The Compulsive Woman
by
Sandra Simpson LeSourd


Published by chosen books

FLEMING H. REV ELL COMPANY OLD TAPPAN, NEW JERSEY

Many of the names in this book have been changed to protect individual
privacy.

Library of Congress Catalog Number: 87-23415 ISBN 0-8007-9111-8 All
rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means
without the prior permission of the publisher.  The researched material
in this book is used where possible with permission of the copyright
holders.  In some cases copyright information was not available.  If
any unacknowledged material remains, the publisher welcomes word to
that effect and will give proper credit in all future editions.

A Chosen Book Copyright C) 1987 by Sandra Simpson LeSourd Chosen Books
are published by Fleming H. Revell Company Old Tappan, New Jersey
Printed in the United States of America

CONTENTS

Foreword

Introduction

BOOK ONE ILLNESS AND RECOVERY

1. Facing Off

2. The Violated Childhood

3. The Dysfunctional Home

4. Into the Fast Lane

5. The Cultist

6. Why Live?

7. Breaking the Cycle

8. Do It Now

9. The Pain in Change

10.  Intervention

11.  Facing Truth

12.  Anger and Male Dependency

13.  Deception and Other Little Monsters

14.  Learning to Like Yourself

BOOK TWO-HANDBOOK OF SPECIAL HELPS

How Do I Get Back on Track?

1. Self-Help Programs

Alcohol Addiction

Drug Addiction

Eating Disorders

Emotional Disorders

Compulsive Exercising

Compulsive Gambling

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

Relationship Dependencies

Sexual Addiction

Shopaholics

Nicotine Addiction

Workaholism

Cults

Other Compulsions

Treatment Centers

Other Resources for Publications, Films, Tapes, etc.

2. Help for Families and Friends

Open Letter to the Family

Intervention

Co-Dependence

Al-Anon

Families Anonymous

Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACOA)

Alateen

Seven Do's and Don't's for Parents of Children on Drugs

Parents Anonymous

Suicide Prevention

3. The Spiritual Dimension

Alcoholics for Christ

Prayer of a Recovering Addict

Christian Treatment Centers

With Gratitude

Footnotes

Foreword

This book offers some good news and some bad news.  The bad news is
that you will recognize someone when you read it.  You know a
compulsive woman.  She is your co-worker, your wife, your sister, your
mother, or she might be you.  She is leading a driven, pain-filled
life, acting as if she freely chooses to live this way.

Sandy LeSourd was such a woman.  Many people will assume that her story
is extreme or unusual.  It is not.  She did not live on the streets,
sleeping in parks or alleys.  She had a house, a car, nice clothes, and
friends.  She looked like a lot of people you know.  She appeared to be
leading "the good life."  The inside, however, did not match the
outside.  Inside she was far from leading a good life.  Her day was
full of compulsive behaviors.  When her supply of one thing ran out,
she turned to something else to numb her pain.

The costs of compulsive behaviors in terms of dollars and human
suffering are staggering.  Medical science has been successful at
eliminating many of the diseases that were dread killers only a few
decades ago.  But we have made little progress until recently on
helping people with illnesses of lifestyle.  Many of the things that
kill us now are things we do to ourselves.  In spite of overwhelming
evidence that smoking caused fetal injury, cancer, and heart disease, a
third of the population smokes daily.  In a world where millions go to
sleep hungry and starvation is all too common, we live in a society
preoccupied with diets and weight loss and where nearly half of our
citizens are obese.  Over eighteen million adults drink in a

The Compulsive Woman way that causes them serious problems.  Cirrhosis
of the liver is still the ninth leading cause of death in America.
Alcohol abuse alone costs the U.S. economy annually over $49 billion.

Compulsive behaviors are nothing new.  They have been with us as long
as recorded history.  We have called them by various names-sin, weak
moral character, possession, insanity-and we have tried to treat them
with threats, fines, medications, jail terms, even executions.  We
haven't been very successful.  It is becoming clear, however, that
there are important similarities between addictions.  We are headed
toward the day when professionals will study addiction, rather than
addictions.  When the Compulsivity Clinic was founded, we were told
that it would not work, that each addiction needed separate treatment
and that people with a particular addiction could not relate to someone
with a different addiction.  We found out different.  We found that
there are more similarities than differences when it comes to working
with compulsive people.  This book will show you that as well.

I said that this book offers both good and bad news.  The good news is
that there is hope.  Even as you read this, there are thousands of
compulsive women (and men) all over the world who are active in
recovery programs.  They are leading joyful lives free from the
restraints of compulsive behavior.  Each time a person tells her story
of recovery it makes it a little bit easier for the next person to
begin the journey.  There is hope for the compulsive woman in your
life.  There is hope for you.

Mic Hunter, MA."  MS."  C.C.D.C. Co-Director, Health Activation
Services"' Clinic Coordinator, Compulsivity Clinics of America"

Introduction Who is the compulsive woman?

The woman who volunteers for everything, who can't say no.

The woman whose TV is on all day long or who lives her life around soap
operas.

The woman whose life revolves around food.  She eats too much or too
little.  Sweets are often her downfall.

The compulsive woman is an exercise nut, jogging miles every day, rain
or shine.  She is the one who shops when she needs a high while debts
pile up.  She may be a chain-smoker or a closet alcoholic; hooked on
prescription drugs or sex or dependent on male approval for her sense
of worth.

The compulsive woman is easy prey for psychics, spiritists, cults of
every kind.  She's a perfectionist who never lives up to her own
expectations.  Her natural drive and energy have become distorted; her
motor is running wild.  She has an irrational need to do something over
and over to the point where she has lost control.

In other words, the compulsive woman has a complicated problem, and the
solution to her problem has to address more than her primary addiction
or symptom.  According to a study done by Ms.  magazine published in
February 1987, "The patterns of dependence [for women] have been
obscured by the tendency to took at individual addictions rather than
the forces that create dependency..  .."

One of the significant features of the Ms.  survey was a precedent
setting demonstration that the compulsive personality expresses

itself in more than one addiction.  " Cross-addict ions," that is,
multiple or reinforcing addictions, are a tremendous problem for the
compulsive woman; a cure is difficult so long as one tries to treat
only the symptoms without getting at the root causes: fear, anger,
and-in particular-shame.

Another significant feature in compulsion revealed in the Ms.  study is
the gender factor.  The survey revealed that women are more likely to
have certain kinds of addictions than men (shopping, watching
television, compulsive eating and dieting, taking tranquilizers, etc.).
More importantly, it revealed that there is a particular pattern in
compulsion that most compulsive women demonstrate.

"We are trained from early childhood to form at least part of our
identity in terms of dependency," observes Ms., 11 generally upon
fathers, boyfriends, male bosses, or husbands who are older..  .. " The
compulsive woman is often addicted to love.  Wrong love.  Or she is
dependent on men as the primary token of her value.  And this pattern
of dependency leads to lack of self-direction, selfcontrol, and
self-esteem.

"Addicted people are willing to endure anything in order to
reexperience that physical and psychological state of being," writes
Drs.  Connell Cowan and Melvyn Kinder in Smart WomenlFoolish Choices,
"that compelling satisfaction they feel whenever they take in that
substance, whatever it is-alcohol, drugs, nicotine, food, or a man's
love.  This hunger for love becomes obsession when it reaches such a
proportion that the woman feels she needs it just to feel that life is
worth living, just to maintain her everyday emotional balance.

I was led to a study of compulsive behavior not out of any abstract
interest, but through the desperate need to understand my own life and
behavior.  I had not one but all of the compulsions mentioned above.  I
was cross-addicted to almost everything at one time or another.  The
despair it caused led me at one point to try to kill

myself.  If some women can identify with my symptoms and my misery, I
hope that my pathway to recovery will also inspire and encourage these
women in their battle to gain mastery of themselves and their lives
gone out of control.

I have built this book around my own life struggles.  And as a result
of my studies into compulsivity, I have also included at the back of
the book self-assessment lists, information about compulsive behavior,
and guides on where you can get help.

it is possible for the compulsive woman to break the patterns that
control her, to recover her self-worth, and to lead a constructive and
joyous life.  That is the promise of this book.

-Sandra Simpson LeSourd

BOOK ONE

ILLNESS

AND RECOVERY

Facing Off Many people operate in their daily lives as automatons,
almost completely unaware that their nearly every action is dictated by
compulsion, with little or no freedom of choice and with virtually no
spontaneity.  Many people don't know the difference between compulsion
and choice.... (Theyl are so overwhelmed and tyrannized by their
compulsions that they must act out (do things) immediately,
impulsively, without thought or consideration in order to overcome
complete and utter paralysis.

Theodore Isaac Rubin, M.D.

The Winner's Notebook

S I WALKED UP TO THE WOODEN GATE OF THE CAMP SPONSORED BY THE

Compulsivity Clinic of America, after having been dropped off in the
parking lot by a friend, I felt my stomach knot in fear.  Don't he
silly, I told myself.  You're here to learn more ah out yourself-why
you've been a compulsive person all your life.  There is nothing to be
afraid of.

I'd felt this way before the first day of school .. . being dropped off
at a Girl Scout camp.  But to have these feelings now was ridiculous. I
was forty-eight years old!

Anxiously I looked about the crowded parking lot-doors The Compulsive
Woman slamming, men and women tugging suitcases and duffle bags from
yawning car trunks.  Were all these people as apprehensive as I?

A ruddy-faced young man standing in the center of the parking lot
pointed up a blacktop path toward a gray wooden lodge half-hidden in
the Minnesota woods.  Falling oak leaves swirled about his head as he
spoke.

"You'll be staying up there at the end of the path.  Down here"-he
gestured at a brown log building closer by@"is where you get fed."

A comforting thought, being fed.  Was I going to be preoccupied with
food this week?

Only a month ago my interest had been perked by a telephone
conversation with a vivacious young woman who had just "graduated" from
this Compulsivity Clinic course.  She had enrolled with serious food
disorders only to discover she was alcoholic as well.

I knew I had been an alcoholic-correction, was a recovering
alcoholic-and that I had other compulsive behavior problems as well. It
was time to subdue the rest of these monsters.

The advance information had fascinated me:

The Compulsivity Clinic program offers you the opportunity to uncover
the causes of your compulsive behaviors.  It provides support to make
lifestyle changes.  You will learn about:

Addictive relationships Managing change Dealing with shame and guilt
Chemical dependencies Sexual abuse and addiction Self-defeating
lifestyle problems can include:

Workaholism Relationship dependency Eating disorders Smoking Gambling

As I struggled up the walkway with my suitcase, I was filled with fresh
resolve to uncover those hidden areas buried deep within myself.  Dread
and exhilaration coursed through my veins, unlikely companions.

At the door of the lodge a staff member issued a green plastic
three-ring notebook containing the week's schedule and other
information, then with a warm smile assigned me to a bed.  All the
staff people looked energetic, lean, disciplined, bright.  I wondered
how they viewed us.

What are these people going to find out about me?  More terrifyingly:
What am I going to find out about myself?  The women's sleeping areas
were separated by carpeted room dividers.  I found my cubicle at the
far end on the right side.  Good.  I'd have some privacy here. Suddenly
I wanted to protect myself from getting too close to these others.

Across the aisle I glimpsed a thin young woman solemnly unpacking an
orange nylon duffle bag, methodically and mechanically sorting her
personal belongings.  A pile of paperback books slid onto the floor
with a thud.  As she dove to retrieve them, the words child abuse on
one of the covers caught my eye.

I could only speculate that my silent roommate across the way bore some
invisible scars.

After tidying up my tiny cubicle, I looked it over with satisfaction.
To counter harsh ceiling lights, I had brought my small gooseneck
reading lamp.  It now threw a comforting beam of light on my "security
blanket"-a new blue down bathrobe, a recent purchase so I would not be
cold in the Minnesota night air.

At five o'clock we all streamed back to the brown log dining hall for
an early dinner.  I fought down nervousness as I filled my plate and
selected a seat.  You've been in groups before, I told myself. Relax.

It was a futile command.  The thick hero sandwich I began to stuff into
my mouth suddenly exploded into a shower of ham, lettuce, tomato, and
onions.  As I tried to catch the falling food, m) The Compulsive Woman
paper plate tumbled to the floor.  My feet were awash in debris.

As every eye in the room turned to survey the mess, I let out a
self-conscious giggle.  Immediately the entire room broke into gales of
laughter.

"Looks like you'd better start all over again," cracked a large blonde
woman seated next to me.  As she turned toward me, I noticed a steel
brace supporting her back.

Looking around the room at the now-smiling faces, I felt cheered
somehow that my blunder had been a welcome icebreaker.  Everyone had
been as tense as I was.

After dinner the leadership team was introduced, including Terry
Kellogg, founder of the Compulsivity Clinics, and we got down to
basics.  First some important definitions were explained to us.

Obsession: recurring, persistent thoughts, images, or impulses that
occur in your mind.  They seem to come from nowhere; they are not
voluntary.  You do not seem to be able to control or suppress them,
though you try.

Compulsion: an insistent, repetitive, intrusive, and unwanted urge to
perform an act that is contrary to one's ordinary wishes or standards.
Since it serves as a defensive substitute for even more unacceptable
unconscious ideas or wishes, failure to perform the compulsive act
leads to anxiety.  Performing it relieves anxiety.  Yet performing it
is also linked with the desire to resist doing it and often a sense of
shame.  The compulsive link to a particular act, event, experience
(like gambling or shopping), or thing (like alcohol) often leads to
addiction.

Addiction: a pathological link or relationship with a mood altering
act, event, experience, or thing that causes major life problems.  An
addiction is more serious than a compulsion and can be life-threatening
if it involves substance abuse (alcohol, drugs, or even food and
tobacco).  It is behavior that continues despite adverse emotional,
medical, financial, or social consequences.

After the introductory staff comments, the twenty-five of us who

had enrolled in the Clinic introduced ourselves and spoke briefly about
the problems that had brought us there.  We were alcoholics, drug
addicts, chain-smokers, gamblers, compulsive TV-watchers.  Many had
come with sexual compulsions or severe dependency relationships.  Most
of us had one form of eating disorder or another.

Some were given to excessive shopping, spending, or other types of
hinge behaviors.  It was heartening, somehow, to know that my secrets,
my problems, were also the secrets and problems of others.  Several
faces now became brightened by a new sense of hope.

Mic Hunter (who is now the coordinator of the Clinic) assured us that
what seemed impossible to resist was indeed resistible, that our
problems were treatable and curable.  He was later to offer this
checklist to help identify compulsive behaviors:

* Is the behavior ritualized?  If interrupted, does the person get
upset?

* Is there time distortion when the person is involved in this
behavior?  (Does it go on for much longer than he thinks it does or
than he expects?) * Does the person set rigid rules for himself in this
behavior, and then tend to violate them?  (He says he'll drink only
between the hours of ten and twelve, and then doesn't; etc.) * Does the
person go to extremes, from overdoing to under doing in this
behavior?

* If there are negative consequences, does the person continue the
behavior anyway?

* Is there any "situation stressor" causing this behavior?  (A man
insulted sexually by a woman who has spurned him, for instance, may
launch a succession of promiscuous relationships, but only to prove his
masculinity and not as a compulsive behavior.  When he understands the
reason for

what she said, or that it isn't true, he will stop his promiscuity.) Is
there preoccupation ("obsessing") about this behavior, in which the
person thinks more about it than anything else, so that it interferes
with his life?  (Copyright (0 1986 by Mic Hunter; taken from the
forthcoming Excessive Appetites.) After the introductory comments, our
first group session came in a small room with mahogany-paneled walls
and one large window.  We all sat on floor pillows.  It felt strangely
cozy inside these walls, almost womb like  There we met our six group
members: two men and four women, including myself.

Our counselor, Maureen, welcomed us: "You are to become a family-to eat
together, spend time together when we are not in this room, and 'be
there' for each other.  I want you to experience trust and love for one
another, something you may never have really known in your own
families."

She paused a moment.

"For the rest of the week please do not contact anyone on the outside.
This is especially important for those of you with relationship
dependencies.  We suggest you don't call out and 'get a fix."  You're
here to focus on yourselves, to feel your true feelings and confront
your fears.  I urge you to stay within the framework of our program so
as not to become fragmented."

I liked Maureen, a lovely Irish wisp of a woman with a cloud of short
auburn hair and a mellow, soothing voice that was competent and
reassuring.  Maureen described herself as a recovering alcoholic from a
strongly "dysfunctional" family.

"Over ninety percent of American families are dysfunctional to some
degree," she added.  She defined the dysfunctional family as one in
which either father or mother or child has a problem that causes an
imbalance in family relationships.  A father may be addicted to
alcohol; a mother may have a nervous breakdown; a son or daughter may
have a serious illness.  Whatever the specific issue,

the family begins to revolve around the problem, ceasing to function in
a healthy, mutually supportive way.

Soon a cover-up of feelings begins.  Hurt, angry, confused emotions are
stuffed down inside of us, kept concealed even from ourselves.
Out-of-touch with our own deepest truth, we feel driven to do things
without knowing why.  Compulsive behavior is born.

Fred, a heavy-set man in his thirties, sat in the corner frowning.  He
was a stockbroker in the Gamblers Anonymous program.  Wall Street, he
confided, was spawning a new breed of gambler, the compulsive investor.
Fred spoke slowly, as though physically exhausted.

Maureen bore in on him.

"I suspect you are so full of sugar and starch-they act as a
medication, you know-that your real feelings can't get through.  For
the rest of your time here, Fred, I want you to totally abstain from
all sugar and white flour.  You need to cleanse your body of these
substances before you can start to feel what you need to feel."

The stories that poured out from this group triggered memories and pain
of my own:

"I've always had problems with money and men."

"I'm a chain-smoker and addicted to soap operas."

"My wife said if I didn't get some help for my pornography addiction
she would divorce me."

11 My father raped me when I was eight; then my uncle and my two
brothers took advantage of me.  I hate them all."

My contribution: "I've had five years of sobriety, but I know I've only
struck the tip of the iceberg in working out my compulsive behavior.  "
Each person spoke with deep emotion, some with anger, some with tears.
An ever-present box of tissues was scooted about the room.  Complete
strangers a few hours earlier, we began to see ourselves by the end of
the session as being bound by a common thread of inner pain.

was too keyed up after this encounter to go to bed, so I took a short
walk under the trees.  Geese honked on nearby Lake Minnetonka; the
smell of burning leaves recalled fall nights in Vermont where I grew
up.

I wondered about how I had come across.  Had I sounded too "put
together"?  Hollow?  Superficial?  Defensive?  Had I used too many
humorous quips to keep people from getting too close-because I was too
selfish or scared to communicate more meaningfully?

After bredkfast the next morning I stopped to talk with the woman in
the steel back brace who had sat next to me the night before at dinner.
Perched uncomfortably on a straight naugahyde chair, she was wheezing
and struggling for breath.

"Can I help you?"  I offered weakly.

She pointed to her pack of cigarettes.

"You could take these things and throw them in the lake.  But I'd
probably be fool enough to dive in after them."

"I used to be hooked on them, too," I said, then wondered if my used
to" sounded lofty or self-righteous.

The morning small group session was heavy going.  We again sat on
pillows in a circle, while Steve, the other male in our group, sobbed
uncontrollably and rocked back and forth on his pillow.  He told the
group about his problem.

"I hate myself!"  he kept saying, pounding at the oversized pillow
beneath him.

"I told myself when I came here I wouldn't read that stuff again, but I
did last night before I went to bed.  Then I took a fantasy trip and..
.. " He didn't go on.

"Steve, who are you really angry at?"  Maureen asked.

He was silent for a moment.

"I guess it's my parents.  It goes 'way back.  As kids, we couldn't be
normal.  You know, no smoking, no drinking, no dancing, no movies."

"So reading sex magazines was a way to get back at them," ventured
Maureen.

Steve nodded.

"The only thing my parents ever said to me about

sex was, "Don't do it.  It's wrong."  Since they wouldn't answer my
questions about masturbation, I felt like a freak."  He started to
pound his thighs with his fists.

"Steve, stop beating yourself up," Maureen ordered.

"I want you to get in touch with how lonely you have been, how isolated
you've felt.  " Steve's realization moments later: "When I started
rebelling, voices inside me began saying, "You're bad!"  That really
scared me.

I guess I was scared because I wondered if those voices in my head were
from my parents or from God or from the pit of hell."

He talked for a half hour.  We all went through his torment with him.
Finally spent from this wrenching session, Steve leaned back against
the wall.  The toes of his stained white tennis shoes were tilted
slightly inward, reminding me of a little boy abandoned in his playpen.
I had a glimpse then of a little Steve, desperate and lonely, wanting
to be picked up and held.

Then the little boy opened his eyes, reached for his horn-rimmed
glasses, cleared his throat, and was transformed before our
compassionate eyes into the Steve of today, the forty-year-old
accountant.

Each day there was some kind of breakthrough in a member of our group.
Some of the things I heard resembled my own nightmares.  Others
represented the secrets and fears of other lives.

Peggy, thirtyish, with green eyes and a sprinkle of freckles, was
office manager for a small insurance company.  Despite her responsible
position, she had come to the Clinic desperately needy and scared.  The
oldest girl in a family of four, she'd been responsible for the care of
her younger brothers and sisters.  Her mother, obese and deeply
disturbed emotionally, had spent most of her time in bed, getting up
only for trips to the bathroom or refrigerator.  Her father, a violent
and abusive man, had beaten his children unmercifully.

"I became sexually active with boys in my class at age thirteen," Peggy
related.

"By the time I was seventeen, I'd tried it all except

e been marriage.  That was a disaster.  All four of my marriages have
failures.  I've lost track of the times I've tried to kill myself-six,
eight.

11 Why suicide?"  asked Maureen.

"Maybe suicide was an attempt to kill that part of me I didn't like.
The guiltiest I feet is about my abortion twelve years ago.  Since my
marriage was breaking up, I thought it would be a mistake to bring a
child into the world.  I never told my husband."

Would you like to let go of that guilt, Peggy?"  Maureen asked.  Peggy
wiped her nose with the back of her hand.

"Oh, God, yes!  Is there any way I can?"

Maureen moved across the room to where Peggy was sitting and put her
arm around her.

"We're going to have a memorial service for your child, right here.
Would you like to invite the group to be part of it?"

Peggy blinked, her stricken eyes meeting the gaze of each of us seated
around the room.

"Would you all like to come?"  she asked.

Profoundly affected, we nodded.  What Maureen didn't tell us then is
that ritual acts often help to break the pattern of guilt that
underlies compulsive behavior.  That is why cleansing rituals as an
expression of real faith-rituals like baptism and communion-play such
an important role in many addicts' recovery..  "Does your daughter have
a name, Peggy?"  Maureen asked.

"Yes.  Her name is Kim."

"Please invite Kim to come into the room and be with us now."

Peggy moved her lips self-consciously, her eyes filling with tears.

"Would you describe Kim to all of us, Peggy?"

"She is twelve years old.  Her hair is blonde and she has blue eyes.

She looks so sad.  There are tears in her eyes .. .... "Do you know why
she looks so sad, Peggy?  It's because she doesn't want you to go on
mourning for her.  She is happy and at peace in heaven.  Is there
anything you'd like to say to Kim?"

Breaking a long pause, Peggy blurted in a shaking voice, "Please
forgive me, Kim.  I was so confused when I found out I was pregnant
with you.  I was so frightened and unhappy.  I didn't dare to have you
.. . please forgive me!

"I love you, Kim.  I miss you and I miss not having you with me now
when I could be a mom to you.  But I wasn't ready.  I hope you can
understand that.  " Peggy broke down, her tears and mascara running
together down her cheeks.  Most of the women in the group were also
weeping.

"Is there anything else you want to say to her, Peggy?"

"Just I love you .. . I love you .. . I know we will be together
someday..  .. "

"It's time to say good-bye to her, to let her go."

"Good-bye, Kim .. . good-bye .. . I love you .. .... The six days with
the Clinic felt like forever, yet when it was over they seemed to have
sped by.  We had exercise sessions, lectures on the dysfunctional
family, sexual disorders, nutrition, and so forth.  Information helps
us to get a handle on our problems, I learned, because fear plays a
major role in compulsive behavior.

The last morning I took an early morning walk alone, past Lake
Minnetonka into the forest.  The woods were pungent with the smell of
moist earth.  I found a sunny spot on a gently sloping hill where
leaves protected me from the damp ground.  Easing my body to the
ground, I looked skyward in self-examination.  I felt strangely
vulnerable, so I began a deep breathing exercise we had been taught in
one of our sessions.  In .. . out .. . in .. . out.  We had been taught
that getting proper oxygen to the brain is often enough to help reduce
or eliminate the fear response.  Agoraphobics and other people
afflicted with fear are often able to reduce their anxiety simply by
improved breathing.  Hyperventilation occurs frequently during anxiety
attacks and makes you feel dizzy, that you are losing control.

The breathing exercise helps compulsives as well.  We used it in
combination with focusing mentally on our grief, pain, or sadness.
After a while a surge of emotion welled up from deep inside me.  I
sobbed wrenching sobs, thinking of my new friends.  The intimate
details of our lives we had shared, and the mutual support we had given
one another, had brought us close together.

The Compulsivity Clinic had provided insights into the nature of the
problem millions of women face, but left me with unanswered questions:
How can compulsive people change?  Were we wounded ones permanently
damaged or was there a clearly marked path to wholeness?  How far along
was I?  Were there any positive elements in compulsive behavior?

The root cause of all compulsions, we had been told, was fear and
shame.  I needed to ponder that deeply, to look for the origins of
shame in my own background.

The search would take me not only into my own history, but into the
experiences of many others.  It would take me to hospitals and clinics,
halfway houses and self-help groups, into libraries and research
centers.  It would set me interviewing health professionals and people
struggling with current addictions.

I offer my own story following as an illustration of the genesis and
growth of compulsive behavior.  It is typical of the inhibiting and
self-defeating patterns many women live and suffer under.  It also
illustrates the process by which you and I can be released from the
bondage in which compulsions keep us.

 The Violated Childhood More than other emotions, shame involves a
quality of the unexpected; if in any way wejeel it coming we are
powerless to avert it.  This is in part because of the difficulty we
have in admitting to ourselves either shame or the circumstances that
give rise to shame.  Whatever part voluntary action may have in the
experience of shame is swallowed up in the sense Of something that
overwhelms us from without and takes us' unawares.  We are taken by
surprise, caught off guard, or off base, caught unawares, made afoot
of.  It is as if we were suddenly invaded from the rear where we cannot
see, are unprotected, and can be overpowered.

Helen Merrell Lynd On Shame and the Search for Identity

LEARNED SOMETHING ABOUT MYSELF FROM EVERY PERSON AT THE CLINIC.

ome of their experiences helped me open long-closed doors in my past.
Peggy's story was much sadder and more traumatic than mine but, her
green eyes clouded, she pried open a door I had sealed shut in my
childhood.  Peggy traced her low self-worth to unremitting abusive
treatment by her father, and the un supporting passive behavior of her
obese mother, who became a negative role model for her.

Because her mother was so disturbed, Peggy had to fill the role of
mother to the other children.  Before she reached puberty, Peggy found
a way to prevent her father from beating his children: sex.  If she
gave in to her father's demands, he would not abuse the younger
children.

"My father wanted to have sex with me all the time.  I just didn't have
the strength to resist, so I let him," Peggy had told us
dispassionately.

"I felt it was my fault somehow that my mother acted so strangely."

My heart had ached for her.  Basically a talented, responsible
person-she'd held her office job for seven years-Peggy's emotional life
was a mess.  A compulsive eater and drinker, obsessed by fears, she had
been looking desperately for help.  The memorial service for her
aborted child, Kim, had been a good start.  A lot more healing had to
take place inside Peggy before she could acquire positive feelings
about herself.

What was the connection, I wondered, between sexual abuse in childhood
and compulsive behavior problems in adulthood?

Reading Silent Scream by Martha Janssen on her incestuous relationship
with her father helped me understand Peggy's agony of spirit.  Martha
Janssen's book is written in blank verse:

Daughters love to sit on daddies' laps, Me too.  I would scramhle up at
the end of the day.  We'd talk until Mother left the room.

Then we'd 'play.

Now I know why I watch so carefully little girls sitting on their
daddies' laps.

The Violated Childhood Then this indictment addressed to her abusive
father:

YOU!  You walk calmly among people, relatives.  They don't know you as
I do.  You smile and feel no guilt no shame.  You walk away from my
pain.

This is crazy.  I carry the weight of the sentence But you are the
killer."

My mind went back to a clinic lecture.  If children are sexually
molested, then the "boundaries" of their bodies have been violated.
It's as though their right to say no has been stolen from them.  Thus
they grow up confused, with certain protective limits erased, prone to
erratic and compulsive behavior.  Such people have a lifelong struggle
with shame.

Shame, I learned, has to do with how we feel about ourselves, whereas
guilt has to do with our behavior.  We incur guilt when we violate some
value we hold, but it has a constructive purpose in that it motivates
us to make amends.  Shame has no such constructive purpose, in that it
turns us away from others and strikes a blow at our very worth as
persons.  Shame isolates, alienates.  It makes us feel we're no good,
that we're unworthy of respect.

Because shame is almost impossible to communicate, and because a person
suffering from shame tends not to talk about his problem-or even
perhaps be aware of it-he looks for temporary relief through some
outlet like food, drugs, or alcohol, any mood-alterer" to ease his
pain.

An estimated seventy percent of all women who come to treatment centers
are victims of sexual abuse as children.  Estimates of sexual abuse of
girls under fourteen range from 45,000 to 500,000 incidents per year.
Some estimate that one in every four girls and one in six boys in the
U.S. will be sexually molested before they are eighteen.  Government
statistics, moreover, indicate that nearly fifty percent are victimized
by a member of their own family.  The Ms.  study (see page 11) compiled
striking anecdotal evidence that "women who have been victims of incest
or rape are vastly overrepresented among the addicted population."

Only in recent years have women been able to acknowledge their rejected
memories and describe their experience.  The emotional 2 progression of
a victim goes something like this:

1. Deep inner hurt and dismay over the sexual violation; a feeling of
being damaged goods.

2. Fearful resolve not to tell anyone.

3. An attempt to bury the episodes) in one's subconscious, where the
memory festers and creates an inner disorder.

4. Adult relationships with men are damaged.

5. Trust and intimacy problems with both sexes develop.

6. Suicide can seem the answer-as it had to Peggy.

The road back to health for the victim takes this course:

1. Facing up to the fact of abuse, dredging it up from the
subconscious.

2. In a therapeutic setting, admitting to others that it happened, as
Peggy did in our small group.  Once this exposure gets the abuse into
the light, much of the destructive power goes out of it.

3. Seeing it as the abuser's problem and fault, not the victim's.

4. Forgiving him her for it.

Peggy's experience, outwardly so different from my own, nevertheless
had triggered childhood memories.  The change from the emotionally
charged atmosphere of the six-day Compulsivity Clinic to the more
relaxed pace in my small rural community was what I needed to begin to
sort them out.  I developed a whole new perspective on this period of
my life, including one traumatic episode that had burst out of my
subconscious.  One day with notepad and pen I began to dig into my
early years.

At first glance my childhood seemed utterly normal.  An only child, I
was reared in the small community of St.  Johnsbury Center, Vermont. My
father, Richard Simpson, was a handsome and gregarious man, and served
as a salesman, first for an appliance store, later for an automobile
dealer.  His wife, Elizabeth, my mother, was a fragile, pretty woman
who centered her life on homemaking with few outside interests.

For me going to the old Congregational village church was a high point.
On Sunday mornings I'd arrive starched and curled, eager for the Sunday
school lesson to begin.  The smells linger to this day; men's minty
aftershave, the musky, damp odor of the church bell rope (how I longed
to give it a hearty tug), coffee, cinnamon, and ham from the church
kitchen.

I can still see the ladies dressed in dotted swiss and print voile
dresses, their "finger-waved" hair-dos precise as metal washboards. The
men in their three-piece suits seemed oddly stiff, as though their legs
wouldn't bend in pants with such razor-sharp creases.

Their hair slicked down with Brilliantine, noses and cheeks aglow from
vigorous scrubbing, their hearty "how-do-you-do's" rang through the
building.

My classroom was a clutter of small oak chairs presided over by our
teacher, my Aunt Ethel.  Next to the large blackboard was an oak-framed
picture of Jesus.  I recall his strong, sensitive face, long,
beautiful, flowing hair-and those eyes.  Warm, loving eyes.  Jesus

was holding the lost sheep in one arm, a staff in the other hand, a red
cape over his long white garment.

11 Jesus loves you," Aunt Ethel would intone.

"He wants you to come to him with whatever is bothering you."  What was
bothering me in those early years was the fact that my father and
mother didn't seem to love each other as other daddies and mommies did,
but I couldn't even tell Jesus this.

Then my aunt would teach us from the Bible.  A verse she often chose
was, "He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our
iniquities .. . and with his stripes we are healed.  -3 I couldn't
understand these words at all.  Aunt Ethel explained that the stripes
were the wounds of Christ, but the only wounds I saw in the picture
books were in his hands and feet.  They looked more like holes in his
flesh than stripes.  Yet the verse was strangely comforting.

The hour of Bible stories always passed too quickly for me.  Soon it
was time to join the grown-ups in the auditorium, where the organist
extracted loud and wondrous sounds from the quaking mahogany organ with
her favorite selection: "Yes, Jesus loves me..  ..

How I loved these Sunday afternoons when we'd motor around the Vermont
countryside in our slate-gray 1938 Plymouth!  Occasionally we'd take
the hour's journey to where my Uncle Ralph and Aunt Agnes lived.  Aunt
Agnes always had freshly fried doughnuts and orange Kool-Aid for us,
and her house smelled of lavender and polished wood.

One of these visits, however, was not so pleasant.  For many years what
happened that Sunday at Uncle Ralph's had lain buried deep inside me.
Peggy helped me recall it.  The rest I discovered in a therapy session.
As I began to put the episode down on paper, I trembled so violently I
had to get out of my chair and walk around the room.

It happened when I was five.  On this particular Sunday we had

driven there in time for lunch.  Afterward we gathered around the old
player piano in the living room for la songfest.  Uncle Ralph let me
select the music roll from the glass-front cabinet where the player
rolls were stored, then sit beside him on the piano bench.

Mother and Aunt Agnes didn't sing, just sat nearby smiling
encouragingly as Dad, Uncle Ralph, and I warbled away.  Dad sang tenor
to Uncle Ralph's bass, with my squeaky child's voice feebly carrying
the melody.

Every time a polka was played, I'd slip off the bench and skip about
the house, through the dark hall with its ticking clocks, past Uncle
Ralph's gun case with the stuffed animals on top, then out through the
kitchen past the black wrought-iron stove with its gleaming chrome
trim, on into the dining room.  Breathless, I'd bound back onto the
piano bench, bumping affectionately into Uncle Ralph as he manipulated
the brass levers beside the keyboard.

When the music ended, Aunt Agnes, a gardener of great skill, invited us
to help pick vegetables for dinner.  Usually when she suggested this
I'd be the first one out the door, but on this occasion I decided to
stay behind while Uncle Ralph rolled his handmade cigarettes, a ritual
I found fascinating.  All the ingredients were in place to start
production when Uncle Ralph sank down into his oak rocking chair.  I
noticed that his face was flushed and his breathing wheezy.

"Is something wrong, Uncle Ralph?"  I asked.

"No, dear, not really, but I would feel better if you'd come over here
and sit on my lap."

Eager to please, I approached the seated figure, turning my back to him
expecting to be lifted into his lap.  Instead his strong hands pressed
my small body next to him.  He gripped so tightly I could hardly
breathe; then one hand groped for my pubic area.  I heard his rasping,
measured breath, felt the brass fittings on his suspenders digging into
my shoulders.

What was going on?  Why was he breathing so fast?  Now he was pressing
and poking and hurting me through my cotton dress.

Terror filled me.  Shame .. . horror.  What if Dad and Mom and Aunt
Agnes were to walk in now?  I could hear their voices chatting
nonchalantly outside.

"Let's dig some more beets," I heard my father say.

What is this man who I love and trust doing to me?  Uncle Ralph
wouldn't touch me there..  .. But he is, and he's acting crazy and
frantic and his false teeth are clicking in my ears.  Oh, somebody help
me!

Little short gasps and moans, then his hands dropped limply beside me.
He slumped back in the squeaking rocker like an exhausted rag doll, his
eyes shut, the spittle running down the corners of his mouth.  The only
sound now was the tick-tock of the hall clocks.

Breaking loose from his locked legs, I streaked upstairs to the
bathroom, past the stuffed animals, my heart pounding, my stomach
heaving, my eyes burning with tears of guilt and fright.  There was the
beautiful ceramic jar with the blue forget-me-nots where Aunt Agnes
saved the long strands of her jet-black hair.  This saintly and
pristine lady, what would she think of me?  I let Uncle Ralph touch
those private parts that Mother told me no one was to see or touch.
Mother and Dad would be furious if they knew!  They must never find
out.  Deep within me something was dying-a joyfulness and a trust.  A
passage had been made from innocence to something I wasn't quite sure
of, something frightening and unclean.

I pressed my body so hard against the washbasin that my chest ached.
Gallons of water must have passed through my desperately scrubbing
hands.  My nightmare was interrupted by a familiar tap at the door.  My
dad always knocked that way.  Dum-dum-da-dumdum-da-dum.

Poking his head around the door, he teased, "Snookie, are you

going to use up all the water in the reservoir?  We're waiting on you
to come help with dinner."

"I'll be right down, Daddy."

Shyly I entered the kitchen, the skipping child of an hour ago now
silent, ashamed, wounded by an encounter she neither understood nor
could share.  Irrevocably I gave myself an order: I will never ever
tell anyone what happened today.

The beets stained my small fingers as I scrubbed off the dirt in the
old stainless steel sink.  My hands were almost raw.  Would I ever feel
clean again?

Years later at the Compulsivity Clinic, I asked Mic Hunter if this
single instance of sexual abuse could be one of the underlying causes
of my compulsive behavior.

Compulsivity, he admitted, usually has a complicated genesis.  The
shame guilt reaction of the victim in cases of abuse can be a major
contributing factor.  The key is the way in which the family responds
to the person who has been victimized.  In my case, he said, there was
no one I felt I could talk to.  Nor did anyone notice my trauma
symptoms.  The implication to me as a child was: Your pain doesn't
matter.  So I forced the pain inward and blamed myself.

It was significant, I think, that I tried ritual obsessive hand washing
to cleanse myself.

According to psychologists Pamela Vredevelt and Kathryn Rodriguez in
their book Surviving the Secret, there are five common identity and
interpersonal problems suffered by sexual abuse victims:

I -Minimizing their own abilities and maximizing others' strengths.

2. Tending to take responsibility for others' behavior.

3. Having difficulty achieving intimacy with others.

4. Tending to think if they please others they will be considered
perfect.

5. Worrying obsessively about problems and sabotaging their own efforts
to change.

In retrospect, I can see that my experience of being abused shattered
not only the trust I had in myself, but also in others close to me-and
even of the boundaries of the world as I knew it.

 The Dysfunctional Home Passive dependent people are so busy seeking
to be loved that they have no energy left to love.  They are like
starving people, scrounging wherever they can for food, and with no
food of their own to give to others.  It as if within them they have an
inner emptiness, a bottomless pit crying out to be filled but which can
never be completely filled.

M. Scott Peck, M.D. The Road Less Traveled

OUGH I WAS FORTUNATE THAT NEITHER OF MY PARENTS DRANK-I

became an alcoholic in spite of this-it was apparent to me at an early
age that my father and mother did not enjoy being with one another.
Dad's absence for three years during World War II didn't help.  Our
home, off-balance because of the problem relationship between my two
parents, was dysfunctional.

As the alienation between my mother and father grew, a spirit of
sadness took over our home.  A dome of silence seemed to settle over
us.  Yet for years, probably because of me, their only child, my
parents struggled to hold their marriage together.

I remember a recurring dream in which I was a lifeguard trying to pull
my parents to the ocean's shore.  I'd swim frantically to

rescue one as the other went under.  I could never get them both to
safety; one or the other would drown before I could reach him. Choices!
Which one to save?  Why couldn't I save them both?  I'd awaken tangled
in my bedclothes, heart pounding, my nightgown soaked in
perspiration.

Tensely I'd lie awake until my dad's short, dry cough from the
adjoining bedroom, and the sound of Mother's steady breathing, assured
me that all was well.

But all was not well.  They were playing a charade called marriage.
Sometimes my mind would form a strange fantasy.  I'd imagine that our
rambling three-story house was actually made of cardboard.  If you cut
on the dotted line you could fold it up and return it to the carton it
had come in.  One day I'd return home from school and there would be
nothing there-just a grassy plot with a few lilac bushes standing
sentinel over an empty hole.

Often my heart would race with fear as I hurried up the broken asphalt
sidewalk of Elm Street after school.  Maybe today was the day the house
had vanished.  All the other neat clapboard homes were in place, their
prim, Priscilla-curtained windows following my anxious odyssey toward
home.  Eagerly my eyes would sweep up the street to our house on the
hill.  It was still there!

My steps would quicken.  I hoped there would be a simmering pot of
chowder on the stove.  First I stamped my muddy feet on the square
raffia mat, then burst into the kitchen.  I was always trying to bring
light and sunshine into the house, into my parents' cold marriage.

There was Mother, neatly groomed in her modest cotton house dress, her
sad hazel eyes lighting up as her only child came through the door. She
seemed so fragile, so vulnerable.  I felt responsible for her.  How I
wanted to throw my arms around her and tell her not to worry, that I
would protect her.

After chowder and cookies I would slip out the kitchen door and head
for my very own sanctuary.  There it was!  The golden glow of The
Dysfunalonal Home the afternoon burst through the pink-and-white
blossoms of my apple tree, warming my long braids and sprinkling me
with diamonds.  My skin was dusted with golden flecks of light.  The
red clover and buttercups in my hand were celestial blooms.

Vermont disappeared in a misty vapor, our house and garage spinning
away into space.  Here I was away from sad people, unhappy people.  My
apple tree was a magic place.  There was no pain here.  No confusion.
No one spoke cross or accusing words.

My tree always welcomed me.  It never said, "Come back later; I have
branches to straighten now.  " just, "Come rest in my arms.  You're
safe here.  " My tree had a heartbeat.  I could feel the rhythm
pulsating as I sat in the branches.  I didn't mind sharing my tree with
the robins and the fat honeybees.

My earliest "addiction" was for love and approval.  There were happy
times with my father.  He taught me while I was still small to use
carpentry tools and do other boyish things.  I was only four when I
started "helping" him work on our gray Plymouth.  He'd take the motor
apart, placing nuts and bolts and gaskets in murky baths of lubricating
oil, I'd swirl them around with my hands and squeal in delight as the
oil ran down my arms.  How much I depended on Daddy's approval!

Knowing deep down that my parents' marriage was failing, I tried harder
to please.  It was at this point that I slipped into what I now know as
the "co-dependent role."  I so wanted our family life to be happy that
I was ready to play any part that could bring this about.  Very early,
perhaps as a contrast to the joylessness in our home, I determined to
be a "fun person."  I was always playing jokes on others, mimicking my
teachers and friends.  I laughed a lot, developed a reputation as a
class clown.  I was not yet a true compulsive, but already my gaiety
had something excessive about

it, as though I were telling myself, "I will be happy!"  Hurting
inside, my defense was a perpetual smile.

Years later I was to read my own youthful situation reflected in the
words of social philosopher Helen Lynd: "The discovery that our parents
are not all-wise and all-good and that we must face the uncertainties
of our own judgment .. . is a lonely experience.  It becomes still more
lonely and poignant, and in a real sense shameful, when it is followed
by a realization that, instead of our elders being our interpreters of
the world, our protectors, we must, instead, protect them from their
own fallibilities and shortcomings, and from the shameful knowledge
that we are aware of them" (On Shame and the Search for Identity).

I was also to learn that an addiction-prone personality like mine
typically manifests an exaggerated degree of compliance, and is overly
concerned with pleasing people and winning approval.

But not even my desperately cheerful facade, as it turned out, could
stop the breakup of our home.  I was fifteen when Mother and Dad
separated and filed for divorce.  I retreated to my apple tree on the
hill.  By now my teenage legs were too long for the "stirrup" limbs and
it seemed pretty dumb to sit in a tree at my age.  So I'd lean up
against the warm bark, feeling the heartbeat of the moving sap.  Was my
parents' separation something I had caused?  Was there something I
could still do?

All year my heart throbbed like a toothache.  Typical of young people
in dysfunctional families, I felt increasingly responsible to take care
of my mother.  To fix everything in her life, to "make it all
better"-the phrase she'd often used when she kissed a bump or
scratch.

My tree had no answers.  So I retreated behind an air of bravado,
masking my hurt with a casual veneer.  Life was a charade .. . smile ..
pretend.  I practiced my act before my dressing table mirror so-what"
expressions, "I-couldn't-care-less" gestures.  Cultivate The
Dysfunctional Home the quick, merry laugh, Sandra jean.  Crinkle your
eyes in merriment.

After the divorce both my parents entered second marriages that proved
to be solid and lasting.  Not aware of the happiness ahead for them,
however, I remained the confused child in-between.  Feeling
disconnected with family life, I sought love like candy, and tried,
intensely to be more acceptable to my friends.

One of these friends was Linette.  She was a sunny blonde with a
dazzling smile and a Bo Derek figure that drove the guys at Spaulding
High School wild.  We were sophomores when Linette invited me to spend
the weekend with her while her parents were away in Montreal.

She set out popcorn and potato chips, then poured Cokes from a frosty
twelve-ounce bottle.

"Should we put some bourbon in these?"  she asked.

"That would be fine with me!"  I replied in my best Rita Hayworth
imitation.  I had never seen a bottle of bourbon.

Linette went to a dining room cabinet and flung open the double doors.
Before us stood a dazzling array of liquor-vodka, gin, Scotch, bourbon,
brandy, wine, creme de menthe, rum, champagne.  What an education!

How worldly I suddenly felt, as she measured a crystal shot glass of
bourbon into each glass of Coke.  After stirring the swirling mixture
with a pink flamingo swizzle stick, she triumphantly handed me my
glass.

"Here's to Spaulding High!"  she toasted.

