. Uh you know, I think from my point of view, um, the main thing for me was to be patient with the people that you love. You know, when you first come into recovery, you are going to 12-step meetings, you're going to a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a life coach, a recovery coach, you know, you name it, you are working so hard on recovering and getting sober and staying sober that you tend to move along pretty quick. You know, you are like feeling better, you know, as the days go on. Yep. And you're completely immersed in it. But your loved ones, they are still getting over those wounds. You know, they've just been hit by a truck, yeah, like multiple times, and they're still trying to get up and dust themselves off after that.

SPEAKER_00 14:10

And they're still waiting for you to relapse again because it's what you've done. You've said sorry, you've tried to get well, yeah, and then you've gone back out again. And they just wait. Exactly right.

SPEAKER_01 14:18

Yeah. And you know, my ex-husband now said to me he would always come home with white knuckles holding the steering wheel because he didn't know what he was driving home to. He didn't know if I was going to be passed out, vomited, or sober in bed, which didn't happen. You know, he he had no idea. So that level of nerves and anxiety, you know, that that's still got to stick around for a long time. Um, but you know, I think people can also get care of fatigue that if you've got a loved one that's really close to you, um, my beautiful mum was was that person who really copped a huge brunt of that care of fatigue. Um, and my mum needed to take a bit of time away from me when I got sober to look after herself, and that is so important. And I, you know, you we have to, we being the people in recovery, have to allow those people to look after themselves and to recover in their own way. Yeah, we have to respect that. This horrible disease, you know, because what we do when we're drinking, yeah, it's unforgivable. You know, there's a lot of stuff that happens that is so messed up and so horrendous that some people can't get over it. No, my ex-husband's one of those people, and you know, I respect him for whatever his journey looks like. You know, I can't force him, and I could never and I would never force him to get to a point of forgiving me fully because that's just unrealistic. And um, I think that's the thing, you know, we've got to be ready to accept that we might lose some people. Yeah, you know, it may happen, you know, and and also to give those people the room to come back to you and the time and the patience to come back to you because you know, I I've got to say I said I wasn't gonna say this, but I'm gonna say it because you know, my beautiful sister, my little sister is, you know, my soulmate. We're six years apart, but it's like we're twins. Um, and and it took her quite a long time to come back around, you know. But she said if I hadn't have been so patient with her and not pushed her to come back, then it wouldn't have happened. So thank God, you know, thank God. Um, and I think, yeah, the Al-Anon thing, I was lucky enough to go and be a speaker at an Al-A-Non meeting. And it was, you know, amazing what they do and amazing that they dedicate so much of their own lives to staying in a fit and spiritually well place after dealing with people that have had alcoholism. Um, power to them, you know. I think it's just incredible. But you know, we can and the living amends again, you know. I I have a five-year-old son who's a little bit younger than Harrison, but my little guy's Harry, and the same thing, he's never seen he won't remember mum being um drunk.

SPEAKER_00 17:09

Not at all, thank God.

SPEAKER_01 17:11

Um, but I I do work really hard on being the best mum that I can these days for him because A, he deserves it, and B, you know, that's the way I try and make up for it. Um, but look, you know, we're lucky to have these loved ones, and we're lucky to be in recovery because we get to forge these real have real, really truthful relationships.

SPEAKER_00 17:33

Oh, yeah, and we know what it's like to have a real relationship. Yeah, you know, that that is not, you know, not you know, when I when I was drinking, all of my relationships, you know, were were forced and fake. You know, I would pick my friends on what they could do for me. Um, you know, whether it be, you know, a hairdresser or you know, a makeup artist or a masseur or whatever, you know, I would I it was all about what I can get out of a friendship. And, you know, that's not what my life is about today.

SPEAKER_01 18:03

And I, you know, pausing and letting people um talk, you know, it's it's amazing what you learn in recovery. Like my dad always used to try and have these tough conversations with me. And because my go-to was to attack and defend, because I didn't like any hard emotions. So as an alcoholic, I was like, that's not true, you know, you don't know what you're talking about. But actually, what I've found in recovery is I can actually stop and listen to what that person's saying and say, okay, thank you so much for that opinion. I really appreciate it. And our loved ones are now being able to have real conversations with us about maybe tough emotions, but as we learn to sit with our emotions and deal with them and live with them, then those conversations actually have a place to happen, you know? It's just yeah, it's incredible what what we can give back to those people. And you know, if uh if you might be a loved one of someone that is in active addiction, you know, stick by them if you can. Um they they will get there, they just need a bit of help.

SPEAKER_00 19:08

Yeah, they do, they do.

SPEAKER_01 19:11

Um, and it doesn't mean that they don't love you.

SPEAKER_00 19:14

No, it doesn't mean that they don't love you, but also what I will say is, you know, you've got to love yourself though. You know, the family and and whatever, they have to love themselves and don't don't allow these people to to treat them, you know, um, in a bad way. And if they have to remove themselves from a what for a while, that doesn't mean that they are never going to have anything else to do with them. But sometimes tough love is what they need for a while. Um, we can all relate to tough love, hey.

SPEAKER_01 19:43

Yeah. And if you need to have, you know, a conversation about your recovery, talk to those people that are a part of your recovery, you know, the 12-step programs, your psychologists, you know, your recovery coach, you know, take use those people as a people to talk to about your recovery because having that separation, talking to your loved ones about life, great. But sometimes they don't need to hear the nitty-gritty detail of the recovery.

SPEAKER_00 20:09

Of course, because how can they understand it? You know, they've never been through it, they're never going to understand it. So if you try and talk to them about your recovery too much in too much depth, they're not gonna understand it. They're just, you know, they're probably they have no idea of your addiction, they have no idea of your recovery. And sometimes it's not even worth having that. That's why you have, you know, the fellowship of other people. You know, a fellowship is of other people, a fellowship of other alcoholics. A fellowship doesn't have to be a 12-step fellowship, it's just a fellowship of people going through the same thing that you're going through. So just a bunch of alcoholics trying to get well, you know, because they're the ones that you can talk to who won't sit there with their eyes rolling because they'll know what you're talking about and they'll understand, and they've been there and they can relate and they'll be very grateful to hear your story. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 21:01

And I think there's, you know, like you said, with your children and and you know, your partner, there's a lot of shame that we end up collecting as alcoholics, you know, and and part of this recovery is learning to deal with it, work through that shame, work through those horror. How can I ever forgive myself? They're questions that we hear a lot, and I've asked myself a lot, but we, you know, it just takes time, and you've got to be patient with yourself, be patient with the people around you and yourself. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 21:32

And you know, you will probably do a complete 160, 180, 180. You know, I just miss a bit. You know, do a complete turnaround, you know. Yeah. I used to um the the amount I would drink, the way I would drink, being able to drink a guy underneath the table, you know, I would wear that as a badge of honor. You know, look at me, look at me. Me too. Now, now that I'm this far into recovery, I wear my recovery as a badge of honour. You know, I you know, look at me. Now, look what I can do now. You know, um, never did I think I would ever be so proud of being an alcoholic, and I am proud, you know. I am a proud, grateful alcoholic. And that's a beautiful place to come, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 22:16

Oh, it sure is. Yeah. Well, thank you guys. We really appreciate you being with us today, and we look forward to uh spending some time with you on our next episode six. So take care, guys, and sending lots of love. See ya. Bye.