Alcoholism Documentary (Chris' Remarkably True Story)

I couldn't deal with my emotions. I couldn't deal with stress. I couldn't deal with responsibility. And when you're blackout drunk, you don't have to deal with anything. Thinking back to the first time I I got sober, I narrowly avoided a dui. I was living in Atlanta. I was dating a girl, and I was driving her to work, and we were running late, and I'd been drinking, and I remember asking her, do you want to get there on time or do you want to get there safely? And she said she wanted to get there on time. Okay. And I was in the HOV lane going down 85 through the heart of Atlanta. Because I was in the HOV lane, it was pretty much open, but all four lanes to the right of us were pretty much stopped. And this guy pulled out into the HOV lane and I rear ended, rear ended him. Luckily, I think he sort of felt like it was his fault and probably didn't realize that I had been drinking. We just agreed that, like, we don't need to call the cops. We can just exchange information. You know, you need to get on your way. I need to get on my way. Yeah. I was like, perfectly normal. Got out of that one. I don't think I had my wallet with me. And there was nothing abnormal about that day in terms of my drinking other than I just happened to get into a car wreck at on 85. But I was able to drive away from it, and my girlfriend didn't break up with me, so it didn't matter. And the cops didn't come, so it didn't matter.

But was she late?

She was late to work, but she was able to show her boss the picture of the crash, so it didn't matter. But I stayed drunk for the next three weeks while this guy called my phone incessantly trying to get me to make a statement to my insurance company and to actually figure it out. We moved to Chicago. My dad took a job up there when I was 11 or 12. And I didn't immediately move up. I stayed with mom. But that. That was a disaster. I was just a little boy that needed his dad, I think. And so I. That. That's when a lot of behavioral stuff started coming up in school. And then I went to a larger high school with like 450 kids, downtown Chicago, and felt very alone, except for through soccer. And then eventually I got invited to hang out with a group of guys. That's sort of when I remember, like, really looking forward to the weekends because we're gonna go drinking the cool kids. Yeah, I hate to, like, think about it in those terms, but, yeah, that's what we were. At least that's how we perceived ourselves. I didn't really feel like I belonged in that group, and so I had to do something to make me feel okay being there. And usually that meant putting others down. I remember sophomore year of high school, we were drinking before a party, and that's all I really remember. I don't remember the party. I don't think we made it to the party. We got stopped by the cops walking to the party, and they quickly realized how intoxicated I was and called an ambulance. My parents were out of town. They were in Washington, D.C. for a Chicago politician, senatorial inauguration. It's a big deal. And I capitalized on that. To get out of the house and escape from the babysitter and go hang out with friends. Made the most of the night by getting completely obliterated. My sister had to come to the hospital, and then she took me back to her friend's house whose mother was a doctor, and I woke up there. I vaguely remember the hospital, but remember waking up at my sister's friend's house. But the guilt and shame didn't last very long. The cops took pictures of me, which was probably not legal, I don't know, but they took pictures of me with a bag taped to the front of my shirt that was, you know, used to catch the vomit. And so for the next two or three weeks, I had people coming up to me like, hey, I got stopped by some cops in Jonkville Park. And so I guess these cops were like, you've been drinking tonight. You don't want to end up like this kid. And so I had, like, upperclassmen coming to me and say, oh, hey, Chris, I saw your pictures from the other night. Some cops showed them to me.

Don't do drugs. Post your challenge.

But that's not how I took it. I was like, finally, I'm getting the recognition I deserve. You know, people are talking about me. Yeah, street cred, for sure. I think I even started a Facebook group after that about, like, you know, share your craziest stories.

So you liked it?