The mossy smell of the liquor sifted through the sweet Coke aroma.  Now
I was in the big leagues-a rite of passage a woman at last!

Yuk.  The first rush of bubbly liquid hit my tongue.

"This tastes awful, Linette.

it gets better as you go along," she assured me.

Sure enough, the second and third swallows were less pungent.  A

warm, tingly feeling was taking hold.

"I see what you mean.  This is okay!"  I burbled, gulping the contents
of the glass.

"Hey, take it easy," Linette warned.

"You shouldn't drink it so fast!

Before long my body felt as though it were floating in warm
butterscotch sauce.  I felt cozy and cared for.  Cared about.

"Do you suppose I could have another?"  I don't remember how many times
I asked this question that evening.

Sometime later Linette telephoned our boyfriends.  When it came my turn
to talk, I gushed something wonderfully witty into the phone.

"You all right, Sandy?"  the boy on the line asked.

"You sound funny.  " That's the last thing I remember.  I awakened
fully clothed, flat on my back in Linette's guest room bed.  By
flinging my leg over the side, I stopped the room from spinning.  Then
waves of nausea came and I rushed for the bathroom.  Kneeling on the
tile floor I gripped the toilet in a death lock.

I didn't feel at all like Rita Hayworth now.

It would be two years before I had another drink .. . but I had the
exact chemistry to become an alcoholic.  I see myself in this
statement: "The dulling of sensibility, the soothing feeling that all
is well, is a powerful experience for some people..  .. Those who
depend totally on such an experience do so because it gives their lives
a structure and secures them, at least subjectively, against the press
of what is novel and demanding.  This is what they are addicted to"
(Dr.  Stanton Peele in Love and Addiction).

After graduating from high school, I enrolled at the Rhode Island
School of Design in Providence.  Weekends several of us would go to
nearby Brown University for fraternity house weekend parties.  Feeling
like a small-town bumpkin in my homemade clothes,

unsure of myself in the company of sophisticated Ivy League girls, I
began to depend on alcohol for my security.

During exam week in May 1956, at the end of my second year in Rhode
Island, I got a telephone call from my father who was now living in
Barre, Vermont, with his new wife, Nora.

"The Chamber of Commerce wants Barre to have a contestant in the Miss
Vermont@ Pageant this year," he told me, "so I volunteered you.  Your
picture ran in last night's paper."

I was too stunned to speak.  Dad had always been a practical joker, but
this time he'd gone too far.

"The Pageant is next weekend at the Burlington High School Auditorium,"
he continued.

"You'll need to be there on Friday with a talent presentation."

Panic set in even before I hung up.  What would I wear?  What in the
world could I do for a talent presentation?  Could I lose twenty pounds
before next weekend?  Fretful hazel eyes stared back at me from the
bathroom mirror.  Dark circles.  jowls.  Why did I stuff myself with
all those sugar doughnuts at the Bluebird Cafe?

Somehow I completed my exams, got some clothes together, and made the
trip to Burlington, Vermont, all in three days' time.  The pageant
weekend activities were a blur of teas, lunches, interviews, and
rehearsals.  The night of the finals was brutally hot; the makeshift
fans that wheezed asthmatic ally from the gymnasium balcony raised
barely a tickle of breeze.  As I went onstage to do my talent, I was
sure I would faint.

I'd decided to repeat a skit I'd done at the School of Design, a
pantomime about the precocious little six-year-old Eloise who lived in
New York's Plaza Hotel.  To my amazement the audience in Vermont seemed
to like it: riotous laughter and applause.

Still, as the contestants circled the stifling auditorium in formal
gowns for the final time, I knew I had no chance of winning in the face
of the far more beautiful and talented competition.  I was

already undressing in the basement as the announcer began to call up to
the stage the runners-up for the title of Miss Vermont.

I had just gotten out of my soggy copper-colored velvet gown and was
struggling with a jammed hook and eye on my voluminous crinoline hoop
skirt when the final announcement came: "And now, Miss Vermont of 1956,
Sandrajean Simpson of Barre!"

I couldn't be hearing right.  Struggling back into my clothes, I
stumbled up the stairs and burst onto the brilliantly lit stage.
Blinking in disbelief, I heard applause pouring from the packed
auditorium.  People were standing on their chairs.  Even the judges
were giving me a standing ovation.  I was in shock.

A crown of daisies, roses, and ferns was placed ceremoniously on my
head.  It was too big and slipped down over my ears.  A brass trophy
was thrust into my hands, while a white satin banner affirmed that I
was indeed being named Miss Vermont of 1956.

My eyes scanned the audience for my parents' faces.  Mother was weeping
copiously on the left side of the auditorium.  Dad and Nora were
clapping wildly on the right.  For one addicted to pleasing others, it
was a heady experience.

Suddenly I felt somehow terribly alone, vulnerable.  The thorns in a
mountainous bouquet of red roses pricked painfully at my arm.  In all
that noisy, spotlit room, only the pain seemed real.

Though I didn't know it, the pain had just begun.

 Into the Fast Lane Suppose a bottle should materialize before him
full and unopened.  Once assured of its reality, how calmly then, all
excitement gone, he would open it and pour, almost not needing it in
the security the sight of it gave him.  But he would drink it, of
course.  He wouldn't care how bad it tasted-un-iced, without water or
soda, lukewarm, stinking, throttling.  He would drink a good half-glass
at once and at once the pricking nerves would die down, the thumping
heart quiet, the fatigue and ease come warmly over him at last, That's
what liquor and only liquor could do for him.... --Charles Jackson The
Lost Weekend E MORNING AFTER THE VERMONT PAGEANT I AWOKE IN MY FATHER S
hhome to the scent of roses.  I rolled over in bed and touched the
gleaming trophy on the nightstand.  So it wasn't a dream; it had really
happened.

"Here's the morning paper, Miss Vermont," my stepmother chirped,
bringing coffee.

"Your picture's on the front page."

Indeed it was.  There above an expanse of bare shoulders, a mass of
greenery and flowers obscured my eyes.  Only the tip of my nose

protruded out from under the foliage like a shiny cautious mouse.

"Oh, no," I groaned.

"I look like a tossed salad."

Weeks later the same horrid picture glared at me from the slick pages
of Confidential magazine.  The magazine staff had amassed the most
unflattering photos of state pageant winners they could dig up and
concocted what they felt was a real pageant expose.  The caption under
my picture: Is This Vermont's Best?

Shortly thereafter each contestant received an unsettling flood of
letters from members of a fundamentalist group as we prepared to go to
Atlantic City for the Miss America Pageant.  We were informed through
elaborate maps and diagrams that we had chosen the road to death and
destruction.

My oversized crown was not the only unflattering aspect of the
newspaper picture.  At 146 pounds I was twenty pounds overweight.  A
stint as tennis instructor at a summer camp turned out to be a good way
to prepare for the Miss America Pageant looming ahead in September in
Atlantic City.  The campers monitored every mouthful of food I ate and
by late August the twenty pounds were gone.

Meanwhile, filling the duties of Miss Vermont had its perilous aspects.
Who, for example, would have anticipated horse shows?  At these
appearances it was my duty to tromp to the center of the field, present
trophies to the victorious riders, and pin the ribbons to the bridles
of their snorting, gasping mounts.  Since horses have terrified me
since early childhood, these ribbon ceremonies represented pure
torture.

The Stowe Horse Show was almost canceled by heavy rains.  But "the show
must go on."  At the judge's nod I picked my way gingerly through mucky
clods of earth toward the biggest, blackest stallion ever born.

As I approached, this black monster reared up on his hind legs.  When
his right front hoof came down, it pummeled my left foot into the
slime, driving my periwinkle pump several inches into the Into the
Fast Lane mud.  Only my stocking foot emerged, undamaged-but how does
one walk off the field with one shoe?  My fear of the beast turning to
indignation, I began to dig furiously for the submerged pump.  Some
unseen force was pulling it in the opposite direction.  By now my white
gloves were two clunky paws.  At last I struggled upright, clutching
the oozing shoe, while a nervous judge helped me off the field past the
tittering onlookers.

Unaware that my insecurity had turned me into an all-out
people-pleaser--especially with men to whom I automatically looked for
approval-I accepted blindly all suggestions put forward by the Vermont
Development Commission, the Chamber of Commerce, and the Vermont Ski
Association.  In spite of the fact that September was breaking all heat
records, I agreed to travel to Atlantic City dressed in ski garb.  The
outfit they chose made me look like a raspberry-colored walrus.
(Raspberry was the newest and most daring shade in ski wear in 1956.)
But I lived to please.

Departure day at Burlington's airport was the initial test. Approaching
the plane I had my first tussle with my cumbersome skis and poles. 
Even though laced together, they clearly had a mind of their own and
poked out of my frantic grasp in all directions.  Trying to be terribly
nonchalant, despite the trickles of perspiration running down my face
in the 80' heat, I stumbled up the narrow stairs of the DC-7, my ski
boots massive lead weights.  Somehow the stewardess and my traveling
companion, a charming woman named Barbara who was director of the
Vermont Pageant, got me sandwiched into the narrow seat.

Getting off the aircraft at La Guardia Airport for a change of planes
was difficult, but a breeze compared to my encounter with the revolving
doors inside the terminal.  Barbara sensed impending disaster.

"Clasp your skis and poles close to your body," she urged.

"Take teensie steps until you get around, then step out slowly."

Holding my breath, I clattered into the swirling cubicle.  What
happened next I can hardly describe.  Skis, poles, and I flew from
the

spinning contraption like an exploding pinwheel.  Barbara darted to
safety as a pole zipped by her head.  Stunned onlookers peered in
disbelief at the tangled mass of steel and bamboo that lay sprawled on
the marble airport floor.

We did eventually arrive at the Atlantic City airport where we were
whisked into a pageant limousine.  When we emerged at the Claridge
Hotel, Barbara collared the photographer who had been assigned to
record my arrival.  Where was that promised brisk breeze from the
ocean?  I was about to faint from the heat.

"Let's set up the shot on the beach," the photographer suggested,
leading us across the boardwalk and onto the scalding sand.  There I
strapped the skis to my boots and crouched in my best downhill position
while he took shot after shot.

The blowing sand caked my perspiring face and stuck in my teeth.  My
knees felt as though they'd never unbend.

Afterward I clomped off dutifully to Registration.  Assembled
contestants floated about the palatial ballroom perfectly coiffed and
groomed-immaculately pressed, buttoned, and zippered.  Over in the
corner, by contrast, was propped a wretched raspberry robot, fumbling
with skis and poles.

The net result of the ski publicity attempt:

1. No picture in any paper-local or otherwise.

2. Two huge blisters on both heels.  Pageant week continued to provide
one glitch after another.  I spilled food and broke my zipper at a
crucial moment.  At the end of my talent presentation I forgot the
presence of stage hands and bustled about cleaning up my equipment,
causing, to my mortification, a burst of laughter from the audience.

Yet'this very laughter served as my escape.  As I'd learned, first as a
child, then as a teenager, I covered my confusion with pranks and
pratfalls.  It won me acceptance from the other contestants, who voted
me Miss Congeniality.

Once again the press handling did little for my ego.  One reporter

noted that my listed weight of 146 pounds (recorded before I had
dropped the twenty pounds) was the highest of any contestant, and wrote
this caption under my picture: Fattest At Pageant Is Fri.endliest.

Nevertheless, my future seemed full of promise.  The day after the Miss
America Pageant (beautiful Marian McKnight of South Carolina won that
year), I was flown to New York and introduced to the Broadway columnist
Walter Winchell.  Winchell delighted in discovering young talent and
creating opportunities for them.  Thus began an unusual friendship. 
Probably because my naivete intrigued him, he took a fatherly interest
in my career.

One night I was escorted by Winchell and Joe DiMaggio to a party for
Judy Garland at the Plaza Hotel.  The small-town girl from Vermont
gazed around the room awestruck at the celebrities from sports and show
business.  In the glow of the flickering candles and flowing champagne,
the world seemed a warm and wonderful place.  I became hooked on the
celebrity lifestyle.

Hoping to launch me in an entertainment career, Winchell got me breaks
on television variety shows.  But even his clout could not compensate
for the fact that I was a lousy actress.

By now I was going to classes at the Parsons School of Design in New
York City, and working part-time at the Vermont Development Commission
office in the Radio City Music Hall building.  There I met the
Operations Manager of Disneyland who offered me a job as an artist
doing caricature sketches of tourists.  Soon I moved into a Newport
Beach, California, beach house with three other girls.

After a two-week apprenticeship under a Disneyland instructor, I was
assigned a location at Sleeping Beauty's Castle.  My first assignment
might have served as a warning of trouble to come.  A young mother with
three sons signed up to have each child sketched.  The first two
likenesses flew easily from my pad.  Not so the third.  The little boy
wiggled, slid down from his chair, made

faces, stuck out his tongue.  The first three tries were disastrous,
the fourth barely acceptable.

I was close to tears.  What was wrong?  Why was my hand shaking?  Could
it have been because of the beach party that had gone on until two that
morning?  My roommates seemed to feel fine after these late nights. Why
couldn't I stop after one or two drinks the way they did?

In any case, the Disneyland job lasted only for a season.  Pepsi Cola,
one of the Miss America Pageant sponsors, offered me a position in
their public relations department with a good salary and an expense
account.  I moved back to New York City.

One of my first assignments was to go to Providence, Rhode Island, to
help with a fashion show promotion put on by the local Pepsi bottler.
While strolling down the familiar streets-it was hard to believe three
years had passed since my father's phone call ended my stint at the
Rhode Island School of Design-an episode occurred that, once again,
should have alerted me to the excessive side of my personality.

Ahead I saw a familiar storefront logo: Kays of Newport.  As a student,
I'd drooled over their gorgeous shoe windows, but could never afford a
single pair, even on sale.  Today the store windows were swathed in
wide paper banners.  Relocation Sale!  50-75% off!!

Seated inside the store on a plush velvet chair, I smiled nervously at
the salesman.

"I was thinking of a little evening sandal in silver," I said, trying
to sound sophisticated.

Soon he returned balancing six shoeboxes.

"Ooo6h," I squealed amid a flurry of fuschia tissue paper, as he
slipped a gleaming sandal with rhinestone trim onto my foot.

"I'll take them," I gasped enthusiastically, not wanting to appear
gauche and ask the price.

"Would you care for something similar in gold?"  he asked.

More boxes, more mountains of tissue.

"These lucite sling pumps with rhinestone heels are very new.

If they were very new, I wanted them.  After all, I was expected to be
a trend-setter, wasn't P Back and forth from the treasure trove behind
blue velvet curtains he bounced, arms laden with boxes-black patent
pumps, red espadrilles, blue-and-white candy-striped "slings," purple
iridescent slippers, navy suede sandals, charcoal gray dinner shoes,
yellow flats with flower trim.

"Yes .. . yes .. . yes," I kept saying.

By now the tower of boxes around my chair was obscuring me from the
rest of the store.  The sales staff were clearly impressed.  So were
other customers.  Who was this extravagant mystery woman?  I loved the
attention.

An hour later my shopping hinge was complete: twenty-two pairs of
shoes, five matching handbags.  One entire month's salary gone.  The
purchases would be delivered to my hotel that afternoon.

How was I going to pay my rent?  Somehow that didn't matter.

I floated back to the hotel in a euphoric trance.  From then on,
shopping would give me what almost amounted to a chemical high.

Dr.  David J. Juroe, writing in his book Money, comments on just this
kind of reaction: "For those inclined toward buying, compulsive
spending sprees keep them on excitable highs, away from being bored or
listless about life.  What really happens is that the compulsive
striving, in this case spending, sustains the constant activity that is
needed to distract them from the real inner disturbances.  " I was to
become very much like the Liza Moran described as follows in
"Compulsive Shopping" (April 1986 Glamour):

It is 7:00 p.m. and twenty-eight-year-old Liza Moran is in tears
because her boyfriend has just called to cancel their dinner date. This
has happened four times in the past month; Liza is afraid the
relationship is falling apart.  She looks at the clock, realizes the
stores are open until 9:00 tonight, and heads out the door.

Several hours later, Liza returns home with a $200 cashmere sweater and
a $ 15 0 pair of suede boots.  She would have bought even

more but she had already used up most of her available credit on an
earlier $ 1000 shopping hinge that began after her boyfriend canceled a
weekend in the country.

The article went on to describe Liza Moran (not her real name) as a
compulsive shopper.  When anything goes wrong in her life, she spends
money.  Liza even uses the language of drug addicts to describe her
shopping sprees and their guilty aftermath.

"I get high when I catch the first whiff of perfume from the cosmetics
counters," she says.

"I'm flying the whole time I'm in the stores.  The crash comes the next
day, when I look at the pricetags on everything I've bought.  I tell
myself I'll never do it again, but I know I will.  The high is worth
the letdown."

The pace of my own life speeded up.  Early morning plane departures.
Cabs, terminals, hotel lobbies.  Hands to shake, speeches to make, an
endless blur of faces and places.  Lonely room service dinners.  A
drink to blunt the loneliness.  Better still, two drinks..  ..

The glamour soon began to wear off as I battled the pinchers and
strokers who grabbed at me.  At times I felt like a plastic wind-up
Barbie doll, at other times like a trained seal: "Throw me a fish and
I'll balance a ball on my nose!"

"How many other gals are raking in the dough you're making, doll?"  one
Pepsi bottler asked.

True.  I would be silly to quit such a rewarding job.  Yet if people
only knew how grim it was to live out of a matched set of turquoise
Samsonite.  Finally I placed a call to my boss in New York: "Mitch, I
can't go another mile.  I've been on the road now for five weeks
straight.  May I take a rest?"

"Sure.  Why don't you take a few days in Palm Springs and soak up the
sun."

Sitting by the pool of a fancy resort hotel, I let the warm California
sun melt away my battle fatigue.  I knew I was drinking too much.

Often I'd made promises to myself-one more drink and I'd toddle off to
bed.  Too often there'd been a rising sun on those words.  Time only
for a shower, a change of clothes, then it was back to the cola wars.

Reaching for the suntan oil I realized hours had passed.  The pool
waiter was certainly efficient.  I wondered if he'd counted all the
drinks he'd served me.  It didn't matter if he had.  I was an important
public relations woman.  In the big leagues now.

Weaving slightly toward the thatched snack hut, my toe caught in a
chaise lounge leg and down I went onto the pool tarmac.  Four waiters
in safari uniforms leaped to my rescue.  Gently they seated me at a
glass table under a tilting purple canvas umbrella.

"May I bring you something to eat, miss?"  one asked.

My skinned knees burned.

"Yes, bring me one of those pineapple things with shrimp .. . and
perhaps a vodka martini on the rocks.  " After all, it was lunchtime
and the guys back in New York would be at the Cub Room starting on
their Bloody Marys.  It was a ritual I missed.  The camaraderie.  The
comfort of that coterie of bodies pressed together at our end of the
bar.  The Bloody Marys and the inevitable London broil accompanied by
soggy sliced tomatoes and mushy green beans.  Nirvana!

Another martini arrived.  The whiff of juniper pricked my nostrils as
the first bracing jolt of the velvety liquid exploded my taste buds.

Wow, Simpson, you're a fireworks gal!  You glitter, You flash.  You
dance in the sky.

Although for me at least at first-alcohol acted as a stimulant, it is
known to depress the activity of the central nervous system.

Drs.  Ray Hodgson and Peter Miller, in Self-Watching: Addictions,
Habits, Compulsions, describe the effects of alcohol as follows: "In
small doses fit] results in a lessening of tension and a feeling of
relaxation and lack of inhibition.  Increased dosage, however, leads to
a progressive loss of control over judgement, skills and emotions,
often accompanied by violence and aggression.  In large doses

alcohol poisons the whole system and may result in coma followed by
death.  Alcohol also has a long history of inducing a dependence which
is notoriously difficult to break.  " Traveling with the current Miss
America became one of my greatest challenges at Pepsi (I was now the
Coordinator of the Miss America/ Pepsi Cola Scholarship Foundation). 
It was my responsibility to see that her public appearance schedule was
kept within limits.  Not an easy task when the host bottler was paying
a thousand dollars a day and wanted her to visit his favorite Aunt
Minnie for 'just a couple of minutes."

Then there were those harrowing evenings when the new queen was to
appear at the same function where Mrs.  Alfred Steele (Joan Crawford,
wife of the Pepsi Board Chairman) was also to be.  As Walter Winchell
warned: "Don't invite Miss America (any Miss America) and La Belle
Crawford to the same party."  When it happened, as it had to, we
staffers went into maneuvers not unlike a beachhead invasion, complete
with walkie-talkies, to make sure those two stellar females didn't
cross paths.  Mrs.  Steele didn't like to share the spotlight with
beautiful younger women.

I used to have the cold sweats hearing in Mrs.  Steele's icy voice the
words I most feared: "Miss Simmmmmmmsunnnnn!"

Joan Steele was a diminutive dynamo in matching couture creations.  Her
hat, gloves, handbag, and dress were frequently stitched from the same
bolt of fabric; those high-heeled sandals with clear plastic ankle
straps were her trademark.  The famous crystal blue eyes, flashing
under the black slashes of her eyeliner, and the stony set of her
crimson, butterfly-shaped lips could transform me into a pillar of
salt.

I developed an especially close relationship with Marilyn Van Derbur,
Miss America of 1958.  One evening after a long, stressful afternoon of
appearances, Marilyn, her official pageant traveling companion, and I
decided to have dinner sent up to her suite in an Atlanta hotel.  We
ordered filet mignon, which arrived on a pink

linen-skirted room-service table, along with a bouquet of pink
sweetheart roses.

"Thank God this day is over!"  I gasped as we kicked off our shoes and
collapsed into chairs about the table.

"Why don't you do just that?"  Marilyn urged.

"Just what?"  I asked, trying to blink away the rum punches I had
gulped down in the hotel bar before coming up.

"Thank God Why don't you say grace, Sandy, so we can start on this
gorgeous dinner!"

I was nonplused.  I didn't know a grace to say.  I couldn't remember
the last time I'd heard one.

Then she rescued me.

"That's okay, Sandy, I'll say it.  You've had a rough day.  " Softly
Marilyn thanked God for his goodness, for his protection, for her
responsibilities and privileges as Miss America.  I suddenly wished I
could talk to God as she just had.  How many years had it been since I
had gone to Sunday school or church?  Five?  More like ten.

What I couldn't understand was why I wasn't enjoying my life more.  I
was meeting glamorous and important people; I had a solid income
(although never quite enough to cover my shopping flings) and all the
travel and excitement I'd ever dreamed of.  Yet I was empty and
frustrated and needy and scared.  Nothing was filling that void in my
chest regardless of what I tried to stuff inside me.  It was a hole so
empty that the wind seemed to blow through it.

I was twenty-two and alone too much.  Drinking by myself more and more.
on lonely evenings my mind would travel wistfully the 11
white-cottage-and-rose-trellis" route.  Maybe it was time for me to get
out of the fast lane and settle down somewhere.  "(The Cinderella
Complex) used to hit girls of sixteen or seventeen," writes Colette
Dowling, "preventing them, often, from going to college, hastening them
into early marriages.  Now it tends to hit women after college-after
they've been out in the world a

while.  When the first thrill of freedom subsides and anxiety rises to
take its place, they begin to be tugged by that old yearning for
safety: the wish to be saved The Cinderella Complex."

But where is Prince Charming when you really want to find him?  For me
he turned up in a most unlikely place: Billings, Montana.  The Pepsi
bottler there had arranged for a blind date for me.

"Oh, no," I groaned, recalling disastrous evenings set up for me in
other cities.

"But he's Billings' most eligible bachelor!"

"Maybe the most eligible bachelor in the whole Northwest," the Pepsi
supplier chimed in.

"And to top it all off, he's a doctor!"

Bells went off in my brain.  Wedding bells.  A doctor.  That
rose-covered cottage.  Security.  Prestige.  A man to depend on.  A man
to love me.  I had myself walking down the aisle in yards of white
Chantilly before I had even met him.

And when I did, he was ruggedly handsome a tanned, angular face, sandy
blond hair, tall, athletic frame.

The evening flew by .. . a blur of cocktails at his apartment, dinner
in a dimly lit Chinese restaurant, dancing at the Skyline Club atop the
rim rocks that formed the northeast border of the city.  My heart was
dancing as fast as my feet.

Parked outside my hotel in the wee hours of the morning, Werner leaned
an arm on the wheel of his Thunderbird convertible and looked me
straight in the eye.

"Young lady, I think I want to marry you.

Nine weeks later we were en route to Europe on our honeymoon.  Who is
this stranger I married?  I thought, waking in a Paris hotel to see a
tousled head on the pillow beside me.  We knew so little of each other.
A flurry of phone calls, flowers, I love you letters.  So little time
together-maybe two weeks total, if that.

I was suddenly frightened.  Marriage was such a big step and I was so
ill-prepared.  Maybe this isn't really happening.  Maybe I'll be

getting on a plane in a little while, on my way to some Pepsi
promotion.  But no, I was replacing one treadmill with another.

The honeymoon was a string of riotous days and nights.  Afterward
Werner stayed on for a radiology conference scheduled months before,
while I went on ahead of him to New York.

A week later I met him at the International Arrivals Building at
Kennedy Airport with some unexpected news.  I felt sure I was
pregnant.

His face dropped.  So did the ever-present pipe in his mouth.

"All those people in Billings will think we had to get married," I
wailed as we headed for home.

"That's okay, honey," Werner assured me.

"Let 'em talk.  You and I have got the world by the tail."

Wrong.  I had a tiger by the tail.  Its name was alcohol.  The
invitations started as soon as we got back to Billings.  Who was the
beauty queen from the East who had snatched the town's most
sought-after unattached male?  Many seemed dying to know.

Dinner parties, luncheons, summer barbecues-an endless flow of social
engagements.

Usually parties were my forte.  Not when I was pregnant, I soon
learned.  Would I ever be able to stop carrying my little bag of soda
crackers?

Sitting on the lawn of our lovely new brick home on Rimrock Road during
Werner's long days at the hospital, I'd look out at the college campus
across the street, wrestling with the feeling of unreality that still
swept over me.  The collie dog at my side looked up at me with adoring
moist brown eyes.  Was this really me?  The doctor's wife in Billings,
Montana?

Nine months after our marriage our son was born.  We named him
Bradford, after Brad Frapart, the business manager of the Miss America
Pageant who'd become a good friend.

Our Brad was adorable, a cuddly bundle.  It was almost like playing
dolls, only this doll cried and shrieked.

I'd never been around a baby before.  Werner assured me that motherhood
would come naturally.  In his eyes, apparently, mothers were
all-capable.  Twenty minutes after his son and I got home from the
hospital, he headed out the door to go bowling.

Brad was four months old when my doctor told me I was pregnant again.

To help me adjust to this news, Werner took me to Mexico.  We left Brad
in Billings with Werner's parents-strict, old-world German Swiss who
still spoke with heavy accents.  I was intimidated by my mother-in-law.
She towered over me in every sense a devout Christian always talking
about "the good Lord."  I couldn't remember what was so good about
him.

"Bring me another Margarita," I said now to the hovering beach
waiter.

Brent burst into the world feet first the following April and never
stopped running.  An active, cheerful, precocious baby, he kept me
running, too.  I was lifting him from his bath one morning when I
caught sight of Brad grinding the contents of a can of coffee into the
gold carpeting of the dining room with his little saddle shoe.

"I'm not cut out for this," I moaned as I raced to retrieve the can
from Brad's chubby fist.

"I need a drink.  " "I deserve a drink."

Brent was four months old when the doctor again had staggering news.

"I'm pregnant again, Polly," I told the woman who was living with us
now to help care for the two little boys.

"That's wonderful!"  she exclaimed.

"Wouldn't you like to lie down and rest?"

Lie down?  I wanted to flee somewhere, anywhere.  There was a junior
League meeting that afternoon.  Or was it the Medical Auxiliary?  An
addict to volunteering, I belonged to every organization in town that
could keep my mind off the growing silence between Werner and me.

Here is a description from Nancy Friday's best selling My MotherlMy
Self of the kind of anxiety-ridden, angry, compulsive woman I had
become: "The compulsive housekeeper, the lioness of the Anti-Porn
Society, the nonstop charity-worker, the overprotective and critical
mother who does it all for someone else's good who can fault these
people out loud?  .. . Very often, these women are obsessive
compulsive-suffering from forms of behavior that seem to have nothing
to do with anger.  Unlike depressed people who turn their anger within,
against themselves, the obsessive compulsive express theirs
outwardly-but in such an indirect way they never need face their furies
at all.  " My third pregnancy was the hardest of all.  In my sixth
month, regularly as clockwork at one in the afternoon, the premature
labor pains would begin. Hospitalization was the only way to prevent
the baby from being born too early.  For six weeks I lay in a room on
the maternity ward.  And every afternoon at one the familiar pains
would begin.

Lisa was a beautiful little girl with dark curls.  Six weeks premature,
her head was barely larger than a tennis ball.  So fragile.  So
helpless.  So in need of dedicated mothering.

With Lisa's birth I'd had three children in less than three years.
Lying in bed in the hospital through the weeks of waiting had been a
time for reflection.  How little of this there'd been in my twenty-five
years!  I seemed to have careened through life with my motor racing.  I
couldn't seem to turn it off.  I want .. . I want .. . I want had
fueled it.

"Anything worth doing is worth overdoing" seemed to be my motto.

But surely now, as a mother with three children, I could stop
scrambling for whatever it was that kept eluding me.  Now I would slow
down, savor, devote myself to raising my family.

I returned home with my daughter in my arms and high resolve

in my heart-and was soon driven as frenetically as ever.  I didn't yet
apply the word compulsive to my behavior.

Nor had I ever considered an observation like that of Stanton Peele, a
social psychologist and probably the foremost expert on addictive
behavior: "A person will be predisposed to addiction to the extent that
he cannot establish a meaningful relationship to his environment as a
whole, and thus cannot develop a fully elaborated life.  In this case,
he will be susceptible to a mindless absorption in something external
to himself .. . his susceptibility growing with each new exposure to
the addictive object (or experience]."

In fact, there were a succession of habits I seemed powerless to stop.
The more I hated myself for them, the more I did them.  The
chain-smoking that had begun in lonely hotel rooms now launched the
day: I couldn't get out of bed until I had a lighted cigarette in my
hand.  The four-letter words I'd acquired as "one of the boys" popped
out increasingly when I least intended them.

What to do about my bulging waistline?  I hated the flab and knew I
needed to do something about it.  Exercise!  jogging!  I bought black
tights and a leotard for workouts, a warm-up suit, and a pair of
running shoes for jogging.  At a women's program at the Y, I groaned
and moaned through my first session.  Agony!  Next I donned my running
gear and jogged around the wooden running track until cramps forced me
to stop.

Day after day the same routine.  Exercise, jogging, then I pummeled my
fat on the wooden rollers and my hips with the canvas vibrating
machine.  My body began to revolt.  Cramping, nausea, clouded vision. I
simply didn't know when to stop.

"Jogging .. . can become addictive in its own right," writes
psychotherapist Howard M. Halpern in How to Break Your Addiction to a
Person.

"I have seen people so obsessed with running and so uncomfortable and
anxious about missing a planned run that the activity begins to
interfere with other important areas of life."  (See section on
Compulsive Exercising, p. 231

Far from cutting down outside activities, however, I continued to
volunteer for every civic cause that came along.  I'd open my mouth to
say no and out would come, "Of course!  I'd be glad to."

Where was my backbone?  But Polly was so competent with the children,
so patient and steady .. . so unlike me.  The only part of married life
in which I felt confident was entertaining-and a doctor's wife did lots
of that.

So the years slipped into a pattern: part-time mothering, full-time
socializing.  The drinks required to get me into a party mood grew in
number.  So did the awkward moments, the blackouts, the incidents I
simply could not remember.

Like the turkey episode one Thanksgiving.  Our guest list had grown to
twelve.  Preparation the day before had involved marketing, fixing
dishes ahead of time, fussing over the table setting, arranging fresh
flowers.  Before dashing out the door for a luncheon date, I decided to
stop at the super market and pick up a larger bird on my way home.

Four o'clock already!  How I hated to pry myself away from those
after-lunch coffee-and- brandies at the Golden Belle to face the
teeming hordes at the grocery store.

The turkey department was a free-for-all.  People pushing and elbowing
one another to extricate the frosty birds from their refrigerated
nests.  A twenty-five pound frozen turkey isn't the easiest object to
maneuver.  As I lowered mine into my cart, waves of dizziness and
nausea swept through me.  Why did I drink so much?  I didn't seem to be
able to stop anymore.  I'll start catting down tomorrow, I promised
myself Back at home I faced a new problem: Where was I going to thaw
the turkey?  The clothes dryer!  The perfect place!

Thanksgiving morning I crawled shakily out of bed to get the turkey
into the oven.  A bird that size would take many hours.  Now where was
it?  Not in the refrigerator, I quickly discovered.  With

increasing frenzy I searched the car trunk, bathtub, downstairs shower,
outside barbecue, the roof of the tool shed..  ..

How many drinks had I had yesterday?  An attic-to-cellar search aided
by all three children failed to unearth the elusive bird.  Twelve
guests arriving at three o'clock!  I was in a panic.  While making a
last-ditch sweep through the laundry room, I saw hanging limply from
the open dryer door a golden yellow tag: Swift's Butterball.

A scarier episode occurred many months later after a party at the
Yellowstone Country Club, I didn't remember driving home.  Around three
A.M. I awakened to see lights glaring into the bedroom window.

Struggling to my feet and pushing back the drapes, I observed a
peculiar scene in our front yard.  There on the lawn sat the white jeep
Wagoneer I had driven alone to the party.  (My husband had had to
attend a special meeting and had gone in his own car.) The jeep's
headlights on high beam were blazing into my aching eyes.  Both doors
were wide open, an inside ceiling light illuminated the car's
interior.

At first glance it looked like an errant UFO.  I stumbled out the front
door and through the thick grass to the lighted vehicle.  Cautiously I
backed the jeep across the lawn, over the short curb into the street,
then into our driveway.

Back in bed I noted gratefully that my husband had not awakened.  You
lucked out this time, kiddo.  When are you ever going to learn?

The next morning I dragged myself out of bed, started the coffeepot,
then headed out the front door to fetch the morning paper.  As I passed
by the jeep, my glance turned into a stare of horror.  Red stains
covered the splash panels behind the front wheels.  Long, ugly reddish
streaks were splattered on the white door.  The touch of a trembling
finger confirmed my worst fears.  It was blood.

What had I done?  Had I run over someone last night?  Had I killed
someone?  Oh, my God!

Dashing to the mailbox, I yanked the Sunday paper from the metal box
with such intensity I skinned my knuckles.  Tearing the rubber band
from the paper, I searched the front page for a hit-and-run story,
forgetting that of course there'd been no time to make today's news.

Nothing there.  Frantically I spread the paper on the ground, tearing
and flailing at the pages to find the item I didn't want to see.  Still
nothing.  Gathering up the mangled newspaper, I headed back for the
kitchen, my heart pounding.  My head was splitting from front to back.
What had I done?

"Lord God, -I will never, ever drink again!  just tell me I haven't
killed anyone and I'll go on the wagon for the rest of my life!"

My husband entered the kitchen and eyed the jumbled newspaper.

"Did this thing get hit by a bus?"  he asked, reaching for the sports
section.

I was standing pressed up against the sink, taking short breaths so as
not to faint from fear.

"Did you hear that dogfight this morning?"  he went on.

"I had to go outside and turn the hose on them.  The setter across the
street got bitten badly; his blood's all over the jeep."

The relief that flooded through me made my knees buckle.

"Gosh, no, I didn't hear a thing.  " My vow never to drink again lasted
exactly ninety minutes.  As I fixed my children's breakfast I decided
to treat myself to a Bloody Mary.  I had something to celebrate!

These 1985 statistics from the National Council on Alcoholism are
certainly nothing to celebrate: There are 18.3 million adult "heavy"
drinkers in the U.S. (who consume more than fourteen drinks a week). Of
these, 12.  1 million are alcoholics (one-third of them women)-an
increase of 14.3 percent since 1980.

New research indicates that women apparently metabolize alcohol
differently from men-due, perhaps, to hormonal levels; the menstrual
cycle; birth control pills; or even to women's lower percentage of
water content and higher percentage of body fat.

Whatever the cause, observes Ms.  magazine (February 1987), it adds up
to the fact that "alcoholism and all its health consequences tend to
'telescope'-proceed at a much faster pace within a female body.  "
Researchers for the Ms.  survey, moreover, found that as drinking
increases, so does other addictive behavior, Alcohol, drugs, tobacco
and food, according to psychoanalyst Theodore Rubin in Compassion and
Self-Hate, 11 are often used as sedative and anesthetic devices in an
attempt to relieve self-hate.

[Such people] put themselves into a temporary haze in order to escape
their feelings..  .. This device is also unfortunately and nearly
always unconsciously used as a form of slow suicide."

Are You an Alcoholic?

(The Johns Hopkins Questionnaire) Yes No I Do you lose time from work
due to drinking?

2. Is drinking making your home life unhappy?

3. Do you drink because you are shy with other people?

4. Is drinking affecting your reputation?

5. Have you ever felt remorse after drinking?

6. Have you gotten into financial difficulties as a result of
drinking?

7. Do you turn to lower companions and an inferior environment when
drinking?

8. Does your drinking make you careless of your family's welfare?

9. Has your ambition decreased since drinking?

10.  Do you crave a drink at a definite time daily?

11.  Do you want a drink the next morning?

12.  Does drinking cause you to have difficulty sleeping?

13.  Has your efficiency decreased since drinking?  k 14.  Is drinking
jeopardizing your job?

15.  Do you drink to escape from worries or trouble?

16.  Do you drink alone?

17.  Have you ever had a complete loss of memory as a result of
drinking?  IS.  Has your physician ever treated you for drinking?

19.  Do you drink to build up your self-confidence?

20.  Have you ever been to a hospital or institution on account of
drinking?

If you answer yes to any one of the questions, there is a definite
warning that you may have a problem with alcohol.  If You say yes to
any two, chances are you have a problem.  If you answer yes to three or
more, you definitely have a problem with alcohol.

The Cultist Real life is harsh.  It is constantly injuring our
sensibilities.  The temptation to escape from it by flight is the
stronger the more sensitive we are: We run away in order to protect our
sensitivity, to escape the conflict which wounds it.  The land of
dreams is close at hand, so that one can escape into it at any moment,
far from these painful realities..  .. It is a secret treasure into
which be pours the best of himself.  It is his way of turning the
tables on harsh reality.

Paul Tournier, M.D. The Healing of Persons DIDN'T WANT TO FACE MY
FURIES.  I WANTED SOMEONE ELSE TO DO IT FOR me.  Compulsive people are
particularly vulnerable to the quick fix of mind-bending fads and
cults.  We are dependency-prone.  We want to please.  And from
childhood I'd been attracted by the Invisible world.

11 Have you noticed what a vivid imagination Sandra has?"  relatives
would say of me.  Being an only child in a houseful of adults created
companionship problems.  So I created imaginary playmates.  The
characters in my fairy tale books became real people to me.  Draped in
face curtains and tottering in Mother's high heels, I was Cinderella
swirling in the arms of Prince Charming at the ball.

On warm, sunny days I'd scamper through the tall grass of our
neighbor's pasture to my magic hideaway in the woods.  It was a small
mossy shelf to the right of the path, which I pretended was my majestic
medieval bed.  My headboard was an enormous Vermont maple with low
hanging branches, my foot board a bush of wild roses.

Sometimes I'd bring along Ted, my lambskin teddy bear.  Ted and I were
great friends.  I'd prop him up on my chest facing the rosebush, so he
could see what I could see.  His black silk eyes were far more
perceptive than mine and he could spot an elf or a fairy at a hundred
yards.

Once as we were sitting there, a yellow butterfly landed delicately on
my chest.  I hardly dared breathe for fear I'd frighten this glorious
visitor.  As the butterfly remained balanced there, I felt our souls
touching at some mystical level.  So real were these fantasies that it
was often hard for me to return to everyday life.

Beautiful and innocent childhood fun, surely.  Where and how does it
begin to turn into something not so pure and good?

We often had a chicken wishbone at our house drying on the windowsill
over the kitchen sink.  Dad and I would wait till it was completely
dried for the ritual of breaking.  Whoever got the longer piece would
have his wish granted.

Superstition was part and parcel of New England life: Never walk under
a ladder.  If you spill the salt, throw some over your left shoulder,
Never put your hat on the he'd.  Never let a h1ack cat cross your path.
Never open an umhrella in the house.  If you leave the house and have
to go hack for something, sit down and count to ten he fore proceeding
on your way.

There were rabbit's foot key chains and horseshoes nailed over
doorways. (Make sure to mount them properly or the luck will slip
through.)

Then came a OuiJa board craze.  Great mysteries were revealed by this
means, I was assured by one neighbor.  She had special clairvoyant
insights and could tell you where you had lost things.  The police used
to go to her to ask about missing persons.  My mind whirled at such
powers.  In my early teens I made frequent visits to her house seeking
answers to all kinds of problems.

Once as a seventh-grader I attended a magic show at the Barre Municipal
Auditorium.  My friend Betty Lou and I arrived early to get front-row
seats.  The magician, the Great Garlock, was a character right out of
my early fairy tales.  Tall and handsome (who wouldn't look that way in
a tuxedo,-the first I'd ever seen), he wore a magnificent floor-length
black satin cape.

He needed twelve people to be hypnotized.  Were there any volunteers?
Betty Lou and I streaked to the stage.  Perched on wooden folding
chairs, we stared obediently into his intense blue eyes.

"Count backwards with me," he told us.

"One hundred .. . ninety-nine .. . ninety-eight .. .... Somewhere in
the eighties I lost consciousness.  When I awakened it was to gales of
laughter.  Later friends told us that after being given hypnotic
suggestions, we had scratched frantically as if covered by fleas and
shivered violently from icy cold blasts.

Afterward we volunteers stumbled down the steep stairs from the stage.
I crumpled uneasily into my seat.  Something was wrong.  My mind
wouldn't focus.  I felt confused, disjointed.

The Great Garlock spoke.

"If any of you I have just hypnotized have any problems bringing your
mind back into focus, I'll be here tomorrow morning in the director's
office to help you readjust.

Next morning I made the mile walk back to the auditorium.  The building
smelled of varnish and perspiration.  At my knock the door to the
director's office was flung open and there stood the towering black
figure from the night before.  He was wearing the long satin cape, yet
somehow it looked tawdry in the morning light.

"I'm one of the people you hypnotized last night," I told him.

"I've felt strange ever since you woke us up.  My mind seems fuzzy.
Everything's all mixed-up.  "

"You must be one of the very sensitive ones," the Great Garlock
replied.

"Really, what I did last night was routine.  Perhaps you went into a
higher plane of consciousness than the others.  " The man in the black
cape fixed his eyes on mine and started the countdown from one hundred.
I was aware of onions on his breath.

Suddenly I had the strangest sensation-as though something unknown,
something dark and disagreeable, were trying to climb right inside me.
My heart started pounding.

"I don't want to do that again," I walled.

"But you must if I am going to help you."

"Can't you do it any other way?"  I pleaded.

"Well .. . perhaps."

He pulled a chair beside mine and explained that he would call upon a
higher power to help me.  I didn't understand the words he used after
that.  Magicians must have their own language, I thought.

Ten minutes or more passed.  His voice trailed off into a chant.  I was
feeling very uncomfortable.

"You should have no further problems now, miss," he said at last.

I thanked him weakly and backed out of the room.  Did I feel any
better?  I wasn't sure.  A part of me felt violated that had felt safe
and secure before that night.

Psychic phenomena, however, continued to fascinate me.  It wasn't long
after the Miss America Pageant that I visited a woman who told fortunes
with a deck of cards.

"Your parents are divorced," she revealed.

"They live in close proximity.  " Quite true.

"You have just won a national honor," she went on.

"It will carry

you into new horizons of job opportunities and influential
relationships.  " This woman is wonderful, I thought.  The shoe-buying
orgy in Providence was my first look at my own tendency toward
excessive behavior.  Alarmed by this lack of control within, I started
looking for control outside myself.  Soon I was searching regularly for
the "Today's Horoscope" column in newspapers.  If my horoscope said to
beware of short trips, I'd hesitate to cross the street for a cup of
coffee.

When marriage to Werner failed to supply the needed external control, I
sought out a psychic in Billings.  She called herself Madame X-a
pot-roast of a woman, solid, round, with watery brown eyes and hair
pulled into a tight bun at the back of her neck.  I began to depend on
her for most of my decisions.

At one visit (fifteen dollars per session) she announced that we had
been joined by her "spirit guide" who also happened to be her dead
mother.  Together they went into the previous lifetimes they said I'd
had, including one as the wife of a cruel Chinese war lord who sold me
as a prostitute.  I was anxious to believe these revelations, my
imagination captivated by the intrigue of my supposed past.

To expand my psychic awareness Madame X encouraged me to attend the
weekly class she taught.  At these group sessions, held in the basement
of her modest home, she'd speak of members who were absent, telling us
what they were doing at the precise moment we were meeting.

"One mind exercise she taught was billet reading.  We would write
things on pieces of paper, fold them up, and pass them around in a
basket.  Picking one at random, we were to feel the vibrations of the
message and "read" it without opening it up.  I got to be pretty good
at it.  One of my friends tried to warn me against all this. 
Influenced no doubt by her Roman Catholic faith, Lois Ann a stately
brunette

with compelling blue eyes, called such practices "occult."  They were,
she informed me, "an abomination to God."  She even brought a Bible to
my house one day and read me a passage out of Deuteronomy:

Let no one be found among you ... who practices divination or sorcery,
interprets omens, engages in witchcraft, or casts spells, or who is a
medium or spiritist or who consults the dead.  Anyone who does these
things is detestable to the Lord..  ..

it struck me as a little far out but I didn't say anything.  The person
who brought the most stability into my life at this time was our
cleaning woman, Hilda, an outgoing, energetic woman with copper red
hair.  (Polly had gone to be with her grandchildren.) Hilda was more
than an employee.  She was a surrogate grandmother who had great
strength, endurance, love, and tenderness.  I often turned my
responsibilities to my children over to Hilda so that I could focus on
civic projects and social engagements.

