Responsibility ...

His Hand
Originally uploaded by h.koppdelaney

I went to a Big Book meeting today and we read the Chapter entitled: "To Employers". This portion of the Big Book is about the kinds of irresponsible behavior an alcoholic may display on the job and what employers need to know, particularly how to act in the event that they may have an employee on the job who is drinking.

For me, this brought to mind many circumstances while on the job when I not only drank, but was completely irresponsible for what I was charged with as an employee. When I really think about the start of my employment history, it still amazes me that I was never fired. I think that has a lot to do with what I could talk my way out of -- being a quick thinker and persuasive to boot -- and the fact that I was smart enough to know how to do just enough to slide by. In my first "official" real job out of college, I was hired to be the live-in supervisor of a group home for 6 women with mental retardation. I was charged with their overall care and the supervision of several staff who also worked directly with them in the home. My best guess is that I was under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs for about 85% of the time I was working there. The remaining 15% would account for extreme hangover days and meetings at the main office where there would be too many "eyes" on me. I administered medication to these women while intoxicated. I drove an enormous van, with any or all of the women as passengers, in an inebriated condition. These women counted on me for nearly every aspect of their daily living and were unaware that I was in an altered state most of the time. I would chug a beer in my attached apartment, come upstairs and make them dinner, go back to my apartment and smoke a joint and have another beer, return to do baths and other evening chores, and once I got everyone situated in pajamas and in front of the TV, I was back in my apartment to "finish the job" of getting good and stewed so I could pass out in order to sleep through the night without a panic attack. Heaven forbid any of these women needed anything during sleep hours because it would have been near impossible to wake me.

As things got shakier in terms of my ability to carry out my duties and the fact that I had a new boss who scrutinized me more closely and would surely discover that I was doing things that were not acceptable on the job, I conveniently moved and found a job in another state, believing that things would change and be better because I changed locations. This is the insanity of addiction. Regardless of where you relocate, if you do the same thing over and over again and expect different results, you are engaging in insane behavior. And I was certifiable.

My next job finds me with a little more responsibility and a lot more irresponsible behavior. I now drink on the way to work and while at work. 7-11 Big Gulps disguising super-sized vodka cocktails. And I firmly believed that if you drank clear fluids, like Sprite and vodka, that somehow they couldn't be detected. Like clear equals invisible. And popping tic-tacs hides the smell. Yup. Cunning, baffling, powerful that alcohol is. And really convincing. I kept a cooler at all times in the back of my car filled with beer. And usually a bottle of vodka in the trunk for good measure. And, I don't get fired ! I know how to get my paperwork in and how to make it look and sound good, which keeps me afloat. Somehow this carries me through all the times I call out sick, am late because of a hangover, or have made an outlandish excuse for why I won't be at work. As soon as I get a whiff that I am getting dangerously close to being found out, I am onto the next job.

I make a promise to myself that I'm not going to drink before work. I break that within a few days. And once again, I'm back to my old habits and am ball & chained to the bottle. The excuses become more elaborate and I am missing work for multiple days at a time, rather than the sporadic day here & there. My car gets repossessed because I've stopped making payments. I move from the suburbs to the city so I can walk to work. I go to low-bottom dive bars with rolls of pennies to see how much booze I can get and am bought sympathy shots for my patheticness. I am in a dingey studio apartment with a high rent and within a block of several crack houses. I live on peanut butter and rice cakes and tuna. On paydays, my number one priority is having an ample supply of beer and vodka. Then comes rent. I default on my student loan and am called constantly by bill collectors. And I don't get fired. I do, however, get written up a few times. And then it's back to the suburbs and off to a new job.

The time I have left to keep up this lifestyle is ticking away. I hear the nagging voice deep in the recesses of my brain that warns me I need to stop. This is going to kill me. I try to push it away. I find a way to talk my parents into giving me their old Plymouth Horizon with a fabricated story about needing a car for my new job. I'm at Temple University teaching people who are trying to get off welfare about how to work with people who are mentally retarded. It's a temporary, grant-funded position. I'm paid a bulk sum at the beginning of the 2 month period and I think I've hit the lottery. I spend a great deal of it up on high-end booze. Stoley's vodka. Heinekens. Heaven. And it's on this job that I hit my bottom. I meet my first girlfriend here and spiral into drinking sprees that last for days on end. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I think I knew that this was all coming to an end and this was going to be my last hurrah. Everything comes crashing down after Labor Day weekend of that year; the grant ends a month after I stop drinking and the party is indeed over.

Had I been fired from any of these positions, would that have been the catalyst for me to put down the bottle? I don't know. A woman in today's meeting spoke about how none of us are truly ready to stop until we're willing. And for some of us, getting fired may have been the spark. For others, it was the reason to drink more. I'd like to believe that it was my future self, the "who is" that I am today, that was the nagging voice who gave the warning. That saw a vision of what was possible. That understood I needed to let alcohol run its course and trusted that I could stop. That always believed there was a caring, loving soul that could be responsible.