You liked it? Oh, I love the. I love the attention of the summer. Going into my junior year of high school, my family moved here, and I went to a boarding school in North Georgia, because a guy with a prestigious reputation like me from, you know, who was living in Chicago, doesn't go to Greenville, South Carolina. I've never heard of Greenville, South Carolina. And I Was furious at my parents and I was way too cool for Greenville. So I ended up going to this boarding school because one of my good friends from Atlanta had ended up there. I think that in a lot of ways tempered my drinking because. Structure, accountability, constant supervision. It was the first time I noticed the obsession when I can look back and I can say, God. I went to. I would meticulously plan these weekend outings because you would have to get parental permission from, from my, from my mom to like, go down to Atlanta. And I chose Atlanta over Greenville. A, because I was mad at dad, but B, because I had been in Chicago. Mom was so happy to have me close by. She was also oblivious, you know, and what she wasn't oblivious to, she was blinded by love too, you know, so you could just give. Yeah, so I could get away with whatever. And so I would plan out these, these trips where, you know, I'd get all my friends to, to get weekend passes to come to my mom's house and we were going to get alcohol, who was going to buy it and who, you know, who had, who had cash that week and who owed. From last week. And I was just. I really remember, like, going to great lengths to figure out how we're going to get alcohol. I think a lot of it for me was like, comfort and control, being in my own home, not having to worry about driving anywhere. I think it was about being able to control all these different factors that were necessary in order to have a good weekend. I went to Georgia State and down in Atlanta, knew a lot of people who went down there. My mom lives in Atlanta. I remember school being really important to me. I also remember laying down on the floor of my dorm knowing I was gonna be late to my one o' clock class the second day of school. I was so hungover. That's when like, the choice was, was made. Whether I realized it or not. I knew that, like, the, the benefits of going out and drinking outweighed the benefits of making it to class. And I couldn't do both. For whatever reason, I did really poorly my first semester. I need to do well and I need to maybe prove something. But there was no verbalized pressure from my, my parents. They'. Educated. It was just as much as anything what I was supposed to do. So I, I remember thinking, education's important. This stuff's important. Knucklehead friends that like, were going out and doing crazy stuff. And I remember thinking, I can't, I can't go out tonight. I, I have class. But I also remember that only lasting, like, a week. And then, like, in high school, I figured out what the. You know, eventually would figure out what the bare minimum was to get by. But that was super structured. Once I got to college and realized there was zero structure and zero accountability and I could do what I want, then I did what I wanted to do, and that has been whatever takes the least possible effort. And, like, drinking. I didn't have to worry about class. I didn't have to worry about social situations. I didn't have to worry about anything because it just. It made everything click. As the semester went on, I knew those consequences were coming down the pipe. Consequences that maybe in high school would have made me, all right, I gotta buckle down and, you know, study for this test because I have to do well. I was able to say, okay, well, I'm just gonna drink more. I had as much structure as college can offer. You could pick, like, a course track, and you got based on your interests, put with 20 other freshmen, and you guys all took the same classes. Okay, so there were that. I went to class enough for them to know me and know I should be showing up and to, you know, have made friends with some of them, but not well enough where I really cared what they. They thought of me. I didn't have to show up for, like, a final exam group presentation, and I was. I was drunk, but they told me what to say, and I said it, and I. And you got through it and got through it. Everything else I failed. I got three semesters worth of failing grades at Georgia State. I joined a fraternity second semester because I thought my issue was I wasn't socializing enough because I was just staying in my dorm room, drinking and smoking weed. And joining a fraternity would just get me out. And again, it would be a group of people to hold me accountable to good grades. But the only thing that happened was once they realized what my GPA was, they just said, well, you can't officially be a fraternity member, but you went through rush, so you can hang out with us. Got all the benefits with none of the dues. And then I think at that point, dad was like, you know, what is going on? And so he gave me one more semester to sort of get it right. And I went to an academic advisor because they put me on probation after the second semester. And they literally. She was just like, I'm gonna sign you up for these two courses that are, like, guarantee days if you just show up. And I just couldn't show up. And I had moved off campus for third Semester. By that time, I didn't really draw a sober breath. I wasn't drinking in the mornings yet, but I was waking up and smoking weed. I had to have something. The illusions were starting to wear off that, like, I could get it. I will. I'll get it together next time, next semester, next class. Other people were starting to notice again. It's. I think I look back and what was my relationship with alcohol? And I chose alcohol over everything. And that was really apparent that semester, where it was clear I chose it over school. It was clear that I chose it over my hobbies. It was clear I chose it over girlfriends and friends. It was clear that I chose it over family. When I would go home and visit. Thinking back about why was education so important? That's what normal people do. And there was nothing in my life that I could say, normal people do this. You. I was living an abnormal lifestyle, was suicidal and miserable and, you know, woke up and chemically dependent and had to treat it every morning. And I knew that. And I think I was. I still had. I hadn't crossed whatever invisible line was there really. But I come right to the edge of it. You know, my older sister came to Atlanta to visit mom and we went out to dinner and I was shaking a little bit and not bad, but enough for her to notice until we ordered drinks and I was able to get a drink down. And so she sort of had an idea and I imagine she said something to my parents, but I don't remember any sort of intervention type or specific questions or. So I was miserable enough. I knew I was gonna fail school again and essentially fail out. And I called my dad and broke down and just said, I don't know what's going on. He said, well, you know, you can move back here and we'll figure it out or I'm cutting you off financially. So he was prepared to do that. And I moved back and so I went to therapy and did some like a series tests. The first day, like three hours of testing. I remember like that testing, plus like an hour session with my therapist. And, dude, you don't, you don't need to. You need to go to aa. I still had some power of choice, I think I was able to like, okay, I'll go to, I'll go to AA and I'll try this without much of a. Of a fight. It was recommended that I go to 12 Step Recovery and I went to a 12 step meeting at a local detox center and I went by myself and I didn't go Back again. There was something about 12 step recovery that it didn't click that time, but pretty quickly it just resonated with me and I think in some healthy ways and in some unhealthy ways. But I didn't initially get sober. I tested the waters for a couple months. I stopped drinking for a while, but was still smoking weed because that wasn't a problem. But I kept messing up. You know, I realized that I treated weed the same way that I treated alcohol. I was enrolled at Greenville Tech and again, just some easy courses to get back into the FLO school. And I wasn't drinking, so everything was gonna work out, but I was smoking weed. And my stepmom had had surgery recently, so I had some of her painkillers because she took like two and then forgot about them, which is so weird. So it was like a really nice semester of doing ex. Exactly what I would have done drinking. And so I did that for a while. Eventually I learned that I, I really liked the setting of 12 step recovery. And I, I think I liked like that I was sort of special and unique and that I was 19, 20, 21, sobering up and people that. Oh my gosh. And when people spoke about their feelings, that resonated with me. And so I knew it was a place to go. And I did the same thing here that I'd been doing in Atlanta. And now I was under the watchful eye of my parents. And they said, get a job, go back to school, volunteer, do something. Get out of this house. I wasn't allowed to be in the house from like 9 to 5, so I would drive around. Oftentimes I drive around getting high and, or drinking. And sometimes I'd park at Cleveland park and I'd see like my stepmom walking our dogs.