Sometimes I would catch her looking at me sadly: "Sandy, you've got to
spend more time with these kids.  They need you.  You don't have to
volunteer for every committee in town.  The years will slip away, the
kids will grow up, and you'll have missed the most important time in
their lives.  " I knew she was right.  And I loved my children dearly.
But, compulsively driven as I was, I could only overwhelm them with
gifts and affection in sporadic efforts to make up for lost time.  What
little I was able to pass along to them issued right out of my own
compulsive traits.

My perfectionism where clothes were concerned, for example.  I used my
design training to see that the family's wearing apparel was
color-coordinated.  And one day I discovered that Lisa, age four, was
changing her clothes several times a day.  If her socks didn't match
her dress or sweater, she went into a frenzy, tearing through her The
Cultift dresser drawers for just the right combination.  The thought
that my daughter was growing up like me was scary.

What I didn't give our children was time.  My husband and I came home
late from a country club party to find Brad, Brent, and Lisa asleep in
the hall instead of their bedrooms.  For solace-for
companionship?-they'd wrapped themselves in their nylon comforters like
three little quilted cocoons.  Remorse tore at my heart.  Why didn't I
stay home more?  What was I doing to these tender little lives?

Werner, too, was seldom available to them.  Every daylight hour he
spent at the hospital or tennis court.  In addition, his practice took
him to other towns in Montana.  When I went to Madame X with a litany
of complaints against my workaholic doctor husband and his absenteeism,
she consulted her spirit guide and reported that we were not right for
each other.  I already knew that: at the ten-year point of our marriage
I was rationalizing my heavy drinking as the result of our
deteriorating relationship.  Werner and I were two utterly unconnected
people wandering in our own worlds.  Strangers when we married, the
passage of years had not brought us much closer.

What advice did Madame X have for improving my marriage?  The psychic
shook her head.

"You and your husband are working out your karma from other lifetimes.
Perhaps the next time around will be better for both of you.  " Since I
had suffered the trauma of my parents' breakup, divorce was the last
thing I wanted for myself and our children.  Nevertheless, it took
place legal separation in 1970, divorce the following year.  I moved to
our weekend home in Red Lodge, sixty-five miles from Billings, and
entered the three children in school there.

It was a miserable time for us all.  The children missed their father
and their friends back in Billings.  One fall morning my older

son Brad, then ten, announced he was running away.  He put on his
corduroy jacket over his jeans and shirt, packed a pair of socks, two
cans of tomato soup, a knife and fork, and a flashlight in a brown
paper bag.  Then he headed up the street, kicking the brown and yellow
aspen leaves as he went.

I watched him from the living room window, set to jump into the car and
follow him the moment he was out of sight.  Where the road turned,
however, he stopped.  For a long while he stood there, head bowed. Then
slowly he retraced his steps.  Inside the house he emptied the contents
of the paper bag onto the foyer floor.

"I'm back," he said.  I hugged him fiercely, his cowlick tickling my
nose.

Brad's unhappiness with the current arrangement remained, however, and
a few weeks after this episode he went to live with his father. Several
years later Brent would join him.

Meanwhile, I married again.  The answer to all my problems, I decided,
was another husband.  Perhaps this man could fix what was wrong with
me, fill that empty place.  The need for someone who could show me what
to do, who could bring control and order into my life, was
compelling.

"Too often," writes Dr.  Sonya Friedman in Men Arejust Desserts, "women
marry to escape their true selves, believing that marriage will make
life work for them.  Operating under the assumption that they are
incomplete, unformed, lacking the capacity to take care of themselves
financially or emotionally, they seek out a man who will be caretaker,
benefactor, lover, and hero-'everything' to them.  " Similarly,
psychoanalyst Karen Horney in her classic Feminine Psychology referred
to "neurotic women who feel unhappy, insecure and depressed as long as
they do not have someone devoted to them: who loves them or somehow
cares for them."

My new husband, Randall, was a sharp Billings trial lawyer, a man of
striking good looks.  The children and I were glad to be back

in Billings again, where we could see Brad more often, where Brent and
Lisa could visit their father, where I could resume my hectic social
schedule.  In my obsessive busyness it didn't occur to me that no
amount of outside activity, only a transformation inside, could
satisfy.  In my neediness I continued to cry out for answers from
anyone and everyone.

One day I saw an advertisement in the newspaper that read something
like this:

Who Are You?  Why Are You Here?

Looking for Answers?  Is inner contentment eluding you?  Come Wednesday
night to a lecture of The International Serenity Society* and
revitalize your life.

8 p.m. Comanche Room, Warbonnet Inn.

I have a date with destiny tonight, I told myself as I pulled my car
into the overflow parking lot of the hotel.  I was disregarding the
advice of Lois Ann who had warned, "Sandy, stay away from all that
hocus-pocus!  You're playing with fire."

I tuned out her words as I hurried up the concrete sidewalk and into
the sprawling dark brown stucco building.  Inside I found a
registration table strewn with alluring color pamphlets of the Serenity
Society.  I grabbed a handful and headed for the crowded lecture
room.

The evening's speaker was a stocky, handsome woman named Velda.  She
had short salt-and-pepper gray hair curled tightly about a strong
square face, and bright dark eyes that snapped knowingly behind thick
glasses.

Not the real name.

"The International Serenity Society has totally revolutionalized my
life," she began.

"For years I suffered from depression, asthma, and painful arthritis,
but this simple program has given me the tools to overcome these
problems.  Any one of you can change your lives this way, too."

The lecture lasted an hour.  Facts, graphs, humor, even Scripture.
Velda had a mixed bag of technical data and psychic techniques.  I was
captivated by her presentation, wanted to know more, and made a date
with her for a special counseling session the following morning.

At 10:45 A.M. I swung into the driveway of the address she'd given me,
a crisp twenty-dollar bill in my pocket.  Velda greeted me at the
screen door and invited me back to a book-lined study.  A tall
grandfather clock ticked in the shadows reminding me suddenly of Uncle
Ralph.  Feelings of helplessness, of the desire for some kind of
external control, flooded me.

When I was seated Velda explained how she would help me contact my
"spiritual guides" through her own guides, a process that involved much
eyes-closed concentration.

Apparently sensing uneasiness on my part, Velda assured me, "You have
nothing to be afraid of.  These guides are spirits who've been with you
ever since you were born.  Even before that.  They are committed to
helping you as long as you are on this side.  " Further revelation: I
had nine guides, which supposedly meant I had a very important earthly
mission.  Most people have but four or five.

"You are a very old soul," Velda told me, 11 a master who has returned
from many lifetimes.  You didn't have to come back this time but you
chose to.  " My head was spinning, the ticking clock setting the pace
of my heartbeat.

"What are you trying to tell me?"  I asked.

"That you are a prophet," she answered, "with strong visionary

capabilities-gifted in intuition, but confused in the feeling part of
your psyche.  " Before dismissing me, she urged me to attend the summer
camp of the International Serenity Society, which would be held in
Idaho at a place called Spirit Lake.

Should I go?  How I wished I had Madame X to advise me.  She'd died
recently of gall bladder trouble a terribly grubby earthly ailment, I
thought, for such an ethereal spirit.

In Madame X's classroom I'd heard about people who received answers via
"automatic writing."  Back at home I sat down at the kitchen table with
pencil and legal pad borrowed from my new husband's desk.  With pencil
poised, I waited self-consciously for some message from the spirit
world.

"Should I go to this camp?"  I wrote at the top of the page.

Now what?  Would some unseen force seize my fingers and spell out the
answer?  Would the pencil write by itself?  How did these discarnate
spirits communicate?

For a long time nothing happened.  Frustrated, I cried out, "Okay, if
there are nine of you guides out there, or in here, or wherever you
are, somebody please tell me something."

I felt my arm begin to shake with small tremors.  Placing the pencil on
the waiting pad, my hand scribbled, "YES.  GO."

Thrilled with this outward sign of affirmation, I sent in my
application.

I was a cauldron of conflicting thoughts and emotions when I returned
from Spirit Lake.  Part of my conscious mind was telling me it was all
nonsense-maybe even dangerous nonsense, as Lois Ann had warned. Another
part was telling me how fascinating this new knowledge was. Why, it
even contained Scripture.  Well, what sounded like Scripture.

What I didn't realize was that the compulsive woman unrecognized inside
me was finding a "high" in these experiences.  Psychic
phenomena-offering experiences like altered states of consciousness,
trances, perceptions of auras surrounding objects, even the exaltation
of becoming divine-attract people seeking a mood change, and can
deliver just as effectively (and addictively) as alcohol or drugs.

In fact, new research suggests chemical explanations for so-called
transcendental states of consciousness ("Anatomy of Ecstasy," American
Health, January/ February 1987).  Arnold Mandell, brain chemist and
professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego,
theorizes that meditation inhibits the action of the neurotransmitter
serotonin, ordinarily a brain-quieting hormone.  The result: increased
electrical discharges.  In Dr.  Mandell's words, "Affectual and
cognitive processes characteristic of religious ecstasy.  " Eugene
d'Aquili, a psychiatrist and neuroscientist at the University of
Pennsylvania, postulates that electrical stimulation of the parietal
lobe of the brain corresponds with advancing states of transcendence,
all the way to "ultimate mystic experience."

I knew nothing of such chemical explanations, of course, but was drawn
by the intrigue and spiritual euphoria promised by the Serenity
Society.  Since I had agreed to be the Montana representative, our home
soon became the destination of a steady stream of visiting ISS
"counselors," each one stranger than the last.  My new husband,
Randall, had welcomed these visitors good-naturedly at first, but his
attitude soon changed to frustration, then outrage at the constant
intrusions, the endless long-distance phone calls.  He was totally
turned off by my new psychic vocabulary: chakras, auras, reincarnation,
karma.

Desperate for help with my out-of-control drinking and the eating
binges with which it alternated, I began calling these

counselors for advice.  To each I described my inability to
concentrate; the mocking, haunting voices in my head; the ugly faces
that zoomed in and out of my mind whenever I closed my eyes.

"You've picked up some angry souls from a past life who are out to get
you, now that they have your attention," one told me.

"There is an as tro-soul counselor in the Denver area," another said.

"He could regress you through your former lives to find out just
exactly who is harassing you.  11 But the process, it seemed, would
take months and be very expensive.

A third adViser suggested I try cold showers.

"These dark spirits cannot stand the cold.  Cold baths work well, too.
You might want to throw in a couple of trays of ice cubes  Later this
same counselor called back long-distance (charges, of course, were
always reversed).  "We're having a conference here in Los Angeles this
weekend.  Friday night at ten o'clock sharp we will all send you our
energy.  Be standing under a cold shower so you can receive it.

At ten o'clock that Friday night (eleven o'clock my time) I was
shivering in the shower stall.  Was I receiving the promised energy?
The only observable result was a miserable cold.

Days, weeks, months passed while the sinister voices, the hideous faces
became more insistent.  Nothing could shut them out-not alcohol, not
the cakes and other sweets I'd slip into the kitchen to gorge on in the
middle of the night.

My weight was now crowding two hundred pounds; coloring and setting my
hair, taking time over my clothes-everything had become too much
trouble.  Once as I was standing in the checkout line at the grocery
store, I overheard a woman behind me whisper to someone else, "She was
in the Miss America Pageant?  She couldn't win a livestock show the way
she looks now!  " One day in desperation I remembered that my daughter
possessed

a-two-inch silver crucifix on a black silk cord; I found it in her top
bureau drawer and clutched at it for comfort, the sharp edges embedded
in my frantic palms.  But nothing seemed to help.

Nor any person.  My husband was bewildered by the change in my
appearance, and my enslavement to the bizarre practices of the Serenity
Society.  Brent and Lisa would come home from school and greet me with
troubled faces.  One day when I was out the two of them rifled through
my desk drawers and threw out what they could find of my Serenity
Society literature, explaining when I discovered the loss that it made
me "act funny."  I ached to be a real mother to them.  Yet I had
nothing to give.  I was totally consumed with self self-hatred and
self-pity-and spent endless hours in bed with the covers pulled up over
my head, the drapes closed to shut out any prying rays of the sun.

I had everything to live for and yet something inside me was pushing me
straight into a dark pit.

These days "channeling "-men and women giving up temporary use of their
bodies in order to channel the messages of spirits, ostensibly wise old
"ascended masters"-has become a multimillion-dollar business. In
California, according to the New York Times (May 10, 1987), consumers
can consult a reincarnated spirit" for as little as ten dollars or as
much as $ 1,5 00 an hour.  The best-known channels (formerly called
mediums) charge admission fees of $200 to $400 at weekend seminars that
attract hundreds of people.

The same Times article quotes Marcello Truzzi, professor of sociology
at Eastern Michigan University who specializes in paranormal research,
with this critique: "What we have is a tremendous democratization of
religion, allowing many people to be the pathway to the almighty.
Everybody has a pipeline, be your own guru; everybody is their own
priest.  It assuages guilt, tells people that what they are doing is
all right..  .

Psychiatrist Scott Peck, on the other hand, in The Road Less

Traveled, writes tellingly of the attempt to escape the anxiety and
pain of being responsible for one's self.  It is this anxiety that
drives the compulsive person to self-destructive acts and perilous
dependencies:

The difficulty we have in accepting responsibility for our behavior
lies in the desire to avoid the pain of the consequences of that
behavior..  .. Whenever we seek to avoid the responsibility for our own
behavior, we do so by attempting to give that responsibility to some
other individual or organization or entity.  By this means we then give
away our power to that entity..  .. In attempting to avoid the pain of
responsibility, millions and even billions daily attempt to escape from
freedom.

Why Live?

I do not believe a real urgency to die produces the suicidal act, so
much as the feeling of not knowing what else to do to ease the Pain.
The person is all out of struggles.

-Arthur janov, Ph.D.

The Primal Scream I WAS NOT UNTIL I ATTENDED THE COMPULSIVITY CLINIC,
YEARS LATER, that I gained true insight into my suicide attempt.  just
as Peggy, in our small group there, had started me thinking
systematically about my early years, so another group member helped me
look into the depths of the pit I had finally reached.

Ginny was a small, thin brunette with a soft voice, eyes full of hurt,
and an apologetic manner.  At the Compulsivity Clinic she had listened
to the lectures and small-group revelations with no sign of emotion.
Confronted by our group leader, Maureen, for her passiveness, Ginny had
opened up enough to say she loathed herself and had tried four times to
commit suicide' "You're full of anger, Ginny," Maureen informed her.

"That's what's behind your suicide attempts.  Suicide, you know, is the
ultimate angry gesture."

The mousy little woman shook her head in shocked denial.

"Yes, you are angry, Ginny.  You're angry at your father for abusing
your mother.  You're angry at your mother for putting up with it.  And
you're angry at them both for neglecting you.  You've stuffed these
feelings down for years.  When they wouldn't stay down, you turned this
rage on yourself."

Ginny again denied harboring such emotions.

"Everyone in this room is full of anger at someone or they wouldn't be
here," Maureen persisted.

"We're going to do something about yours right now."

With that she opened the closet in our small conference room and
brought out a hollow plastic bat.  Then she instructed the rest of us
to make a pile in the center of the room of the cushions we were
sitting on.

11 Now, Ginny, your father is here, sitting there in the corner
watching you.  Go ahead and whack these pillows as you talk to him. Let
it all pour out.  You need to get rid of your rage if you're ever going
to be healthy."

Protesting that it was silly, Ginny did it halfheartedly at first. Then
something seemed to explode in her.  Soon the room was reverberating
with her fury.  Quiet little Ginny had suddenly become the mouse that
roared.

"I hate you, Dad!"

Whack!  Splat!  .. for your filthy, rotten mouth!"  Whack!  Blap!

"For getting drunk all the time!"  Whack!  Thump!

"For beating Mom all those times when she couldn't fight back!"  Thunk!
Whap!

"For leaving us without money for food-and spending it on your creepy
friends!"

Whack!  Crack!

"For cheating on my mother!"

Whap!  Klop!

"I hate you ... I hate you.  Whack!  Whack!  Whack!  Ginny was so into
it now that she began kicking the pillows right through the open door
into the hall, all the while screaming, I hate you, you rotten,
miserable sob.!"

We were drained just watching her.  Ginny returned to the conference
room red-eyed but peaceful, spent by her outburst of pent-up emotion.

"That sure felt good," she exclaimed.

"Now I need some hugs."  Soon she was in my arms holding onto me as if
she would never let go, our tears running together.

I could identify with Ginny completely.  For I was remembering the time
several years before when I too had tried to end my life, and the
tremendous store of repressed anger I myself had found.  Therapy had
helped me discover a lifetime of bottled-up rage which was, Maureen
insisted, the major factor in most suicides.  I did not have the kind
of traumatic memories Ginny acted out.  But I had grown up in an
environment that blocked the free expression of negative emotion, an
environment that encouraged peace at any price.

There might be another reason for my anger, too.  The echoes roused in
me at the sight of Ginny's distorted face made me wonder suddenly: Did
all of us share an inheritance of fear and rage, roots deep in the
human past that I could have unwittingly tapped into when I opened
myself to the visitations of "spirit guides"?  By the time I arrived at
the Compulsivity Clinic I no longer believed the Serenity Society's
far-out theories about previous existences.  But those rage-twisted
faces, those shrieks and curses hounding me asleep and awake, had been
real enough.  Could I have invited Anger itself into my unconscious?

By the time of my second marriage I had also started seeing a
Psychiatrist, but we did little but spar with words.  Several times I

was a patient for a period of weeks on the psych ward of Billings'
Deaconess Hospital.  These served as brief drying-out times only.  Back
home each time I resumed my drinking to blot out the voices, the faces,
the reality of my failure as a human being.  One advantage of alcohol
as an escape is that it occupies your mind even when you're sober.  All
my creativity went into subterfuges to disguise the amount I was
consuming.

The Tuesday morning trash collection ritual, for example.  The moment I
heard the familiar grinding of the garbage truck down the street, I
would speed out to the garage where sat our two green plastic trash
cans.  Stealthily I would lift a white dress box from under a dusty
stack of discarded magazines nearby and place it into one of the
containers.

A gentle shake of the box satisfied me.  The bottles didn't rattle:

I'd wrap each one in tissue paper and Scotch tape.  Inside six empty
Smirnoff bottles lay like silent soldiers, shrouded for burial.

Quickly I would open the garage doors, push the cart containing the
bottles out to the street, then run back into the garage and fumble for
the "door close" button.  Whew!  One more time I'd gotten the bottles
out of the house before Randall had found them.

Getting rid of the empties had become an increasingly challenging
ritual.  They were always wrapped carefully so that the garbage men
wouldn't see them.  Heaven forbid these four faceless men (I never had
the nerve to look out the window to see what they actually looked like)
should know how much I drank!

An all-out commitment to soap operas was another way I drowned out the
painful situation around me.  The soaps had become my reality since it
was too difficult to face my failure as a mother and wife.

At eleven A.M. sharp I'd be seated in the den waiting for All My
Children to begin.  I'd surround myself with a nest of pillows on the
black naugahyde couch, make sure I had a fresh pack of cigarettes

and sometimes a sixpack of Pepsi with ice bucket and vodka bottle.  The
phone came off the hook.  I didn't want any interruptions.

As time went by, my repertoire of soaps expanded: The Young and the
Restless, The Days of Our Lives, Search for Tomorrow, The Edge of
Night, Another World.

The characters in the dramas became good friends.  I talked about them
as though they lived next door.  Each tragedy I eagerly identified
with, each triumph accepted reluctantly.  For my own life was still in
a shambles.

Even my grocery list was a problem.  Why burden my mind with more
decisions than I could cope with?  List in hand, I'd drive to the small
neighborhood grocery store, wrapping the paper around the steering
wheel so as not to lose it.  Once things got into my purse, they could
be lost forever, and I couldn't risk losing anything as important as
this.  I had to get dinner.  That was one function I still performed.
Yet it was becoming increasingly hard to stir and saute and chop and
fry.

Grocery shopping would have been impossible without the woman at the
checkout counter.  Somehow Shelly seemed to look past my rumpled
clothes, the dried vomit in my hair, my confused manner.  If she
suspected that the boxes of candy and cookies were not for "those
hungry kids" but for myself, she said nothing.  Sometimes she'd leave
her checkout line and help me assemble each item on my list.  She cares
about me, I thought on more than one occasion.  I wonder why.

One morning as I laced my steaming cup of black coffee with a healthy
slug from the vodka bottle, I remembered suddenly that Lisa's sixteenth
birthday was the following day.  By now Brent had joined Brad at his
father's; Lisa still lived with Randall and me.

Visions of a glorious birthday celebration suddenly danced in my head.
Lisa, radiant and smiling, her bright-eyed young girlfriends seated
about a candlelit table.  Great baskets of field flowers everywhere.  A
spectacular concoction of marzipan, whipped cream,

and candied violets ablaze with sixteen candles illuminating the
contours of her beautiful face.

"Make a wish and blow out your candles," I would urge her gaily.

"All of them, or your wish won't come true!"

But it was only a vision.  There wasn't time to invite guests.  And
anyway, Lisa's mother was .. . too sick to do it.  None of Lisa's
wishes were coming true.  The smiling sixteen-year-old of my daydream
was in reality a fretful, stressed young fawn, blinking shyly as she
surveyed her disenchanted forest.  Life in her stepfather's home was
increasingly tense; my remarriage was already floundering under the
strain of my progressing addictions.

Well, if it was too late to ask friends, at least we could have her
brothers over-make it a warm and wonderful family celebration!  At the
grocery store Shelly greeted me courteously and helped me find the
things I needed for the birthday dinner.  Back in my kitchen, I would
have just one beer before starting.  Three beers and two hours later, I
plodded through the motions of unpacking the groceries.

I must make tomorrow special for Lisa!  After all, a sixteenth birthday
is very important.  I recalled how often as a tiny girl she'd stood by
my bed with a bottle of Vicks syrup and a spoon in her little hands
when she'd heard me coughing in the night.

Closing my mind to such memories, I tried to focus on the job at hand.
The cake.  The birthday cake.  The cake for my child.  The child who is
taking care of me.  Do something special for her, for God's sake' I
picked up the box of chocolate cake mix.  Add two eggs and one cup
water.

I put the box back on the counter, sat down in the middle of the
kitchen floor, and wept.  I couldn't cope with a cake mix.  It was too
hard.

A call to the bakery produced an angel food cake with pink icing.

The next day I muddled through a family birthday dinner that was
strained and sad.

But not as sad as the following Mother's Day.  On my breakfast plate
was a card-To the Most Wonderful Mother in the World-with a verse that
brought wrenching sobs to my gut.  Late that afternoon my husband and I
went to visit friends.  There were many drinks.

At 11:30 P.m. we returned home.  The dining room table had been set
lovingly with our best dishes and gold-filled flatware.  In the center
of the table was a bouquet of hand-picked flowers from our yard
arranged in my favorite crystal vase.  Loving touches from the loving
hands of a girl wanting to please her mother, to honor her mother on
her special day.

I lurched woozily past the pan of dried-up barbecue ribs Lisa had tried
valiantly to keep warm for the Mother's Day dinner.  I lifted the lids
from the pots on the cold stove.  Rice .. . broccoli .. .

carrots.  I sampled each pot's wilted contents, wiped my mouth with the
back of my hand, and headed for Lisa's bedroom.

She was still awake.  She had been crying.  Weakly I tried to
apologize.

"Lisa, I'm so sorry.  The excuse was threadbare by now.

"Where were you, Mom?"  she asked, her voice anguished.

"I've been so worried..  .. "

"Please forgive me, honey.  It will never happen again."  As I bent
down to kiss her she turned her face into the pillow.

As the number of alcoholics has increased over the years, a new
category of damaged people has emerged.  According to statistics 4
there are now from 28 to 34 million children of alcoholics in the
United States, of whom seven million are under the age of 18.  One out
of every eight Americans is the child of an alcoholic.  Here are
further facts:' Alcoholism runs in families.

Sons of alcoholic fathers are four timeg more likely to become
alcoholics.

Daughters of alcoholic mothers are three times more likely to become
alcoholics.

Children of alcoholics are often grandchildren of alcoholics. Daughters
of alcoholics are more likely to marry alcoholics.  Many of us who have
contributed to these statistics are trying to rectify the damage done
to our children, to rebuild their sense of self-worth, to help them
find fulfillment in life.  It can happen, but not easily or quickly. 
Because of their upbringing, Adult Children of Alcoholics AC OAs
develop the following tendencies: 6 1. Adult children of alcoholics
guess at what normal behavior is.

2. Have difficulty following a project from beginning to end.

3. Lie when it would be just as easy to tell the truth.

4. judge themselves without mercy.

5. Have difficulty having fun.

6. Take themselves very seriously.

7. Have difficulty with intimate relationships.

8. Overreact to changes over which they have no control.

9. Constantly seek approval and affirmation.

10.  Usually feel they are different from other people.

11.  Are super-responsible or super-irresponsible.

12.  Are extremely loyal even in the face of evidence that the loyalty
is undeserved.

13.  Are impulsive.  They tend to lock themselves into a course of
action without giving serious consideration to alternative behaviors or
possible consequences.  This impulsivity leads to confusion,
self-loathing, and loss of control over their environment.  In
addition, they spend an excessive amount of energy on cleaning up the
mess.

I was forcing my children, especially Lisa, into this life of misery. I
despised myself.  The taunting voices in my head were growing

insistent: Give everyone a break .. . kill yourself.  Go ahead!  Do it!
Get out of this life!

No question about it-everyone would be better off without me.

The angry little men who inhabited my inner world had been pointing
this out for some time.  Sometimes I'd fondle the handle of Randall's
hunting rifle.  No, I couldn't possibly shoot myself.  Or use a
razor.

At the very back of the top shelf of the bedroom closet was my exit
visa from the world: a cache of sleeping pills that I'd ferreted away
in a fat orange plastic cylinder.

Clutching it in a shaking hand one late April afternoon in 1978, I
headed for the cherry cabinet where stood a tall, clear bottle of
vodka, almost full.

"You'll soon be where you can't do any more damage," I promised myself
as I poured the liquor into a water glass at the kitchen sink.  Opening
the plastic container, I dumped the pills onto the black formica
counter where they rolled about in a riot of color.

The yellow wall phone caught my eye.  From far away something said,
Don't do this.  Think of your children, your husband, your parents. For
God's sake, don't do this.  Call someone.  Get help.

No.  Death would be a welcome relief.  I was dead in so many ways
already.

Scooping up the skittering capsules, I stuffed them into my mouth and
washed them down with an enormous gulp of the bitter vodka.  More pills
.. . more vodka .. . till the capsules were gone.  Then more vodka to
kill the taste of the gelatin coating.  Two cups of strong black
coffee, half-coffee half-vodka.  I reasoned that the hot coffee would
melt the capsules in my stomach faster and speed the whole process.

Outside, the gray Montana sky increased the sense of doom.  Anyone
glancing up at the brick ranch-style house with the white

shutters would see a manicured lawn, majestic blue spruces, a glorious
willow tree sweeping the ground.  No one would suspect that the figure
standing at the kitchen window in a red bathrobe was waiting for
death.

My lips started forming words.  In a quivering voice I began to sing,
"Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so .. .... How
peculiar that I would think of that song at such a time!  The happy
Sunday school tune of years ago marched persistently through my mind. I
could think of nothing else.

I placed my hand on the kitchen counter as if it were a ballet barre
and practiced ridiculous leg positions, all the while singing "Jesus
Loves Me."

Did everyone revert to childhood at a time like this?  Drowsiness was
stealing over me.  I had to get into bed before I collapsed.  I didn't
want Lisa or Randall to find me on the floor.  Locking the bedroom
door, I turned back the bed covers, lowered myself onto the cool
sheets, and pulled up the blankets.

I plumped the pillow around my head, the way Mother used to tuck me
into bed at night.  My eyes scanned the familiar walls of our bedroom
for one final time.  On the dresser the chocolate brown digital clock
stared back at me, its green fluorescent numbers blipping away the
final moments of my life.

My eyes rested on a framed watercolor of a red barn.  A Vermont barn.
Then inky blackness.  A howling wind.  Nothingness.

Where was I?

I smelled adhesive tape and ether.  A blinding light was shining from
somewhere above.

Then the sound of my husband's voice: "Sandra, are you awake?"
Randall's anxious face looked down at me.

I struggled to comprehend.  The pills, the darkness .. . but I wasn It
dead.

"Who found me?"  I managed to mumble.

"Lisa," my husband answered.

"She crawled through the bedroom window."

Self-loathing filled me.  Lisa had found me.  I had planned all this
carefully so that she'd be spared needless horror.  What kind of
monster was I?

"You've been in Intensive Care for twenty-four hours," Randall was
saying.

"It took three medical teams to bring you around.  They'd given you
up---someone felt a faint heartbeat.  You were lucky..  .. " I didn't
feel lucky.  I felt sick.  Despairing.  I couldn't even succeed at
killing myself.  I rubbed my nose and my fingers came away stained with
dark gray crystals.  Charcoal.  They had used it to save my life.  Why
had they bothered?

I had reached the bottom of the pit.

Fully thirty percent of all suicides, according to the Department of
Psychiatry at Cornell University, are committed by people suffering
from severe depression mixed with alcoholism and drug abuse.  Recent
statistics on suicide, available through the National Center for Health
Statistics, indicate that in 1985 there were 28,620 successful attempts
at suicide.  Many more people than that attempt to kill themselves
every year-for a variety of reasons.

"It seems incongruous," writes Arthur janov in The Primal Scream, "to
say that the aim of killing oneself is to live, but my experience with
the attempted suicides makes it difficult to reach any other
conclusion..  .. As a rule, the attempt at death is one more neurotic
plea to be loved.  In this sense, the attempt at death is a cry for
life.  " \020Breaking the Cycle At the time.  any person comes for
psychiatric help he is lacking the most critical factor for fulfilling
his needs, a person whom he genuinely cares about and who he feels
geniunely cares about him.

-William Glasser, M.D.

Reality Therapy

T WAS AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PIT THAT CHANGE FOR ME BEGAN.  I HAVE

since come to learn that this is typical of compulsive personalities.
So long as we can keep up the slightest pretense of normality, we deny
the seriousness of our problem.  Nor, until a crisis comes, do those
around us confront us with our unacceptable behavior.

With my near-suicide all this changed.  At the insistence of my
psychiatrist and my husband, I entered Montana's hospital for mental
disorders at Warm Springs, two-hundred-fifty miles from home, and one
of very few facilities in the state then available to treat people with
addictions.

I arrived at the hospital dazed, lethargic.  There were perhaps
eighteen men and women on the ward where I was placed; addicts at that
time were mixed in with the mentally ill.  The best way the staff knew
to keep their charges functioning and manageable was through
medication.

The turning point for me occurred in this hospital, but it did not

come through chemicals; it ha pened another, totally unexpected p
way.

As one hopeless day slid into another, I sat staring through the
greasy, nicotine-streaked windows at the dazzling blue Montana sky
outside.  How had I gotten myself into such a miserable state, locked
up now like a criminal?  I didn't want to answer that question, really.
For whom could I blame but myself?  Two husbands, my children, my
parents, my friends had tried to help me.  Lord knows how hard they had
tried.

Family visits were infrequent because of the distance.  Friends sent me
helpful books.  One, Beyond Our Selves by Catherine Marshall, I carried
about for days, but never got beyond the dedication page: "To Len,"
whoever he was.  I seemed to have a block about reading anything
religious.  At the words God or jesus my eyes would simply refuse to
focus.

One afternoon my roommate, "Jackie," a wispy, angular waif with sad,
dark eyes, and I were sitting on our beds waiting for the lunch bell to
ring-a signal for us to line up by the front door to be counted before
being picked up by the asthmatic old bus that took us all to the
central dining hall.  Just then a nurse brought a new patient to the
room adjoining ours.  The young woman collapsed on her newly assigned
bed, sobbing and plucking at the bed covers.

Jackie and I looked at each other uneasily.  This show of raw emotion
was not uncommon at the hospital, but the moans of this poor girl were
unnerving.

"Oh, Jesus!  Jesus!  Jesus!"  she intoned over and over.

"Karen, try to pull yourself together," the harried nurse implored.

"It's almost dinnertime!"

"I don't want to eat, I want to die, " came the muffled sobs.

Catching sight of Jackie and me, the nurse came to our doorway.

"Karen is very upset.  She was to be married next week and her fiance
has been killed in a car wreck.  Perhaps you two can speak with her and
persuade her to come to dinner with the rest of the unit."

Jackie got up swiftly from her bed and stepped into Karen's room.  I
shuffled self-consciously behind her, alarmed at this new patient's
wailings and writhings.  Karen was not to be consoled.

"Jesus, help me!"  she kept crying out.

"Please, Jesus-help me!"

I was to hear these words hundreds of times in the days that
followed.

When Jackie and I returned to our room after dinner, we were startled
to discover Karen up and walking regally about the hall.  The change in
her appearance was startling.  Before she'd been a crumpled, sobbing
body in rumpled sweater and jeans.  Now her short auburn hair was
neatly combed, framing a gracefully beautiful oval face.  Huge luminous
brown eyes shone beneath thick lashes.  She had changed into a long
white bathrobe and white slippers, giving her an angelic appearance as
she glided down the hospital corridor.

I was struck by her loveliness-such a powerful contrast to the other
disheveled, vacant-faced patients.  She fascinated me and frightened
me.  I wanted to reach out to her, but her constant calling on Jesus
grated on my nerves.

As a little girl I had loved to hear Aunt Ethel tell us Bible stories
and to stare at the picture on the Sunday school wall of Christ holding
the lost sheep.  Somewhere alone the way I had lost that connection to
him.  So I felt a grain of envy for Karen's faith.  Even through the
personal torment I sensed within her a quality of grace.

Later that first week after Karen arrived I was alone in the room when
I looked up to see her in the doorway.

"May I come in and talk to you?"  she asked shyly.

"I'm scared of this place .. . of some of the men..  .. " This was the
first of endless visits to our room.  Karen seemed to appear in a puff
of smoke-suddenly she'd just be there.  It soon became apparent that
Karen had appointed me her special friend and protector.  I never had
to guess who was behind me in the food line, her beautiful brown eyes
searching for assurance that it was okay for her to be around.  She'd
be waiting in the corridor when I

got out of the shower room, by the door at the close of my therapy
session.

Before long we became close friends.  She shared her love for Jim, her
deceased fiance, the dreams and plans they'd made for their lives
together.

One sultry July night, tossing restlessly in the heat of the stuffy
hospital room, I was aware of Jackie's deep, regular breathing in the
bed next to me.  How could she sleep in this oven?

Then I sensed another presence in the room.  Half-sitting up in my bed,
I saw'a familiar white-robed figure.  There was Karen standing in the
doorway, her long robe startlingly bright in the moonlight.

As Karen approached my bed I could hear she was crying.

"Oh, Sandy, does Jesus love me?  Does Jesus really love me?"

The pleading in her voice sounded as though this was the only thing in
life that mattered to her.

What to do?  What to say?  Some instinct in me longed to comfort this
weeping child.  I got up gingerly, not sure how to console this
quivering soul-how to reassure anybody of anything.  Taking Karen in my
arms, I patted her damp hair.  It had been a long time since I'd held
anyone to offer comfort.  I'd always been the one demanding comfort.

Clearing my throat awkwardly, I said, "Yes, Karen, Jesus loves you.

Her sobbing stopped in an instant.

My heart was beating furiously.  I felt cold and warm at the same
time.

Karen detached herself from my embrace, wiped her eyes with the back of
her hand, thanked me in a voice of childlike gratitude, and slipped
back to the adjoining room.

I lay back down, puzzling at a strange lightness, almost giddiness,
that was pulsing through me.

The full moon dipped lower in the west.  The room seemed filled with a
fragrant coolness.

I slept peacefully until dawn.

As I write these words eight years later, I am filled with awe at how a
fragile little event like this can change the direction of a life.  We
compulsives travel down one road after another, willfully driven on
toward growing darkness and a dead end.  In fact, road signs along the
way warn that we proceed at our own risk.  But pride and stubbornness
compel us on.

Then something happens, Perhaps an encounter with another traveler, the
breakthrough of a new idea.  A change takes place perhaps only a slight
change, as in my case through Karen, but a change nevertheless.  The
traveler changes direction, hesitantly at first.  And the way becomes
lighter.

The turning point for me was no more than a flicker in my spirit.
Shortly after her nighttime visit Karen was discharged, her leaving as
sudden as her arrival.  Lying on my bed one early morning a few days
later, my eyes drifted to the room next door, resting on the rumpled
bed that had been Karen's.  Priscilla, a burned-out rock singer, was
now camped there.  Her bed was a shambles of posters and Rock Star
magazines.  A hand-tooted leather belt with thunderbolts etched around
the word rock, hung limply to the floor like a fleeing snake.

A chill rushed over me.  I recoiled at the thought of this violation to
Karen's special place.  She'd brought such light to those dreary
surroundings.

Shifting to a sitting position on the side of my bed, I stared out the
window into the small grassy courtyard.  The morning sun had appeared
over the building annex, exposing the drabness of our rooms.  The
windowpane was covered with dusty rivulets from last night's
thunderstorm.  How I longed to polish the window to crystal clarity.
The dirty windows everywhere represented more walls transparent walls,
but walls further reinforcing my feeling of confinement.

Glancing down at my lap, I was astonished to see my hands in a prayer
position.  Across my skirt and onto the floor marched a

shadow pattern from the slotted roof overhang-a pattern of stripes.

"By his stripes we are he ale-Where had those words come from?  Of
course!  I'd heard them as a child in Vermont from Aunt Ethel.  I
didn't have any more idea what they meant now than I had then, except
that they were somehow good words.  Strong words.

My eyes went back to Priscilla's snake belt on what to me was Karen's
bed.  What if there really were two worlds at war, good and evil?

The breakfast bell jarred me back to the reality of hunger pangs.  I
really felt hungry!  I hadn't felt anything for so long.

"Good morning, Gus," I chirped to our pudgy Scottish bus driver.

"Well, gud mawrnin' to you, Miss Sandy.  An' if you aren't a
bright-lookin' lass!"

After breakfast, another change.  Somehow this morning the thought of
gulping down my nine o'clock medication was repellent.  The inevitable
line was forming, patients clutching yellow Dixie cups to receive their
juice and pills.

I inched forward at the end of the "meds" line, my eyes sweeping the
dingy lounge strewn with old magazines and pots of pathetic scrawny
plants, finally resting on the blaring TV set suspended from the
ceiling (a precaution to keep the inmates from wrecking it).  I saw NBC
announcer John Chancellor appear: "We interrupt this program to bring
you a special news bulletin.  The Pope has died in Rome.  " I felt a
rise of tears burn my eyes.  Why should I react?  I wasn't even
Catholic.  I remembered with a pang the off-color stories I'd told
about the Pope.  Being funny had given me power.  All at once I was
repulsed by my "gutter humor" which, like foul language, slipped so
readily from my tongue.

I had almost reached the cart where two nurses were mechanically
filling the cups and dispensing the medications.  I didn't want to
swallow these pills anymore.  What would happen if I didn't take
them?

As the person in front of me moved away, I approached the nurses'
station with newfound resolve.

"Here are your meds, Sandy."  One nurse filled my Dixie cup while the
other proffered gray capsules in a small pleated cup.

Her tired blue eyes stared at me as I popped the pills into my mouth
and swished them quickly under my tongue, at the same time swallowing
the canned orange juice "chaser."

As they pushed their squeaky cart back to the nursing station, I
slipped into the women's bathroom.  My heart was pounding as I entered
the wooden stall.  Flushing the toilet, I spit the bitter pills into
the swirling water.

No more pills The words seemed to come from outside of myself. Suddenly
it mattered what I took into my body.

"Going against medical advice can be dangerous," my first husband had
said many times from hard-won experience as a doctor.  True, if
arbitrarily you discontinued medication for something like diabetes.
But these pills were chiefly to pacify and control.

Leaning against the rough plaster wall, I felt a tremulous stirring of
well-being in that squalid little stall.

Like many women alcoholics, I had become addicted to prescription
drugs, creating a dependency I was hardly aware of.  The addiction
continued when I was institutionalized during the 1970s because the use
of drugs was a standard procedure in the treatment of patients during
this period.  Today most treatment centers have patients go through a
detoxification procedure before entering their program; drugs then
administered are done only after careful evaluation of the patient's
medical history.

Many of these treatment programs, moreover, see a good rate of success.
Kitty Dukakis, for example, wife of the Massachusetts governor,
announced in July 1987 that she had been treated successfully for a
secret twenty-six-year addiction to amphetamines-diet pills.

"I am now drug-free and I have been for five years," she was quoted
telling an audience.

"I'm very proud of

that..  .. I am telling my story because I want to help others.

It was a sign of the times that her confession elicited not criticism
but respect, and even sympathetic identification.

As knowledge has increased about cross-addiction (for example, a
patient is freed from an addiction to alcohol only to become addicted
to sweets), patients are treated for their basic compulsive addictive
personality disorder.  Cross-addiction, for me, also meant that at one
time I was addicted to several substances (alcohol, tobacco, sweets,
etc.) At the well-publicized Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage,
California, only ten to fifteen percent require prior hospitalized
detoxification, but it takes at least a week for the different drugs to
leave a patient's system.  Whether the problem being treated is
alcoholism (their number-one problem), cocaine or prescription drug
abuse, or often a combined addiction, that first week represents the
hell of withdrawal-shakes, headaches, nausea, and exhaustion.

Even withdrawal, however, is only the first step.  The person trying to
break any addictive pattern is subject to an extraordinary degree of
internal conflict.  She wants to break the pattern and she doesn't want
to.  Symptomatic of this conflict: dissociation, a sense of separation
from oneself, which sometimes results in a woman's feeling like a
helpless spectator to her own self-indulgence.

"Dissociated feelings," write Drs.  Hodgson and Miller in Self Watching
"are linked with anxious and depressed states of mind in which
willpower, planning, and reasoning are difficult to sustain.  In
helping people to overcome habits, then, it is not enough to identify
why habits arise and how they are triggered.  The individual must be
equipped with the necessary skills to survive episodes of conflict,
when morale and motivation are likely to be at their lowest ebb.  "
\020Do It Now To acknowledge four necessary lossesl and nevertheless
find our freedom, make our choices, recognize what we are and what we
might be, is what a responsible adult is all about.  Bowing to
necessity, we must choose.  This freedom to choose is the burden and
the gift that we receive when we leave childhood, the burden and the
gift that we take with us when we come to childhoods end.

-Judith Viorst Necessary Losses

AT WAS THIS CHANGE INSIDE ME AFTER KAREN?

At first it was simply in my attitude.  Less despair.  A glimmer of
hope.  And the resolve to take no more of the daily medication.

When there was heavy traffic in the john, I would slip the pills into
an empty cigarette pack and hide them temporarily in my suitcase.  I
was careful about this because I'd seen what happened to patients who
refused to take their medication.  Off to the "Quiet Room" to be
strapped to a table and given their medication by injection.

I couldn't risk discovery.  My progress was slow-imperceptible some
days-but I rejoiced at the new freedom I felt.  Freedom from

the inner fuzziness produced by the Quaaludes and the effect of the
Thorazine, which seemed to fling my nerves against my body walls while
I drifted in and out of reality.  How- could I ever get well in a
psychedelic haze?

I knew that for some patients-the more violent-chemical stabilizers
were the welcome alternative to physical restraint.  Yet I sensed that
in my case true recovery could not begin until I was free of artificial
aids.

A second resolve was to regain my sense of personal dignity.  My
clothes had been confiscated for "special laundering" when I was
admitted.  There had been a forced shower and shampoo ordered by the
impersonal admitting physician who inspected me like a side of beef,
charting my scars, birthmarks, and tooth fillings.  Even my wedding
ring was taken from me, the last vestige of my "belonging" to
somebody.

I felt like a faceless number among murderers, rapists, manic
depressives  Every conceivable type of mental illness was baking in an
asphalt pressure-cooker.  Helplessness and despair had all but
swallowed me whole.

To restore my sense of dignity, I began spending more time on personal
grooming, taking more interest in my crafts class, even standing
straighter.  I stuck all my greeting cards on the wall over my bed as a
cheery reminder that I was loved.

As I lay on my bed during rest time one afternoon, my spirit felt
lighter.  I fell asleep contemplating a return home to my family.  Then
a nurse was shaking my shoulder.

"Wake up, Sandy.  The staff wants to see you at once."

I followed her apprehensively down the corridor.  What could the staff
want to see me for?

As I entered the conference room I saw nurses and doctors assembling in
a circle of chairs ready for "report."  They were sipping coffee,
shuffling papers and patients' charts.  My eyes fell on Harry, the
hospital administrator, the ever-present unlit cigar

jammed into the corner of his mouth.  Today he looked particularly
disgruntled.  My heart sank.  I was in trouble, but I wasn't sure
why.

At a nod from the nurse I threaded my way past the outstretched feet
and lowered myself into an orange plastic chair.

"It has been brought to our attention that you have not been taking
your medications," Harry began.

"Unswallowed capsules were discovered in your suitcase this morning.
Not taking your prescribed medicine is a serious violation of hospital
rules.  Do you have anything to say for yourself?"

Panic gripped me.  Visions of being strapped down in the Quiet Room
almost paralyzed my voice.  Then something happened.  My voice acquired
strength.  Purpose.  I requested formally to be taken off all
medication.  To my surprise I had moved suddenly from defense to
offense.

"I also need a week at home with my family to see if I can adjust to
the outside world.  Please," I concluded, "Just give me a chance."

Surprised looks.  Clearly they had been caught off-guard.

"Reactions?"  Harry queried his staff.  At first there was mild
dissent.  I pressed my point, stressing the progress I had made in
recent weeks.

"I'll need to clear it with your doctor," Harry said uncertainly.

"If she says you may go, I guess there's no reason a week at home
wouldn't be all right.  Okay, staff?"

There were reluctant nods of agreement around the circle.  When
queried, my doctor, a warm-hearted Filipino woman, was favorable.  The
only stipulation: stay on my medication.  Before week's end I was on a
bus to Billings.

My husband was waiting at the bus station.  On the drive home our
conversation was strained.  Later I stood in my own kitchen for the
first time in four months and looked about in childlike wonder.  Was
this really my home?  Somehow everything looked strange.  Different.

