Cyd (pictured above)

Millions of people are affected by addiction. In the United States it is estimated 23 million Americans are chemically dependent. In addition to those at least three other people are impacted by the addict’s disease. Many children grow up in a home surrounded by alcohol and drug abuse. Many more find themselves involved in relationships with people suffering with the disease of addiction. We recently met Cyd from Edgewater Park, New Jersey. This is her story about how someone else’s addiction impacted her and still to this day, years later, impacts her.

IA: How has alcoholism and addiction affected you?

CYD: I grew up in a dysfunctional home that included lots of chaos. My dad and mom split up when I was two years old. This made me feel abandoned! Then my dad married, what I call, the wicked step mother. My mom got remarried and my new stepdad was an alcoholic- very passive aggressive to say the least. My mom was a rage-aholic and also walked the line of addiction. She was a waitress out late at night and she was home but really not there mentally, emotional etc.

IA: What sticks out in your mind about those times?

CYD: There were always fights between them that were so horrific. For example, I remember my mom trying to stab him on the front lawn of our house and she was exposed with her undergarments and really everything was hanging out.
My childhood was never happy. She would come home and I didn’t know if and when “the shoe would drop.” My dad, on the other hand, would miss work and we would find him at the bars. As little kids, we had to go with my mom to get him at the bars and check on him. It was one lie after another.

IA: How did this affect your relationship with your dad?

CYD: I always had a love for him and yet felt very strange towards him.

IA: So far you describe a lot of neglect. What else if anything?

CYD: I never knew if it was real or imagined but when my sister grew up we found out he repeatedly sexually molested her and me too. My sister has very clear memories of that but I have blocked out that part of my life. I have no recollection of it. So I have since made amends and have forgiveness. I told him how I felt and he essentially never talked to me again.

IA: And how did that continue to and still affect you today?

CYD: Every relationship I had with a man was always with someone who had problems whether it would be a drug or alcohol addiction or sex addiction. It didn’t matter. I loved them and they loved me. I thought I could fix them. Recently, I have been in a relationship with an alcoholic who I have known for six years who seriously refuses to change.

IA: So from a child to now an adult, you experience the same problems but with different faces. How do you stop the cycle?

CYD: I have pleaded through the years, lectured, attempted to control, tried being nasty but the reality is for all of us, we can’t change another human being. I have learned that acceptance never has to mean to accept unacceptable behavior. I realize that alcohol is a disease but it is not an excuse to not change.

IA: Have you sought any outside help?

CYD: I did and still do. The embarrassment, frustration and resentment I felt at one time went away when I walked into my first Al-anon meeting. There were and still are people who accepted me as I am. The more I listened about the disease the more I understood what is was about. “If only I would change then the situation would change.” Yes the situation can change but sometimes in order for it to change you must change. You need to either work with it or move on because it can kill your spirit and your emotional and physical stability. I remember at a meeting a woman said, “If you are on a plane and they get on the loud speaker saying the plane is going down, you grab the oxygen mask first.” Think about it, you have to save yourself and if you are not healthy and don’t take care of you, you will go down with the alcoholic. We all have choices. We can choose to be stuck or we can say this is it. I am not doing this anymore. It is only when you have the courage to set boundaries and to make healthy choices for yourself that you will finally see the light.

IA: Any final thoughts? How is your life today?

CYD: Alcoholics aren’t bad people. They have a bad disease. Now I have a sponsor in my program, work the steps and have turned the negative in a positive. I have goals and am graduating with an Associates Degree in Addiction. I will go on, with God's will, to Rutgers University and become a counselor. I’m doing things for myself. I have goals to help others but not sacrifice my own happiness. That is truly what it is all about. You can love others and sometimes it may take loving them at a distance and not having them in your life.
Families suffer from this horrendous disease and so does the alcoholic. I share my experience, strength and hope with others to let them know they aren’t alone! I have a spiritual foundation no matter where or what I may be going through. It is necessary to achieve and maintain that inner peace. I continue to still have hope. Everyone deserves to be happy but happiness comes from within.