Oh my goodness.

Because I was supposed to be in school or I was supposed to be at a job or I was supposed to be, supposed to be functioning. Yeah, I was supposed to be, you know, doing what other normal human beings were doing. And so I just, I hit another bottom that had less to do the amount I was consuming or I wasn't drinking a lot. You know, I had been introduced to a solution. I wasn't quite ready for that solution, but I knew enough that I wasn't drinking as much and the weed was doing the trick and it was appeasing the beast. For the time being. I just was getting really uncomfortable again. But again, luckily I'd been exposed to a. And I picked up a white chip one night and got a spot Sponsor and a home group. And that's something I'd never done. And then six months into that, I moved down to Atlanta. My dad and stepmom were kind of just done with me at that point, you know, and they said, you gotta get a job or you gotta get out of here. I think I was too afraid to put myself out there to get a job, but my uncles had just opened a factory south of Atlanta and I knew I was guaranteed a job with no effort. And so I moved down to Atlanta. And then I fell with a 12 step group. That really shaped my recovery and shaped my life. And it was an all men's group. Didn't care that I was a young cool guy in recovery. I identified me as just another drunk on the bus and a very diverse group. Where, you know, in Greenville, it's not super, not super diverse, but you go down to Atlanta and in meetings with guys who were on the streets smoking crack for 10 years and him relating and identifying with them, and they sort of taught me the ins and outs of 12 step recovery and taught me about taking personal responsibility for my life and taught me about what it meant to be a sober man. On the spectrum of 12 separate recovery groups, these guys would probably be classified as like hardcore militant school. You know, I would get told stuff like, stop talking to me about your problems and go find someone to help who has real problems. You know, you have a, you have a year sober, you have two years sober. Go find somebody with a day.

No woe to me. Yeah, no self allowed.

Stop taking up space. Contribute. And don't just contribute in the various 12 step meetings, but contribute in life. This is how, this is how you contribute at work. This is how you contribute to your family. It was very intensive and it was very structured and there was a lot of accountability. I got sober officially after my 21st, but there was a couple months there where I wasn't drinking. I was just.

That was in the. When you were like smoking all the beers.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I had never had the experience of, you know, being able to like.

Walk up to the bar.

I mean, I had a, a fake id, but I wasn't super confident in it, you know, but I could go with total confidence anywhere I wanted and get whatever I wanted. And the excuse to, like, try a lot of different stuff and buy a lot of different things.

It's almost like a rite of passage.