I was suddenly aware of the depth of my emotional and physical

exhaustion.  As tired as I was, however, I dreaded going to bed with
this stranger I was married to.  Randall must have felt it, too.  A
silent wall separated us that night.  He, so vibrant, bright and
productive; I, so frightened and uncertain, a failure at everything.

The temptation to stay in bed the next morning was nearly overwhelming.
A late August breeze was puffing the green shantung drapes in languid
little bursts.  Why not just roll over and go back to sleep?  It would
be so easy to do that.  I really wanted to.

Yet deep within a kind of inner knowing gnawed at my soul.  If I didn't
get started right this morning, my life might never get straightened
out.  Today was the first day of the rest of my life.  With this
realization came the practical message I most needed to hear: Get up!
Get moving!  Do something to help yourself!  Do it now.

There had been countless mornings when I'd had this choice and had
chosen to avoid the world, to hide in my bed, blankets pulled over my
head.  When I finally would get up, I would go from doctor to doctor,
psychic to psychic, friend to friend, desperately hoping one of them
could "fix" me, somehow transform me magically into a whole per son,
sound of body and mind.  The answer over the years had become
agonizingly obvious: no one else could do it for me.

The effort to change, to get well, was going to have to start with
me.

In describing this freedom to choose, Dr.  Theodore Rubin in The
Winner's Notebook writes: "The decision I arrive at is uniquely my own
and born of my freedom to struggle through my feelings to either act or
not act..  .. This kind of freedom to feel and to decide and if
necessary, to experience conflict and to struggle through conflict to
an answer, produces values.  This kind of tapping of one's own feelings
and arriving at one's own individual values produces a sense of
self-responsibility and identity."

Now, from my bed, I gave myself a set of commands: "Get up, take a
shower and get dressed!"  My body obeyed reluctantly.  These

seemingly normal routines had been almost impossible during my periods
of depression.

Wiping the steam from the bathroom mirror with the sleeve of my pink
cotton robe, I peered at the anxious face that stared back at me.  My
appraisal:

Eyes: Apprehensive.  Needed the usual help from a mascara wand and
eyeliner.  I hadn't bothered with eye makeup for months.

Eyebrows: A jungle growth.  Get out the tweezers fast!  Skin: Ghastly!
So dry.  Like an alligator suitcase.  Alcohol and cigarettes do a job
on skin.  I looked at broken spider-web veins around my nose.  Quick,
where's the face cream and liquid foundation?

Hair: A disaster area.  Stubborn wisps of gray hair were spiraling
through the tangled auburn mop like errant bits of barbed wire.  It had
been months since I'd cared about coloring my hair.

To signal the change that I hoped was taking place inside, I'd start
today to make over the outside.  I dressed carefully, then went across
the hall to the den where I had a small desk.  There I made a list of
the things I wanted to accomplish that day.  Simple things.  Make a
date at the hairdresser.  Take my soiled dress and slacks to the
cleaners.  Buy nail polish.  I came up with nine items.

As I searched for the hairdresser's number, the old temptations flooded
back.  What's the hurry?  You've been four months in a grubby hospital.
Sit down and have a cigarette, Bet there's a cold beer in the
refrigerator.  You deserve a break.  What are you trying to do-@in a
medal?

For a moment it was an all-out battle.  My new resolve vs.  the old
pattern.  Oh, how I was tempted.

Do it now!  Those three words snapped me out of it.  I found the number
and reached for the telephone.

That nagging little voice pursued me all day.  Are you some kind of
slave driver  Take it easy.

Then from inside the rebuttal: You've had enough rest.  Get on with
your life.  Do it now.  At the end of the day, to my astonishment, I'd
completed all nine items on my list.  I'd also made a decision not to
take the tranquilizers given me by the hospital.

The high point came when I went to get my hair done.  What is there
about the sounds and smells of a beauty shop that rejuvenate even
before the work begins?  As Rod, my favorite hairdresser, snipped and
whirled me about in the dance that hairdressers do, visions of a new me
spun through my brain.  For some reason my mind flashed back twenty-two
years to the summer of 1956 before the Miss America Pageant.  I had
felt the same sense of adventure, of a life-changing journey.  The
clinging coat of depression was dropping away from me like hunks of
hair from Rod's scissors.

Wow, what a difference, I thought when Rod finished.  I couldn't
believe my eyes.  The "before" and "after" was staggering.

My husband did a double-take when he walked through the door that
evening.

"Can this be the same woman I said good-bye to this morning?"  he asked
with an astonished smile.

Settling for the week into a household routine after months of
hospitalization, however, wasn't as simple as I'd thought.  The second
morning I wondered-should I dust?  Should I iron?  Should I bake
something?  Such mini-decisions seemed overwhelming.

I wandered from room to room trying to reacquaint myself with my
surroundings.  Gingerly I examined each object in the living room as
though reintroducing myself to old friends.  Why did everything look so
strange?  A sudden fear began to strip away the fragile self-confidence
built up by the first day's small achievements.  Would I be able to
stick out the week?

Our house was full of old ghosts.  Dreadful, painful memories.  The
chair where I did my heaviest drinking and planned my suicide seemed to
menace me each time I passed it.  Maybe it should be

stored in the basement where I couldn't see it.  No, that would be
ridiculous.  All the furnishings held memories of some sort.

Taking a deep breath, I entered Lisa's now-vacant room.  She had moved
to her father's house to live with him and her brothers during my
hospitalization.  I was grateful that the children had pulled together
while their mother was falling apart.  I wondered if they knew how much
I loved them, how guilty I felt.

As my sickness had worsened it had become increasingly difficult to hug
them, to show them warmth.  My heart had become an icy lump sprouting
from stainless steel ribs, my body home to miles of nerves that twisted
and tangled around wooden bones.  I had felt no life, just
desperation.

Lisa's room still had her fragrance about it.  The "Love" cosmetics
popular with teenagers sat in a pristine row on a mirrored tray.  Her
dressing table was immaculate, each item in meticulous order.  The
stuffed animals she'd left behind stared up at me from her red plaid
bedspread.  Clutching an armful of them, I sobbed into their soft plush
bodies.  Lisa had often held them for comfort.

"Oh, Lisa, what have I done to you?  To all of us?"

In the hallway outside her room, the white stucco walls seemed to close
in on me.  Then they expanded like rubber bands stretching to some
far-off horizon.  Back and forth.  Back and forth.

Perhaps I belonged back in the hospital.  Apparently I wasn't as strong
as I'd thought.  It had seemed so easy in my daydreams at the
institution.  Was I becoming a robot like so many of the patients
there?  Had I developed an institutional mentality?  Was I unable to
make any decisions or do anything for myself?

An insistent inner voice shouted, No!  Get busy.  Do something.  Do it
now!

This was going to be the toughest battle of my life.  One night that
week my husband took me out to dinner.  He seemed so proud of the "new
me" and scrambled to open the car Ill

door and help me with my chair at our favorite table at the Rex Hotel.
For the first time in months, I felt special.

As I took dainty sips from my chilled glass of white chablis, I forgot
the panic in the hallway.  My husband was newly attentive, my
self-confidence straining to break through the years of selfloathing.
The rather attractive woman reflected in the bar mirror was really me.
I tried not to stare at her.

From our table in the back room next to the wall, Randall liked to
watch the stream of diners drift in and out.  He had the lawyer's
observing mind-every detail, every nuance.  I admired him so.  Yet our
marriage had stretched on the brink of disaster for five years.  It
would take a miracle to breathe new life into it after so much
damage.

I tried not to think back to only two years before when we'd sat at the
same table on my fortieth birthday.  I was on medication and had sat in
this same chair in a fuzzy haze.  My size eighteen dress did not cover
the bulges from my hinge eating.  I'd felt like an overstuffed chair. A
black-and-white print chair.  The dress was hideous, but it was the
only one I could still get into.

Now, while Randall ordered dinner, I took another sip of chablis to
wipe out the memory.  A little wine never hurt anyone.  After all the
heartbreak, I had still not faced up to my drinking problem..  ..

On the six-hour bus ride back to the hospital, I thought back over the
ups and downs of the week just ended.  The visits with my children had
been too short and tense to be satisfying.  They had stared at this
"new" mother, doubtless wondering whether they dared trust the changes
they saw.

What had been accomplished by these seven days?  A start .. .

and the latching hold of a three-word principle: Do it now, When I
arrived back at the Warm Springs Hospital, it was afternoon.  Since the
entrance door was always locked, I rang the

buzzer for admittance.  A nurse named Gretchen peered through glass at
me.

"May I help you?"

"Gretchen, it's me!  Sandy.  Don't you recognize me?"

"Good heavens, no!  You look so .. . good.  In fact, you look terrific!
Come on in."

Patients and staff alike gathered in the smoky lounge foyer to survey
the returning patient.  Incredulous stares greeted me, as though I were
an alien from outer space.

Harry almost bit through his cigar as he rounded the corner of the
nurses' station.

"Looks like Billings agreed with you, Sandy.  We're about to staff.
We'll want a report on your week."

My doctor's round face was wreathed in smiles as she spotted me.

"You look wonderful," she declared in her thick Filipino accent.

And to the rest of the staff.

"We can all see the positive results of home visits!"

Harry was staring at me with questioning, "show-me" eyes.

"Give us a report, Sandy."  The pressure was on, every eye in the room
riveted on me.

"I-I got along fine," I began.

"The hardest part was to walk back into a house that held so many
memories of pain and failure-and to know my time there was an
experiment only.  Could I change old habits?  Could I start over?  In
many ways I was like a baby who had to learn to crawl before she could
walk.

"I knew I had to set a schedule for myself that I could follow.  I've
always put unrealistic goals on myself.  I've been such a
perfectionist.  If I couldn't do something perfectly, I wouldn't try at
all.  That's been a real trap for me all my life.

"I decided to choose a few simple tasks and do them.  Not to expect
perfection, but to make progress-any progress-on functioning normally.
I wasn't sure that I could, but I did do what I set out to do.  I was
able to relate to my husband and my children as an adult instead of a
sick-o.  They were all surprised about that.  I got

up each morning and showered and dressed and accomplished my
housework.

"The first morning I decided to do something about the way I looked on
the outside, to show that things were changing on the, inside.  I made
an appointment to have my hair cut and colored.

After coming out of a mental hospital, it took courage to walk back
into that shop and face all those beauty operators I'd known so well.

I was amazed at the warm way they all welcomed me!  Since I'd let fear
paralyze me for so long, it felt good to take a risk and have it work
out.  It's given me confidence to face the next hurdle."

Harry's bulldog face was set in rapt attention.  The cigar was
teetering in the corner of his mouth.

Gretchen seemed puzzled.

"You make it sound so easy, Sandy.  It's hard for me to believe you
could adjust so quickly.  You didn't show that kind of initiative
here..  .."

My heart sank.  Did the rest of the staff feel this way, too?

"Let's let Sandy continue," urged my doctor.

"I'm sure she has a lot more to tell us."

Now what?  What could I add?  Frantically my mind raced ahead trying to
second-guess what would impress these staffers.  I had never been in a
situation like it-except the judges' interview at the Miss America
Pageant.  The thought of that experience in this setting was so
ludicrous I almost laughed.  It was the comic relief I needed.

"I don't know what else to say," I told them.

"Obviously Gretchen finds my new resolve hard to believe.  But I've had
a lot of time to think while I've been a patient here.  What do I want
to do with the rest of my life?  I want to get well.  I want to have a
good marriage and be a good mother.  I want to be the best I can.  Thus
far I've been pretty much of a goof-off.  I want to get on with the
rest of my life.  "

"All good intentions," Harry interjected.

"How do you plan to accomplish all this, Sandy?"

My heart was beating like a thrashing machine.  My eyes were stinging.
What to say?

"I've made some progress.  My husband is supportive and my children are
anxious to have their mother back.  That's a good start.

I have a solid base to go home to.  I'd like to find a job.  I feel
optimistic about my life in Billings .. . about my chances to get well
there.  Frankly, I don't believe I belong in this hospital or any
hospital.  " My doctor was smiling at me.  Oatting my clammy hand, she
spoke softly.

"Staff, I'm going to ask Sandy to leave the room while we process this.
just have a seat in the lounge, if you will."

I struggled to my feet and all but fled.

"Somebody give me a cigarette," I commanded in the lounge area.  My
roommate, Jackie, offered me an unfiltered one.  The bitter jolt of raw
nicotine almost spun me around.

"How can you smoke these things?"  I gasped.

"I've always said if you're going to smoke, smoke a real cigarette,"
Jackie retorted.  If she only knew how many nights I'd been awakened by
her racking cough.  Suddenly I felt very tender toward her.

It seemed like hours but it was probably only twenty minutes before I
was readmitted to the conference room.  Taking the vacant orange chair,
I awaited the verdict with lowered eyes.

"It is the consensus of the staff," my doctor announced, "that you are
capable of being released from this institution as soon as we can
process your papers.  We feel you have shown favorable initiative and
sufficient resolve to adhere to a solid program of recovery.  You've
been a cooperative patient.  I especially will miss you, and I wish you
much good luck in your life outside this hospital."

Tears welled up in my eyes and slid down my cheeks as the staff
applauded.

1 19e Pain in Change It is indeed possible for us to mature out of a
belief in God.  What I would now like to suggest is that it is also
possible to mature into a belief in God.  A skeptical atheism or
agnosticism is not necessarily the highest state of understanding at
which human beings can arrive.  To the contrary, there is reason to
believe that behind spurious notions and false concepts of God there
lies a reality that is God.

-M.  Scott Peck, M.D.

The Road Less Traveled

Y HOSPITALIZATION AND RECOVERY PERIOD INTRODUCED ME TO A

new word in the treatment of compulsive behavior: enahler.  An enabler
is the addict's spouse/parent/child who because of embarrassment or a
sense of guilt attempts a cover-up to protect the family, enahling the
addict to continue his destructive behavior.

An enabling wife is one who calls her husband's office on Monday
morning and tells his boss that her hung-over spouse has the flu.  A
whole pattern of deceptive practices, involving all members of the
family, is under way.  The addict's sickness is all too obvious; the
rest of the family's "sickness" is not so recognizable, yet it is Just
as real and needs to be treated.  " No matter what personality type you
live with," writes Mary Ellen Pinkham in How to Stop the One You
Lovefrom Drinking, "all

members of the family will react to the alcoholism, and as the
alcoholic becomes more involved with his drinking, you become more
involved with him, You will eventually experience identifiable and
pathological behavior that is as predictable as the pattern of the
alcoholism itself.  If, as the National Council on Alcoholism estimated
in 1985, each of the 12.  1 million alcoholics in the U.S. directly
affects four other people, then there are at least sixty million people
intimately involved with alcoholism.

Family members, through embarrassment and guilt, will try to cover up
the destructive behavior of the addict.  Husband and children will
adjust their daily routines and even go through psychological change in
their efforts to protect the addictive wife and mother.  In doing this,
they became enablers.  They not only do not help the addict; they
become sick, too.  (Check your own co-dependence on p. 262.) The
addict's sickness is usually obvious to family and close friends; the
rest of the family's "sickness' is not so recognizable, yet it exists
and needs to be treated.

An enabling husband will often assume the role of peacemaker in the
family when his wife is an addict.  A family friend in his forties, for
example, was married to an alcoholic for twelve years.  When she died,
he took his two young children quickly into a second marriage with a
widowed woman and her teenage daughter.  The result: tension and
conflict in the home.

"When I tried to resolve these squabbles, they dubbed me "peacemaker,"
the friend revealed.

"The term was often used contemptuously.  It took an Al-Anon meeting to
make me see that in my first marriage my role as enabler had, in a
sense, made me sick too.  My ability to act openly and forthrightly was
impaired.  I did seek peace at any price and my second family was
calling me on it.  11 My own past is most painful to reflect on, when I
see the effect The Pain in Change of my compulsive behavior on my
family.  All tried valiantly to help me: my parents, two husbands, my
children, my parents-in-law.  All became enablers in one way or another
in their efforts to protect me, doing damage in the process to
themselves.

My husband Randall, for example, used to watch the liquor cabinet to
see how much I consumed.  I knew this, so one winter morning I
conspired to outwit him.  After he left for work I plucked a full
bottle of vodka from the cabinet, plotting to use just one shot in my
morning coffee.  I planned to add a touch of water to fill it up, then
re stick the seal with glue.  He'd never know.  Besides, Randall never
drank vodka in the winter anyway-just Scotch.

At 11:30 I was on my second pot of coffee and the bottle was half-gone.
I'll run out later this afternoon and get another bottle, I promised
myself By four o'clock it was snowing and I was in no condition to
drive anywhere.  I had to sober up and fix dinner.  When Randall
arrived home at 6:30 the vodka bottle, filled with water, was back in
the liquor cabinet, paper seal in place.

Randall sat down in his favorite chair and started to peruse the
evening paper.

"How about fixing me a vodka and tonic tonight?"  he asked.

My heart pounded.  I'd gotten caught.

"There's no vodka," I murmured.

"What do you mean no vodka?  There's a full bottle in there."

"I'm afraid it's full of water."

His eyes never left the paper.  His tone of voice never changed.

"Okay, then fix me a Scotch and water."  No confrontation.  He had
resigned himself to the hopelessness of the situation.  I wondered how
he could go through this little drama without blinking an eye.  No
wonder he's such a good trial lawyer, I thought to myself.

Like millions of other husbands with alcoholic wives, there were times
when he did get angry at my heavy drinking, railed at the

family upsets that resulted.  But over the years he drifted into the
role of enabler, protecting me as best he could from myself.

When I returned home from the Warm Springs hospital in the fall of
1978, I had made only the tiniest start on the road to recovery.  At my
departure my doctor had given me a list of medications to take, most of
which I had already decided against using.  As the months passed, I had
no idea what further steps to take.

There had been some kind of spiritual -change inside me, but I didn't
know what to do about that either.  I even sensed God had spared me but
why?  I was still tormented at times by angry inner voices.

My deepest desire was to rebuild my home situation, become a good wife,
and develop closer relationships with my children.  But how to do that?
Probably by working to conquer my destructive behavior patterns. Three
areas especially concerned me: smoking, overeating (especially sweets),
and drinking.  (I was not ready to admit I could not drink at all.) How
should I attack these problems?  Willpower, I concluded.

A flutter of resolve stirred within me.  I wanted to change.  I knew I
had to change.  But how does change happen?

I decided to begin with nicotine, which had already been demonstrated
scientifically to engender genuine drug addiction, not just an
addiction to the activity of smoking (Edward Brecher, Consumers Union,
1972).

I'd first tried to quit eight years earlier, when a doctor warned me
that smoking was damaging my lungs.  I'd agreed, It was time to stop.
Besides, I hated the spidery lines that were forming around my lips
from my constant puffing.

I'd done it back then on sheer willpower.  My first act of a morning
had been to not light up as soon as my eyes opened, but reach for a
Life-Saver.  If I'd forgotten to leave these "saviour" packs by the
bed, I'd fly into a frenzy.  What to stick into my mouth?

Ballpoint pens, frayed toothpicks, paper clips, anything I could lay my
hands on.  Every pair of eyeglasses I owned soon had their bows chewed
so badly that they scratched my temples.

What had happened then should have alerted me to the fact that it was
not tobacco I was battling-or alcohol, or overspending, or any of my
other excesses-but a compulsive personality beneath all the specific
cravings.  Eliminating cigarettes eight years before had simply brought
about a switch in compulsions.  Chocolate had then become my slave
master  In any form.  At any time.  I'd stir from my bed at ungodly
hours and bake a pan of brownies or struggle through the ritual of a
devil's food cake mix.

"Aptly named," I'd sigh as I stumbled around my kitchen in the
darkness.

My clothes had gotten tighter and tighter, as the fibers strained to
cover my ever-increasing thighs and derriere.  My nocturnal baking
sessions baffled my children at first, but soon they looked forward to
fresh-baked "surprises" for breakfast.  Brownies and cereal.  Brownies
and eggs.  Brownies and pancakes.

After two years off tobacco, one day for no reason I had picked up a
pack of cigarettes.

"I merit a Merit!"  I joked weakly to my drinking companions.  The
first puff slammed against my throat in a burst of welcome relief.
Every dormant nicotine sensor screamed to first-alert: Welcome back! We
knew you'd give in someday.

I had begun to smoke more than ever.  Two packs a day.  Three packs if
I got up early and stayed out late.  I'd have smoked in the shower if I
could have figured out a way to keep the thing lit.

I had hated myself for caving in.  What had happened to all the
resolve?  I had resigned myself to the fact that it was better to smoke
than to be fat-just the opposite of what I'd told myself before as I'd
waited those endless hours for my cakes to bake.  I had thought
willpower was the answer-if only I were strong enough.  I know now why
that is a typical, erroneous thought of a compulsive person: "Willpower
as a pure act," writes Dr.  Theodore Rubin in The Winner's Notebook,
"invariably comes from compulsive drives

and contracts and further contributes to compulsion.  There is no real
self involved in an attempt to overwhelm a disastrous situation by an
act of 'strength' alone.  It just doesn't work.  Insight, on the other
hand, involves real knowing of self and real self-involvement on the
deepest level."

I had no such insight into the driving force of my own inner
compulsions.

Today the hard evidence against smoking is overwhelming, connecting
smoking with cancer and diseases of the heart, lungs, and circulatory
system.  Smoking is dangerous to one's own health, to nonsmokers
around, even to persons not yet born.  Smoking is a problem on the job.
Each year smokers miss almost three days more work than the nonsmoker.
Counting smoking damage, health insurance, and other factors, the
smoker costs his her company about $4,600 per year.

Despite the almost irrefutable evidence, however, about one third of
adults-54 million Americans-are still smoking, including 26 million
adult women.

Dr.  Virginia Ernster, associate professor of epidemiology at the
University of California at San Francisco School of Medicine, observes
that cigarette companies worldwide perceive "the working woman, under
stress, as the ideal candidate for their product."

Nicotine is extremely addictive; its addictive characteristics are now
being compared to heroin and cocaine.  What's more, although
individuals involved with other addictions such as alcohol or hard
drugs sometimes take a break from their usage from a few days to weeks
and sometimes even a few months-smokers never take a break.  They smoke
every day, through all their waking hours.  Some even have difficulty
making it through the night without smoking.

Dr.  Ellen Gritz, director of the Division of Cancer Control at UCLA's
Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, points out that "cigarettes are
often used to control negative moods and stressful

feelings.  When a woman quits, she may start expressing these negative
feelings, and people around her get upset.  I've had lots of women tell
me that their families begged them to go back to smoking.  " Even if a
woman can escape this pressure, and even survive the pain and
discomfort of cold-turkey withdrawal, she is met with a psychological
attachment that is extremely difficult to break.  Some of the following
might prove helpful:

Ways To Curb The Urge To Smoke' If craving a cigarette, distract
yourself, change your activity, telephone an ex-smoker or an
understanding friend until the feeling subsides.

If cigarettes give you an energy boost, try modest exercise, a brisk
walk, deep breathing exercises, and a balanced diet, avoiding foods
high in sugar.

Go places where you can't smoke.

Keep a glass of water nearby and instead of smoking take sips through a
straw.

Don't linger at the table after a meal.

If you do slip and smoke a cigarette or two, that doesn't mean you've
become a smoker again.  Decide why you succumbed to temptation and set
a new goal of not smoking-and not slipping up.

Remember, the urge to light up lasts only five to ten minutes.

One day I was visiting with a friend going through a painful.
separation.  We were commiserating with each other about the messes
we'd made of our lives.  I took out a pack of cigarettes, my

third of the day, and struggled with the stubborn cellophane
wrapping.

"I'll quit if you will," she challenged me suddenly.

"Let's put money on it.  The first one who smokes owes the other .. .
fifty dollars?"

Realizing it wouldn't be possible to extract that much in secret from
my household budget, I declined the contract.

"We can do it without any bets.  I know we can."

Enthusiastically we pumped each other's hands.  We could kick this
thing.  Later, to reinforce my resolve, I rolled down the window of my
car as I drove home.

"Farewell, evil weeds!"  I intoned, tossing the fresh pack out the
window..  Suddenly it was as though Karen were sitting in the car
beside me.  I heard her voice as I'd heard it so many times in the
hospital at Warm Springs: Please, Jesus-help me!

"If you really exist," I whispered, "and if you really do help people
.. . will you help me quit smoking?  Please.  " When I awakened the
next morning, my eyes greeted the sunny morning with a strange new
clarity.  And an unaccustomed sense of peace.  The frayed edges of my
ragged nerves were somehow knitted together.  The craving for tobacco
was simply and amazingly gone.  I stared wonderingly through the
bedroom window at the dazzling blue Big Sky of Montana, As before,
however, doing without cigarettes seemed to activate my taste buds.  My
urge for chocolate returned stronger than ever.

I tried to resist, but defeat followed defeat in my kitchen.  The inner
voice seemed to gloat, Weak, hopeless, failure, At the time I didn't
understand that if checked in one area, the compulsive nature will
break out in another, that the sickness was not this addiction or that,
but deep inside me.  I was upset when I went to yard sales and came
home with items I didn't need, or even want.  Clothing sales drew me
like a moth to a flame.  When closets bulged with "bargains," I hid the
overflow in bags under the bed.

Harvard psychiatrist George Vaillant has observed just this kind of
cross-addictive behavior, reporting that former alcoholics often shift
to new dependencies-candy, compulsive work, hobbies, gambling, etc.
Indeed, in the groundbreaking Ms.  survey, women confessed addictions
to a large variety of behaviors, including shopping, walking, running,
yoga, exercise, cleaning, sleeping, work, daily routines, credit cards,
nail-biting, even using the phone.

For me there was always a monster lying in wait, ready to take charge
again: my craving for alcohol.  I still sipped wine at the dinner table
and drank at parties-but no longer could I count on the numbing relief,
the rush of exhilaration that had always accompanied the flow of
alcohol into my system.  More and more often now there was only a
fearful gray fog whenever I took a drink.

I longed to stop altogether, but lacked the willpower-or, as Dr.

Rubin points out, the self-knowledge.

The answer came unexpectedly.  It was Valentine's Day, 1980.  That
night I was hostess for a dinner party in my home.

The day began with feelings of nervous anticipation, a desire that the
party be a dazzling success.  I'd made a special quilted tablecloth,
spent hours planning the food-even to colors that harmonized-and
arranged elaborate floral decorations.

It would be a night of striving to win the approval and acceptance of
my husband's friends and law associates.  I'd be under the microscope.
Being scrutinized wasn't new, but an ex-mental patient always seems to
have more to prove.  Could I pull the evening ofo.

As the guests arrived, I fluttered in the kitchen, hovering over
gurgling pans and checking the oven obsessively.  Somehow the meal
materialized on my flower- and candle-bedecked table.  There were so
many decorations there was barely room for the food.

Profuse compliments flowed as fast as the dinner wine.  Then Randall
tapped his wineglass to signal "toast time."

I grasped the stem of my goblet.  As I did, the dark burgundy

sloshed about, creating swirling purple rings in the crystal.  And in
those rings I saw, as clearly as if they had been etched in the glass,
three words:

Poison Death Insanity f wanted to scream.  I stared incredulously at
the telltale words.

The others were raising their glasses, laughing, talking.  Couldn't
they see the message inscribed in wavering purple letters?

I don't want to drink this.  I don't want to drink anything alcoholic
ever again, A feeling of warmth coursed through my body from head to
toe.

A renewed sense of being protected.  Was it Karen's God revealing his
love to me on Valentine's Day, the day for lovers?

Days passed.  As with cigarettes, the craving for alcohol was
startlingly and totally gone.

For other women, of course, the battle is more drawn-out, especially
when they are faced with social situations in which they are urged to
have "just one" drink.  The following suggestions, from Hodgson and
Miller's Self-Watching: Addictions, Habits, Compulsions, help to
develop skills for coping with those social situations likely to
arise:

Social Coping Strategies I .  Stay for a half hour and then leave.

2. Get over my anxiety by just listening to people.  Forget about
trying to impress.

3. Drink tonic, because people might think it is vodka and tonic.

They will then be less likely to pressure me into drinking.

4. If I feel a craving coming on, then I'll walk around the block until
it disappears-that is, the craving, not the block!

5. I must remember how good I felt at Charlie's party two months ago
when I successfully resisted the pressure to drink.

6. Be assertive.  Tell all and sundry that I am not drinking and I will
be very angry if they offer me a drink.

Despite the fact that I had suddenly, completely lost the desire for
alcohol, I had not lost the desire for chocolate.  Or the sudden
yearnings to go shopping, And the pain was still in place.

In an effort to understand my compulsive tendencies, I started reading
everything I could Jay my hands on.  One report, "The Nature of
Craving,"" showed that monkeys and rats, even when hungry, chose
cocaine over food.  When given free access to cocaine, the animals
"went into a frenzy of drug-taking activity."

The study suggested that some machinery for addiction is built into our
brains.  To combat this innate tendency, the author called for a
joining of biological, psychological, and sociological forces.  No
mention was made of spiritual forces having any part to play.

As I read this report, I had a picture of all the antiseptic hospital
halls I'd walked down, of intellectually determined and well meaning
medical men talking in scientific jargon about my problems, of pills
prescribed and then more pills, and of a kind of emotional and
spiritless sterility that surrounded it all.

This sterility of spirit is referred to in Scott Peck's The Road Less
Traveled, "It is indeed tempting for psychiatrists to view themselves
as knights of modern science locked in noble combat with the
destructive forces of ancient religious superstition and irrational but
authoritarian dogma," he writes.

Meanwhile I struggled with the volcano of compulsion inside me.  Why
did eating binges and shopping splurges so quickly follow my victories
over tobacco and alcohol?

I asked this question of a neighbor.  Kathy was about my age,
mid-forties, with a pert nose and a short, chestnut page-boy haircut.
She responded by inviting me to a prayer meeting.  Because I was hungry
for answers, I agreed to go.

So one bright June morning I walked into a living room filled with
smiling women who welcomed me warmly.  Nervously I perched on the edge
of a green sofa.  The pastor of the Methodist church was there, giving
me a sense of assurance that I was not involved with spiritual
oddballs.

At the prayer meeting someone suggested that because of my exposure to
the occult, I should get rid of everything related to it.

I went home and burned all my occult books and horoscope readings.  It
was amazing the amount of psychic material a scavenger hunt revealed. I
even discarded items of my clothing that had signs of the zodiac and
jewelry with arcane symbols.  Part of me argued that the whole
performance was nothing but superstition and fanaticism.  Yet with
these things out of the house I felt .. .

lighter, somehow.  Purged.

Was it my imagination, or in the days that followed were the angry
voices in my head fainter, farther off-often silent for long periods.

But the craving for food, especially chocolate, still drove me.  I
still slept late too many mornings, had trouble getting myself
organized.  My needs were visible to everyone.

Kathy, however, was one of those caring people who sees a friend
through the long haul.  I especially remember the morning she appeared
on my doorstep clutching a book.  Eyes filled with concern, she thrust
the book into my hands as I stood behind the slightly cracked door.

"Here, Sand, maybe this will help .. .... Then she ran back to her
idling car and sped off down the street.

Shutting the door, I thrust the book into the pocket of my

rumpled bathrobe.  In the walnut-framed hall mirror I caught a look at
myself.

Good grief!  Who is that?  Backing up in disbelief, the leering image
gaped back at me.

That couldn't be me!  It must be some beached whale wrapped in a
chenille robe.

And those haunted eyes ringed with wilted mascara.  Raccoon eyes!

A beached whale with raccoon eyes.  Tears flooded my eyes, splashing
down my cheeks onto my robe.  I was suddenly aware of the deep hollow
in my chest.  I knew how to fill it.  There was a fresh half-gallon of
chocolate ice cream hidden in the freezer under the Brussels sprouts. I
could count on my dark, cool, sweet friend to bring me relief.

To the freezer!  I'd need a serving spoon.  Yes, a big spoon.  For I
intended to eat it all.

The just-delivered gift of love, Kathy's book, now rested forlornly on
the dark pine kitchen table, its pristine newness smudged with brown
dribbles from my chocolate hinge.  I'll read it tomorrow, I promised
myself Several weeks later Kathy's voice on the phone sounded bright
and enthusiastic as she told me about an upcoming workshop at her
Methodist church.  I wasn't so sure, except that since I'd stopped
drinking I needed something to occupy my mind.  There were so many raw
emotions coming to the surface that I couldn't deal with: frustration,
fears, anger, and-oh, God-the guilt.

"Sandy!  Welcome!"  Entering the church for the workshop I was
smothered with hugs of well-wishers, many of whom I'd known socially
over the years in Billings.  I tried not to be preoccupied with the hug
wrinkles on my meticulously ironed blouse and scarf.

The workshop leaders were a couple from Spokane, Washington.  As the
husband spoke I glanced at the shadows on the far brick

wall-a syncopated pattern of stripes.  I thought of the stripes I'd
seen across my lap in the hospital.

The speaker was opening his Bible.

"Turn with me to Isaiah 53, verses 4 and 5," he said.  Then he began
reading: "Surely he Uesus] hath borne our griefs, and carried our
sorrows:

yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted.  But he
was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities
.. . and by his stripes we are heated."

I stared at him open-mouthed, stunned at the timing of the words, and
felt a transfusion of hope.

"Are you coming to the healing service Sunday night?"  Kathy asked
later.

"I'll be happy to pick you up."

I shook my head.

"I'd better pass it up.  11 Sunday evening Randall and I ate dinner in
silence.  I tried not to look at the kitchen clock that indicated
twenty-five minutes until the healing service began.  While scraping
the dishes, I wondered what my priorities should be.  On the one hand,
my husband' s negative attitude toward my churchgoing was clear.
Religion almost seemed more of a threat to our marriage than my
drinking.  On the other hand, something inside was pushing me toward
the church.  That, obviously, would be a mistake.

I changed into my faded blue jeans and slipped on a baggy gray sweater
for an evening of TV-watching.  When I entered the den, Randall was
already settled in his black leather chair, the set tuned to the Sunday
night movie.  I sank into the couch.

A moment later I was back on my feet.

"I have to go to church," I said lamely.

"I don't expect you to understand why.  I'm not sure I do, either."

I raced out the front door with the image of his puzzled stare
following me.  Was I being driven by yet another compulsion?

Organ music was filling the church with a mighty crescendo when I
entered.  Such joy flooded the sanctuary that the putty in the

stained glass windows must have struggled to keep them from exploding
outwards.

The memory of my husband's disapproving look was dissolved in the
majesty of the music.  When the invitation was given to come forward
for healing, I rose from my seat and walked down the center aisle.
People were streaming toward the front from all over the church.  There
was just enough room for me to squeeze in at the altar rail, A large
white cross hung from the ceiling over the marble altar.

In the brilliance of the ceiling spotlights its whiteness was dazzling.
My eyes fell on the enormous open Bible resting on the marble missal
stand.  Below it in brushed brass letters were the words This Do in
Remembrance of Me.

At first, as I grasped the thick oak altar rail, my mind was racing.
Scenes: the living room at Uncle Ralph's; wearing the flower crown of
Miss Vermont; awaiting death at my kitchen window.  Places: Atlantic
City, Disneyland, Deaconess Hospital here in Billings.  Faces: Brad,
Brent, Lisa, my mother and father, Shelly at the checkout counter,
Karen.  Like whirling dancers they sped past.  Then calm-a holy
silence.

A few minutes later a woman minister joined me at the altar rail and
listened to my litany of pain.  Then she placed her hands on my
shoulders and looked straight into my eyes, as the following words
flowed with quiet authority from her lips: "If God has forgiven all
your sins, how dare you not forgive yourself?"

My eyes smarting, my nose running, I offered up my prayers to God-and
felt the deep-down happiness of being accepted for what I was.  I was
the object of a love greater than any I had ever known.

"To forgive your own self," writes Louis B. Smedes in Forgive and
Forget, "is almost the ultimate miracle of healing!  To forgive
yourself is to act out the mystery of one person who is both forgiver

and forgiven.  You judge yourself-.  this is the division within you.
You fergive yourself.  this is the healing of the split."

Later, as I reflected on what happened at the church, I saw it as a
ma)or step toward health.  Since compulsive behavior, by its very
definition, entails acts we experience as involuntary-in which our
wills are overwhelmed by a desire that feels as if it comes fro m out
sid ourselves-the remedy for such behavior lies in submitting
oursel,@es to a countervailing positive force.  Alcoholics Anonymous
call tl@js force a Higher Power.  Many therapists construct other
ideals "Outside" the patient.

A skeptic might argue that by this procedure the compulsive person
merely exchanges addictions.  I don't agree.  Every sufferer knows the
difference between pain and release from pain.  As Dr.  Stanton Peele
writes in Love and Addiction: "T@,e difference between not being
addicted and being addicted is the lIfference between seeing the world
as your arena and seeing the world as your prison..  .. If what a
person is engaged in en haw-es his ability to live-if it enables him to
work more effectively, to love more beautifully, to appreciate the
things around him 00re, and finally, if it allows him to grow, to
change, and expanJ-then it is not addictive."

Theugh other compulsive women may find other "Higher Powej@that release
them from enslavement to detested but irresis:ible urges, I can speak
authentically about only one.  For me, Chrisian conversion and faith
was the necessary outside force to break the grip of patterns that held
me in thrall most of my life.

A @OciolOgist might say that compulsive individuals in our cultuj@, are
predisposed toward a Judeo-Christian solution to their behavor.
Whatever reasons may be given, I can only say personally that i worked
for me.  My compulsive lifestyle was reordered by a power outside
myself, which since that night in the church I contilue to experience
and call Jesus Christ.

 Intervention For some reason, I can tell you where each person in
that room was sitting, the floor plan is burned into my brain..  .. And
they all proceeded to confront me with a second intervention.  Only
this time, they meant business..  .. All of them hurt me.  I collapsed
into tears.  But I still had enough sense to realize they hadn't come
around just to make me cry; they were there because they loved me and
wanted to help me.

-Betty Ford The Times of My Life S I PROBE BACK INTO MY RECOVERY, AND
THAT OF OTHER COMPULSIVE people, and see how the sick and defeated are
transformed into healthy and productive people, one central fact comes
through: Recovery seldom comes ah out through one or two experiences;
recovery is not an event, it is a process.

Encountering Karen at Warm Springs Hospital was a beginning, the
activation of a long-buried desire to respond to the hurt and need of
someone else.  Explains John Schwarzlose, executive director and
vice-president of the Betty Ford Center: "Alcoholics and addicts have
isolated themselves for years.  We want them to form relationships
again."

The discovery of those three little words Do it now was also a step to
healing, the coming to life of a part of me that wanted to take
responsibility.  It too was part of the process.

After throwing my cigarettes from the car window and uttering what
might have been the first real prayer of my life, I was loosed from
bondage to nicotine.  When months later I was released from the desire
to drink at the Valentine's Day party, I thought I was now free from
all addiction.  (Far from it.  My compulsions to overeat and go on
shopping binges were to reemerge stronger than ever.) And after the
beautiful cleansing experience at the Billings Methodist Church, the
mental and physical listlessness brought on by years of abusing my body
was replaced by a powerful infusion of energy.  I felt more alive than
I had in twenty years.  Yet this healing was also only a step on the
long road back to health.

During the recovery process, I encountered attitudes that were
troubling.  Some new church friends took the position that I would find
all the healing I needed through prayer alone.  God's work in me might
be endangered, they said, if I got involved with any secular-scientific
treatment.  The medical world, on the other hand, expressed
indifference and even hostility toward any healing that came about
through "religion," saying it came either from mass hysteria or a kind
of self-hypnosis.

Yet I could see value in what both camps offered.  In any case, there
were few effective medical treatment centers for addictive people until
the 1970s.  Before then alcoholics and drug addicts were often
institutionalized, as I had been, right in with the mentally disturbed.
Once separate facilities were set up to help addiction sufferers, a new
era began.  These medical centers usually worked closely with
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), the one approach to alcoholism that had
proven effective statistically since it was started in 1935.  A
significant discovery was that the basic Twelve Step program of AA
worked not only for alcoholics, but for other compulsive behavior
problems, too.  (See p. 209.)

Recovery begins, counselors discovered, when patients face reality-as
required by the all-important First Step of the program.  But oh, how
hard it is for the addict to change years of practiced deception and
self-delusion.  Our emotions are defensive, self protective  Facing
truth can be like pulling teeth without anesthesia .. as I was soon to
discover.

For weeks after my healing at the Methodist church, Bible study and
prayer groups became the doors to a new life, while I tried not to look
at the wreckage of two homes.

My three teenage children were living with their father and had their
own lives and activities, where I did not fit.  Randall and I were
growing farther and farther apart.  Many months had passed since my
last drink.  My resolve was intact, but my body was behaving strangely.
Sometimes I talked like a machine gun.  I raced from the supermarket to
a prayer meeting to back home again at a frantic pace.

"Are you sure you're okay?"  friends would ask.

"You seem so revved up.  Slow down and catch up with yourself!"

Any sense of peace had lit momentarily like the butterfly that had
enchanted me in my childhood hideaway, then flitted off elusively.  A
restless gnawing often filled my heart.  I couldn't seem to focus my
mind anymore.  Blaming the symptoms on the stress of my personal life,
I didn't realize I was heading straight for a "dry drunk" condition
when a recovering alcoholic exhibits deceptive, unrealistic or "hyper"
behavior without the use of alcohol.  (See Checklist of Symptoms, p.
214.) Thinking a change of scene would help, I decided to drive out to
a seminar in Seattle.  On the way I could spend the weekend with my new
friend Cathy and her husband, Dirk.

At their home in Red Lodge, Montana, Cathy and Dirk welcomed me warmly.
Feeling exhilarated by our evening of discussion, I lingered in the
cozy living room of their log cabin lodge long after Cathy and Dirk
went off to bed.

Classical music from an FM station set a dreamy mood, I drifted about
the room, rolled back the braided rugs, and danced barefoot on the
smooth varnished floor.

The sound of a male voice fractured my reverie.  It was Dirk, "What in
the world are you doing at this ungodly hour?"  Startled, I just stared
at him.

"Sit down, Sandy.  I want to talk to you," he exclaimed as he tightened
the tie of his terrycloth bathrobe.

"You may not like what I'm going to say, but I have to say it anyway. "
He studied me for a moment in the soft light.

"I know how much progress you've made since Cathy and I first met you
and how fragile you are right now, but I have to tell you that your
behavior is absolutely bonkers.  You are on one heck of an emotional
hinge, kiddo.  A dry drunk.  If you don't do something about it, it may
turn into a wet drunk and God knows what would happen to you then.

"You are in absolutely no condition to drive to Seattle by yourself. Or
anywhere else for that matter.  You need to go to a treatment center. 
And fast.  I mean tomorrow.  Before the sun goes down.

"Meanwhile, quit prancing around like a princess and get to bed.  You
need rest.  We'll call St.  Mary's when the office opens at eight
o'clock and see if we can get you in.  You've got to go, Sandy.  Your
life depends on it.  You're a lot sicker than you think you are."

I hated him.  I was fine .. . just on a slight roll.  I argued,
stormed, wept, but deep down I knew he was right.  His words pierced
through all my denial.  I couldn't run any longer.  My life was still
out of control.  It was time to face my sickness head-on.  Dirk helped
me face the truth-that I needed professional help.

The next day I was on my way to St.  Mary's Treatment Center in
Minneapolis.

The "dry drunk" is a common experience for recovering addicts if there
has been no inner healing of the emotions.  The message to

me was pointed: "You may have stopped drinking, Sandy, but you are
still binging emotionally."  My compulsive nature was still in control.
Turn off tobacco, turn on sweets; turn off alcohol, turn on a 11
spiritual" high from music or over talk

What Dirk had done for me was a spontaneous form of an increasingly
popular treatment approach called intervention.  (See p.

258.) The purpose: to get the sick person to face up to reality.  The
method: confrontation.

"Your behavior is bonkers, Sandy.  Your very life's at stake.  Get to
treatment-fast."

Intervention is "a move initiated out of love and concern by the people
who care about the alcoholic," writes Mary Ellen Pinkbam in How to Stop
the One You Lovefrom Drinking.

"It involves their getting together to tell the alcoholic the facts
about his disease and how it is affecting him.  It's the only kind,
gentle, and caring way to help a chemically dependent person.  It's the
only thing that works, the key to stopping someone whose life is in
danger."

If too many family members have been "co-dependents" with the addict
for too long a period, they lose their ability to be honest with each
other, to share true feelings.  An intervention reverses this process
of dental and deception by the family and facilitates their facing up
to truth-and dealing with their loved one in a loving, caring way.

Since family and close contacts are too involved emotionally to lead an
intervention, a specialist is needed.  Such a professional can usually
be found through a local drug or alcohol council, Alcoholics Anonymous,
or a mental health department.

Interventions are structured carefully, with as many as six or more
people involved.  The ideal combination is the spouse, a parent, one or
more children, a doctor, the employer, and the family pastor.

Preparation for an intervention calls for a series of meetings between
family members and the intervention professional, usually at a location
other than the addict's home.  The professional explains

the process and rehearses the concerned persons as to how they will
present their facts.  Very often this is the first time the family has
actually sat down together and discussed what is going on in the home.
All those involved make a list of events in which the addict's behavior
has hurt and embarrassed them.  Then they practice their presentation.
Intervention works for drug abuse, bulimia, anorexia, gambling, and
other compulsive behaviors.

Other suggestions: 9 Timing is crucial.  Most successful interventions
take place early in the morning when the addict is most vulnerable.  It
is not advisable to do an intervention when the addict has had time to
fortify herself with alcohol or drugs.  This is when her denial and
defenses are highest.

Firmness of resolve.  The spouse and family should have a plan for
separating themselves from the addict if she refuses to go for
treatment.  The employer should be ready with an ultimatum:

treatment or loss of job.  Often the threat of the loss of one's
salaried position is the most persuasive factor.

Who to exclude from an intervention.  Anyone who would be too
legalistic or moralistic; anyone whose mental balance is questionable;
family members too full of hate to perceive the addict as sick and in
need of help.

Have a specific treatment plan ready.  If the addict agrees to go for
treatment, have a time and place firmly set.  If there is too much
delay, the addict will change her mind.

If the intervention fails.  Sometimes the addict will storm out of the
meeting.  If possible, try it again.  Remember that there is tremendous
anxiety inside the addict, who is involved in all-out denial.  What
doesn't work at one setting, will at another.  Also the intervention,
even if it falls, can start a healing process in the family by bringing
members together to face the truth of their situation.

Is there any type ofpersonfor whom intervention won't work ,@ None that
I know of.  When I went to a treatment center, I met doctors,

pastors, two lawyers, and a judge, all of whom were patients. Addiction
grips people in the highest and lowest job classifications-which is why
Betty Ford in A Glad Awakening calls alcoholism an "equal-opportunity
disease."

There is new hope for all these people in that ninety-seven percent of
alcoholics, given the intervention procedure by a specialist, go to
treatment within forty-eight hours.  The process is so simple that few
can believe it works-but it does.

I hated being confronted by Dirk just as much as I had three years
before by my friend Lois Ann.  For this was the second (not the first)
time someone had cared enough to play this uncongenial but necessary
role in my life.  Three years earlier, at the height of my involvement
with the Serenity Society, when each new "spiritual counselor" sent me
spiraling deeper into craziness and depression, Lois Ann had organized
her own version of intervention.

One day she'd invited me to her house for morning coffee to meet a
special friend.  The friend turned out to be a vivacious blonde who had
just gotten out of an alcohol rehabilitation center in Minneapolis. Her
sky-blue eyes danced as she excitedly related her twenty eight day
experience there.

"I feel like a new woman," she rhapsodized, "like I have a second
chance in life.  I can't believe how much better I feel."

I took an instant dislike to this lovely creature.  She looked too
happy, too put together.  I suddenly felt terribly tacky in the tired
black polyester pantsuit I'd had on for several days.  My head itched
from need of a shampoo; the runners in my pantyhose looked like the Los
Angeles Freeway.  What a slob you are, I had thought to myself.

Lois Ann cleared her deep voice and began in halting phrases.

"I've invited you here today for a very specific reason, Sandy.  I
don't know much about alcohol, but perhaps this is your problem, too.

Perhaps you need treatment.  I can't bear to see what you're doing

to yourself.  Taking a deep breath as though to muster a new burst of
courage, she added painfully, "Have you looked at yourself in a mirror
lately?"

Her words burned into my soul.  She had hit a raw nerve.  But alcohol
wasn't my problem!  I drank to escape my problems.

I'll 11 be glad to phone and make arrangements for you, " the friend
volunteered.

"I know a marvelous counselor there who can answer any questions you
might have."

Soon I was chatting with a pleasant-voiced older man.

"We'll take good care of you here, Sandy," he said.

"When you get out, you'll be the woman your husband fell in love
with."

That challenge registered.  I promised Lois Ann I'd speak with my
psychiatrist and my husband.  At my doctor's appointment that
afternoon, I broached the subject.  He thought it was worth a try.  The
sessions with him were clearly not working.

Randall was more skeptical.  The last three years had diminished his
faith for my restoration.  He saw such devastation and hopelessness in
me.  He lived with it and in it.  Nevertheless, he agreed it was worth
trying.

One January morning in 1977 I was on a Northwest jet headed for
Minneapolis.

The intervention set up by Lois Ann had succeeded to the extent that it
got me into a treatment center.  In the majority of cases today, these
specialized facilities get the addict turned around.  I was one of
their failures.  The twenty-eight-day treatment, like my short stays on
the psychiatric floor of Billings' Deaconess Hospital, removed me
temporarily from my destructive lifestyle and started me on new
disciplines.  But when I returned home and tried to deal with the old
problems, the old pitfalls were too many.  I chose to ignore the
"aftercare" plan that had been set up for me.  I'd been confronted with
the truth, but at that period in my life I had had no resources to
undergird me and I couldn't cope with it.  I had

opted for the "out" of suicide and begun squirreling away sleeping
pills on a closet shelf.

Perhaps, though, it was that first intervention by Lois Ann in 197 7
that prepared me for this second one, in June 1980, which got me into a
treatment program that worked.

I I

Facing Truth Contrition .. . is not an American virtue, and, indeed,
mere contrition could admit everything, and change nothing.  To find
culprits is more our style; but culprits, in taking their punishment,
take our part of the guilt with them.  Liberation can come only from
insights into the relevance of past guilt and into the place of ethical
choice in the reformation of identity.

Erik H. Erikson, M.D. Dimensions of a New Identity COOKING BACK, I
SOMETIMES THINK DIRK S INTERVENTION, UNSTRUCured as it was, saved my
life.  I had been trying to put up a good front with Randall, my
children, and my friends; underneath I was confused and frightened.
What to do about my marriage?  Though Randall had supported me during
six bad years, I had sensed his rejection in a number of ways.  Now
that I'd stopped drinking and was on the road to recovery, he expected
me to fit back into his lifestyle.  I couldn't do it.  It was this
social scenario that had kept me in trouble for so long.

"In our society," writes Betty Ford in The Times of My Life, "we get to
know one another over drinks, we associate feasts and celebrations with
liquor.  We think we have to drink, that it's a

social necessity..  .. It's romantic as long as you can handle it-for
years I could and did-but it's misery when you become addicted."

Randall didn't understand this, or why my new religious faith was
suddenly important.  Since I was no longer the wife he married, and
since we were going in different directions, we agreed to separate.

My children were completely bewildered by my decision to go to a
treatment center.  To them, I was more stable than they could ever
remember me.  Why did I have to go back to the hospital?  I couldn't
explain to them how desperately insecure I was, how close to the
breaking point.

In mid-June 1980, I entered St.  Mary's Rehabilitation Center, a
twenty-eight-day treatment facility for alcohol and drug-related
addictions in Minneapolis (a different facility than the one I'd gone
to three years earlier).

The three-story treatment center contains, in addition to patients'
rooms and counselors' offices, a number of small meeting lounges, a
large lecture room, a small chapel with stained glass windows, a
nurses' station, and a large recreation area with pool tables and a
piano.

I had a small single room with cream painted walls, a hospital bed, and
built-in dresser and desk.  The daily schedule given us:

Breakfast, 8:00 A.M.

Morning lecture, 9:00 A.M.

Group therapy, 10:00-11:45 A.M.

Lunch, 12:00 noon Afternoon lecture, 1:00 P.m.

Group therapy, 2:00-4:30 P.M.

Free time relaxation therapy, 4:30-6:00 P.m.

Dinner, 6:00 P.M.

Evening lecture, 7:00 P.m.

Free time alcohol support group meetings/reading/homework, 8:30 on

At intake I was given a physical, a blood test, and psychological
testing (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-the "MMPI").  I
also met with a staff psychiatrist who suggested Lithium therapy for my
mood swings, For the first few days my blood pressure was monitored
frequently.

For me, group therapy would be the cutting edge of the program.  Six of
us met together twice a day for close sharing led by a staff counselor.
In our group there was Gwen, our counselor, in her late forties; Max, a
stockbroker, maybe sixty; Carol, fiftyish, a clothing saleswoman;
Larry, a balding, middle-aged businessman; Sue, a tense, depressed girl
barely twenty; and myself, now forty-four.

We met in Gwen's office, a plain room with a desk pushed into the
corner and six plastic chairs placed in a circle.  On one wall hung a
chart of the Twelve Steps of Alcoholics Anonymous.  I got as far as the
First Step--"We admitted we were powerless over alcohol, that our lives
had become unmanageable "-and stopped reading.  Powerless,
Unmanageable, Tough words.

Gwen passed out a worksheet to each of us.  Homework to be done in our
rooms that evening.  In response to a series of questions we were to
write out our drinking history.  I did not look forward to that.

"You need to get the garbage in your lives out on the floor and sort
through it," Gwen explained.

"You will know if you're in touch with how it really was, because it
will hurt.  So I wish you a lot of pain, because then something is
happening to you.""O After two hours of sharing and teaching, Gwen
closed the session.  Holding hands in a circle, we recited Reinhold
Niebuhr's Serenity Prayer (a staple in many treatment programs): "God
grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage
to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference."

That night I sat down to tackle the homework.  The sooner I get going,
I told myself, the sooner I'll get it over with.  At the little
formica-topped desk, I began reading the sheet of questions.

"Effects on character.  List thirty values important to you and give
examples of how you have compromised them as a result of your usage.

Suddenly my mind was swirling with indictments-ignoring people's
feelings, lying, wasting money, forgetting my children's needs, taking
advantage..  .. Now the whirlpool was sucking me down toward unbearable
horrors.  I flipped the sheet of paper over and slapped my hand down on
top of it.

"I'll do it later."

I wandered into the big lounge and joined Carol, the fiftyish clothing
salesperson, and Sue, the depressed, twenty-year-old.

"It's so awful to be a woman and an alcoholic," Carol was saying.

"The hiding you have to do, the denying-it really grinds your
insides."

Sue nodded bleakly.

"What made me really mad was the unfairness," Carol continued.

"It was okay for the men to be at the bar having fun.  I was stuck at
home.  My husband and I had equal status till we got married, and then
all of a sudden, plop!"

I nodded, remembering my days at Pepsi Cola: "I wanted to drink like a
man so I could be with the men."

Our group sessions, while the cutting edge of the program, soon became
the most difficult part of treatment for me.  There was always a knot
in my stomach as I approached the door to our counselor's room.  How
could I escape Gwen's penetrating green eyes?  I admired her, but
feared she could make mincemeat of my carefully cultivated poise if she
probed too close.  I would sit in the circle with my best Miss America
training: knees and ankles together, one foot tucked behind the other.
And my Miss America smile intact.  I'd learned to smile early.

"Put on a happy face," my mother would tell me.

When my turn came to give a brief biography, I described my hospital
experiences in Billings and Warm Springs, and how I'd since stopped
smoking and drinking.  I touched lightly on my healing that night at
the Methodist church, trying hard not to come

across as a religious fanatic.  Most of the group looked impressed with
my progress.  Gwen's eyes were expressionless.

"You paint a positive picture of yourself, Sandy.  just why are you
here?"  Gwen asked.

"My friends think I'm on a dry drunk."

"Do you agree with them?"

"I guess so."

"But you're not sure?"

"My life is sort of a mess.  My marriage is breaking up; that is, my
second marriage.  My three children are living with their father, my
first husband.  And"-to my disgust, tears were filling my eyes-"and I'm
.. . well, not sure of myself at all.  "

"In short, you could fall off the wagon tomorrow."

"I guess so.  I came here to Minneapolis for treatment back in 1977.
Stayed sober for two months afterwards, then took that one drink.  I
know I shouldn't drink.  "

"Correction.  You know you can't drink, but you're not sure you won't.
" "I'm pretty sure."

"Sandy, I'll be blunt with you.  In some ways you're the sickest person
in this room.  You spout pious phrases, you hold people off with your
sense of humor and your light approach, but you're not in touch with
your feelings.  I've yet to hear you say how you feel."

I IRight now I feel like I've been kicked in the butt.

"Good.  "

"And I'm miserable underneath all these smiles."  The tears were
flowing again.

"And I'm scared.  And I hate myself for what I've done to my family."

"Much better, Sandy.  For the first time you come across as real."

She turned to others in the group.

"What is your feedback to Sandy?"

"Likable, but too pious," ventured Carol.

"I felt she was determined to show us she didn't belong here."

"Trying too hard," offered Max.

"She was out to win us from the start.  A people-pleaser.  A lot of
froth on top to cover up something underneath she didn't want us to
see."

"Hear that, Sandy."  Gwen's eyes were boring into me.

"Because you've been to treatment before and because you've been dry
for a while, you felt you were above the others."

Devastating.  Carol handed me some tissues.  I felt naked before these
people.

Inner healing had begun.  The purpose of these group sessions was to
get us to open up, be honest, be vulnerable, express what we felt, not
what we thought we ought to feel.  At the next session, Gwen zeroed in
on my relationship to Randall.

"How did he react to your drinking?"

"Frustration at first.  Apathy at the end.  As a lawyer it bugged him
that he couldn't persuade me to stop.  He's used to being able to
control people and situations."

"So you showed him that he couldn't control you by drinking more than
ever."

I shifted uneasily in my chair.

"My drinking was a problem before I married him."

"Would you have drunk so much if he had been less controlling?"  Max
asked suddenly.

Startled, I thought a moment.

"Maybe not," I admitted.  Max kept pressing, "Why?"  I jammed my hands
under my thighs.

"Well, I got so mad .. . maybe there was some revenge mixed in
there."

"I just heard something honest," Gwen said, "and I congratulate you.
What was your reward for getting mad?"

My mind swam.  My mouth was dry.  Leaning forward, I stared at the toes
of my shoes.  Maybe if I leaned far enough the floor would open and
swallow me.

"I don't know.  Maybe I was getting something out of my system."

"There was a great big reward," Gwen said, "and I'm not sure you want
to give it up yet."

I could feel the circle of eyes watching me.  Finally I said
tentatively, "Maybe part of the reward was an inner permission to drink
more."

"Part?"  asked Gwen, cocking an eyebrow.

"A lot, " I said.

"Do you see," Gwen said, "that your anger has been one of the dynamics
of your alcoholism?"

There was another long pause.  I felt a fear I could not explain.

"But sometimes I drank because I was happy."  Max asked, "What would
make you so happy you'd take a drink?"

I laughed.

"Not taking a drink."  Gwen was not smiling.

"I don't know whether you do that in all your relationships, but humor
is a way of getting off the hook and stopping communication.  As I see
it, Max was trying to help and you made a joke.  Then he's down and
you're up.  Take a look at that.  " Gwen spoke again.

"I urge you to accept what has been said, Sandy.  I don't see you
making any progress toward accepting the disease concept and the fact
that you are powerless over alcohol which tells me that you are not
working on your First Step.  You will not really get into treatment
until you begin focusing on you, your addiction, and how it has
affected you."

At the close of the session I hurried away to an isolated chair in the
second-floor lounge.  I replayed the last exchange Gwen's voice zapping
me for that joke.  I felt marooned in a hot funk of embarrassment, like
a little girl caught red-handed.

Max's voice broke into my trance.

"Sandy, don't look so down.  It happens to the best of us.  " Looking
up, I smiled ruefully.

"It's always darkest before it's totally black.  " Max shrugged and
left me alone.

I felt a flush like a prickly rash spreading up my throat and across my
face.  I had just done it again, made a quip to keep someone at arm's
length.

My time came as it did for everyone in our group to read aloud the
first homework assignment: a comprehensive look at how addiction had
affected every area of my life.  Afterward, I waited confidently for
the group's approval.  No one could accuse me now of covering up: I'd
bared my very soul!

But the others disagreed.  Some thought I'd minimized the effects on
myself and my family, others that I "skated away" from talking about
real issues.

And I was totally unprepared for Gwen's response.  She told me calmly
that I was one of the angriest women she had ever had in her group and
that I'd better get in touch with that anger or it would surely
sabotage my recovery.

"When you finish your treatment here," she said, "I think you should
consider going to a women's halfway house for continuing recovery."

She added that I'd been so ill for the past twenty years, I hardly knew
what planet I was on, and that going to Billings could be disastrous.

"And from now on," she concluded, "I want your outsides to match your
insides!  No more hiding behind your smile.  " I was stunned that she
detected such anger in me.  I hadn't lost my cool even once in the
group.  Was I really so angry?  I wasn't sure I wanted to find out.

After this session, I slipped down to the chapel on the second floor of
the treatment center.  It was my special place of peace and refuge, an
eye of calm in the storm all around me.  Kneeling in the serenity of
that place, I started to search my life for clues to my aborted
anger.

As I meditated, I saw I was indeed angry, and that it had begun when I
was very young.  I had picked up people's feelings and moods, known
what was acceptable behavior and what was not.

Facing Truth Observing adult responses to my actions, I'd discovered
it was not all right to be angry.  My home was not a healthy emotional
climate where feelings were expressed frankly.  So I learned to mask
anger and annoyance, smile sweetly, say nothing.  I felt one way and
acted another.  Pretty soon I didn't know how I felt.  Apparently this
pattern was still in effect, refined by years of practice.  My denial
system protected me like a bulletproof vest.

What Gwen said, then, was true.  Beneath the placid exterior I was
angry.  In fact, I was mad as hell!  A childhood episode came back to
me.  Once when I was angry at my grandmother I'd covered my whole body
with big white adhesive-tape Band-Aids.  Then I'd stood in the lawn
sprinkler so the Mer@urochrome on the pads would run down my body like
blood.  It was a pathetic attempt to get people to notice my
feelings-and won me no attention at all.

As an adult I became a door-slammer.  On three occasions, when angry at
my husband, I'd thrown pots through a kitchen window.  The man at the
glass repair shop chuckled the third time he replaced the pane: "It'd
be cheaper to kick a tire, lady."

I had never learned to express feelings appropriately.  I knew I
couldn't blame my parents.  They were victims of victims and I realized
that I, too, had made victims of my children.

Was it this pattern of denied emotions, I wondered, generation after
generation, that had made me such a ready receptor for those 11 angry
little men" who'd tormented me so long?  I only knew there was an
avalanche of rage inside that wanted to come out.

A similar pattern of repressed anger shows up again and again in
compulsive individuals like me smiling people-pleasers who are covering
up years of suppressed anger and hurt.

"No matter how 'grown-up' one acts in therapy or in life," writes
Arthur janov in The Primal Scream, "it must be an act which has little
bearing on one's maturity until the 'little girl' is felt..  .. We must
feel the anger fully in order to eradicate it.  When a person can feel
himself, instead of acting out his feelings symbolically, he will

be unlikely to act either impulsively or aggressively.  The dialectic
of anger, as with Pain, is that when it is felt, it disappears, when it
is not felt, it remains waiting to be felt.  " As the days passed and I
opened up haltingly to the group, some of the long-buried feelings came
out.  Memories surfaced that had festered unacknowledged for years. But
always, it seemed, more pain lay underneath.

The third week of my treatment was called "family week," made memorable
for me by a visit from my son Brent, at nineteen a handsome six-footer.
My middle child, Brent has always been creative, athletic, popular with
his peers.  The day he joined our group, Gwen placed our two chairs in
the center of the circle face-to-face, then asked Brent to describe how
it felt to grow up in an alcoholic home.

He shifted about uncomfortably and said he hadn't noticed anything was
wrong until he had visited the homes of his friends and seen that their
mothers didn't drink as I did.

Gwen explained to him that children of alcoholics blank out the pain
and have almost an amnesia about their parents' drinking.

As Brent talked, I looked into his guileless eyes and felt such a
wrenching pain in my stomach that I thought I would be sick.  The sense
of lost years with him, Brad, and Lisa was almost unbearable.

"Stop crying, Sandy," Gwen ordered.

"You're manipulating him with your tears.

It was a hard time, I know, for Brent, as it was for me yet so very
good to have him there.

After kissing him goodbye as he left for the airport, I returned to my
room and found a note propped up against my pillow.  It was neatly
printed with a black felt-tip pen on a paper towel:

Dear Mom, I am sorry that my stay had to be so short.  I hope that we
have cleared up some problems that you have had!  I learned a lot while
I was here.  The people are beautiful.  I want you to know I love you
very much and I don't use the term loosely.  I'm sure Brad and

Lisa feel the same.  Please give my best wishes to all the nice friends
of yours.  I send them all the willpower in the world and my very best
wishes.  Take care and if you ever have a problem, just give us a call.
We will help.

Love, Brent & God bless weep seven years later upon reading this.  The
message has been framed and matted in sunny yellow and hangs on my
kitchen wall.  It's a precious prized treasure from the heart of my
son.

During treatment I was served with divorce papers.  Though I knew they
were coming, the reality devastated me.  More guilt, remorse, defeat.
For two days I barely functioned.  The lecture by a counselor named
Jessica was life-restoring.

Jessica had been a Roman Catholic nun, then an alcoholic.  She'd found
sobriety through the AA program and was now dedicated to carrying the
message of restoration to others.  Her very presence inspired
confidence.  The serenity of her spirit washed over me as she began to
speak.

"An alcoholic can be sober," Jessica was saying, "but still the most
miserable, God-forsaken person on two feet.  There has to be some
rebuilding of the spiritual values destroyed by chemicals: honesty,
humility, forgiveness, trust, love, courage.  This process begins with
surrender.  It is saying "I give up!"  I surrender to the powerlessness
and un manageability of my life.  The chemical controlled me, I said
and did things while drunk that were hurtful, painful, devastating,
destructive.

"In recovery," she continued, "the hardest thing for me to accept was
the fact that kind, gentle, caring Jessica, while drunk, was capable of
doing terrible things.  I knew I could be forgiven for those things.
But as long as I was unable or unwilling to forgive myself, it was
difficult to feel their forgiveness in my gut.  I still carried the
burden of my past around like a big boulder on my back."

As Jessica spoke my thoughts went back to that night at the Methodist
church.  The words of the woman minister rang in my head: "If God has
forgiven all your sins, how dare you not forgive yourself?"  It sounded
so simple, but I saw now that a lack of self-forgiveness had continued
to be the biggest stumbling block in my recovery.

Jessica continued: "So I finally faced the reality that I was a failure
at running my own affairs.  Then the question: Where am I going to get
help outside myself?  Is there anything in this program that I can grab
hold of and hang onto very, very tightly that will make me become a
healthier, happier person?  Is there anything that will give me a deep
sense of forgiveness?  That brought me to a further stage of
surrender-surrender to God as I understood him which surprisingly, I
had never really done.

"I know now," Jessica concluded, "that God will give me the grace, the
strength, the courage, the people that I need to get through today
without drinking.  For that I am very grateful."

Powerlessness.  Acceptance.  Surrender.  Gratitude.  Great words to
say, but how to own them, to integrate them into my life?  I suddenly
saw with new eyes the un manageability of my life.

I could take Step One of our recovery program and put any number of
things where the word alcohol appears: cigarettes, food, relationships,
shopping sprees, the occult, caffeine, anger .. .. * The list seemed
endless.  I was powerless over my whole life.  That was what was
unmanageable.

Step Two was equally crucial: "Came to believe that a power greater
than myself could restore me to sanity."

"Developing your spirituality," writes Robin Norwood in Women Who Love
Too Much, "no matter what your religious orientation, basically means
letting go of self-will, of the cleternaination to make The Twelve
Steps can be applied to any self-help group or program.

things happen the way you think they should .. . believing that you
alone have all the answers .. . becoming willing to hold still, be
open, and wait for guidance for yourself.  It means learning to let go
of fear (all of the 'what ifs') and despair (all of the 'if onlys') and
replacing them with positive thoughts and statements about your life. "
At the end of her talk, Jessica instructed us to stand and grasp the
hands of the people next to us while we sang "Amazing Grace."  At my
right was a ruddy-faced young man whose mother, Carol, was in my
treatment group.  At my left was Veronica, a tiny, birdlike woman in
treatment for her ninth time.  I was struck by the difference of
handclasps.  One so powerful, the other so tremulous.  The words we
sang pierced my soul: "I once was lost, but now am found, was blind,
but now I see."

Soon people were sobbing openly.  Veronica leaned against me, her tears
wetting the sleeve of my blue cotton shirt.  I doubt there was a person
in that room who was not grappling with that reality.  There was new
purpose in faces that before had been vacant.  The air was charged with
electricity.  I felt safe and cared for and loved.  But most of all, I
felt forgiven.

Self-forgiveness without honesty, writes Louis B. Smedes in Forgive and
Forget, "is psychological hocus-pocus.  The rule is: we cannot really
forgive ourselves unless we look at the failure in our past and call it
by its right name.  When you forgive yourself, you rewrite your script.
What you are in your present scene is not tied down to what you did in
an earlier scene..  .. You release yourself today from yesterday's
scenario.  You walk into tomorrow, guilt gone.  "  Anger and Male
Dependency At our worst we women who love too much are relationship
addicts, "man junkies" strung out on pain, fear, and yearning.... We
use relationships in the same way that we use our addictive substance:
to take ourpain away.... As long as we are bent on escaping ourselves
and avoiding our pain, we stay sick.  The barder we try and the more
avenues of escape we pursue, the sicker we get as we compound
addictions with obsessions.

Robin Norwood Women Who Love Too Much S MORE AND MORE IS LEARNED ABOUT
ADDICTIVE BEHAVIOR, THERAPISTS are urging patients to continue their
recovery programs beyond the twenty-eight-day average stay at a
treatment center, preferably in a halfway house.  If for one reason or
another, often financial, this is impossible, the alternative is a
support group in the patient's hometown using the Twelve-Step
program.

At the suggestion of Gwen, my counselor at the treatment center, I
agreed to enter a halfway house.  Twenty years of addictive behavior,
she said, could not be changed in a month's program.  I hated to be
away still longer from Billings where I could see my children several
times a week, but my prime responsibility to my family was to get
well.

My interview at the Jane Dickman House (about twenty miles outside of
St.  Paul) was a surprise.  The words halfway house had always conjured
up a vision of cracked plaster walls, leaky ceilings, and dead flies on
the windowsills.  In contrast, the ride up to Dickman House coursed
along a winding driveway, passed a tennis court and manicured lawn, and
came to a halt beneath the portico of a sprawling wood-and-stone
structure.  It looked more like a country vacation resort than a
facility for chemically dependent women.

Inside I was led past groups of women talking over coffee around small
tables and into a dining room with a chalet window that offered a
panoramic view of a lake.  My interviewer asked me probing questions
about my life and my goals for recovery, noting my answers on a yellow
pad.  At the end of our time, she offered a treatment plan for me: I
needed to work on building trust levels, improving family
relationships, understanding my feelings and emotions.  The cost of
living there came to about $ 1, 100 a month.

All participants were encouraged to find jobs locally or in nearby St.
Paul, not only to help pay expenses, but to build a new life of
independence.

The first few weeks were spent in "Feelings Groups," large and small
house meetings, one-on-one counseling, exercise periods, and alcohol
support group meetings.  There were kitchen duties, special weekend
projects, and social events with our brother halfway house, Team House,
in nearby St.  Paul.

Each woman at Jane Dickman was given a "verbal" by her counselor.
Before we were allowed to speak, we had to use our special verbal and
say how we felt.  Mine, for example, was, "I need to share with you on
a meaningful level.  I feel sad for embarrassed, or angry, or
whateverl.  " By doing this, I would be forced to get in touch with my
feelings.

After one group session my counselor, a no-nonsense, authoritative
woman named Betsy, called me into her office for a one-on-one.

"Sandy, your steady smile tells me that you're a good-natured person.
Are you really that happy on the inside or have you gone through life
in a smiling depression?"

"Perhaps.  "

"Then that happy smile must be a mask to cover up how you're really
feeling.

I nodded, recalling how my group at St.  Mary's had called me on
this.

"Some of your smiles seem spontaneous and natural.  Others I suspect
are cover-ups.  "

"Cover-ups for what?"  I asked, half-afraid to hear her response.

"Your deep-rooted anger.  We're going to deal with that in the next few
weeks."

With that, Betsy instructed the other women to confront me every time I
smiled and ask what I was smiling about.  As an exercise to get my
insides to match my outsides, I was to pay a small fine whenever I used
my smile as a defense.  I was also to be penalized if I employed
exaggerated words like itsy-bitsy, teeny, humongous, gigantic.  Such
words distorted communication, Betsy said.  It was a shock to discover
how often these exaggerations popped out in my everyday conversation.

Betsy also assigned me individual "anger work."  I was to spend five
minutes a day in the indoor racquetball court "screaming.  11 At first
this exercise seemed ridiculous.  Self-conscious at first, my screams
were little more than squeaks, but as I got into the routine, the
emotion poured out.  Using the ball as the object of my anger, I
blasted at it with my racquet.  Soon the squeaks became roars.  I
discovered I was not merely angry, but as Gwen had predicted, I was
full of buried rage.

If the resident had an automobile, as I did, those of us with anger
work were encouraged to use driving time for screaming.  Once, on my
way back to Dickman House from doing an errand, I was idling at a
stoplight and decided it would be a good place to let out some

feelings.  I didn't realize my car window was open until a woman in the
lane next to me scrambled from her car to come to my aid.  That cured
me from screaming at stoplights, but not on interstates.

Betsy suggested I make an anger diary going back as far as I could
remember, noting events, people, and situations that made me angry.
What a revelation that was!  I'd had emotional gangrene most of my life
and never realized it.

I'd always been one of those "don't-make-waves" people who shied away
from confrontations.  In our sexual abuse group one day I was urged to
deal with my unexpressed anger against Uncle Ralph for his molestation
of me when I was five.

"Go back to that place and that episode, " the counselor instructed.

"Tell your uncle how it was for you.  You're not the helpless little
girl now.  Tell him whatever you need to."  She gave me several pillows
to use.

Closing my eyes for concentration, I went back in time to Uncle Ralph's
living room.  I could smell the Sir Walter Raleigh tobacco he rolled
into homemade cigarettes .. . hear the sound of ticking clocks from the
hallway.

Then I saw Uncle Ralph sitting in his squeaky wooden rocker.  Felt his
hands on me, heard him wheezing, clicking his teeth.  I started to sob
and beat my thighs.

"Use the pillows," the counselor ordered.

"I loved and trusted you, Uncle Ralph, and you took advantage of me.  I
was little and couldn't fight back.  You hurt me!  You scared me!  I
hate you for that!"

I was shouting now, my voice high and shrill.  The five-year-old Sandy
was doubled over, pounding the pillows with both fists.

During these sessions I realized that in the past my anger had erupted
all right, only in indirect, inappropriate ways.  Example: overeating.
You could never have convinced me when I was binging on chocolate that
I was really acting out my inner rage.  Not Just at Uncle Ralph, but at
all the times I'd swallowed my feelings and said

nothing.  It made no difference that my dress size was headed for the
twenties, that I was totally revulsed at myself and nauseated
physically by food.  The raging dragon inside demanded to be fed.  Or
placated with cigarettes.  Or booze.  Or a new outfit.

One day the staff counselor at Dickman House jolted me by saying,
"Sandy, do you realize how male-dependent you are?"

Anger in me was now very near the surface; available was the staff's
approving term.  It welled up in me.

"You make me sound like a streetwalker!"  I flared.

"I'm not talking about that kind of dependency.  Your thoughts, your
actions, your needs are centered on men.  You require their approval to
be fulfilled."

"How can you say that?"  I argued.

"I've been hurt by men all my life.  Now at long last I'm free of
them."

The counselor shook her head.

"You only think you're free.  Let me explain what I mean."  She tapped
a paper on her desk.

"The results of your psychological testing confirm your hostility and
dependency on men.  You have probably been dependent on every man in
your life, starting with your father.  The problem with being
male-dependent is that a woman ties all her feelings of self-worth into
what men think about her, what they do and say.  You need to begin to
become responsive to yourself and your own needs.  You are a
'people-pleaser' like most alcoholics-and the people you try hardest to
please are men."

For several moments I was silent, devastated by this appraisal that I
knew deep-down to be true.

"How do I get free?"  I finally asked.

"For the next four weeks you will be on a 'male restriction' program.
This means you will not have anything to do with men.  You can write or
call one male member of your family once a week, but you're to avoid
conversations with men, even eye contact with men on the street.  You
need to learn to trust women and the feedback they have for you."

weeks At first this program seemed peculiar and unfair.  Four weeks
without talking to a man except my father, Brent, or Brad once every
week or so?  Impossible.

But it wasn't.  I discovered how automatically I sought to make eye
contact with men-in restaurants, at meetings, anywhere even with total
strangers.  Somehow the approval of these nameless outsiders mattered.
I'd be buoyed by a flicker of interest, dejected by indifference.  It
was a searing discovery.

"The notion that men are absolutely vital to any value we may have,"
writes Nancy Friday in My MotherlMy Self, "is so woven into feminine
reality that most women think to reject it would be like trying to
reject the law of gravity.  " Friday recalls in her book that "it was
the promise of men, that around each corner there was yet another man,
more wonderful than the last, that sustained me.  You see, I had men
confused with life..  .. It was a religion of a god who gave and took
away life..  .. " Psychologist Sonya Friedman in her book Men Are just
Desserts points out one of the most deeply ingrained messages that
daughters receive from their mothers: A man is the measure of your
worth.

To break the cycle of male dependency, then, it was apparent that I
needed to enhance my sense of self-worth completely apart from men.
And, in fact, after the first few days of my male restriction program,
it became a little easier.  Each time I resisted looking at a man for
approval represented a victory.  I was greatly encouraged.  My
self-esteem was growing in little flutters, but growing.  By the end of
the four weeks, I sensed a new strength in this area.

Other revelations: Male dependence had strangled my development as a
person, kept my maturing process on hold.  I'd often given up
decision-making and goal-setting to comply with what the "he" in my
life dictated.  I had not learned to make responsible choices.

It was disconcerting to realize how early I'd begun to depend on

male approval of my behavior, my appearance, my plans.  An occasional
desire for this kind of approval is normal and good, of course, but
needing it constantly had long since become an unhealthy way of life.

Robin Norwood explains in Women Who Love Too Much that "a woman who
uses her relationships as a drug will have fully as much denial about
that fact as any chemically addictive individual, and fully as much
resistance and fear concerning letting go of her obsessive thinking and
high emotionally charged way of interacting with men.  But usually, if
she is gently but firmly confronted, she will at some level recognize
the power of her relationship addiction and know she is in the grip of
a pattern over which she has lost control.  " You can test yourself for
"Male Dependency" with the quiz on page 2 3 8.

An important aspect of my halfway house program was to reach a point
where I could go out into the world and not only acquire a job, but
succeed in it.  Before I was ready for this step, my counselor felt I
needed special preparation.

"Sandy, it's time for you to attend the assertiveness class," Betsy
told me one day.  She explained that the recovering addict needs to
learn how better to handle confrontational situations without waffling
or being dishonest.  These four everyday situations, for example:

I. A salesclerk won't refund your money.

2. You ordered a steak medium-rare and it comes to the table
well-done.

3. Your car wasn't repaired the way you specified.

4. A door-to-door salesman persists in trying to sell you something you
don't want.

In the assertiveness class we were taught to "hang in there" for our
viewpoint.  Here is a typical role play:

Clerk: "May I help you?"  Me: "Yes.  I'd like a refund of $85.99 on
this vacuum cleaner."  Clerk: "We don't give refunds."  Me: "I
understood that if I brought in the receipt, you would refund my money.
Here is my receipt.  I'd like my money back."  Clerk: "I'm not supposed
to give refunds.  I'll get in trouble."  Me: "I'm sorry for you if that
happens, but I still want my $85.99 refunded.  " Clerk: "Why don't you
take the vacuum cleaner home and try it out for another week?  Get used
to it."  Me: "I want my $85.99 or your name and the name of your
supervisor.  " Clerk: "I'm not supposed to do this, you know," as he
takes the receipt and refunds the money.

In the above exchange I was instructed to state persistently what I
wanted and avoid being sidetracked onto irrelevant issues.  (The person
playing the clerk was told to resist in every possible way.) My ace in
the hole was what I had been told initially about the store's general
policy regarding refunds.

Learning such basic life skills was essential before we recovering
alcoholics were ready to enter the rough-and-tumble of the job market.
Even with this training, the thought of having to interview for
employment paralyzed me.  My work as an artist at Disneyland and my
public relations position with Pepsi Cola had been over twenty years
ago.  Who would want to hire a forty-four-year-old has-been?  Was I
employable?

For two days at the Office of the Civilian Employment Training Agency
(CETA), five of us from Jane Dickman House underwent intensive
schooling on how to conduct ourselves at a job interview.  Then weeks
passed and the only work that became available for me was through an
office temporary service.  Stuffing envelopes for mailings didn't pay
much, and at the end of the day my fingers were covered with Band-Aids
to cover the paper cuts.

"I'll never get a decent job," I moaned.

"How am I ever going to support myself?"

Then CETA phoned.

"The Minnesota Museum of Art is looking for an assistant prep arator of
exhibitions.  Call and set up an interview .. . and good luck!"

What do you wear for an interview with three museum directors?  I had
visions of three dour faces peering at me from behind a mahogany,
skating-rink-sized conference table.  What a shock to find three
laid-back, obviously creative, no-nonsense professionals in tweeds and
corduroys chatting merrily, drinking coffee.

The business administrator asked most of the questions.  I liked her
immediately.  Her pale blue eyes danced in a thin, angular face.  She'd
be enjoyable to work with.

"Do you have any carpentry skills?"  she asked.

"You'll need to be able to do a little bit of everything around
here."

"My father taught me how to build and paint and wallpaper," I
offered.

"Even how to do simple plumbing and electrical work."

The director's eyes lit up.

"I had pictured giving this job to a man," he said, "but if you think
you could handle the physical demands, you might be the one for it.  We
have a number of others to interview today before we decide.  Thanks
for your time."

I was waiting for him to say, "Don't call us, we'll call you," but he
didn't.

Back at the halfway house I lunged for the phone each time it rang.
Hours later the administrator called, "We've reviewed all the
applications and have narrowed it down to two.  I need to ask you a
crucial question: do you know how to drive a truck?"

My mind was racing.  I really wanted that job.  Could,l drive a truck?
Of course!  But my conscience was saying, You've driven only a pickup
truck, Clearing my throat, as if to convince myself first, I replied, A
can drive a truck just so long as it isn't an eighteen wheeler  "

"Great," she responded.

"The job is yours."

I held the job for seven months until my counselor felt I was ready to
go back home to Billings.  It was a valuable experience,

bolstering my sense of self-worth and rekindling my creativity.  it
felt so good to be productive again.

A sign of my walk toward wholeness was the interest I began taking in
other women and their problems.  A seed was growing inside me of love
for people.  The capacity to reach out had withered during twenty years
of addiction, only to sprout anew that night in the Warm Springs
Hospital when I comforted Karen.

One of the patients at the halfway house with whom I developed an
almost mother-daughter relationship was a seventeen-year-old named
Sophia.  She was a pretty girl with brown hair and a face that didn't
show her drug and alcohol abuse.  Sophia had started drinking when she
was in the third grade.  In the sixth grade she was introduced to
marijuana; two years later she began using hashish, speed, and LSD.

At fifteen Sophia moved out from her family and in with a boyfriend,
got a cleaning job at a bar, and was soon drunk morning, noon, and
night.  She'd recently spent a month in treatment, then entered Jane
Dickman House.

I was attracted to Sophia because she was close to the age of my
daughter Lisa (then eighteen) and so needy for love and attention.
Treatment had given her some handles on her disease, but her counselor
and friends wondered if these would be broken when she returned to her
old environment and faced both chemically active friends and a
mate-dependent relationship.

The issue came to a climax one March afternoon.  Her boyfriendI'll call
him Nick-rolled into the parking lot on his motorcycle and bellowed for
his "woman."  Sophia hadn't seen Nick in six months.

Her roommate and I went outside to talk with him.  Nick measured about
six-two and looked at us with sullen, half-closed eyes.

"Where's Sophia?"  he demanded.

"She says she doesn't want to see you," her roommate told him.

"I want her to tell me that."

Reluctantly Sophia came outside and faced the past.  Several of us
formed a protective semicircle behind her while Sophia stared at Nick
in silence.  We could all feel the power he held over her.  Bluntly he
ordered her to come with him.

I knew well what was going on inside of Sophia.  On the one side, a
pull toward sex, drugs, alcohol; on the other, freedom from the
cravings, the beginning of a new self-worth.  The choice: Hop onto
Nick's bike and return to her old life, or stay with us and continue
being heated.

She turned and looked at us, the people who had befriended her.  No one
spoke, but something clicked.  A decision.  She turned to the biker:
"No, I don't want to see you ever again."  His eyes intensified, bore
hard into hers to test her resolve.  Then, with a shrug, he got onto
his bike and roared away.

Each woman who goes through the program at Jane Dickman has a personal
graduation ceremony.  Mine was highlighted by a visit from Lisa,
generous tributes from the staff, other patients, and friends I'd made
in the area.  First steps had been taken in leaving anger and male
dependency behind.  It was time, as Sonya Friedman writes in Men
Arejust Desserts,_ to reassess my skills, my personality, my
self-esteem.

"The more you are," she says, "the more you possess yourself without
getting caught up with pleasing others and the more you can understand
that no one's going to make you happy, or complete, but yourself.  The
more you are, the more you will realize that a man can detract from or
enhance your happiness, but he can never be responsible for answering
all your needs."

 Deception and Other Little Monsters The key word in [self-cure] is
self.  taking charge of your own problem.  Some psychologists call this
self-mastery; others, self-efficacy; others, the belief in free will.
It translates into three components necessary for change: an urge to
quit, the belief that you can quit and the realization that you must
quit-no one can do it for you.

-Stanton Peele, Ph.D.

"Out of the Habit Trap" American Health ECOVERY IS NOT ONLY A PROCESS;
IT'S A PROCESS THAT TAKES TIME.  A lot of time.  Treatment
programs-whether they last a month or a year-are only a beginning.  A
turnaround.  The compulsive person is given a temporary sanctuary, a
direction to go, guidelines to follow.  He's then released into the
world, at which point the real battle begins.  One chemical dependency
specialist estimates that fifteen percent of recovery occurs in
treatment, the other eighty-five percent in the outside world.

When I came out of nearly eight months of treatment at Jane Dickman I
asked myself, "What have you learned?"

A great deal.  I knew, for example, that one drink-'just one could
start an avalanche inside me that would propel me down, down, down to
destruction.  This was not theory.  When I emerged from twenty-eight
days of treatment in Minneapolis that first time, back in 1977, I
abstained for two months, then decided to have a single drink.  What
followed was disaster.

Later I had well-meaning church friends tell me I was now free of my
bondage and that an occasional drink would not trigger a relapse.  I
consider that deadly advice.

Besides, even if it were true that I could take a drink without ill
consequences, I wouldn't do it.  I've come to love the way I feel
alcohol-free.  I like the clear head, the aliveness.  One drink would
bring on the dullness I remember too well.  What I thought was
stimulation was the very reverse.  The seduction of alcohol is that you
feel you are getting sharper, brighter, wittier, while the exact
opposite is occurring.  You are getting duller, more sluggish, merely
silly.  I want no part of that second-class existence now that I've
lived first-class for seven years since Valentine's Day 1980.

I'd also learned that recovery means civil war.  Back home I would
literally be going to war with myself and my old destructive habit
patterns.  After nine months of treatment the battleground was clear to
me.  It involved change-change across-the-board.

Fortunately, most treatment centers offer an "aftercare" plan.  Mine
covered the obvious things I'd already been working on:

Anger Male dependency Food issues Shopping/spending Perfectionistic
behavior To help me abstain from chemicals, I was to be involved with a
continuing alcohol support group.

I was to talk about and express my feelings with someone daily.  I was
to get regular exercise.

I was to watch my nutrition carefully.  As I picked up the routines of
living, I discovered that the danger was not going to be so much from
the big monsters that had nearly destroyed me, as from a lot of little
ones.  Reentry into Billings, Montana, where I had been so sick, was
painful.  There were old relationships to sort through and mend, new
ones to contemplate.  Most importantly, my grown children lived and
worked there.  My dearest wish was to reestablish warm, healthy
relationships with them.  They were so mature in some ways,
self-reliant from years of fending for themselves.  Yet also hurting
and vulnerable, watching me with guarded enthusiasm.  Is this really
Mom?  Is she going to be okay?  In some ways we were almost
strangers.

Sometimes at night as I lay sleepless in the small apartment I'd moved
into, I tried to piece together the fragments of lost years with them.
What had happened during their junior and senior high school years?
Those were the years I was mostly out-of-it.  I felt robbed of so many
milestones in their lives.  In my remorse I tried to think of ways to
make up these losses to my children.  It wasn't possible, of course.
The damage done was real and could not be erased by guilty efforts at
compensation.  In fact, my counselor had warned me that if I focused
too much on trying to undo the past, it would not only sabotage my
recovery but confuse my children in unhealthy ways.

So each day I tried to deal with this little monster of if-only.  If
only I hadn't .. . whatever.  The best method was to focus on today and
be grateful for how far I had come.  I tried to start each day in this
frame of mind, dressing quickly before Six A.M."  bounding down the
stairs of my small third-floor apartment, and walking a three-mile
route I'd laid out around the city, before digging into my work of
costume-and-doll designing for a Boston firm.  ' There was something
therapeutic about being out in the crisp morning air-more so than the
compulsive morning exercising at the Y that had been so unproductive.
I'd read that walking was

good for patients suffering from depression and now I could understand
why.  All body systems seem to tune up when you're walking.  The senses
expand to enfold everything about you.

As I passed the Deaconess Hospital on my route, I offered prayers for
the patients on the psych ward where I had spent several "drying-out"
periods back in the mid-1970s.  Looking up at the fluorescent-lighted
ceilings on the second floor, I recalled the countless hours I stared
at those very light fixtures, and watched forlornly out the window at
people bustling up and down the same streets I now walked in health and
growing freedom.

Another of the little monsters I sought to overcome was the monster of
lying.  This was an especially difficult part of my recovery program-to
change my deceitful nature into an honest one.  The problem is that
lying becomes a way of life for the addict.  We start by lying to
ourselves: "I couldn't have done that.  I just wouldn't behave that
way."

Later my behavior in blackouts had to be covered with lies because I
couldn't remember what I'd said or where I'd been, I lived in a
constant state of fear because I couldn't remember large blocks of
time-what I'd done, how I'd gotten home.  The blood spattered on our
white jeep, for example, that had caused me such apprehension.  Many
were the mornings I raced to the garage to see if my car was in its
usual spot.

All of life thus becomes a lie.  Even my sober times were colored with
various shadings of the truth.  I was wound about like a mummy with
layers and layers of deception.  My ears were deaf to the truth; my
eyes saw only a miniscule slice of reality.

When I started working my recovery program, I knew I had to get honest
with both myself and other people.  Especially with myself.  My
conscience became newly activated.  As soon as I told a lie, a searing
stab of conviction would hit me.

Once, counting my change outside the grocery store, I realized that the
checker had mistaken a ten-dollar bill I'd given her for a

twenty.  This came at a time when I was short of funds.  But I went
back into the store to return the money.  It was a small act, but
represented growth.

Cash-register honesty came more easily than more subtle challenges.  At
the beginning of my rehabilitation, I promised myself I wouldn't lie
for one whole day.  It was interesting to see how quickly little fibs
and exaggerations tended to creep into my conversation.  A friend asked
me over the phone how I liked the book she had loaned me.

"I'm getting a lot out of it" slipped off my tongue.  A white lie, but
still deceptive.  The truthful reply should have been, "I'm looking
forward to reading it this weekend."