Yeah, okay. I, I picked up as bad or worse than when I left off. I also hadn't ever had a job. Active addiction. So not only did I have a job, but I had low expenses because even though I wasn't living with my uncle, I was living at one of his properties and paying him not very much rent. And nepotism is a wonderful thing sometimes. And I was in this job and getting paid this salary pretty much exclusively due to nepotism and the reputation I built while sober in Atlanta for being such a good guy. Yeah. Not just out on my own, out in the middle nowhere with like, no, no neighbors, you know, a 500 foot driveway and just, just me, the trees and the deer. Just. It escalated quickly. It was pretty much from the time that I, I got off work, the, the time that I, I passed out, you know, whatever time that that would have been, and then pretty quickly transitioned into, you know, having. Having a bottle in my car, my lunch break, and drink it in the mornings. And I was working in an office setting, surrounded by. At least some of the people knew that I was like a sober guy. Yeah. And so my direct boss, my uncle's like number three in the company, would say stuff like, gosh, I would have just hated to see what you were like when you were drunk. You know, when I'd, like, failed to complete some task or it was day two on a project that should have been a half a day or whatever the case may be. But what it was really saying is, I'm on the E. I know that you're drinking. It's hard to get away with, especially with the way that I was just existing to drink. So I was living in this, this remote property, and I wasn't, I wasn't bathing on a regular basis because my pipes had burst. And when your pipes burst, that also means, like, that washer doesn't run very well or the laundry machine doesn't really work. And when you're passing out, you're not brushing your teeth before you go to bed or like taking out your contacts, you know, and so. But still I, like, was going to work every day as like the, you know, part of the owning family and trying to keep it together and wearing lots of deodorant, lots of French showers, and it just didn't work because every once in a while you get sober just enough to catch a glimpse of reality or when you're living like that, to catch like a wet of yourself. So it didn't come to an end at this point, but the turning point was I was, I was living in Jersey and one night I was ready to die. You know, I was ready to kill myself. And I got the rope. And I tested. I tied it up and I tested it, make sure it would hold my weight, and for whatever reason, didn't go through with it that night and finished the bottle of whatever I had at that point. It was a lot. It was a lot of Captain Morgan and Coke. I don't know why. The worst hangovers, that spiced rum, but. So I was in a really, really bad place. And the next morning, I got a call that my little sister had been diagnosed with cancer. That diagnosis saved my life because it gave me an out. It allowed me to. To say, well, I need to go home, to be close to my family. And my uncles agreed, everyone agreed that I needed to get out of Jersey. It sort of allowed everyone to do so without saying, you're messing up. So I was able to come home, and even though I didn't stop drinking, I was in a safe place again. I was able to come back and have some purpose and show up for my family. But the family was. I was able to hide and slide under the radar amid all this chaos with her diagnosis. And so that's what I did for another six months until the storm sort of calmed. She was diagnosed with leukemia. And, okay, so she has leukemia. And then it was, what kind of leukemia? Okay, it's the most treatable kind. And then, okay, so there's this breakthrough miracle drug discovered about 10 years ago. If her body responds well to it, she has a really good shot at living a normal life. And a couple months in, okay, she's responding in the 99th percentile. So after the initial diagnosis, everything else has been really positive, and she's living a really good life today. That's such a good reminder for me the parallels of our illness. And what I like to remind myself and guys I work with professionally or personally, is that I have access to a solution that enhances my life. The thing that saves my life also makes my life better. Her solution, the thing that saves her life. This pill makes her life more difficult. But I don't ever hear her complain about it. I've sat with her and held her while she's had a panic attack because of the stress and the emotion and the fear. But day in, day out, she takes this pill that makes her life worse. And it's just such a good reminder for me that I just have to take my daily medicine and I get to live just an awesome life. So I sober up, and I reconnect with an old sponsor. I sobered up on a con. I knew that I was going to be Getting kicked out in January. So I sobered up late November thinking that my parents would not kick me out sober. And they did because they had learned I had sobered up. But, you know, we had made an agreement that I would be out January 1st. And they, they said, we expect you to hold to that, that agreement. And I had time to do that. And I did. If I had anything lined up, they said, okay, well we can be flexible until, until you get there. But I didn't. So they kicked me out. And my. I was able to move in with my older sister, but I was fewer because I was doing so well. It wasn't fair at a month sober and it just was not right. So I was gonna hike the at and that was gonna be how I got sober. God had other ideas and I tore my ACL playing soccer. But this, this connection to the wilderness didn't really die out. My sponsor's wife worked at this wilderness treatment center called Four Circles. She said, you should, you should check it out. And I was coming off this knee surgery, but I was rehabbing and was moving pretty well again. And so I went up there for an interview. And I'll never forget I was asked like, well, what's your thought on treatment? And I was right back in the, you know, the meat and the heart of 12 step recovery. And I looked my soon to be boss dead in the eye. I said, well, I think it's $50,000 for a big book. And because I had this internal dialogue, dude, you gotta be honest. You gotta be honest. You gotta be honest no matter what the personal cost. Because I had never been honest fully with anyone. And so I did eventually get. Get hired. Months later I asked, I said, do you remember that interview? Like, remember what I said? And he said, yes, I remember Chris. But I'll be honest. We needed some warm bodies at that point. So, you know, and it was again an important for me that if I'm honest and I was gonna get the job no matter what, I had a good recommendation. It wouldn't have sit right with me and my values if I had sugarcoated how I felt. I've now been able to grow and to expand my opinion on the various paths to recovery. But I was able to be true to myself with that, Sam.