I was interested much later to note a similar push toward honesty in an
article by Dr.  Sirgay Sanger in the newsletter of the National Council
on Compulsive Gambling (Winter 1985).  He identifies even accepting too
much change in a store as a serious ethical problem that often leads to
behavioral relapse.

"I have yet to see compulsive gamblers who have been lying and cheating
not fall back into gambling," he observes.

"What I usually recommend is a complete dedication to honesty and
integrity in as many areas as possible."

My own daily effort at truthfulness showed me how inclined I was to
deny unpleasantness, always to paint the rosy picture.  The most
staggering realization was how I minimized or lied about my feelings.
As my time of sobriety lengthened, real feelings that I had medicated
for years started emerging.  Unwrapping those endless layers of
cover-up was agony.  Lies had been my armor, my protection.  Now I
stood shivering in naked vulnerability with no place to escape.

An especially nasty little monster was profanity.  I had started
swearing in high school because it seemed sophisticated, and I
progressed to the point where bad language was an automatic knee-jerk
reaction to things that went wrong-or even right.  Once The Com u1sive
Woman I overheard a woman tell her husband in hushed tones what a foul
mouth I had.  I dismissed it as the utterance of a prude.

Now I felt uncomfortable saying, or even hearing, four-letter words.
Yet they still slipped out-sometimes at the most inopportune times.

Though I've begun to make progress in this area, I don't kid myself.
Lurking in my compulsivity is a little monster that has been exposed,
rebuked, and reduced to a whimper.  But it hasn't left the premises.

My behavior is often at war with my will.  I want to be disciplined,
but it's as though my desire world has metastasized, with each tiny
fragment capable of spawning a cancerous growth of its own.

Another monster with which I've had to deal is shopping.  Like so many
hurting women, I used spending binges to fill the emptiness in my life.
In 1976, for example, my work as a sales clerk in Billings' largest
department store was a disastrous experience economically.  Each day I
bought at least one item, rationalizing I was saving money with my
employee's discount.  At month's end my store bill far exceeded my
salary.

Somehow loading my arms with bundles and boxes relieved my sense of low
self-worth, made me feel important, cared for.  What I didn't realize
was that this is addictive behavior as surely as drinking and
drug-taking.

"It is well known," wrote Erich Fromm in his Anatomy of Human
Destructiveness, "that .. . compulsive buying is one attempt to escape
from a depressed mood .. . a symbolic act of filling the inner void
and, thus, overcoming the depressed feeling for the moment."

After the well-publicized spending excesses of Imelda Marcos, it is
interesting that Tammy Faye Bakker, in the height of the so-called
"holy war" among television evangelists, confessed on ABC's Nightline
to prodigious shopping and bargain-hunting because it "helps my nerves.
It's cheaper than a psychiatrist."

During my recovery period I saw my own shopping binges for what they
were saw the shallowness of them, saw the disastrous outcome in
domestic strife and economic setbacks.

Back in Billings I put myself on a budget.  I'd always moaned that this
was too hard, that I couldn't do figures.  I found, of course, that
anyone can do figures if she tries.  But I still have to be careful
when I'm tired or upset; at such moments shopping can become my fix.

Today when I pass stores advertising Sale!  I ask myself, "Do I need
this?"  If I start to enter a store I ask, "Why am I going in here?"
The temptation to spend always begins with the thought I want this. I'm
-gradually learning to counteract this thought with the question of
need.  If the desire won't stand cold, hard scrutiny, then I don't
really want it at all.

In fact, all my problems, it seems, begin in my thought life: I'll eat
JUst this one cookie, I'll just browse at this sale and not huy
anything, I'll take just one drink.  These thoughts and a myriad of
others have to be brought under control.

Do's and Don't's for Compulsive Shoppers Do's I Work out a systematic
budget and stay with it.  Be aware of where almost every penny goes.

2. List all your debts on a large wall calendar as a constant
reminder.

3. Set a goal to get out of debt.  The benefits, such as peace and
delight, will be well worth it.

4. Stay with whatever plan you devise.  You will often want to stop.

Don't rationalize by saying, "I can skip a month; it's too much trouble
to keep records."

5. Always pay bills before spending money on other things.

6. Use the income from a secondary source or from a working spouse
basically for savings, investments, or paying off existing bills and
loans.  From Money: How to Spend Less and Have More by David J - J uroe
Don't's I When you see a sale sign, you don't always have to stop.

2. Remember that if you don't need something, it is not a bargain at
any price, even if it is on sale.

3. Limit the cash you take with you on trips.  If you have more, you
may spend it.

4. Be careful about setting dates for entertainment or events where you
know you will overspend, if you can't afford it.

5. Don't add new debts.  This is very important.  Why not call for a
family gathering and make definite plans to cut spending?

6. Don't use credit for small items.  Concentrate on paying cash for
everything, even if you're in debt.

7. Don't throw away "junk."  Much of it may be useful to someone else.
So why not consider a sale at your house, like a yard or garage sale?
Then use the money to pay off old debts.

Procrastination was another little monster that threatened the recovery
process.

"I'll do it tomorrow" was deeply ingrained.  I'd rail at my daily
schedule, want to stare out the window or chat on the phone.  The Do it
now!  philosophy was helpful in this area.  Slowly but surely I watched
my life taking on healthy structure.

Each morning I made a list of the things that needed to be accomplished
that day, trying to prioritize the three most important items and get
them done before noon.  I also included in my schedule times for
recreation and rest.  As one who had wasted so much time, rest was hard
for me to take.  I felt I needed to make every waking moment count
until I realized my body couldn't physically meet those kinds of
demands.

Whenever I attacked a compulsive pattern in my life, the little creepy
crawler monsters would start to undermine my progress.  Food and
shopping continued to be booby traps, probably because I couldn't
simply eliminate these areas of my life.  Unlike alcohol or cigarettes,
where the best-the only-answer for the compulsive woman is total
abstinence, we all have to eat and we all have to go into stores.  For
the compulsive personality, moderation is the hardest achievement of
all.

For a while I'd do fine on a reasonable regimen of eating.  Thenmost
often in the late afternoon-I'd be attacked by what I called the
"hungry horrors.  " Stricken, I'd dash to the refrigerator or out to a
nearby convenience store for a pound bag of chocolate-covered peanuts,
one of my choice hinge foods.  This would in turn trigger a desire for
more sugar, more pastry, anything with white flour.  I'd been warned at
Dickman House that I was a "wheataholic.  " (Why not, I had thought.  I
seem to have been every other kind of "aholic" there I.S.) The tendency
to rush to the refrigerator when things go wrong can be compulsivity at
its worst.  Fortunately, I had friends now to help me face down the
food monster.  They steered me to a group of singles in Billings who
met for meals and fellowship often during the week.  This accomplished
three things.  It made me: (1) eat on schedule; (2) choose nutritious
foods; (3) retain the companionship I needed to strengthen my
self-discipline.

Several of us in the singles group who had similar eating problems
benefited from a list of alternatives to food-binging.  Here are some
steps we learned to take.

I I

When the Urge To Binge Is Overpowering:

I. Call a group member or friend.  Keep calling until you reach
someone.

2. Write the hinge down instead of eating.

3. Take a bath or shower.

4. Take a walk.

5. Do a non-food-related activity outside the kitchen.  Stay out of the
kitchen.

6. Go to an eating disorder support group meeting.

7. Do a relaxation exercise or meditation.

8. Distract yourself with a craft project, book, or TV program.

9. Read something inspirational or positive.

10.  Run or )09-, 11.  Take a nap.

12.  Engross yourself in something.

13.  Go to a concert, play, etc.

14.  Think the hinge through-"what I'll get out of it."

15.  Put the hinge off five minutes at a time.

16.  Write down the things you want out of life.

17.  Write down the things you've missed because of binging.

The following guidelines to good eating habits can be helpful:

1. Eat slowly and chew well-especially when emotionally upset.

2. When eating, only eat.  No other activities such as TV, radio,
reading, or driving.

3. Eat sitting down at a table.

4. Clear the table immediately when through eating.

5. Know what you're going to do after a meal-have a plan.

6. Throw leftovers away.  It's okay!

It was also helpful to remember that it takes twenty minutes for our
stomachs to register a "full" feeling.  I tried to stop eating before

I felt full.  The best defense I found against the hungry horrors and
other assaults was to begin each day with an admission of my
helplessness and dependence on God.

My religious faith has played a growing role in my overcoming these and
other "monsters."  A verse from the New Testament book of Romans is
interesting, in this regard: "I do not understand what I do.  For what
I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do.  ,12 This internal
warring describes the compulsive woman to a T, and I am as dependent as
the writer of these words in finding success by turning to Jesus
Christ, my Higher Power, when I am overwhelmed by the temptation to
succumb to one of my former compulsions.

The same biblical writer talks in another place about bringing every
thought captive" to Christ."  3 Is this God's suggestion to those of us
who are dealing with compulsivity?

Many women, of course, do not choose this way of dealing with it.  I
understand.  Regardless of a person's religious orientation, it is
imperative only that she practice some form of quieting herself, of
centering down, of broadening her perspective on life.

"Develop your spirituality through daily practice," advises Robin
Norwood in Women Who Love Too Much, "Whether or not you have a belief
in God, and if you do, whether or not you're on speaking terms with
Him, you can still practice this step..  .. Even if you are a
100-percent atheist, perhaps you get pleasure and solace from a quiet
walk, or contemplating a sunset or some aspect of nature.  Whatever
takes you beyond yourself and into a broader perspective on things is
what this step is all about."

Along the way to recovery I found it necessary to break off
relationships with old drinking friends or those who had "enabled" me
when I was ill.  As I expected, some heaped scorn on me as 11
self-righteous" or "judgmental" or "a lousy friend."  Later, when I'm
stronger, perhaps I can seek them out to try and establish
relationships on a new basis.

Other good advice that came to me along the way:

"Stay in the present!  Yesterday is a canceled check.  Tomorrow is a
promissory note.  Today is ready cash.  Spend it wisely.  Enjoy life
where you are right now."

Whenever I forgot and started to dwell on the past, I was dragged down
into a numbing state of depression.  Actually, I thought of it as a
"depressionetta," a mere niggle compared to the crashing bottoming-out
of the past.  What helped me was having a meditation time while I
walked in the morning and a prayer time when I took my personal
inventory before retiring for the night.  As I struggled through a
succession of difficult choices day by day, I was chasing the little
monsters out of my life.

"It takes time, effort, and faith to mature out of an addictive
disposition," declares Stanton Peele, one of the foremost authorities
on addiction.  "..  . Therapy or no, the ultimate responsibility is
still our own" [Love and Addiction].

In taking responsibility for my own recovery, and in breaking the
pattern of negative thinking I've engaged in for most of my life, I'm
learning to get my feelings out on the table, look them over, and
realize they can be changed.  One procedure is through simple positive
statements such as the following:

Changing the Negative to Positive" I .I [your name] like myself.  I am
a lovable person.

2. I have the right to say no to people without losing their love.

3. Other people have the right to say no to me without hurting me.

4. Every organ, every gland, every cell in my body is functioning in a
rhythmic, healthy manner.

5. I am building a perfectly functioning body.

6. I affirm health, harmony, peace, and abundance.

7. I am giving my subconscious mind a new blueprint for my life.

8. I am calm, relaxed, serene, and confident.

9. Smoking no longer appeals to me.

10.  I am developing a taste for non-fattening foods.  Il.  Every day I
am becoming more aware of things for which I can be thankful.

12.  I am activating my immune systems which protect me from illness
and disease.

13.  I have now enough time, energy, wisdom, and money to accomplish
all my desires.

14.  I have an abundant supply of energy and draw upon it at will.

15.  I have an excellent memory and it is getting better every day.

16.  I am well-organized in every phase of my life, giving me time for
leisure.

17.  I am able to relax as deeply as I wish at any time.

18.  It is safe for me to love and trust people and to accept the love
and trust that is my birthright.

19.  I see myself in my right job, performing it completely and
easily.

 Learning to Like Yourself Learning to fufill our needs must begin
early in infancy and continue all our lives.  If we fail to learn we
will suffer, and this suffering always drives us to try unrealistic
means to fulfill our needs.  A person who does not learn as a little
child to give and receive love may spend the rest of his life
unsuccessfully trying to love.

-William Glasser, M.D.

Reality Therapy

OR YEARS I VE ASKED MYSELF WHY SOME PEOPLE CARRY AROUND SUCH A

low self-image when they're as richly endowed with gifts and talents as
anyone else.

In my case I've identified some partial answers dating to childhood. An
early episode of sexual abuse produced in me a sense of shame because I
felt somehow it was my fault that it happened.  The silent, unhappy
home where emotions were not acknowledged soon made me ashamed of any
strong feelings.  When eventually my parents divorced I felt still more
s-hame, believing that undoubtedly this was my fault, too.

The root of compulsive behavior, as we have already seen, is shame.  To
compensate for my own shame, I became an overachiever and
people-pleaser.  This way I didn't have to face my own pain,

anger, fear, and guilt.  My constant attempts to win approval led me
into a pattern of obsession about my appearance and the neatness of my
surroundings.  If everything looked impeccable on the outside, no one
would ever know that inside there was such a mess.

Because I couldn't love myself, I searched for others to love me,
especially men, even though subconsciously I didn't trust them.  I was
desperate for the reassurance that I was lovable.  When these
relationships didn't work out, I sought my reassurance from alcohol and
food.  My search for some sense of worth and meaning led me into a cult
that left me haunted with more self-hate and condemnation than before.
Soon all my compulsive behaviors and dependencies became woven together
in a spiderweb trap.  I'd break through in one area only to be
strangled in another.

In thinking back to when my suicidally low self-image began a
turnaround, I've identified some early steps:

1. Karen singling me out in the hospital as her friend.  Her need
compelled me to give instead of take.

2. Making a list of simple things to do my first day at home from the
hospital-and then getting them done.

3. Making a successful case before the staff for my discharge from the
hospital.

4. Stopping smoking.

5. Stopping drinking.

These action-steps may not even have been as important as the
corresponding changes that took place in my mind and spirit.  These
changes, harder to trace, began at that magical moment in the hospital
when I remembered a Scripture verse learned as a child: "By his stripes
we are healed..  .. " I knew then my mind was not damaged beyond
recall.  The changes that followed revolved around the fundamental-and
astonishing-awareness that I didn't have to prove anything to God.  To
my amazement he loved me unconditionally.

Despite my insights into the origins of a poor self-image, and how this
can change, developing a sense of self-worth was a painfully slow
process.  It's a strange thing to encounter the real you for the first
time in middle age.  Strange and frightening.  What if I didn't like
me, let alone love me?

I did love the new freedom-freedom not to have secrets any longer.
Freedom to be open and honest.  Being able to share in groups, learning
to have my own opinions instead of parroting those around me, helped
self-esteem grow.  Gradually I began to feel more comfortable with
myself.  For years I had been running and hiding from myself, searching
for answers everywhere but inside.

At the four-year mark of my sobriety I felt a sense of peace, of being
on target.  I had moved in March 1984 back to my home state of Vermont,
taking a small house in Montpelier next to my mother's even smaller
one.  (My stepfather had died the previous spring.) I hadn't wanted to
move so far from my children, but they were all in their twenties, out
in the working world, driving their own cars, busy with their own
friends.  We had loving relationships though not intimate.

So I settled into my little house in Vermont, quick to commit to an
alcohol support group.  I also converted the raised hearth of my living
room fireplace into a makeshift altar.  I laid a white lace cloth on
the bricks and placed on it a pair of my Aunt Ethel's candle holders
with white candles.  It was here I spent much time in quiet prayer and
reflection.

Sometimes my mind went back to the people I'd hurt-used and abused-and
to situations I had tried to forget.  As I repented of my sins against
husbands, children, parents, friends, I asked God to show me where
amends were possible and where restoration had to lie with him alone;
where trying to clear my own conscience publicly would only lay further
burdens on those I had injured.

Still other times I thought of people I needed to forgive, of anyone
against whom I had nursed a grievance, starting with Uncle

Ralph.  I'd write the name on a scrap of paper, say a prayer releasing
that person from my judgment, and ask God's blessing on his or her
life.  Then I'd touch the paper to the nearest candle and watch old
resentments turn to ashes in the fireplace.

What lightness and exhilaration of spirit followed!  One by one the
closed doors of my life were being opened, as I did what in effect
amounted to a personal housecleaning.

Along the way I discovered ten exercises that have helped me begin to
find the creativity I had lost.  Since people recovering from addictive
behavior have to face up to their need for personal disciplines, I
offer them to you:

Ten Disciplines to Restore Creativity 1. Go "lean" one day a week. This
is not necessarily a fast.  Some who use this discipline reduce their
food intake to juices, clear soups, and a few crackers.

2. Write a letter complimenting someone-or make it a telephone call. Be
specific: "I admire the stand you took for that minority housing pro)
ect etc.

3. Once a week do something you've very seldom (if ever) done before.
Go to the ballet, walk through a museum, try out a new recipe, plant
some flowers, attend a church service.

4. Be completely honest for one full day in everything you say or do.
If you can't be honest about your boss's expansion plans or your
friend's new outfit, for example, say nothing.

5. For one hour think or pray on one subject.  Or divide the hour into
two separate periods, each devoted to one concern.

6. Express a heartfelt regret or ask forgiveness for something negative
you have said or done fairly recently to a friend, co-worker, relative,
etc.  Do this through a letter or telephone call.

7. Spend one day being totally concerned about other people.  This can
be accomplished through volunteer work, through visits to

a hospital, through helping a friend with housework, through
intercessory prayer.  Avoid talk about yourself, your ideas, your
plans.

8. For a set period of time at least a day, perhaps a week or
longer-keep your conversations with close friends or acquaintances or
chance encounters on his her interests solely.  Focus on drawing the
other person out.  Learn what he she thinks, feels, is experiencing.

9. Plan your activity in minute detail for one whole day and then live
with this plan unless emergency situations arise.  Try to anticipate
everything that will happen and schedule time for telephone calls, for
rest, recreation, eating, etc.  See how close you can stick to your
plan.

10.  Set aside one day for obedience.  As best you can let God and/or
others determine what you do (within reason, of course).  Consider
yourself a total servant for this day.  See yourself as a willing tool
or instrument to bring joy and encouragement to others.

In the course of my own recovery, I decided the single life must be
what I was now called to.  I'd attended a number of retreats and
workshops on how to find fulfillment as a single.  I discovered I could
help hurting single women, especially the ones with alcohol or drug
problems, and felt drawn toward this work.

Sometimes I thought about marrying again, but always dismissed the
thought.  Two failures there had battered my self-image as a desirable
person.  And yet .. . something deep within me yearned to be a genuine
partner.  Not the needy, confused Sandy of the past, compulsively
seeking a man to solve my problems, but a real wife, able to give as
well as take.  Could I hope to believe I had become, in a real sense, a
new woman, clean and pure as the freshly fallen snow on my Vermont
rooftop?  I thought about this often, that first winter back East.

As I began telling my story here and there, a publisher contacted me
and suggested I write a book.  My newly won self-confidence

quailed before such an assignment.  I borrowed a typewriter and spent
long, frustrating hours in front of it.  When it was obvious I didn't
know what I was doing, the publisher suggested I attend the Decision
Magazine Writer's School to be held in St.  Paul, Minnesota, in August
1984.

Once out there, I pored over the week's schedule, wondering what
courses to take.  On Monday afternoon there was to be a workshop on
Creative Ideas by a longtime Guideposts editor named Leonard LeSourd.
Hmmmm.  I needed creative ideas for sure.

Monday morning there was talk at breakfast about the LeSourd workshop
and about the death of his wife Catherine.

"He must be awfully lonely," one woman said.

"They were so close."  Everyone seemed to know this Catherine and said
her name with reverence.

Catherine who?  I wondered to myself, not wanting to show my
ignorance.

"I've read Christy seven times!"  someone gushed.  Finally someone said
Catherine Marshall.

Beyond Our Selves!  I'd carried her book around for weeks at the Warm
Springs Hospital.  I had flipped through the pages thinking, "This
woman has it too put together for me."  Several times I had stopped at
the dedication page-To Len,-wondering who he could be.

That afternoon I arrived at the auditorium early and found a seat
directly in front of the speaker's podium.  Soon a handsome gray-haired
man wearing a blue-and-white striped seersucker jacket and light blue
trousers stepped up to it.  Why, as Len LeSourd began to speak, did my
heart do a ridiculous flip-flop?  I didn't know this man at all.

With so many people crowding around him after the talk, I felt shy
about introducing myself.  I walked out of the lecture hall regretting
that I would never exchange even a word with him.

At dinner, however, Len chanced to sit at the same family-style table
where I was.  Somehow I found myself telling him about my struggle with
alcoholism.  To my amazement, tears formed in his

state-blue eyes.

"I have a niece who is battling that problem," he said.

"Would you be willing to write to her?"

He gave me her address and took mine.  Noting that I lived in Vermont,
he mentioned that he would be driving through New England later that
month.

"Maybe I'll give you a call."

Three weeks later in Vermont, my telephone rang.  Len was in the area;
could I make a room reservation for him somewhere nearby for Saturday
night?  He'd become such a workaholic since Catherine's death, he
explained, that his family had needled him into taking this vacation
trip through New England.

"I'm supposed to stop regularly and smell the flowers."

I took that as a personal mission.  I reserved a room at the Montpelier
Tavern Inn, an historic spot where stagecoaches used to stop.  Now for
a surprise welcome.

Margaret, a creative friend of mine, and I borrowed the key to his
room.  We pinned a newsprint banner-Welcome to Montpelier, Len!-to the
top of the drapes.  On one of the twin beds, we placed a large black
teddy bear, decked out in an antique lace collar and black hat trimmed
with violets.  Nestled next to the bear was a straw basket labeled
First-Aid Kit for the Weary Traveler.  In it was a box of Vermont maple
candy, a clump of red grapes, imported crackers and cheese, and a
bottle of aspirin.

On the small table by the picture window was a bouquet of black-eyed
Susans.  I smiled recalling how I'd picked them the day before in a
drenching rain.  Was my compulsive nature showing?  Well, Len had
admitted to a compulsive side, too.

Late in the afternoon the telephone rang again.  Len was chuckling.

"There seems to be a bear in my room.  Does she have a name?"

"Yes.

"Golly.

"I see."  A pause.

"Is she a good roommate?"

"Oh, yes.  She almost never snores.

After our first dinner date at the Trapp Family Lodge in nearby Stowe,
Vermont, Len and I began to see a lot of one another.  As the weeks
passed and he kept discovering reasons to come to Vermont, we
acknowledged that we were falling in love.  At the same time, both of
us were impressed by a principle we chose to govern our relationship:
The best comes out of self-denial.

I'd known that with my mind all my life.  Even as my compulsivity drove
me to indulge every pass' on-whether for chocolate, clothes, booze,
cigarettes-I'd known that a saner, healthier existence meant saying no
to these things.  What I'd never been able to do was make my no
stick.

Now, because of the psychological, chemical, and spiritual heating
taking place in me, I found a bracing kind of joy in self-denial.  By
forgoing a sexual relationship, Len and I became friends first, learned
how to laugh together, got to know each other at a deeper level.

As weeks turned into months and the desire for marriage grew in us
both, we set out to visit all members of our two families.  The visit
that showed me much about my recovery was when I joined Len for a
weekend at his farm in Virginia, forty-five miles west of Washington.
Living with him in her own wing at Evergreen Farm was his
mother-in-law, Leonora Wood, whose exploits as an eighteen-year-old
schoolteacher in the Great Smoky Mountains back in 1912 formed the
basis for Catherine's novel Christy.  Mother Wood, now 93, was the
beloved and respected family matriarch.  How would she receive me?  And
how would Len's friends and business associates respond to the new
woman in his life?

After the Sunday morning service at Len's church, one woman with
piercing gray eyes grilled me in a polite way, drawing out that I had
been twice married and twice divorced and was presently unemployed
because I was trying to write a book.  Hardly a success story.

Nor was my time with Mother Wood encouraging.  Though frail

and bent in body, Mrs.  Wood is a towering personage with an active
mind, mixed with the loneliness of a mother and grandmother who has
said premature good-byes to a husband, two children, and three
grandchildren.  She was kind and courteous to me, but I sensed
underneath a steely opposition.  And why not?  To her I must have
seemed a brash outsider with designs on taking Catherine's place.

Wherever I went in the nineteen-room farmhouse, Catherine's presence
preceded me.  She smiled at me from dozens of photos about the home and
office.  Her serene gaze from a magnificent oil portrait in Evergreen's
formal parlor met my own each time I came through the front door.

Only a few years earlier, I would have fallen into the trap of
comparing myself with her.  Shame-ridden people compulsive people-do
that.  Finding no worth in themselves, they make other people the
standard.  Other people's achievements, other people's virtues.

I learned, happily, that I was far enough along in my recovery to
realize that of course I could not take Catherine's place, or the place
of anyone else.  I was me.  I'd spent the past few years getting to
know me-and, wonder of wonders, I was beginning to like me.

Still, there came a bleak moment when I just wanted to flee.

Clearly I didn't belong among these productive, successful people.  In
my despair I sought out Len and suggested I return early to Vermont. He
looked at me, smiled, and shook his head.

"It's rough for you, Sandy, but you'll make it."

"But your family is.so .. . put together.  I'm still struggling, and
I'm a failure as a wife and parent."

"You are not a failure.  You're an over comer  That's even better than
being a success."

I knew for sure at that moment why I loved this man.

Other family get-tog ethers followed over the next few months191

with Len's three children and their two spouses, his stepson and
family, my three children, and my parents.

The final green light for me came after the Mother's Day church service
one May Sunday in Virginia.  Len and I had taken Mother Wood there,
packing her wheelchair into the trunk of the car.  When I leaned down
to release the brake before wheeling her out, she drew my face very
close to her own and looked into my eyes with her incredibly intense
blue ones.

"I love you, Sandy," she said softly.

"I'm so grateful you're going to be part of our family."

Len and I were married on June 22, 1985, at the Trapp Family Lodge, in
Stowe, Vermont-ten months after our first date there the previous
August.  As we began to adjust to each other in marriage, we both took
a hard look at compulsive behavior persisting into the present-mine and
his.  Len had been a workaholic and a sportsaholic.  Forty years of
meeting publication deadlines, often working past midnight and over the
weekend, had produced an imbalance in his life.  Often his change of
pace came through a more-than-casual involvement in televised sports,
especially pro football.

Len's emotional involvement with the Dallas Cowboys was a revelation.

"To root for a team you need to read up on the players, coaches, get
all the local color," he told me by way of explaining the pile of
sports magazines by his chair.

"But why does losing a game take on more importance than a nuclear
accident or a disastrous earthquake?"  I asked.

Len looked reflective.

"I'm powerless over my sports addiction and my life has become
unmanageable," he said with a grin.  Then, more seriously, he confessed
to disturbance over the intensity, even destructiveness, of fans
absorbed with a team, the ridiculous salaries of the players which
often lead to drug use, the obsession with winning.

He admitted that involvement in a late-night game on television often
rendered him sleepless for hours afterwards, wiping him out

for most of the next day.  Sunday afternoon games often assumed such
importance, he further revealed, that he would duck social engagements,
even family responsibilities, to watch his team play.

"Next Sunday I won't watch the game," he declared suddenly.

"We'll go for a drive, smell the autumn leaves."

Next Sunday Afternoon we did go out for a couple of hours.  Upon our
return he fidgeted miserably about the living room, then switched on
the TV.  Soon he was glued to the action.  I watched him with bemused
understanding.

For I'm still -battling certain compulsions in my life.  Shopping, for
one.  Sometimes I still come out of stores with more items than I
planned to buy, and rail at myself later.

Then there was the time I made a special greeting card to celebrate the
birth of one of Len's grandchildren.  It started out as a simple card.
Four hours later it had grown into a huge eight-color poster announcing
The First Annual Mary Catherine Lader Golf Classic.  The following day,
playing golf with friends, Len and I displayed the poster on the back
of our golf cart and sent photos of the "event" to Len's daughter and
son-in-law.

It was this spontaneous "golf classic," silly but fun, that helped me
understand something about compulsive behavior.

It's not all bad!

Along with certain native gifts and abilities, we often have an inner
drive that helps us channel gifts into a successful career.  We need
the tenacity, the determination, the focused energy to achieve
worthwhile things.  Len's compulsion for work made him a topflight
editor; my compulsion for quality-whether in dress design or floral
displays-is also an exercise of my gift.  The all-out effort poured
into a project can make that project shine.

This was an important discovery for me.  I'm not to crush my zealous
nature, or scorn it.  It's a part of me, a kind of inner dynamo given
me for a purpose.  Only for years I misused it.  I let this

driving quality inside, the "I-want-what-l-want-when-l-want-it" part of
my nature, take over my life.

Now I'm striving to bring this compulsive part of me, like the rest of
my being, under control.  There are times when I try to take charge
again, which we're all free to do.  But I'm learning to catch myself.

In my early mornings, for example.  As soon as we got married, Len and
I began praying first thing in the day that God would take the inner
drive we both have and guide it.  This seems to be happening.

I also find continuous healing as I shift my attention away from myself
to other people, focusing on the words serve, give, teach, share.  As
parents and grandparents, this involves Len and me with more than forty
people in our family alone.  But it doesn't stop there.

Len and I have begun conducting team workshops on the subject of
compulsive behavior.  Researching the subject has taken us to treatment
centers around the country.  What troubles me is that medical and
religious programs do not work more closely together since I received
such solid help from both disciplines.  The main differences stem from
definition.  The scientific world regards compulsive behavior as a
disease-chemical or psychological or both.  Christians consider it a
sin.

It was a lift to find one treatment center that combines both
approaches.

When we drove into the Dunklin Memorial Camp thirty miles west of
Stuart, Florida, the spacious grounds were alive with activity: men on
tractors, or wielding shovels, or hoisting furniture into the back of a
mud-spattered pickup truck.  This alcohol and drug treatment center was
clearly a busy place.

We parked and entered a low stucco office building to receive a warm
welcome from Mickey Evans, who over a twenty-three-year period has
built a sizable complex out of eight hundred acres of Florida swamp. He
eased his powerful frame into a desk swivel chair and got quickly to
the facts:

"This is a center for male alcoholics and drug addicts," he began.

"We can house about thirty.  Most of the men are poly-addicted; we
don't get 'simple' alcoholics today except a few older men.  We don't
detox here.  That's done down at the center in Fort Pierce.  The men
come to us sober.  They're here to work and learn.  I tell each man,
"There's a waiting list to get into this place.  If you want to stay
here, you must earn the right.  If you don't, I'll give your bed to
someone who'll make better use of it."

" Mickey went on to describe excruciating difficulties with cocaine
users calling this drug "deadly beyond our understanding; it can stay
in the system for up to ten months.  " Then came words that elated me:
"Some Christian programs treat addiction as a sin, which it obviously
is.  Sin simply means off-the-mark'-and these men's lives are certainly
that.  But some of these places go further and take the stand that
alcoholism and drug addiction are not physical diseases. They shun all
medical helps, including the Twelve-Step program.  After twenty-three
years, I've concluded that chemical dependence is both sin and
sickness.  We treat addictions as a disease and use the Twelve-Step
program that stresses commitment to a Higher Power.  Here the Higher
Power is Jesus Christ.

"We insist each man have a quiet time first thing in the morning,"
Mickey continued.

"He also must make a daily moral inventory of the past twenty-four
hours.  This helps him get in touch with the attitudes that are
motivating him.  Addicts have to change their attitudes before they can
change their behavior.  All the men keep a personal journal to record
their insights into themselves.  Also, some of them never knew prayer
is a two-way street.  I feel the quiet time-learning to listen as well
as to speak-is the key to the whole program."

The work program is also crucial to the addict's recovery, Mickey
explained.  This includes kitchen duty, laundry, painting, ranch

work, gardening, caring for the horses.  Residents grow most of their
food and raise their own beef.

Weekends are devoted to family programs, when wives and children come
out to participate in various activities.  Even spouses are asked to do
a daily moral inventory.  Mickey considers addiction a family disease:
"Sometimes the wife and children are sicker than the addict himself."

The Dunklin Camp has seen some remarkable improvements in families on
these weekends.

"Often it's the first time they've been able to sit down and be honest
with each other," says Mickey.

"Also, the first time the patient has been thinking clearly enough to
hear what his family has to say to him.  We won't take a man unless his
family will agree to be part of every weekend program At first addicts
were taken in without charge.  But as time passed Mickey became aware
of the human tendency' to take lightly what we get for nothing. Though
the program is still financed largely by contributions, the fee is now
set at a thousand dollars for each three months of treatment. Each
family pays fifteen dollars for the weekend program.

If a man is too poor to pay, but does have a television set, a gun, or
some garden tools, Mickey will accept these as payment.  He is
convinced that unless a man has some kind of material investment in his
treatment, he tends to drift through it.  For those who stay in
treatment for one year, there is a ninety percent recovery rate.

When I asked Mickey about a comparable program for women, he said that
one Dunklin graduate and his wife had recently started a program in the
Orlando area, based on Dunklin procedures.

People helping people.  That's the message I receive as I look back on
all I've learned over the past ten years.  Karen; my Filipino doctor at
Warm Springs; my friend Lois Ann; Dirk, who intervened when I was
flying without chemicals; my counselor Gwen..  .. The list goes on and
on.

July 9, 1986, was an extraordinary day, as well as a traumatic one. Len
and I had traveled to Billings, Montana, to visit my children and meet
with certain groups.  But I was apprehensive about a speech I was to
give before two hundred women at the Warbonnet Inn.

As our hostess for the week drove me to the meeting, I looked at my old
hometown with new eyes.  So many familiar landmarks, most filled with
painful memories.  The Warbonnet Inn itself-, twelve years before I'd
come to this same hotel ballroom for that first Serenity Society
conference.  How dazed and confused and frightened I'd been back then!
And how much worse after my involvement with that cult.  Now I felt
alive, filled with enthusiasm.

As the audience started arriving my excitement-and nervousness-mounted.
Many of the women had been dear friends during the twenty-one years I
had lived in Billings.

Kathy, my former neighbor, who had led me to the seminar and church
where I received my healing.

And Hilda, the woman who had been more of a mother to my children as
our housecleaner for twenty years than I had.

And the grocery store clerk, Shelly, who had helped me with my grocery
list when I could barely function-who had loved me when I couldn't love
myself.

I was delighted to greet my former mother-in-law who visited me
faithfully when I was in the state mental institution and encouraged me
during my dark years.

Best of all, my daughter, Lisa, who had taken the afternoon off from
her work at a video store.

Never before had there been assembled in one room so many people I
loved, so many who had touched my life: the women from the Thursday
prayer group, some of my tennis and bridge club friends; friends from
the singles group; even former babysitters.

After the introduction I moved up to the podium before these people,
opened my mouth to speak .. . and instead broke down and wept.  When I
regained my composure, I told the story of my

compulsive behavior, addictions, hospitalization and recovery, having a
strange sense of being at one point or another every woman in the
room.

Looking back on my life, I was overwhelmed with gratitude for the
patience, love, and support of so many people: family members who
always believed in me somehow during the darkest of times; close
friends who never quit praying that a miracle would occur in my life;
and a loving and forgiving God who brought me back from the pit of
hopelessness.  Now I could say with total conviction that there are no
hopeless situations.  A helping hand awaits anyone, everyone who
reaches out for it.

For I knew only too well the frustration, the pain, the sense of
failure, the depression, the desire to self-destruct that compulsive
women feel at one time or another.  I had been through it all and
discovered there are no hopeless cases.  There is a way through the
darkness into the light.  We compulsive women can be freed from our
bondage.

The way is long but it's possible.  It begins with a frank
acknowledgment of the areas of our addiction, all of them-a surrender
to the reality of the problem.  Critical are the steps of
self-forgiveness and forgiving others, going back as far as we can
remember.  Face any long-buried emotion; walk through it, not around
it.  A "feelings journal," like my anger diary, may be helpful in this.
A support group is invaluable.  Developing a relationship with a Higher
Power is crucial.

Then come the building-up steps.  Set a succession of reachable goals.
Maybe the admonition Do it now will be as helpful to you as it is to
me.  Every small victory raises our self-esteem, lets us know we can
succeed, that we can do something even better.  At last we will be
ready to move beyond focusing primarily on ourselves and reach out
toward those around us.

What a great feeling it is to know we have stopped being takers that at
last we have something to give!

BOOK TWO

HANDBOOK

OF SPECIAL

HELPS

CONTENTS

BOOK TWO-HANDBOOK OF SPECIAL HELPS

How Do I get Back on Track?  205 1. Self-Help Programs 207 Alcohol
Addiction 207 The Twelve-Step Program of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) ...
How You Can Apply the Twelve Steps ... Twelve Rewards of the
Twelve-Step Program ... Drugs Alcoholics Should Avoid ... The Dry Drunk
... Suggested Reading on Alcoholism Drug Addiction 217 Facts about
Eight Deadly Drugs (Cocaine, Alcohol, LSD, PCP, Marijuana, Heroin,
Amphetamines, Barbiturates) ... Narcotics Anonymous (NA) ... Suggested
Reading on Drug Addiction Eating Disorders 225 Compulsive Eating-A Case
Study ... Overeaters Anonymous (OA) ... Suggested Reading on Eating
Disorders Emotional Disorders 229 "Just for Today"-The EA Credo ...
Suggested Reading on Emotional Disorders Compulsive Exercising 231
Warning Signs Compulsive Gambling 233 Warning Signs ... Gamblers
Anonymous (GA) ... Suggested Reading on Compulsive Gambling Contents
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder Relationship Dependencies How
Male-Dependent Are You?  .. . What Women Want Most .. . Suggested
Reading on Relationship Dependencies Sexual Addiction The Progression
Toward Sex Addiction .. . Sex Addicts Anonymous (SAA) ... Ask
Yourself-A Quiz ... Suggested Reading on Sexual Addiction Shopaholics
Check Your Spending Habits .. . Where to Find Help Nicotine Addiction
Smokenders Workaholism Workaholism Inventory ... Suggested Reading on
Workaholism Cults Suggested Reading on Cults Other Compulsions An
Evaluation ... Are You a Perfectionist?

Treatment Centers Compulsivity Clinics of America ... Alcohol and Drug
Treatment Centers Other Resources for Publications, Films, Tapes,
etc.

2. Help for Families and Friends Open Letter to the Family Intervention
How It Gets the Addict to Treatment .. . Intervention-A Case Study .. .
Suggested Reading

Co-Dependence 261 Test Yourself .. Letting Go-Freeing Oneself from
Co-Dependency .. Co-Dependence A Case History .. Suggested Reading on
Co-Dependence Al-Anon 265 An Overview .. . Suggested Reading for
Families and Friends of Alcoholics Families Anonymous 267 Adult
Children of Alcoholics (ACOA) 268 Test for Family Members of Alcoholics
.. The Bill of Rights for Adult Children of Alcoholics .. Suggested
Reading for Adult Children of Alcoholics Alateen 271 The Twelve
Traditions of Alateen .. . Suggested Reading for Children of Alcoholics
Seven Do's and Don't's for Parents of Children on Drugs 273 Suggested
Reading for Parents Parents Anonymous 275 Suggested Reading on Child
Abuse Suicide Prevention 276 Warning Signals .. . Ways to Help the
Person Who Might Be Considering Suicide 3. The Spiritual Dimension
Alcoholics for Christ Prayer of a Recovering Addict Christian Treatment
Centers With Gratitude Footnotes

How Do I Get Back on Track?

While both men and women are prone to compulsive behavior, the problems
of women especially concern me-because I have been there.  Correction,
I am still there because I will be coping with my compulsive nature the
rest of my life.

The good news, for me, is that I am on the recovery road.  I know what
I have to do to keep on that road.  I can't do it on my own power;
primarily it is surrender to the Higher Power that keeps me on track.
But there are other guideposts that give me direction every day of my
life.

This Handbook of Special Helps, the result of months of research, is a
compilation of some of the resources and tools available for addictive
compulsive people.  Though far from being a complete listing, it can
chart a course of where to go in finding the recovery road that is
right for you.  Suggested action: Go through the listing of helps on
the contents page and focus on the areas of compulsivity to which you
relate.

My hope for you is that if you are being defeated by behavior you can't
control, as I was for so many years, you will decide today that it is
time to do something about it.

Self-Help Programs

ALCOHOL ADDICTION

The Twelve-Step Program of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) These steps are
the cornerstone of most treatment programs.  Alcoholics Anonymous is
the pioneering group that established the basic principles to guide the
addict back to health.

AA was founded in Akron, Ohio, by two men, publicly identified as Bill
W."  a New York stockbroker, and Dr.  Bob S."  a surgeon.  Both had
long histories of irresponsible drinking.  Both had been considered
hopeless alcoholics.

In the fall of 1934, Bill W."  hospitalized for alcoholism, experienced
a sudden spiritual "awakening" that seemed to free him of the desire to
drink.  He tried to persuade other alcoholics that they could
experience the same transformation, but none recovered.

The following spring in Akron, after the collapse of a business
venture, Bill was seriously tempted to drink again.  Fearful of the
inevitable consequences of taking the first drink, Bill recalled that
he had had no desire for liquor during the preceding months while he
had been working with alcoholics in New York.  In desperation, he
sought a similar contact in Akron and was led to Dr.  Bob.  The latter,
impressed by Bill's recovery story and by the opportunity to share his
own drinking problems with an admitted alcoholic, achieved sobriety
shortly thereafter.

More important, the two men discovered that their own sobriety

was strengthened when they offered to share it with others, stressing
their own practical experience as recovered alcoholics.  By the fall of
1935, a small group of sober alcoholics was meeting regularly in Akron,
known as the Fellowship of Alcoholics Anonymous.

The following two-paragraph definition is now read at many AA
meetings:

Alcoholics Anonymous is a fellowship of men and women who share their
experience, strength and hope with each other that they may solve their
common problem and help others to recover from alcoholism.

The only requirement for membership is a desire to stop drinking. There
are no dues or fees for AA membership; we are self-supporting through
our own contributions.  AA is not allied with any sect, denomination,
politics, organization or institution; does not wish to engage in any
controversy, neither endorses nor opposes any causes. Our primary
purpose is to stay sober and help other alcoholics to achieve
sobriety.

Preamble printed with permission of The AA Grapevine,inc.

Step One: We admitted we were powerless over alcohol-that our lives had
become unmanageable.

Step Two: Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could
restore us to sanity.

Step Three: Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the
care of God as we understood Him.

Step Four: Made a searching andjearless moral inventory of ourselves.
Step Five: Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being
the exact nature of our wrongs.

Step Six: Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of
character.

Step Seven: Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

Step Eight: Made a list of persons we had harmed, and he came willing
to make amends to them all.

Step Nine: Made direct amends to such people wherever possih1e, except
t4en to do so would injure them or others.

Step Ten: Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong
promptly 'admitted it.

Step Eleven: Sought through prayer and meditation to i mp rove our
conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for
knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

Step Twelve: Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these
steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice
these principles in all our affairs.

The Twelve Steps reprinted with permission of Alcoholics Anonymous
World Services, Inc.

How You Can Apply the Twelve Steps Here are suggested guidelines for
adapting the Twelve-Step program to your compulsion addiction  These
comments are observations of the author and not of Alcoholics
Anonymous.

Step One: This is perhaps the most difficult step for the addict who
does not want to concede weakness and helplessness, who says, "I can
stop any time I choose to."  Taking this first step means conceding
that there has been a long period of self-deception.  But for progress
to begin, the ego must topple off the throne.  Then the addict can
admit, "I'm no longer in control.  " Step Two: The addict is faced with
a second momentous decision.  Previously she admitted her life was out
of control; now she admits she needs help, not from a husband or
friend,

but from that area of a mysterious Higher Power.  Most addicts have
trouble acknowledging this Higher Power because self has been their
higher power for years.  Now comes an agonizing shift-a transferral
from a power that's broken down to a power that's new and different, a
threat to all that was comfortable and familiar.

Step Three: The progression of decisions the addict must make
continues.  First, an admission of powerlessness; second, an
acknowledgment of strength greater than our own; third, a decision to
surrender to the greater strength.  How one resists that idea!  Yet
inner release comes through giving up that hard-co're area of
self-reliance.  Letting go brings peace.  You give up something that's
been destructive to get something that promises health.

Step Four: This is a most painful step for the addict who would prefer
to blot out of her consciousness all the terrible things she has done
to herself and others.  Making a searching, fearless moral inventory
means writing down people, places, events, dates with brutal candor and
incisiveness.  Spare nothing.  This is the way toward recovery.

Step Five: Looking on paper at the specifics of our moral inventory has
to raise the question "What can I do about all this?"

Try to forget it?  That's the road back to chemical dependency.

Confession?  Yes.  To God and to another person.  What person?  Someone
you trust, who will keep what you say in confidence.

Step Six: After confessing their wrongdoing, many women leave it there,
figuring they've done all that's necessary.  God

does forgive, doesn't he?  Now we can go on with our lives.

But wait!  What about those character defects?  Pride, anger, lust,
jealousy, resentment, and so on.  They have become "old friends."  Are
we ready for God to change these things?  Are we willing to do what he
asks to bring about the change?

We need to make a conscious act of setting our wills in a state of
readiness so that we can receive any instructions.

Step Seven: After an act of the will that says to God, "I'm ready for
you to change me," then comes the next step, asking God to take action.
We have moved ahead steadily from unbelief or indifference to a
relationship with God.  Now comes the expectation of a miracle!  Those
who see their Higher Power as human destiny or nature or some other
impersonal force may struggle with these steps.  If so, they may want
to rethink what or who the Higher Power, for them, really is.

Step Eight: The key words here are became willing, The act of making a
list will be difficult because of painful memories, some of which may
have been blotted out.  A good procedure is: (1) Take pencil and paper,
go back in time, and write down in some chronological order with dates,
the names of people harmed and what the offenses were; (2) Pray that
God will unblock your mind and reveal the people and events he wants
you to include; (3) Ask him to help you become willing to make
amends.

Step Nine: In this crucial and painful step of the recovery process,
there is need for sensitivity and discernment as to whom we contact. At
an alcohol family support meeting one man whose problem was lust
admitted that attempts to make restitution to a woman with whom he had
had sexual encounters years before backfired on his current marital
situation.  Consider each person on your list, seeking wisdom about
what action to take.

Step Ten: The addict has lived in a world of self-indulgence for so
long that a formidable defense system separates her from the rest of
the world.  The road to recovery involves tearing down this defense
system.  Coming to the point where the addict can admit a mistake,
which also may mean an apology, is a big step toward health.

"I was wrong.  I am sorry.  I made a mistake.  Please forgive me.  "
There's healing every time these words are uttered.

Step Eleven: Moving into prayer and meditation is a major step for the
addict because it means the building of a relationship with God, a
process that could take months, even years.  On top of that the addict
is to pray for power to follow God's will.  For some, Bible study
classes and prayer are essential to make Step Eleven work.

Step Twelve: This last step is a clarion call to reach out to other
addicts.  Unlike the previous steps, most of which involve pain, this
one flows almost irresistibly from the newfound )oy and purpose of our
lives.  The transition from compulsive self-centered ness to being
"others-centered" releases undreamed-of energy into daily living.

Twelve Rewards of the Twelve-Step Program I Hope instead of
desperation.

2. Faith instead of despair.

3. Courage instead of fear.

4. Peace of mind instead of confusion.

5. Self-respect instead of self-contempt.

6. Self-confidence instead of helplessness.

7. The respect of others instead of their pity and contempt.

8. A clean conscience instead of a sense of guilt.

9. Real friendships instead of loneliness.

&4(-Help Programs 10.  A clean pattern of life instead of a
purposeless existence.

11.  The love and understanding of our families instead of their doubts
and fears.

12.  The freedom of a happy life instead of the bondage of a drugged
obsession.

Remember, the task ahead of us is never as great as the power behind
us.

Drugs Alcoholics Should Avoid' The following is a partial list of drugs
demonstrated to be hazardous to alcoholics and other chemically
dependent people.

All sedatives, including barbiturates and synthetic drugs, barbiturates
such as Nembutal, Seconal, Tuinal, etc."  and synthetic sedatives such
as Doriden, Quaalude, Dalmane, Placidyl, etc.

All narcotics, including opium derivatives such as codeine, morphine,
heroin; and synthetic narcotics such as Demerol, etc.

All tranquilizers, including the newest ones.  Of special danger are
Valium and Librium due to their wide usage and addictive
capabilities.

Most pain-relieving medications such as Darvon, Talwin, etc.  Darvon
seems to act as a tranquilizer, and Talwin has characteristics of a
narcotic.  Both these drugs are capable of producing severe
addictions.

All antihistamines.

Drugstore medications containing antihistamines or scopolamine, such as
Nytol, Sominex, Contac, Dristan, NyQuil, and even Miles Nervine.

* Antidepressants and stimulants such as Elavil, Ritalin, amphetamine
compounds, etc.

* Cough medicines and other medications containing narcotics, alcohol,
or antihistamines.  This means almost all cough syrups and many liquid
vitamin preparations.

* Weight control tablets.

* Reserpine compounds, which are basically tranquilizers.

Preparations containing reserpine prescribed for hypertension should be
used with caution and only when absolutely necessary.

The Dry Drunk 2 (Checklist of Symptoms to Watch Out for) 1. Exhaustion.
Allowing yourself to become overly tired or be in poor health.  Some
alcoholics are also prone to work addictions; perhaps they are in a
hurry to make up for lost time.  Good health and enough rest are
important.  If you feel good, you are more apt to think well.  Feel bad
and your thinking is apt to deteriorate.  Feel bad enough and you might
begin thinking a drink couldn't make it any worse.

2. Dishonesty.  This begins with a pattern of unnecessary little lies
and deceits with fellow workers, friends, and family.  Then come
important ties to yourself.  This is called rationalizing-making
excuses for not doing what you do not want to do, or for doing what you
should not do.

3. Impatience.  Things are not happening fast enough.  Or others are
not doing what they should or what you want them to.

4. Argumentativeness.  Arguing small and ridiculous points of view
indicates a need to always be right.

"Why don't you be' reasonable and agree with me?"  Looking for an
excuse to drink?

5. Depression.  Unreasonable and unaccountable despair may occur in
cycles and should be dealt with-talked about.

6. Frustration.  At people and also because things may not be going
your way.  Remember, everything is not going to go just the way you
want it.

7. Self-Pity.

"Why do these things happen to me?"

"Why must I be alcoholic?"

"Nobody appreciates all I am doing."

8. Cockiness.  Got it made.  No longer fear alcoholism.  Going into
drinking situations to prove to others you have no problem.  Do this
often enough and it will wear down your defenses.

9. Complacency.

"Drinking was the farthest thing from my mind."

Not drinking was no longer a conscious thought either.  It is dangerous
to let up on disciplines because everything is going well.  Always to
have a little fear is a good thing.  More relapses occur when things
are going well than otherwise.

10.  Expecting Too Much from Others.

"I've changed; why hasn't everyone else?"  It's a plus if they do-but
it is still your problem if they do not.  They may not trust you yet;
may still be looking for further proof.  You cannot expect others to
change their lifestyles just because you have.

11.  Letting Up on Disciplines.  Prayer, meditation, daily inventory,
alcohol supp or group attendance.  This can stem from either
complacency or boredom.  You cannot afford to be bored with your
program.  The cost of relapse is always too great.

12.  Use of Mood-Altering Chemicals.  You may feel the need to ease
things with a pill, and your doctor may go along with you.  You may
never have had a problem with chemicals other than alcohol, but you can
easily lose sobriety starting this way-about the most subtle way to
have a relapse.  Remember, you will be cheating!  The reverse of this
is true for drug-dependent persons who start to drink.

13.  Wanting Too Much.  Do not set goals you cannot reach with normal
effort.  Do not expect too much.  It's always great when good things
you were not expecting happen.  You will get what you are entitled to
as long as you do your best, but maybe not as soon as you think you
should.

"Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have."

14.  Forgetting Gratitude.  You may be looking negatively on your
life,

concentrating on problems that still are not totally corrected.  Nobody
wants to be a Pollyanna, but it is good to remember where you started
from-and how much better life is now.

15.  "It Can't Happen to Me."  This is dangerous thinking.  Almost
anything can happen to you and is more likely to if you get careless.
Remember, you have a progressive disease, and you will be in worse
shape if you relapse.

16.  Omnipotence.  This is a feeling that results from a combination of
many of the above.  You now have all the answers for yourself and
others.  No one can tell you anything.  You Ignore suggestions or
advice from others.  Relapse is probably imminent unless drastic change
takes place.

Suggested Reading on Alcoholism Alcoholics Anonymous.  Alcoholics
Anonymous, The Big Book, 3rd ed.

New York: Alcoholics Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1976.  Alcoholics
Anonymous.  Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions, New York: Alcoholics
Anonymous World Services, Inc., 1952.  Meryman, Richard.  Broken
Promises, Mended Dreams.  Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown & Co."  1984.
Spickard, Anderson A."  M.D. and Thompson, Barbara.  Dyingfor a Drink.
Waco, Tex.: Word, Inc."  1985.  Ford, Betty with Chris Chase.  Betty: A
Glad Awakening.  New York: Doubleday Company, Inc."  1987.  Dejong,
Alexander.  Help and Hope for the Alcoholic, Wheaton, Ill.:

Tyndale House Publishers, 1982.  Dunn, Jerry G. God Is for the
Alcoholic, Chicago, Illinois: Moody Press, 1965.  Sandmaler, Marian.
The Invisible Alcoholics: Women and Alcohol Abuse in America, New York:
McGraw-Hill Book Company, 198 1.

Self-Help Progww Manning, Brennan.  A Stranger to Self-Hatred.
Denville, NJ.:

Dimension Books, 1982.

DRUG ADDICTION

Today the main focus of drug rehabilitation seems to center on cocaine.
Yet there are eight substances that have destroyed the lives of
millions of people.  Here are the facts about them: 3 Facts about Eight
Deadly Drugs Cocaine * Causes heart palpitations, which can become
chronic and can cause death by cardiac arrest.  Cocaine acts directly
on the heart, and also on the area of the brain that controls the heart
and lungs.

* Increases the pulse rate and blood pressure by constricting the blood
vessels and accelerating the heart.  This can result in stroke.

Causes epileptic seizures.

Causes chronic nausea or vomiting.

Causes chronic fatigue and exhaustion.

Causes chronic mood swings, including depression, paranoia, and
irritability.

Brings about suicidal tendencies.

Causes chronic sleep problems.

Impairs the appetite by fooling the brain into thinking tjae user has
eaten.  Users lose weight and develop vitamin deficiencies.

* Brings on a hard-hitting "crash" as the drug's effect wears off,
causing a strong desire to take more cocaine for relief.

* Anesthetizes the vocal cords, causing chronic sore throat and voice
problems.

* Causes chronic nosebleeds and runny nose through its effects on the
nasal passages.  Large ulcers can result, followed by eventual loss of
the septum-the skin that separates the nostrils.  Causes sinus
problems, resulting in headaches.

* Invites other addictions.  Cocaine abusers often depend on alcohol,
marijuana, or heroin to help them sleep or to combat the Jittery
feeling that characterizes the cocaine high.

* Causes sexual problems.  Habitual cocaine use causes a chronic loss
of interest in sex, as well as impairment of sexual performance.

* Causes compulsive behavior, such as constantly straightening a tie or
licking the lips.

Alcohol * Causes birth defects.  Babies of mothers who drink during
pregnancy are likely to be small and have facial deformities; those of
fathers who drink heavily during the six months prior to conception are
likely to be small.

* Causes liver damage.

* Changes the metabolism of some heart cells, which can cause
fibrillation (uncontrolled fluttering of the heart), arrhythmias
(disturbances in the heart's rhythm), and possibly heart attack.

* Damages the pancreas, which hinders digestion and upsets blood sugar
balance.

* Impairs absorption of nutrients in the intestine, causing
malnutrition.  Deficiency of vitamin BI resulting from poor absorption
can cause neurological damage to the brain.  The liver's failure to
absorb vitamin A causes night blindness.

* Impairs immune system through its interference with the production of
white blood cells.

* Enlarges red blood cells, causing high blood pressure.

* Alters the hormone balance so that the body is in a state of
permanent stress.

* Disrupts menstrual cycle.

* Interferes with sexual performance in males by interfering with the
production of the hormone testosterone.  Shrinks the testicles and
decreases fertility by lowering the sperm count.

* Causes slurred speech, disorientation, lack of coordination, and
impaired memory, perception, and judgment.

LSD

* Alters perception and can cause sensory distortions.

Impairs judgment.

With long-term use, can cause "flashbacks": periodic distortions of
vision or time perception, as well as periods of emotional imbalance
and the intrusion of dreamlike states while awake.  Presumed to be due
to permanent damage to certain brain systems.

PCP

PCP phenyl cyclohexyl piperldine) may cause, in large doses, permanent
impairment of brain function, including

motor control, memory, concentration, and the ability to think clearly.
The possibility of permanent brain damage is currently being studied.

* Causes visual, auditory, and motor disturbances in babies born to
mothers who have used PCP.  Damage may be permanent.

* Brings on a psychotic state resembling schizophrenia, characterized
by delusions and hallucinations.  Behavior is unpredictable and often
violent.  Macabre murders and mutilations have been committed by those
under PCP's influence; users are also prone to injury or death from
drowning or jumping from buildings.

* Distorts sense of time and distance; some users have drowned in the
bathtub, as if they thought it was a much larger body of water.

* Decreases sensitivity to pain.  Users run the risk of serious and
sometimes fatal injuries (such as by sticking a hand in a fire),
because they don't feel pain.

* Induces a catatonic state, in which the user stares mutely into
space, seemingly oblivious to others and unable to communicate.

Marijuana * Causes behavior and reproductive problems, delayed puberty
and birth defects in the offspring of parents who smoke it.

* Weakens the immune system.  Researchers are now investigating whether
those who smoke marijuana may be more vulnerable to AIDS if exposed to
the virus.

* Causes lung damage similar to that from cigarettes; contains powerful
carcinogens.

Impairs psychomotor function, such as driving a car or piloting a
plane.

Impairs short-term memory, learning ability.

Heroin * Slows down breathing.  In the case of an overdose, this can
result in death.

* Depresses the central nervous system, causing slurred speech, clumsy
movement, drowsiness.

* Overdose causes convulsions and coma.

* Increases risk of infections such as AIDS, skin abscesses,
endocarditis (inflammation of the heart), hepatitis-from contaminated
needles (the drug is almost always injected).

Amphetamines * Increase blood pressure and heart rate, which strains
the cardiovascular system and could result in heart attack or stroke.

* Prompt production of a toxin that kills nerve cells in the brain.
This may make a person more susceptible to Parkinson's disease later in
life.

* May cause "mini-strokes" on the brain's surface, in which small
portions of the brain die-particularly when the drug is injected.

* Kill the appetite; the drug fools the brain into thinking the user
has eaten.

* Cause insomnia.

* Cause a condition known as "amphetamine psychosis,"

similar to paranoid schizophrenia.  It's a result of over stimulation
of the same brain systems that cause insomnia.  The person may hear
imaginary threatening voices and can commit violent acts to defend
himself.

* Bring on a severe crash when the drug's effects wear off,
characterized by depression and irritability.

Barhiturates * Cause lethargy and sleep in mild doses; overdoses lower
body temperature, cause lungs to fill with fluid, and can bring about
coma and death.

* Result in serious addiction.  Withdrawal from barbiturates can be
fatal, probably because barbiturates interfere with the brain's ability
to coordinate many different functions.

* Combine synergistically with both alcohol and antihistamines, causing
a loss of concentration, coordination, and control, and increasing the
chance of overdose death.

* Cause liver damage.

* Cause anemia, probably because of toxic effects on the liver.

* Prompt rapid tolerance, requiring larger and larger doses to get the
same effect, though the lethal dose remains constant.

Narcotics Anonymous (NA) This fellowship of men and women is for those
for whom drugs have become a major problem.  It is a program of
complete abstinence from all drugs.  There is only one requirement for
membership: the desire to stop using.  Those who enroll in the NA
program make the following admissions:

We admit we could not manage our own lives.  We could not live and
enjoy life as other people do.  We had to have something different and
we thought we had found it in drugs.  We placed their use ahead of the
welfare of our families, our wives, husbands and our children.  We had
to have drugs at all costs.  We did many people great harm, but most of
all we harmed ourselves.  Through our inability to accept personal
responsibilities, we were actually creating our own problems.  We
seemed to be incapable of facing life on its own terms.

Most of us realized that in our addiction we were slowly committing
suicide, but addiction is such a cunning enemy of life that we had lost
the power to do anything about it.  Many of us ended up in jail, or
sought help through medicine, religion and psychiatry.  None of these
methods was sufficient for us.  Our disease always resurfaced or
continued to progress; until in desperation, we sought help from each
other in Narcotics Anonymous.

After coming toNA we realized we were sick people.  We suffered ftorn a
disease from which there is no known cure.  It can, however, be
arrested at some point, and recovery is then possible.

If you want what we have to offer, and are willing to make the effort
to get it, then you are ready to come to grips with the Twelve-Step
program used by Alcoholics Anonymous.

What can defeat us in our recovery is an attitude of indifference or
intolerance toward spiritual principles.  Three of these that are
indispensable are honesty, open-mindedness and willingness.  With these
we are well on our way.

Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our traditions, ever
reminding us to place principles before personalities.

From Narcotics Anonymous booklet (D 1986 by World Service Office Inc.
For further information write:

World Service Office, Inc.  Narcotics Anonymous P.O. Box 9999 Van
Nuys,

CA 91409 (818) 780-3951

Drugs Anonymous P.O. Box 473 Ansonia Station New York, NY 10023
(212)874-0700 Cocaine Anonymous P.O. Box 1367 Culver City, CA 90232
(213)559-5833 Drug Hotline Number 1-800-241-9746 Cocaine Hot Line

1-800-COCAINE

Suggested Reading on Drug Addiction Ellis, Dan C. Growing Up Stoned.
Pompano Beach, Fla.: Health Communications, Inc."  1986.  Kirsch, M. M.
Designer Drugs.  Minneapolis, Minn.: Comp Care Publications, 1986.
Weiner, M. Getting Off Cocaine: 30 Days to Freedom, New York:

Avon Books, 1984.  Strack, Jay.  Drugs and Drinking: What Every Teen
and Parent Should Know.  Nashville, Tenn.: Thomas Nelson, 1985.
Hazeldon Collection for Addicts, Center City, Minn.: Hazeldon
Educational Materials, order no.  5957.  1986.  Hafen, Brent Q. Ph.D."
and Frandsen, Kathryn J. Marajuana.

Center City, Minn.: Hazeldon Foundation, 1979.

Self-Help Progww

EATING DISORDERS

My problem with overeating and eating the wrong foods (especially too
many sweets) began in childhood and continues to this day.  When I
wrote an article on compulsive behavior for Charisma magazine in 1985,
1 included in it my struggle to control my food intake.  Some
sixty-five readers wrote me of their experiences with compulsions,
including a woman named Evelyn S. She describes how the misuse of food
can endanger one's health and devastate one's emotions, beginning early
in life:

Compulsive Eating-A Case Study As a child, I ate butter sticks like
they were carrot sticks and would even search through the trash for
leftover Easter candy my mother had carefully hidden from me.  As a
result I was called "Butterball.  " I've kept the "five-to-ten pounds
overweight" image of myself most of my life.

At home we only had sit-down meals on holidays and special occasions.
The rest of the time we ate only when we were hungry.  I believe this
erratic eating pattern was at least partially responsible for the
establishment of some of my very strange eating habits.  My mother,
although a very thin woman on the outside, seemed to be "fat in her
head."  She apparently was afraid to cook for fear of regaining the
childhood chubbiness she once was known for.

At boarding school our hall became known for its "pig-outs" which
occurred with almost daily frequency.  It was then I discovered the
thrill of "eating buddies" who would plot with me to raid the candy
machine at 3:00 A.M. or "chow down" on the remaining pie from dinner.
Food became my friend when I was lonely, and even when I wasn't.

My college eating buddies and I joked about fat and did strenuous
exercises to "keep the fat at bay," but inside we ached for help from
our common bondage.  At 5'2V2" and 139 pounds I was rather chunky but
fortunately I did not elicit the kind of stares really fat people
receive, which would have further wounded my already negative
self-image.

By this time I had already gone the gamut of weight reduction pains:
Behavioral Modification, Weight Watchers, and finally, Overeaters
Anonymous.  How thankful I was to find OA, a group of people who
finally were willing to help me get to the root of the problem and who
could understand this compulsion that was driving me to eat.  The
constant fear of another pig-out, the sickening feeling of waking up
with horrible breath from a late-night hinge, the useless feeling of
"why bother to try?  "all these emotions were shared by and with my
comrades in OA.  Together we learned to pray to a "Higher Power."

The weight began to leave me as only the proper amount of food was
allowed in.  Since that momentous occasion I have felt more joyful and
free than ever before.  The destructive desire to be a human garbage
pall left.

I drink six to eight glasses of purified water daily, run two-and
a-half miles a few times a week and work out at the gym two or three
times weekly.  These are all areas of wisdom God instructed me to
partake in so that I would not be only thin, but healthy as well.  I
also eat lots of "health foods."

Evelyn S. Overeaters Anonymous (OA) Overeaters Anonymous, so helpful to
Evelyn, is a fellowship of men and women from all walks of life who
meet in order to help solve a common problem-compulsive overeating. The
only requirement for membership is a desire to stop eating
compulsively.

This organization was founded in January 1960 when three people living
in Los Angeles, California, began meeting for the purpose of helping
each other with their eating problems.  They had tried everything else
and failed.  The program they followed was and continued to
be--patterned after the Alcoholics Anonymous program.  From that first
meeting CIA has grown until today there are thousands of meetings in
the United States and other countries.

The concept of abstinence is the basis of OA's program of

recovery.  By admitting inability to control compulsive overeating in
the past, and abandoning the idea that all one needs to be able to eat
normally is "a little willpower," it becomes possible to abstain from
overeating-one day at a time, OA offers the newcomer support in dealing
with both the physical and emotional symptoms of compulsive overeating.
For weight loss, any medically approved eating plan is acceptable. The
diagnosis of a compulsive overeating disorder, like the diagnosis of
alcoholism, must be self-declared if treatment is to be effective. In
our do-it-yourself society, where weight control is a billion dollar
business and a national pastime, no matter how obese the candidate,
treatment is not possible unless the individual is sick of being driven
to overeat.

Otherwise, it is just a dissatisfaction with excess weight for which
the individual feels he still has some tricks up his sleeve for
self-control.  That has to be left alone, unless there is a genuine
despair about the compulsion.

Nor is overweight the sole criterion for turning to OA.  People are
recognizing their food disorder earlier in life, with only a minimal
amount of excess weight, just as more and more alcoholics are able to
recognize their addiction in its earliest stages and are seeking help.
Extreme excess weight is no longer the criterion for many new entrants.
Recognition of the compulsion is.

Variants of the disorder include the food abuser who has no apparent
weight problem and is often quite underweight but who maintains this by
eating and vomiting, a practice called bulimia.  Another extreme is a
form of self-starvation which results in anorexia.

Overeaters Anonymous has no religious requirement, affiliation, or
orientation.  The twelve-step program of recovery is considered
spiritual" because it deals with inner change.  OA has members of many
different religious beliefs as well as some atheists and agnostics.

C1979.  Overeaters Anonymous, Inc.

To contact Overeaters Anonymous, or other eating disorder support
groups, look in your local telephone directory and/or your local
newspaper's social or calendar section.  Or write:

Overeaters Anonymous Inc.  World Service Office P.O. Box 92870 Los
Angeles, CA 90009 Suggested Reading on Eating Disorders Hollis, Judy.
Fat Is a Family Affair, Center City.  Minn.: Hazelden Foundation, 1985.
Rowland, Cynthia Joyce.  The Monster Within: Overcoming Bulimia.

Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1985.  Stein, Patricia M. and
Unell, Barbara C. Anorexia Nervosa: Finding the Life Line. Minneapolis,
Minn.: Comp Care Publications, 1986.  Barrile, Jackie. Confessions of a
Closet Eater.  Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House Publishers, 1983.  Bill B.
The Compulsive Overeater.  Minneapolis, Minn.: Comp Care Publications,
198 1. Bryan, Nancy.  Thin Is a State of Mind.  Minneapolis, Minn.:

Comp Care Publications, 1982.  Roth, Geneen.  Feeding the Hungry Heart,
New York: Signet Books, 1983.  Chapian, Marie and Coyle, Neva.* Free to
Be Thin.  Mirfneapolis, Minn.: Bethany House, 1979.  Coyle, Neva.  Free
to Be Thin Study Guide.  Minneapolis, Minn.:

Bethany House, 1979.

EMOTIONAL DISORDERS

Emotions Anonymous (EA) was formed by a group of individuals who found
a New Way of Life by working the Twelve-Step Program

of Alcoholics Anonymous as adapted for people with emotional problems.
Their statement of purpose:

There is but one ultimate authority-a loving God as He may express
Himself in our group conscience.  Our leaders are but trusted servants;
they do not govern.

The only requirement for membership is a desire to become well
emotionally.

We respect anonymity-no questions are asked.  We aim for an atmosphere
of love and acceptance.  We do not care who you are or what you have
done.  You are welcome.

We do not judge-we do not criticize-we do not argue.  We do not give
advice regarding personal or family affairs.

Part of the beauty and wonder of the Emotions Anonymous Program is that
at meetings we can say anything and know it stays there.  Anything we
hear at a meeting, on the telephone, or from another member is
confidential, and is not to be repeated to anyone.

From Emotions Anonymous, Inc.

"Just for Today"-The EA Credo JUST FOR TODAY I will try to live through
this day only, not tackling my whole life problem at once.  I can do
something at this moment that would appall me if I felt that I had to
keep it up for a lifetime.

JUST FOR TODAY I will try to be happy, realizing that my happiness does
not depend on what others do or say, or what happens around me.
Happiness is a result of being at peace with myself.

JUST FOR TODAY I will try to adjust myself to what is-and not force
everything to adjust to my own desires.  I will accept my family, my
friends, my business, my circumstances as they come.

JUST FOR TODAY I will take care of my physical health; I will exercise
my mind; I will read something spiritual.

JUST FOR TODAY I will do somebody a good turn and not get

found out-if anyone knows of it, it will not count.  I shall do at
least one thing I don't want to do, and will perform some small act of
love for my neighbor.

JUST FOR TODAY I will try to go out of my way to be kind to someone I
meet; I will be agreeable; I will took as well as I can, dress
becomingly, talk low, act courteously, criticize not one bit, not find
fault with anything, and not try to improve or regulate anybody except
myself.

JUST FOR TODAY I will have a program.  I may not follow it exactly, but
I will have it.  I will save myself from two pests-hurry and
indecision.

JUST FOR TODAY I will stop saying "If I had time."  I never will "find
time" for anything.  If I want time I must take it.

JUST FOR TODAY I will have a quiet time of meditation wherein I shall
think of God as I understand Him and of my neighbor.  I shall relax and
seek truth.

JUST FOR TODAY I shall be unafraid.  Particularly, I shall be unafraid
to be happy, to enjoy what is good, what is beautiful, and what is
lovely in life.

JUST FOR TODAY I will accept myself and live to the best of my
ability.

JUST FOR TODAY I choose to believe that I can live this one day.

The choice is mine!  For further information about Emotions Anonymous
write:

Emotions Anonymous International Services Post Office Box 4245 St.
Paul, Minnesota 55104 (612) 647-9712

Suggested Reading on Emotional Disorders Dobson, Dr.  James.
Emotions-Can You Trust Them?  Ventura, Calif.: Regal Books, 1984.
Grateful Members.  The 12 Steps for Everyone Who Really Wants Them.
Minneapolis, Minn.: Comp Care Publications, 1975.  Minirth, Frank B."
M.D. and Meier, Paul D."  M.D. Happiness Is a Choice.  Grand Rapids,
Michigan: Baker Books, 1978.  Seamands, David.  Healing for Damaged
Emotions.  Wheaton, Ill.:

Victor Books, 1981.  Sanford, John and Paula.  Transformation of the
Inner Man.  So.

Plainfield, NJ.: Bridge Publishing, Inc.  1982.  Rubin, Theodore Isaac,
M.D. The Angry Book.  New York: Collier (subsidiary of Macmillan
Publishers), 1970.  Peck, Scott.  The Road Less Traveled.  New York:
Simon and Schuster, 1978.  Bozarth-Campbell, Alla, Ph.D. Life Is
GoodhyelLife Is Hello.  2nd ed.  Minneapolis, Minn.: Comp Care 1983.

COMPULSIVE EXERCISING

Exercise is good for you when done under proper guidance and controls.
Therapists and physical education people can help you find a balanced
program of walking, jogging, and/or use of gym equipment.

When you turn exercise from a "want-to" into a "have-to," you take the
healthy part out and you take the joy out.  Watch out.

It becomes compulsive exercising when you stop listening to your body,
how you're feeling, and drive yourself with an urgency that has little
to do with reality.  Compulsive exercising is when you're afraid that
your looks, your well-being, your relationship all hinge on going to
exercise class six days a week.

Warning Signs Watch out for these warning signs:

You get so used to your exercise routine that even very important
events are intrusions.  You start fitting your life into your classes
instead of fitting your classes Into your life.

What you eat or don't eat depends on whether you are exercising or
not.

You don't feel "right" or "complete" or "good" unless you exercise.

You exercise even when you feel sick or tired.

It's beginning to be hard to drag yourself to exercise class.  You
think of ways to get out of it; you hope you'll get pneumonia; you
don't like the people who stand next to you in class; you want to punch
the teacher in the mouth.

When any or all of these warning signs apply to you, here are some
things to do.

1. Listen to them.  They are a sign that something has gone wrong.

2. Don't go to your class for a day or a few days.  Take a walk
instead, or sit in a rocking chair for an hour and do nothing, or read
a book.

3. The next morning after you skip a class, notice that although you
didn't burn off 500 calories the day before, you have not suddenly
gained ten pounds.  Keep noticing.

4. Remind yourself of all the things you are besides your body.

Make a list.  Begin it with "I am .. ."  and don't allow any negative
judgments about your body to creep in or on.  In case you forget, you
are worthwhile, you are caring, you are growing.  To name just a few
attributes.

5. Eat when you are hungry, eat what you want, stop when you're
satisfied.  Remember that your body does not want to destroy you and
will not go haywire as soon as you let down your guard.  Trust that the
two of you are working for the same end-your health, your happiness,
your peace.  4

COMPULSIVE GAMBLING

News of the Wall Street scandals touched me in a personal way.  I
remembered Fred at the Compulsivity Clinic, the heavy-set man in his
thirties who was a stockbroker.  Fred admitted that Wall Street was
spawning a new breed of gambler, the compulsive investor, and that he
had been infected.  As a result he had become involved in the Gamblers
Anonymous program.

Compulsive gambling is a disease many people don't believe exists.  On
the surface gamblers seldom show symptoms of their disease, as do
alcoholics and drug addicts.  It is a progressive behavior disorder in
which an individual has a psychologically controlled preoccupation and
urge to gamble that compromises family, job and other pursuits. Studies
show that close to ten percent of the population have a gambling
problem.  These addictive people usually begin to gamble at an early
age (96 percent start before the age of fourteen) and gamble to
compensate for anxiety, anger, and the deprivation of their early
years.

Approximately one third of compulsive gamblers are women, of whom 75
percent gamble to escape problem situations.  About half of all women
gamblers have a drug or alcohol addiction too.  Frequently, the
compulsive gambler who has exhausted all credit sources and the savings
of family members will resort to crime.

Reports Arnie Wexler, executive director of the New Jersey Council on
Compulsive Gambling and a former compulsive gambler himself.

"It's an invisible disease.  People can understand what happens to drug
addicts and alcoholics when they withdraw.  But

not many know that a compulsive gambler can develop stammering, eye
twitches, bloody noses, and other problems when going through
withdrawal."

Warning Signs The following twenty questions may help you decide
whether compulsive gambling is a problem for you or for someone you
know:

1. Do you lose time from work due to gambling?

2. Is gambling making your home life unhappy?

3. Is gambling affecting your reputation?

4. Have you ever felt remorse after gambling?

5. Do you ever gamble to get money with which to pay debts or to
otherwise solve financial difficulties?

6. Does gambling cause a decrease in your ambition or efficiency?

7. After losing, do you feel you must return as soon as possible and
win back your losses?

8. After a win, do you have a strong urge to return and win more?

9. Do you often gamble until your last dollar is gone?

10.  Do you ever borrow to finance your gambling?

11.  Have you ever sold any real or personal property to finance
gambling?

12.  Are you reluctant to use "gambling money" for normal
expenditures?

13.  Does gambling make you careless of the welfare of your family?

14.  Do you ever gamble longer than you had planned?

15.  Do you ever gamble to escape worry or trouble?

16.  Have you ever committed, or considered committing, an illegal act
to finance gambling?

17.  Does gambling cause you to have difficulty in sleeping?

18.  Do arguments, disappointments or frustrations create within you an
urge to gamble?

19.  Do you have an urge to celebrate any good fortune by a few hours
of gambling?

20.  Have you ever considered self-destruction as a result of your
gambling?

Most compulsive gamblers will answer yes to seven or more of these
questions.

From "Compulsive Gambling," Christopher News Notes, 12 East 48 St., New
York, NY 10017 Gamblers Anonymous (GA) Gamblers Anonymous is the most
effective self-help organization available to compulsive gamblers.
Modeled along the lines of Alcoholics Anonymous, GA was founded in
California in 1957.  It now has 300 chapters in the United States, a
total of 450 world-wide.  It uses the Twelve-Step program as its basic
tool.  For further information about Gamblers Anonymous or Gam-Anon
(for families) or Gamateen (for teenagers) write:

Gamblers Anonymous Post Office Box 17173 Los Angeles, CA 90017
Gam-Anon/Gamateen Post Office Box 967 Radio City Station New York, NY
10019 (718) 352-1671

The National Council on Compulsive Gambling, Inc."  was established in
1972 to disseminate information and education on compulsive gambling as
an illness and public health problem.  Their address:

444 West 56 Street Room 3207 S New York, NY 10019 (212)765-3833
Suggested Reading on Compulsive Gambling Braidfoot, Larry.  Gambling: A
Deadly Game.  Nashville, Tenn.:

Broadman Press, 1985.  Pamphlets.  Understanding Compulsive Gambling
order no.  5497;

Early Signs of Compulsive Gambling order no.  5587; What Is GA.
(Gamblers Anonymous) order no.  1393.  Center City, Minnesota: Hazelden
Educational Materials.  Christopher News Notes.  Compulsive Gambling,
New York, New York.

OBSESSIVE-COMPULSIVE DISORDER

The man who has to wash his hands five times before each meal or the
woman who checks the locks on her front and back doors exactly eight
times each night before bedtime probably has obsessive compulsive
disorder (OCD).  Aside from this unusual behavior, most OCD's act so
normally that close friends are unaware that they are ruled by fears
and repetitive, repellent thoughts.

The more bizarre forms of this behavior include such situations as the
young father who won't mail a letter without checking to make sure his
daughter isn't sealed inside.  Or the woman who saves

everything, including the fuzz that comes off her carpet, although she
has no explanation as to why she does this.

Recent studies show that at least ten times more Americans have OCD
than previously estimated, or 2.5 out of every 100 adults, with an even
male-female ratio.

Most people described as compulsive do not have OCD.  Some successful
people in demanding fields often show signs of OCD, with their
preoccupation with dirt, time, and money.  Though such people are
inclined to be miserly, workaholic and perfectionist, they are only
somewhat more likely to have OCD than others.  Nor is the OCD person
likely to be addicted to alcohol, sex, gambling, or food-which all
include an element of real enjoyment.  In contrast, the
obsessive-compulsive gets no pleasure from the dreary, often despised
rituals he's driven senselessly to perform.

Only in recent years has behavioral therapy emerged as the OCD's best
avenue of help.  The therapist makes the patient confront what he fears
over and over again, while preventing him from lapsing into the ritual
acts.  This breaks the circuit between obsession and compulsion.
Certain drugs also help reduce the patient's fear.  What was once
considered incurable behavior can today be treated.  The possibility of
spiritual treatment for OCD is an untapped area.  5 For further
information on obsessive-compulsive disorder and its treatment,
write:

The OCD Foundation Post Office Box 60 Vernon, CT 06066

RELATIONSHIP DEPENDENCIES

If you feel you have a tendency toward unhealthy relationships,
Relationships Anonymous is a self-help organization that uses the

Twelve-Step recovery program of Alcoholics Anonymous to break the
pattern of addictive and destructive relationships.  Support is
provided during painful break-ups.  The meetings emphasize the
importance of confidentiality; only first names are used.  For further
information, write to Relationships Anonymous, P.O. Box 40074,
Berkeley, CA 94704.

How Male Dependent Are YoU@6 If you wonder to what degree you are
dependent on men to satisfy your emotional needs, the following test
will give you some clues.  Answer by checking Yes or No in the
designated spot.

1. You come from a dysfunctional home in which your emotional needs
were not met.  _L-Yes -No 2. Having received little real nurturing
yourself, you try to fill this unmet need vicariously by becoming a
care-giver, especially to men who appear, in some way, needy. If-Yes'
No 3. Because you were never able to change your parents) into the
warm, loving caretakers) you longed for, you respond deeply to
emotionally unavailable men whom you can again try to change, through
your love.  -Z-Yes -No 4. Terrified of abandonment, you will do
anything to keep a male relationship from dissolving.  __@Lyes -No 5.
Almost nothing is too much trouble, takes too much time, or is too
expensive if it will "help" the man you are involved with.  -L-Yes -No
6. Accustomed to lack of love in personal relationships, you are
willing to wait, hope, and try harder to please.  -.1 Yes -No 7. You
are willing to take far more than 50 percent of the responsibility,
guilt, and blame in any relationship.  Yes / No 8. Your self-esteem is
critically low, and deep inside you do not believe Self-Help Progranu
you deserve to be happy.  Rather, you believe you must earn the right
to enjoy life.  ,"-"Yes -No 9. You have a desperate need to control
your men and your relationships, having experienced little security in
childhood.  You mask your efforts to control people and situations
under the guise of "being helpful."  -1-Yes -No 10.  In a relationship,
you are much more in touch with your dream of how it could be than with
the reality of your situation.  _A:@_Yes -No 11.  You are addicted to
men and to emotional pain.  A-If Yes -No 12.  You are predisposed
emotionally and often biochemically to becoming dependent on drugs or
alcohol and/or certain foods, particularly sugary ones.  --4yes -No 13.
By being drawn to people with problems that need fixing, or by being
enmeshed in situations that are chaotic, uncertain, and emotionally
painful, you avoid focusing on your responsibility to yourself.
__7d_Yes -No 14.  You may have a tendency toward episodes of
depression, which you try to forestall through the excitement provided
by an unstable relationship.  --"/-Yes--No ^ 15.  You are not attracted
to men who are kind, stable, reliable, and interested in you.  You find
such "nice" men boring.  _/-Yes-No Note: If you answered 12-15 "yes,"
you are strongly male addicted;

9-12, you have a definite problem; 6-9 there is instability in your
life; 5 or less, watch out, you could be in the early stage of a
self-defeating male dependency.

What Women Want MoSt7 A recent survey of 300 women of all ages revealed
that it's not sex, not money, not good looks that women want most-it's
1.ntimacy.  A

similar survey of men was done the previous year.  Here are the
comparisons:

* In their 20s, women want love and romance, but also want to be
respected for their brains and talent.  Men want a beautiful, sexy
woman.

* In their 30s, women want helpmates.

"They would rather have someone who will take the kids to the
orthodontist than have a candlelight dinner once a week."  Men want a
woman with outside interests and a good income.

* In their 40s, women want it all-men who are cooperative, caring,
attentive, and sexy.  Men focus again on beauty, sex-and younger
women.

* In their 50s and 60s, women and men want companionship.

"They do more things together."

Suggested Reading on Relationship Dependencies Norwood, Robin.  Women
Who Love Too Much.  New York: St.

Martin's Press, Inc."  1985.  Schaeffer, Brenda.  The Healthy
Relationship Series: Power Plays, Signs of Healthy Love.  Center City,
Minnesota: Hazelden Foundation, 1986.  Peele, Stanton and Brodsky,
Archie.  Love and Addiction.  New York: Taplinger Publishing Company,
Inc."  1975.  Halpern, Howard  How to Break Your Addiction to a Person.
New York: Bantam Books, Inc."  1982.  Colgrove, Melba, et al. How to
Survive the Loss of a Love.  New York, New York: Bantam Books, Inc." 
1976.  Cowan, Connell and Kinder, Melvyn.  Smart Women, Foolish
Choices.  New York: Signet Books, 1986.

Jambolsky, Gerald.  Love Is Letting Go of Fear.  New York: Bantam
Books, Inc."  1970.  joy, Donald.  Rebonding: Preventing and Restoring
Damaged Relationships.  Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1986.  Larsen, Earnie.
Stage II Recovery--Lifie Beyond Addiction.  New York:

Harper & Row, 1985.

SEXUAL ADDICTION

The Progression Toward Sex Addiction In his newspaper column "Six
Deadly Addictions," Joseph A. Pursch, M.D."  invited his readers to
examine themselves with these statements.  Do you see yourself anywhere
in this progression?

1. I like sex.  I keep thinking about it.

2. It's like a pleasant preoccupation.

3. I seem to want to do it more and more, even from men I don't
particularly like.

4. My husband (boyfriend, date) says it's getting to be a problem.

5. How come every date leads to this?

6. Sometimes I don't even enjoy it.  Often I wish I hadn'tdone it.

7. This is getting me into bad situations.

8. (Waking up in a strange place:) I can't believe this-I don't even
know these people; they look crummy.  I'd better get out of here before
they wake up.

9. If my (husband, friend, boss, pastor, parents) knew about this,
they'd put me in an institution.

10.  That's it!  I'm stopping!  This is not normal!  I feel driven.

The scenario is the same for gamblers (from the first bet to
bankruptcy), for overeaters, bulimics and anorexics (binging,

starving), for workaholics (deadlines, ulcers, miserable "family"
vacations).

The common dynamic is a compulsion which continues in spite of all
"common sense" resolutions and repeated negative consequences.

Sex Addicts Anonymous (SAA) This is a group of men and women who share
their strength, hope and experience with each other so they may
overcome their sex addiction and help others to recover.  They describe
themselves as follows:

"We were sexually compulsive people.  Despite our most heroic efforts
and solemn promises, we were unable to turn away from behaviors and
obsessions that were ruining our lives.  We interpreted our lack of
control as proof that we were bad or defective people, so we sought
comfort by justifying our behaviors (and sometimes reveling in them),
or by denying our sexuality, and hiding in our shame.  Our compulsions
were at once our worst enemies and our most familiar sources of
comfort.

"We came to SAA because we could no longer deny the pain that our
compulsive sexual behaviors had caused in our lives.  Many of us
experienced divorce, disease, jail, or financial ruin before seeing
that our lives had become unmanageable.  Others among us were
confronted about our behavior by family, friends, or counselors, and
were given a choice to seek help or face yet more loss in our lives.
When we learned of SAA, we began to hope again that our lives could be
freed from our sexual compulsivity.

"Our recovery began when we attended SAA meetings.  We heard stories
similar to ours, and we heard how others in SAA were abstaining from
their compulsive behaviors.  We learned of the twelve suggested steps
of recovery, and when we began to apply them in our lives, we
discovered that we, too, could abstain from

our compulsive behaviors, with the help of our fellow addicts.  We
acquired the faith and courage to make appropriate changes in our
lives, and to accept our daily problems as stepping stones for
spiritual growth.  As we continue in our recovery from sexual
addiction, one day at a time, we are developing healthier sexuality, a
stronger sense of personal integrity, and an ability to truly enjoy our
lives."

Most sex addicts using the Twelve-Step program choose to rebuild the
boundaries in their lives through some form of abstinence.  One woman's
progress report: "I see my abstinence as dynamic.  It changes as I do.
It is not a rigid list based on prohibiting certain behaviors, but a
positive affirmation of my program.  It is grounded in my attitude and
my relationship with my Higher Power, which includes the humility and
joy of knowing I am not alone anymore.  There's a real lightness I find
when I'm centered in my Higher Power.

"When I slip-as I do-I try to be gentle with myself, recognizing my
powerlessness over my addiction and sharing my pain with others.  Then
I start again with the love and support of my own self, my group, and,
above all, my Higher Power, who has given me the wonderful gift of my
recovery."

Ask Yourself-AQuiz If you answer "yes" to three or more of the
following 15 questions, you may want to seek help for an addiction to
sex.

1. Has your sexual behavior caused you either to seek help or made you
feel scared or different-somehow alienated from other people?

2. Do you keep secrets about your sexual or romantic activities from
those important to you?  Do you lead a double life?

3. Have your needs driven you to have sex in places with people you
would not normally choose?

4. Do you find yourself looking for sexually arousing articles or
scenes in newspapers, magazines or other media?

5. Do you find that romantic or sexual fantasies interfere with your
relationships with others or are controlling you?

6. Do you frequently want to get away from a sex partner after having
sex?  Do you frequently feel remorse, shame or guilt after a sexual
encounter?

7. Does each relationship continue to have the same destructive
patterns which prompted you to leave the last relationships?

8. Have you ever tried to leave a specific person or a destructive
relationship and found yourself returning?

9. Do you obsess about sex or romance even when it interferes with your
daily responsibilities or causes emotional discomfort?

10.  Does the time you spend reading pornographic magazines or watching
films interfere with the demands of your daily activities and
relationships with people?

11.  Is it taking more variety and frequency of sexual and romantic
activities than previously to bring the same levels of excitement and
relief?

12.  Are you in danger of being arrested because of your practices of
voyeurism, exhibitionism, prostitution, sex with minors, indecent phone
calls, etc.?

13.  Does your pursuit of sex or romantic relationships interfere with
your spiritual development?

14.  Do your sexual activities include the risk, threat, or reality of
disease, pregnancy, coersion, or violence?

15.  Has your sexual or romantic behavior ever made you feet hopeless
or suicidal?

From the booklet "From Shame to Grace"

Also write or call Sexaholics Anonymous P.O. Box 300 Simi Valley, CA
93062 (818).704-9854 Twin Cities Sex Addicts Anonymous P.O. Box 3038
Minneapolis, MN 55403 (612) 339-0217.

For those who are have been in relationship with a sex addict write:

Twin Cities CO-S.A. P.O. Box 14537 Minneapolis, MN 55414 Suggested
Reading on Sexual Addiction Hope and Recovery: A Twelve-Step Guide for
Healing from Compulsive Sexual Behavior.  Minneapolis, Minn.: Comp Care
Publications, 1987.  Carnes, Patrick, Ph.D. Out of the Shadows:
Understanding Sexual Addiction.  Minneapolis, Minn.: Comp Care
Publications, 1985.  Kast, Charlotte, Ph.D. Women and Sexual Addiction.
Minneapolis, Minn.: Castle Consulting, 1984.

SHOPAHOLICS

Check Your Spending Habits" 1. Is shopping your major form of
activity?

2. Do you buy new clothes that sit in the closet for weeks or even
months before you wear them?

3. Do you spend more than 20 percent of your take-home pay to cover
your loans and credit cards?

4. Do you ever pay one line of credit with another?

5. Do you pay only the minimum balance on your charge accounts each
month?

6. Do you ever hide your purchases in the car or lie about them so your
spouse doesn't know you were shopping?

7. Do you ever lie about how much something cost so your spouse or
friends think you were just after a great bargain?

8. Do you buy something just because it's on sale even though you have
no use for it?

9. When out with friends for dinner, do you offer to put the check on
your credit card so you can collect the cash?

10.  Do you feel nervous and guilty after a shopping spree?

11.  Is your paycheck often gone on Tuesday when the next payday isn't
until Friday?

12.  Do you borrow money from friends, even though you know you'll have
a hard time paying it back?

13.  Do you frequently have to charge small purchases, such as toiletry
items and groceries because you don't have enough in your pocket?

14.  Do you think others would be horrified if they knew how much money
you spent?

15.  Do you often feel hopeless and depressed after spending money?

If you answered "yes" to five or more of these questions, the experts
say you have a spending problem and should seek help.

Where to Find Help Several cities have chapters of Debtors Anonymous
(P.O. Box 20322, New York, NY 10025-9992), an organization for
compulsive spenders.  modeled after Alcoholics Anonymous.  If your area
has a chapter, it will be listed in your local telephone directory.

Shopaholics, Limited (212)484-0998 (active in the NYC area)

NICOTINE ADDICTION

The evidence is overwhelming .. . smoking is dangerous to one's health,
to the non-smokers around the smoker, and even to persons not yet born.
Yet the facts are that most smokers are motivated and would like to
quit .. . but have given up to some extent on their ability to succeed
and on the value of outside assistance.

Smokenders One avenue of help is Smokenders, the oldest, largest and
most successful program of its kind in the world.  It has been in
operation for over seventeen years, and is taught throughout the United
States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia and Japan.

Smokenders is not a quick fix, but a comprehensive six-week program
designed to deal with the addiction and to break the psychological
connectors.  The two-hour sessions are taught by former smokers who
have quit successfully with Smokenders, then were trained to become
instructors.  For further information call or write:

The Compulsive Woman

18551 Von Kaman Avenue Irvine, CA 92715

1-800-828-HELP

The American Cancer Society (4 W. 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 Tel.
(212) 736-3030).  Their Fresh Start program consists of 2-week
programs.

Smokers Anonymous meets in many places.  Check local paper for
information.

WORKAHOLISM

Have you ever wondered how much of a workaholic you are?  We have found
the following inventory to be useful in that determination.  Complete
it as quickly as you can!  Your first response is often your most
honest answer.

Workaholism Inventory 9 1. Once I start a job I have no peace until I
finish.  True False 2. Whereas most people are overly conscious of
their feelings, I like to deal with facts.  True ---False 3. I
sometimes become so preoccupied by a thought that I cannot get it out
of my mind.  True -False 4. I have periods in which I cannot sit or lie
down-I need to be doing something.  True -False 5. My mind is often
occupied by thoughts about what I have done wrong or not completed. 
True -False 6. I feel irritated when I see another person's messy desk
or cluttered room.  True -False

7. I am more comfortable in a neat, clean, and orderly room than in a
messy one.  True -False 8. I cannot get through a day or a week without
a schedule or a list of jobs to do.  True -False 9. I believe that the
man who works the hardest and longest deserves to get ahead.  True
-False 10. If my job housework demands more time, I will cut out
pleasurable activities to see that it gets done.  True -False 11.  I
frequently feel angry without knowing what or who is bothering me. 
True -False 12.  I think talking about feelings to others is a waste of
time.

-True -False 13.  I like always to be in control of myself and to know
as much as possible about things happening around me.  True -False 14. 
I feel that the more one can know about future events, the better off
he will be.  True -False 15.  I rarely give up until the job has been
completely finished.

-True -False 16.  I often expect things of myself that no one else
would ask of himself.

-True -False 17.  I sometimes worry about whether I was wrong or made a
mistake.

True -False 18.  I would like others to see me as not having any
faults.

-True -False Now go back and count the number of "True's" you checked.
A score of 5 or less reflects a fairly relaxed person.  A score of 6 to
10 is average.  A score of 10 or more reflects a definite tendency
toward workaholism'.

For further information write to:

Workaholics Anonymous Westchester Community College AAB 75 Grasslands
Road Valhalla, NY 10595 Suggested Reading on Workaholism Minirth, Frank
B."  M.D."  et al.  The Workaholic and His Family: An Inside Look.
Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 1981.  Hensley, Dennis E.
Positive Workaholism: Making the Most of Your Potential.  Chicago,
Ill.: Longman Financial Services, 1984.

CULTS

When the compulsive woman seeks help through involvement with a cult,
her behavior will often get more and more out of control.  See chapter
five in Book One.

Suggested Reading on Cults Russell, Harold L. Unholy Devotion-Why Cults
Lure Christians.

Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan Publishing House, 1983.  Enroth, Ronald,
et al.  A Guide to Cults and New Religions, Downers Grove, Ill.:
Inter-Varsity Press, 1983.  Martin, Walter.  The Kingdom of the Cults.
Minneapolis, Minn.:

Bethany House Publishers, 1985.  Smith, F. La Gard  Out on a Broken
Limh.  Eugene, Ore.: Harvest House Publishers, Inc."  1985.  Geisler,
Norman L. and Amano, J. Yutaka.  The Reincarnation Sensation.  Wheaton,
Ill.: Tyndale House Publishers, 1986.

Larson, Bob.  Larson's Book of Cults.  Wheaton, Ill.: Tyndale House
Publishers, 1982.  , Hunt, Dave.  The Cult Explosion.  Eugene, Ore.:
Harvest House Publishers, Inc."  1980.

For information on cults, write:

Spiritual Counterfeits Project P.O. Box 4308 Berkeley, CA 94705 (415)
540-0300

OTHER COMPULSIONS10

An Evaluation Use the following profiles as an evaluation tool.  How
many 11 position statements" can you identify with in each of the four
categories?  Check those statements that apply to you, then take a look
at the scoring.

CARETAKER

I generally feel responsible for the happiness of others.  I have often
"bent the rules" to bail people out of trouble that they brought on
themselves.  Sometimes I wonder why so many people lean on me without
being sensitive to my need to lean once in a while.  I find it easier
to take care of others than to take care of myself.  I never have
enough time to accomplish all my tasks.  I am more interested in
talking about other people's problems than in talking about my own.

PEOPLE PLEASER

I have trouble saying no even when I know I should.  I often say "It
doesn't matter," when it really does.

I seldom feel angry, but often feel hurt.  In the name of peace, I try
to avoid talking about problems.  I usually feel that other people's
needs and opinions are more important than my own.

I often apologize.  I would rather give in than make someone mad.

MARTYR

I am usually willing to do without so others can have what they want.

I feel I have terrible luck.  It feels natural to worry a lot about
other people.  My first impulse is to say no when something fun comes
up.  When life runs smoothly for a while, I begin to anticipate
disaster.  I believe life is a struggle and I accept suffering as my
lot.

TAP DANCER

- I find it difficult or impossible to tell anyone the whole truth.

- I would rather end a primary relationship than make a binding
commitment.

Figuring out "what I can get away with" is exciting to me.

I have an abiding fear of being "caught" or "cornered."  I always have
"Plan B" in mind in case I need to escape.  To avoid feeling lonely, I
have to run faster than I used to.  Remember, no one is perfect.
Everyone faces some of these obstacles.  Even though we may shake our
heads and say, "My God, I'm all of it," the issue is that we can deal
with anything we can name.  This is not an exercise to see how broken
we are, but to understand that if we can identify the obstacles and are
willing to work through them, we will increase our ability to "soar
like eagles.  Are You a Perfectionist?

Check the following statements that apply to you.

If I can't do a thing exactly right, I won't do it at all.  I often
start things I don't finish.  It's hard for me to relax even after my
work is done.

I am often amazed at the incompetence of others.  I can't stand it when
things are out of place.  I find unpredictability vexing, if not
intolerable.  I have a burning need to set things right.  I worry a lot
about why I haven't done better.  Any kind of personal failure is the
worst thing I can think of.  It seems to me that standards are slipping
everywhere.

If you checked more than three of the above, you tend to be a
perfectionist, which means you are subject to procrastination,
problem-filled relationships, low self-esteem.  Extremes of
perfectionist behavior can lead to anorexia, bulimia and psychosomatic
behavior.

Ways to overcome perfectionism include:

1. Begin by accepting your mistake-prone nature.  No one is perfect.

2. Make a list of the advantages and disadvantages of requiring
flawlessness in yourself.  You'll be surprised at how few advantages
there are to rigid thinking.

3. See the difference between perfectionism and the healthy pursuit of
excellence.

4. Adjust your thinking to reduced goals.  Dare to be average for a
time.

5. Be willing to experience anxiety about loose ends.  These feelings
will pass if you let some things slide.

6. For the extreme perfectionist, therapy is recommended.

TREATMENT CENTERS

Compulsivity Clinics of America In chapter one of this book I described
my experience at a Compulsivity Clinic.  This program is a part of
Compulsivity Clinics

of America (CCOA), which conduct seminars and conferences in cities
throughout the country.  CCOA, in turn, is a part of Health Activation
Services whose mental health centers offer education and therapy to
people suffering from trauma and/or compulsive behavior problems.

The main office is located at 430 First Avenue North, Suite 660,
Minneapolis, MN 55401.  Telephone: (612) 322-1182.  There is also an
office in Rapid City, South Dakota.

Alcohol and Drug Treatment Centers For information about the location
of alcohol and drug treatment centers write:

Alcoholism and Addiction Magazine 23860 Miles Road Cleveland, OH 44128
(216)475-9010 U.S. journal, Inc.

1721 Blount Road, Suite 1 Pompano Beach, FL 33069 1-800-851-9100 Other
Resources for Publications, Films, Tapes, etc.

COMP CARE PUBLICATIONS

2415 Annapolis Lane Minneapolis, MN 55441

HAZEL DEN EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS

Box 11 Center City, MN 55012

JOHNSON INSTITUTE

5 10 First Avenue North Minneapolis, MN 55403-1607 THOMAS W. PERRIN
INC.  P.O. Box 423 Rutherford, NJ 07070  Help for Families and
Friends

OPEN LETTER TO THE FAMILY"

"I am an alcoholic.  I need help.  Don't allow me to lie to you and
have you accept it as the truth, for in doing so you encourage more
lies.  The truth may be painful, but get at it.

"Don't let me outsmart you.  This only teaches me to avoid
responsibility and to lose respect for you at the same time.

"Don't let me exploit you or take advantage of you.  In doing so, you
become an accomplice to my evasion of responsibility.

"Don't lecture, moralize, scold, praise, blame, or argue when I'm drunk
or sober.  Don't pour out my liquor; you may feel better, but the
situation will be worse.

"Don't accept my promises.  This is my method of postponing pain.  If
an agreement is made, keep it.

"Don't allow your anxiety to tempt you to try to do for me what I must
do for myself.

"Don't lose your temper with me; it will destroy you and any
possibility of helping me.

"Don't cover up the consequences of my drinking; it reduces the crisis
but perpetuates my illness.

"Above all, don't run away from reality as I do.  Alcoholism, my
illness, gets worse as my drinking continues.  Start to learn now.
Understand.  Plan for my recovery.  I need help from professionals who
deal with my illness.  I cannot help myself.  To do nothing is the
worst choice you can make for me."

How It Gets the Addict to Treatment During my period of alcoholism I
had two experiences where loving people tried to make me face up to my
problem.  The 'se confrontations now have a specific name intervention.
The purpose: to get the sick person to face up to his her problem and,
preferably, go into a treatment center-or if this cannot be financed to
seek help through a local support group.

The first effort on my behalf succeeded in getting me to a treatment
center.  After coming home from this twenty-eight-day program, I was
dry two months before "falling off the wagon.  " I was one of the small
percentage of failures of this particular treatment center.

The second intervention also got me to a treatment center and probably
saved my life.

Careful planning is essential.  It can work with serious drug, alcohol,
gambling problems, plus other life or family-threatening addictions.
You can see how carefully the following intervention must have been
planned and rehearsed beforehand:

Intervention-A Case Study Late one Sunday morning Paul Taylor dragged
himself out of bed with a groan.  He was sick to his stomach, his head
hurt, and his hands were shaking.  He wished he hadn't had so much to
drink the night before, and he was looking forward to a strong cup of
coffee.

When Paul came downstairs, he was surprised to find his wife and
children sitting in the living room with the family doctor and the
vice-president of the insurance company where he was a salesman.  The
doctor explained to Paul that they wanted to talk with him about his
drinking problem, and he asked Paul to take a seat.

Help for Families and Friends it was Paul's wife who spoke first, her
voice shaking.

"Paul, on our family vacation this summer, you fell asleep while
drinking and smoking, and set our cabin on fire.  We paid two thousand
dollars in damages, and even though we've been going to that camp for
fourteen years, the management asked us not to return.  " Paul stared
at his wife incredulously, too surprised to respond.

"Three weeks ago," his wife continued, "you came home drunk in the
middle of the night, yelling and swearing.  You threw my mother's
antique china through the window, and the children and I hid in one of
their bedrooms.  We were so afraid of what you might do, we locked the
door."

Paul glared at his wife and shook his head in amazement.  He turned to
the vice-president, who was his immediate supervisor, and explained
that his wife was a nervous woman who frequently became hysterical for
no reason.

"I may have a little too much to drink now and again," Paul admitted
with obvious irritation, "but my wife is really sick.  Maybe she needs
to see a psychiatrist."

"Dad," Paul's oldest son interrupted hesitantly, "when I played
football in high school, I was always afraid of how you would act at my
games.  One time when you were drinking, you ran out' on the field and
tried to slug the referee.  Last month I brought my fiancee home to
meet the family and, you were sitting in the rocking chair, drinking.
When we were alone you said that you could take her any time you
wanted, and that she would like an older man.  " Paul was furious.

"You're a liar," he shouted at his son.

"If I have a few too many drinks once in a while, it's none of your
business."

Next to speak was Paul's employer.

"You're one of our best salesmen," the vice-president said warmly.

"And we go back a lot of years.  But lately you've cost us three major
clients because of your heavy drinking.  We want to keep you in the
firm, but as long as you are drinking, we can't afford to have you with
us."

After the vice-president listed examples of Paul's inappropriate
behavior, Paul grew quiet and grim-faced.  He slumped down into his

chair and listened impassively while his twelve-year-old son explained
how worried he was that his father could no longer follow the story
line of television shows.

"You can't even tell Charlie's Angels apart.  You always ask me to
explain what's happening, but when I do, you get angry and say I can't
talk right.  You say I'm stupid."

Paul's seventeen-year-old daughter was the next to speak.  She told her
father how much she loved him, and how much it hurt that he did not
keep his promises.

"On my sixteenth birthday, you were going to take me out for dinner,
but you came home from work drunk and passed out on the floor.  I spend
a lot of time at my girlfriend's house, but I never bring her here
anymore.  I'm afraid she might see you drunk, and I don't know what you
will say to her.  " The family doctor spoke last.  He explained to Paul
the physical consequences of his heavy drinking, starting with the
damage to his brain and descending to his throat, heart, stomach, and
liver.

"Your high blood pressure makes you a likely candidate for a stroke,"
he concluded.

"And you are fast becoming impotent because of the shrinking of your
testicles.  If you continue to drink alcohol, your chances of living
another five years are not very good."

When the doctor finished speaking, Paul threw up his hands and looked
helplessly at his boss.  He admitted that he had been drinking a bit
too much and that he was worried about his health.

"I promise I've had my last drink, and you won't see me drunk again.  "
The doctor reminded Paul of all the previous times that he had promised
to quit drinking and had failed.  He explained that alcoholism is a
disease that does not respond to will power or good intentions.  It was
highly improbable that Paul would ever stop drinking on his own.  But
there was a local treatment center which could give him the help he
needed.  A room was waiting for him, and he could leave in the morning
for a twenty-eight-day stay.

Paul admitted that maybe he did need help, but he was offended

by the suggestion that he leave immediately.  He appealed to his boss
to explain that it would take at least a month to find a substitute for
his job.  The vice-president told Paul that his job was covered, and he
was not expected back at work until he completed treatment.  This news
startled Paul, who protested that he was being railroaded.  He wouldn't
be pushed around by anyone.  He would think it over, and if it seemed
like a good idea, he would go when he got ready.

There was an uncomfortable moment of silence, and then Paul's youngest
child, a thin, shy five-year-old girl, walked over to her father and
put her hand in his.

"Daddy," she pleaded, "it's now or never."  Paul looked at his daughter
and without warning burst into tears.  By the next morning he was on
his way to a Itreatment center.

Note that the core of this intervention was truth.  No persuasions,
except by the five-year-old at the very end.  Medical facts.  Facts
regarding family events.  On such-and-such a date, this happened.
Paul's work performance spelled out by his employer.  All carefully
planned ahead of time.

Suggested Reading Pinkham Mary Ellen and Staff of Families in Crisis,
Inc.  How to Stop the One You Lovefrom Drinking, New York: Putnam
Publishing Group, 1986.  Ford Betty, with Chris Chase.  Betty.- A Glad
Awakening New York:

Doubleday Company, Inc.  1987.  Spickard, Anderson, M.D. and Barbara
Thompson, Dying for a Drink.  Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1985.

CO-DEPENDENCE

Co-dependents, often without being aware of it, are in bondage to a
drinking or drug-using family member.  Or to a close friend who

is an addict.  You can measure the degree of your co-dependency by the
number of the following statements that apply to you.

Test Yourself My good feelings about who I am stem from being liked by
you.  My good feelings about who I am stem from receiving approval from
you.  Your struggles affect my serenity.  My mental attention focuses
on solving or relieving your pain.  My mental attention is focused on
pleasing you.  My mental attention is focused on protecting you.  My
mental attention is focused on manipulating you to "do it my way.  My
self-esteem is bolstered by solving your problems.  My self-esteem is
bolstered by relieving your pain.  My own hobbies and interests are put
aside.  My time is spent sharing your interests and hobbies.  Your
clothing and personal appearance is dictated by my desires because I
feel you are a reflection of me.  Your behavior is dictated by my
desires because I feel you are a reflection of me.  I am not aware of
how I feel.  I am aware of how you feel.  I am not aware of what I
want.  I ask you what you want.  If I am not aware of something, I
assume.

The dreams I have for my future are linked to you.  My fear of
rejection determines what I say or do.  My.  fear of your anger
determines what I say or do.  I use giving as a way of feeling safe in
our relationship.

"My social circle diminishes as I involve myself with you.  I put my
values aside in order to connect with you.  I value your opinion and
way of doing things more than my own.

The quality of my life is in relation to the quality of yours.

Letting Go-Freeing Oneself from Co-Dependency To "let go" does not mean
to stop caring, but that I can't do it for someone else.

To "let go" is not to cut myself off, but to realize that I can't
control another.

To "let go" is not to enable, but to allow learning from natural
consequences.

To "let go" is to admit powerlessness, which means the outcome is not
in my hands.

To "let go" is not to try to change or blame another, but to make the
most of myself.

To "let go" is not to care for, but to care about.  To "let go" is not
to fix, but to be supportive.  To "let go" is not to judge, but to
allow another to be a human being.

To "let go" is not to be in the middle arranging all the outcomes, but
to allow others to affect their destinies.

To "let go" is not to be protective, but to permit another to face
reality.

To "let go" is not to deny, but to accept.  To "let go" is not to nag,
scold or argue, but instead to search out.  my own shortcomings and
correct them.

To "let go" is not to adjust everything to my desires, but to take each
day as it comes, and cherish myself in it.

To "let go" is not to criticize and regulate anybody, but to try to
become what I dream I can be.

To "let go" is not to regret the past, but to grow and live for the
future.

To "let go" is to fear less, and love more.

Co-Dependence-A Case History Then there was Scott, thirtyish, who
handled legal matters for our family.  He admitted to me that he had
become a co-dependent to his alcoholic father.  When Mark, his younger
brother, was being married, Scott agreed to try and get their father to
the wedding

sober.  He made the enabler's classic statement: "I'll take care of
it," thus assuming the role of protector.  In Scott's own words, here's
what happened:

When I walked into the room, I knew Dad was really "out of it!"  I was
so angry.  My brother and I had made such a point of asking him to lay
off the stuff for just this one day.

"Dad, can you make it through the wedding?"  I asked, "Of course, I've
only had a couple of drinks.  I'm just fine."

How many times have I heard that before I should have left him in the
motel room, but I got him into the car and started parenting him.  I
told him not to ruin his son's big day.

He got furious at me and said if I couldn't trust him, I should turn
the car around and take him back to the motel.  That put me completely
on the defensive, so I caved in and said, "Okay, Dad, let's go to the
wedding and have a good time."

He stumbled slightly working his way into the church pew, but nobody
noticed but me.  Then at the reception he got absolutely ploughed, fell
down flat on his face twice.  The third time he careened into the gift
table and knocked a tray of crystal goblets to the floor.  As if this
weren't bad enough, when I looked down at his pants, his fly was open
and the tall of his shirt was sticking out of his zipper.

At this point, the bride was in tears.  My brother was furious with me,
like it all was my fault, and I wanted to strangle Dad, I was so angry.
When I got him back to the motel, I unlocked his room, practically
carried him out of the car and shoved him through the door.  He fell
down on the bed face first.  Then I felt terrible.  He was so helpless.
Like a bad little boy.  As I looked at him on the bed, I didn't know if
I loved him or hated him.  Finally I undressed him, as I've done
hundreds of times before, and made sure he was securely tucked in bed.
He was snoring and hiccupping when I left.

While driving back to the reception, I was grinding my teeth like I
used to do at night as a boy when I lay in my bed listening

to my father in a drunken rage screaming at my mother.  Before my
mother died of cancer several years before, she told me one day how
much she hated my father.

I said, "But Mom, you've got to forgive him," trying to be the
peacemaker.

She looked me straight in the eye and said "I'll never forgive him for
what he's done to me and to all of you.  Never!  Never!  Never!"

Today Scott is getting help at Al-Anon and Adult Children of Alcoholics
meetings where spouses, families and friends of alcoholics, gather
weekly to learn how to apply the Twelve-Step program to their
situations.

Suggested Reading on Co-Dependence Wegschelder-Cruse, Sharon.
Choicemaking.For Co-Dependents, Adult Children and Spirituality
Seekers.  Pompano Beach, Fla: Health Communications, Inc."  1985.
Schaef, Anne Wilson.  Co-Dependency: Misunderstood-Mistreated.  San
Francisco, Calif.: Winston Press, 1986.  Owens, Carolyn P. and Beattie,
Melody.  Codependent No More.

Center City, Minn."  Hazelden Foundation, 1987.  Woititz, Janet.
Struggle for Intinucy.  Pompano Beach, Florida:

Health Communications, Inc."  1985.  Halpern, Howard, Ph.D. How to
Break Your Addiction to a Person, New York: Bantam Books, Inc." 1982.

AL-ANON

Al-Anon is a fellowship for the families and friends of alcoholics who
need help in understanding and dealing with the alcoholic person.
Al-Anon meetings are held weekly in most communities throughout the
country.  Participants give and receive comfort and

encouragement through an honest and open exchange of experiences,
strength, and hope.  Such groups are bonded together by a policy of
anonymity.

An Overview In Al-Anon sessions people learn:

* not to suffer because of the actions or reactions of other people;

* not to allow themselves to be used or abused in the interest of
another's recovery;

* not to do for others what they should do for themselves;

* not to manipulate situations so others will eat, go to bed, get up,
pay bills, etc.;

* not to cover up for another's mistakes or misdeeds;.

* not to create a crisis;

* not to prevent a crisis if it is in the natural course of events.

This kind of detachment is neither kind nor unkind.  It does not imply
evaluation of the person or situation from which one is detaching.  It
is simply a means for individuals to recover from the adverse affects
on their lives of living with someone afflicted with the disease of
alcoholism.  Detachment helps families look at their situations
realistically and objectively, thereby making intelligent decisions
possible.  For further information, write to: Al-Anon Family Group
Headquarters, Inc."  P.O. Box 182, Madison Square Station, New York
City 10159.

Suggested Reading for Families and Friends of Alcoholics Wegscheider,
Sharon.  Another Chance: Hope and Health for the Alcoholic Family. Palo
Alto, Calif.: Science and Behavior Books, Inc."  1980.  Costales,
Claire and Barack, Priscilla.  A Secret Hell-Surviving Life with an
Alcoholic, Ventura, Calif.: Regal Books, 1984.  Drews, Toby R. Getting
Them Soher: A Guidefor Those Who Live with an Alcoholic, Volume 1 and
Volume 2. Los Angeles, Calif.: Bridget Publications, Inc.  1980 (Vol.
1) and 1983 (Vol.

2).  Al-Anon Staff.  Al-Anon Faces Alcoholism.  2nd ed.  New York:

Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters, Inc.  Staff of Family in Crisis,
Inc.  and Pinkham, Mary Ellen.  How to Stop the One You Love from
Drinking, New York: Putnam Publishing Group, 1986.  Larsen, Ernie.
Stage II Recovery: Life Beyond Addiction.  San Francisco:

Harper and Row, 1985.  Spickard, Anderson A."  M.D. and Thompson,
Barbara R. Dying for a Drink.  Waco, Texas: Word, Inc."  1985.

For an intervention specialist, write: Families In Crisis, Inc., 7320
Ohms Lane, Edina, MN 55435 (612) 893-1883)

FAMILIES ANONYMOUS

Families Anonymous is a fellowship of relatives and friends of people
who are involved in the abuse of mind-altering substances or exhibiting
related behavioral problems such as running away, delinquency,
underachieving, etc.  Any concerned person is encouraged to attend
meetings-even if there is only a suspicion of a problem.  It is a
self-help organization whose program is based upon

an adaptation of the Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions first
formulated by Alcoholics Anonymous.

Group discussions are built upon a specific theme: such as
expectations, anxiety, overprotection, or better communications.  As
members share their own experiences-successes and failures those going
through a particular crisis find understanding and emotional support.
Attention is focused upon the feelings, attitudes, actions, and
reactions of family members; not upon trying to change the person
involved in the unacceptable behavior.  Experience has shown that help
for the family means important help for the chemically dependent
individual.

Those wishing to obtain information about the Families Anonymous group
in their area or to start a new group may contact Families Anonymous,
Inc."  P.O. Box 528, Van Nuys, CA 91408.  To help defray costs
(including postage) FA charges $2.00 for a packet of informational
material.

ADULT CHILDREN OF ALCOHOLICS (ACOA)

Test for Family Members of Alcoholics 1. Do you lose sleep because of a
problem drinker?

2. Do most of your thoughts revolve around the problem drinker or
problems that arise because of him or her?

3. Do you exact promises about the drinking that are not kept?

4. Do you make threats to a drinker in the family and not follow
through on them?

5. Has your attitude fluctuated toward this problem drinker
(alternating between love and hate)?

6. Do you mark, hide, dilute, and/or empty bottles of liquor or
medication?

7. Do you think that everything would be okay if only the problem
drinker would stop or control the drinking?

8. Do you feel alone, fearful, anxious, angry, or frustrated most of
the time?  Are you beginning to feel dislike for yourself and to wonder
about your sanity?

9. Do you feel responsible and guilty about the drinking problem?

10.  Do you find your moods fluctuating widely-as a direct result of
the problem drinker's moods and actions?

11.  Do you try to conceal, deny, or protect the problem drinker?

12.  Have you withdrawn from outside activities and friends because of
embarrassment and shame over the drinking problem?

13.  Have you taken over many chores and duties that you would normally
expect the problem drinker to assume?

14.  Do you feel forced to try to exert tight control over the family
expenses with less and less success?  And are financial problems
increasing?

15.  Do you feel the need to Justify your actions and attitudes and, at
the same time, feel somewhat smug and self-righteous when you compare
yourself to the drinker?

16.  If there are children in the house, do they often take sides with
either the problem drinker or the spouse?

17.  Are the children showing signs of emotional stress, such as
withdrawal, having trouble with authority figures, or rebelling?

18.  Have you noticed physical symptoms in yourself, such as nausea, a
knot in the stomach, ulcers, shakiness, sweating palms, or bitten
fingernails?

19.  Do you feel utterly defeated that nothing you can say or do will
move the problem drinker?

20.  Where this applies, is your sexual relationship with a problem
drinker affected by feelings of revulsion?  Do you "use" sex to
manipulate, or refuse sex to punish him or her?

A yes to any five of these questions probably indicates that alcoholism
exists in the family and is producing negative changes in the person
answering them.

The Bill of Rights for Adult Children of Alcoholics I have the right ..
.

1. To make other choices besides the choice merely to run away.

2. To say no when I feel unready or unsafe.

3. Not to be molested by fear.

4. To feel all feelings.

5. To believe I'm probably not guilty.

6. To make mistakes.

7. Not to smile when I cry or feel hurt.

8. To terminate conversations with those who put me down or humiliate
me.

9. To be healthier than those around me.

10.  To change and grow.

11.  To be relaxed, playful, and frivolous.

12.  To set limits and to be selfish.

13.  To get angry, even at someone I love, without fearing that I, the
other person, or the relationship will dissolve.

14.  To do stupid things without believing I am a stupid person.

15.  Not to be ashamed for what I don't know or can't do.

Adult Children of Alcoholics can obtain help by attending Al-Anon and
ACOA (Adult Children of Alcoholics) meetings if they need to understand
more about their relationship to alcoholics.

A telephone directory or local newspaper can provide local numbers to
call for further information.

Suggested Reading for Adult Children of Alcoholics Woititz, Janet.
Adult Children of Alcoholics.  Pompano Beach, Fla:

Health Communications, Inc."  1983.  Black, Claudia.  It Will Never
Happen to Me: Children of Alcoholics As Youngsters.  Denver, Colora@o:
MA.  C. Printing and Publications Division, 1982.  Gravitz, Herbert L.
and Bowden, Julie D. Guide to Recovery: A Book for Adult Children of
Alcoholics.  Homes Beach, Fla: Learning Publications, Inc."  1985.
Dean, Amy E. Once Upon A Time: Stories from Adult Children of
Alcoholics and Other Dysfunctional Families.  Center City, Minnesota:
Hazelden Foundation, 1986.  Deutsch, Charles.  Broken Bottles, Broken
Dreams: Understanding and Helping the Children of Alcoholics.  New
York: Teacher's College Press, 1982.  Seixas, Judith S. and Youcha,
Geraldine.  Children of Alcoholism: A Survivor's Manual.  New York:
Harper and Row Publishers, Inc.: 1986.  Kritsberg, Wayne.  The Adult
Children of Alcoholics Syndrome from Discovery to Recovery, Pompano
Beach, Fla.: Health Communications, Inc.  1983.

ALA TEEN

Alateen is a fellowship of young Al-Anon members, usually teenagers,
whose lives have been affected by someone else's drinking.  These young
people come together to share experiences, strength and hope with each
other and thus learn effoctive ways to cope with their problems.

The Twelve Traditions of Alateen 1. Our common welfare should come
first; personal progress for the greatest number depends upon unity.

2. For our group purposes there is but one authority-a loving God as He
may express Himself in our group conscience.  Our leaders are but
trusted servants; they do not govern.

3. The only requirement for membership is that there be a problem of
alcoholism in a relative or friend.  The teenage relatives of
alcoholics, when gathered together for mutual aid, may call themselves
an Alateen Group provided that, as a group, they have no other
affiliation.

4. Each group should be autonomous, except in matters affecting other
Alateen and Al-Anon Family Groups or AA as a whole.

5. Each Alateen Group has but one purpose: to help other teenagers of
alcoholics.  We do this by practicing the Twelve Steps of AA ourselves
and by encouraging and understanding the members of our immediate
families.

6. Alateens, being part of Al-Anon Family Groups, ought never to
endorse, finance or lend our name to any outside enterprise, lest
problems of money, property and prestige divert us from our primary
spiritual aim.  Although a separate entity, we should always cooperate
with Alcoholics Anonymous.

7. Every group ought to be fully self-supporting, declining outside
contributions.

8. Alateen 12th-Step work should remain forever nonprofessional, but
our service centers may employ special workers.

9. Our groups, as such, ought never to be organized; but we may create
service boards or committees directly responsible to those they
serve.

10.  The Alateen Groups have no opinion on outside issues; hence our
name ought never to be drawn into public controversy.

11.  Our public relations policy is based on attraction rather than
promotion; we need always maintain personal anonymity at the level

of press, radio, TV and films.  We need guard with special care the
anonymity of all AA members.

12.  Anonymity is the spiritual foundation of all our Traditions, ever
reminding us to place principles above personalities.

From Al-Anon Family Groups, Inc.  0 1969 For further information write
to:

Al-Anon Family Group Headquarters P.O. Box 182 Madison Square Station
New York, New York 10159-0182.

Suggested Reading for Children of Alcoholics Hornik-Beer, Edith Lynn. A
Teenager's Guide to Living with an Alcoholic Parent, Center City,
Minn.: Hazelden Foundation, 1984.  DiGiovanni, Kathe.  My House Is
Different (For Children of Alcoholics Age 6 and Up).  Center City,
Minn.: Hazelden Foundation, 1986.  Ackerman, Robert J. Growing in the
Shadou-Children of Alcoholics.

Pompano Beach, Fla.: Health Communications, Inc., 1986.  My Dad Loves
Me, My Dad Has A Disease.  Denver, Co.: M. A. C. Printing and
Publications Division, 1982.

SEVEN DO'S AND DON'TT'S FOR PARENTS OF CHILDREN ON DRUGS 12

1. Be passive.  Don't enter into one-on-one confrontations and
conflicts with the youngster.  You are dealing with a competitor that
can't be beat.

2. Don't feel compelled to act as a parent should.  Parent/child rules
don't apply during this time.  You are dealing with a sick person who
is in a frenzied emotional state.  Normal parental rules and patterns
can't work.

3. Don't use or listen to negative messages.  Detach yourself.  Don't
participate in name-calling.  It's destructive and weakens everyone's
self-image.  Resist the normal impulse to defend yourself against
accusations the teen makes about you.

4. Don't be angry when your child doesn't show love and concern. During
this time, your child is incapable of displaying genuine emotions.  Be
responsible first for your own behavior.  Don't return useless anger,
judgmental resentment and name-calling.  Show concern and sympathy but
don't try to cover up or aid the drug-user's addiction.  The individual
is sick.  Don't become sick along with him.

5. Don't give the teenager anything destructive.  Don't give financial
or emotional support if it will be used in a negative way.  Be tough in
your loving.

6. Take care of yourself.  Set goals and achieve them.  Don't let your
teenager be an excuse for your own poor achievement and laziness.
Maintain your own health and mental and spiritual well-being.

7. Go outside the family for help.  City, township and county groups,
your local hospital or substance-abuse treatment center, schools and
clergy can provide information and support.

For further information:

The National Institute on Drug Abuse P.O. Box 2305, Rockville, MD 20852
Drug information: 1-301-468-6500 Alcohol information: 1-301-468-2600

National Federation of Parents for Drug-Free Youth Suite 200-8730
Georgia Avenue Silver Spring, MD 20910

1-800-554-KIDS (5437)

Suggested Reading for Parents Dobson, Dr.  James C. Love Must Be Tough.
Waco, Tex.: Word, Inc."  1983.  Halpern, Howard M."  Ph.D. Cutting
Loose: An Adult Guide to Coming to Terms with Your Parents.  New York:
Bantam Books, Inc."  1978.  Nilsen, Mary Y. When A Bough Breaks:
Mending the Family Tree.

Center City: Minn.: Hazelden Foundation, 1985.  Hodgson, Harriet.  A
Parent's Survival Guide: How to Cope When Your Kid Is Using Drugs.  New
York: Harper & Row Publishers, Inc."  1986.  Kaufman, Gershen.  Shame,
The Power of Caring.  Cambridge, Mass.: Schenkman Publishing Satir,
Virginia.  Peoplemaking.  Palo Alto, Calif.: Science and Behavior
Books, Inc."  1972.

PARENTS ANONYMOUS

Parents Anonymous is a program for parents who already have, or are
afraid they might, physically abuse their children.  Not a Twelve Step
program.  For further information send $2.00 donation to.

Child Help USA P.O. Box 630 Hollywood, CA 90028

Suggested Reading on Child Abuse Miller, Kathy C. Out of Control: A
Christian Parent's Victorious Struggle with Child Abuse.  Waco, Tex.:
Word, Inc.  Bass, Ellen and Thornton, Louise.  I Never Told
Anyone-Writing by Women Survivors of Child Abuse.  New York: Harper &
Row Publishers, Inc."  1982.  Jannsen, Martha.  Silent Scream.
Philadelphia, Penn.: Fortress Press, 1983.  McNaron, Toni and Morgan,
Yarrow.  Voices in the Night: Women Speaking about Incest.  Pittsburgh,
Penn.: Cleis Press, 1982.

SUICIDE PREVENTION

Before you finish reading this page, someone in the United States will
try to kill himself.  At least 60 Americans will have taken their own
lives by this time tomorrow.  More than 25,000 persons in the United
States killed themselves last year, and nine times that many attempted
suicide.  Many of those who attempted will try again, a number with
lethal success.  And here's the irony: Except for a very few, all of
the people who commit suicide want desperately to live.

No single group, nor color, nor class of people is free from
self-inflicted death.  Rich or poor, mate or female, Christian or Jew,
black or white, young or old-to some extent every category of man
suffers death by suicide.

The most typical American suicide is a white Protestant male in his
forties, married with two children.  He is a breadwinner and a
taxpayer.  The sorrow his untimely, preventable death brings to his
family cannot be totaled, but the financial burden on his family and
community is considerable.  Costs begin with the city or county
ambulance fee.  The cost of the coroner's time and facilities soon
follows.  Widows' and survivors' benefits and insurance must be

added.  Recent studies indicate that the surviving children of suicide
victims frequently require mental health care.

Over the years a suicide can cost his community at least $50,000.
Counting all the taxes that he would have paid over the next quarter
century, in the end, a suicide may cost the community a great deal
more.

From "Suicide-It Doesn't Have to Happen," by Edwin S. Schneidman, Ph.D.
and Philip Mandelkorn.  Prepared by the American Association of
Suicidology in cooperation with MSD Health Information Services.

As a parent, relative or friend of a troubled loved-one, here are some
of the warning signals that indicate he she might be thinking about
committing suicide:

Warning Signals * Extreme depression, which could include sadness,
anxiety, and other behavioral changes.

* An unexplained drop in quality of work.

* Clear changes in sleeping or eating habits.

* The abuse of drugs or alcohol.

* Sudden withdrawal from spouse, family, close friends.

* Taking unnecessary risks.

* Major decline of energy and interests.

* Verbal expression of suicidal thoughts, or threats.

* Beginning to give away prized possessions.

* Extreme neglect of appearance.

* Preparations for death such as putting affairs in order, making a
will.

Ways to Help the Person Who Might Be Considering Suicide * Understand
the basic facts, that most suicide attempts come from intense feelings
of loneliness, worthlessness, helplessness, depression, or from drugs
and alcohol abuse, or from disease.

Take his her feelings and statements seriously.

Listen and ask concerned questions.

Don't ever challenge the person to "go ahead."  He/she often would call
your bluff.

Stay with the depressed person.  Do something together.

Don't analyze motives.

Don't argue or try to reason.

Encourage suicidal person to get professional help.  Give him her a
crisis line number to call.  Most communities have local crisis line
numbers and information listings.

The Spiritual Dimension

ALCOHOLICS FOR CHRIST

Alcoholics for Christ (AC) is a non-denominational, non-profit
Christian fellowship, founded in 198 I, for alcoholics and their
families.  It is dedicated to the propagation of the Gospel of Jesus
Christ, as well as the sharing of His,burden for lost and hurting
individuals.  This fellowship uses the Word of God as its primary
source of direction.  Its statement:

We agree that drunkenness is a sin and we believe that alcoholism is a
disease with spiritual origins.  We rejoice that Jesus forgives us of
our sin and heals us of our diseases.  Both Scripture and science
indicate that there can be an inherited trait in the alcoholic.

This "trait" may be triggered in some by persistent rebellious abuse of
alcohol (drunkenness) while in others, relatively casual use is all
that is needed to set it in motion and, whether we describe it as a
predisposition to alcoholism or the results of a curse ("visiting the
iniquities of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth
generation .. . Ex.  20:5), the cure is to be found in total abstinence
through Jesus Christ.

We are learning that the Lord delivers some persons immediately from
the compulsion and desire to drink, for others He does it gradually. In
either case, the requirements for maintaining deliverance are total
abstinence and an ever increasing relationship with the Lord.  We
believe that God wants us "chemically free" and that it Is not His
purpose to make "social drinkers" out of drunks.  God heals us by
removing the compulsion and desire and restoring us to Himself.

The alcoholic and family members who attend local AA or Al-Anon groups
are encouraged to remain active in them and, where possible, to
continue to worship within their own body of believers.  However, we do
recommend where no strong denominational ties exist, regular attendance
in a Bible-believing church of their choice.

While the references deal primarily with alcoholism and the alcoholic,
the spiritual principles set forth in AC are applicable to all persons
and their families who are, or have been, chemically dependent,
regardless of the nature of the addiction.

For further information write: Alcoholics For Christ, Inc."  1316 North
Campbell Road, Royal Oak, MI 48067.

PRAYER OF A RECOVERING ADDICT

Thank you for setting me free, Free to yellow my nose in buttercups,
catch a firefly to see his light, pick the first wild strawberry, count
the stars, talk to ladybugs, chase a thistle.

Thank you for setting me free, Free to see you in sunlight dancing on
the water, dogwood smiling at the sky, willows curtseying to the river,
azaleas flaming across the land, rainbowed cobwebs, drij'ting leaves.

Thank you for setting me free.

Free to play with, wonder at and love all that you have given me.
Andfree, as well, to giVe it baCk.  13 Sue Garmon Souvenirs of
Solitude

CHRISTIAN TREATMENT CENTERS

As the compulsion addiction problem reaches crisis proportions in
America, more and more Christian churches and groups are setting up
treatment centers throughout the country.  Specific information can be
obtained through local churches.  Here are names and addresses of a few
treatment centers.

Rapha-a Christ-centered in-hospital counseling care unit, treating
psychiatric and substance abuse problems for the Christian community.

Box 580355 Houston, TX 77258 Nationwide number 1-800-227-2657 In Texas
1-800-445-2657 Teen Challenge-national ministry devoted to "soul saving
and life saving."  For information about drug and alcohol treatment
write to:

Teen Challenge, Inc.  Box 1687 GPO Brooklyn, NY 11202

Dunklin Memorial Camp (see report on p. 194) Route I Box 1600
Okeechobee, FL 33472 (305)597-2841 Hebron Colony and Grace House-a
Christian treatment center for both men and women.  Eight-week course.
Basic approach is that alcoholism is not a disease, but a sin against
oneself, one's family, one's neighbor, one's God.  Scriptural
program.

Route 3 P.O. Box 4600 Boone, NC 28607 (704)963-4842 Faith
Farms-three-fold recovery program to achieve spiritual maturity, mental
awareness, physical discipline.

9538 Highway 441 Boynton Beach, FL 33436 Ephesians 5:18 Life
Ministries, Inc.  (Be not drunk with wine which leads to wild living
but rather be filled with the Spirit.) For information about programs
and treatment, write:

12701 Twinbrook Parkway Rockville, MD 20852 (300984-0655 Others:

The Anchorage, Inc.  P.O. Box 112 Albany, GA 31702 (912)435-5692 Hope
Harbor 616 Forest Street P.O. Box 5427 Greensboro, NC 27403

WITH GRATITUDE

The writing of The Compulsive Woman has been a long-and sometimes
painful-journey.  Without the loving care and concern of countless
people, it could never have been birthed.  As for any journey, there
was a plan to follow, then detours, missed turns, stops for advice,
pauses to recheck the road signs and a learning process all the way.

This book would never have happened without the undergirding love,
support and direction of my husband and editor, Leonard LeSourd.  His
unflagging belief in my ability to put my thoughts on paper stretched
me beyond any limits of creativity I thought I had.  He believed in the
face of my unbelief.  He took my outpourings always excessive,
sometimes compulsive-and wove together a combination of personal
stories, case histories, and a vast collection of facts and figures.

My deepest thanks go to Elizabeth (Tib) Sherrill for her penetrating
analysis and sensitive editing of the manuscript.  To Jane Campbell for
her creativity in compiling research and for her steady enthusiasm for
the project.  And to Richard Meryman for his incisive suggestions for
manuscript development, plus words of encouragement.  (Note: through
1981-1982 Dick had interviewed me for countless hours in developing his
book Broken Promises, Mended Dreams about a recovering woman
alcoholic.) There were many along the way who encouraged me to record
my story.  I wasn't sure I wanted to.  It was so private, so personal,
so painful to tell.  And all the parties in the stories were still
alive.  Standing in a dinner line at a weekend retreat in the mountains
of Montana one July evening, I told my story to Dr.  William E. Berg of
Minneapolis, who was the retreat leader.  His response was simple and
direct: "Sandy, write a book and tell your story.  It will be used to
Ignite people's hope, to give them faith to struggle on,

to assure them that no situation is too hopeless for the healing power
of God."

My experience at The Compulsivity Clinic in 1985 helped me discover new
aspects of myself.  I am indebted to Terry Kellogg's teaching and to
Mic Hunter, who so graciously read the manuscript and gave me helpful
advice and additional material.

I'd like especially to thank Brennan Manning, whose tapes and books
ministered hope to me in my early recovery and the reality of God's
unconditional love and forgiveness when I didn't feel lovable or
forgiven.  We met at a week of renewal in Billings in 1982, at which
time he too encouraged me to tell my story.

These people were also invaluably helpful in reading and making
suggestions and corrections on early drafts: Phillip Bandt, Marjorie
Switzer, June Qualy, and Phil McCarty.

Extra special thanks to the indefatigable Regina Trollinger, a word
processor wizard who typed and retyped endless manuscript changes and
additions; to Jeanne Sevigny whose wisdom, encouragement, and typing
skills were invaluable; and to Pat Ryan, our bookkeeper, who is
teaching me new disciplines in many areas of my life.

And to all those family members, friends, doctors, counselors, pastors
and fellow travelers, too many to list, whose love, dedication,
prayers, time and sacrifice have been crucial factors in my journey to
recovery .. . to them my everlasting gratitude.

Sandra Simpson LeSourd Evergreen Farm Lincoln, Virginia 22078 April 19,
1987

FOOTNOTES

Book One Martha Janssen, Silent Scream (Philadelphia, Penn,: Fortress
Press, 1983), pp.  13, 83.  Used by permission.

2 From a lecture by Terry Kellogg at the Compulsivity Clinic.

3 Isaiah 53:5.

4 From a pamphlet by Children of Alcoholism Foundation, Inc."  200 Park
Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10 166.

5 Ibid.

6 Janet G. Woititz, Adult Children of Alcoholics (Pompano Beach,
Fla.:

Health Communications, Inc."  1983).

7 John M. Leighty, "Smoking: How to Wrap It Up," Washington Post
(November 19, 1986).

Margaret Hamburg, M.D."

"The Nature of Craving," Vogue (August 1986).

9 Anderson A. Spickard, M.D."  and Barbara R. Thompson, Dying for a
Drink (Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1985).  '0 Some materials in this
chapter adapted from Broken Promises, Mended Dreams by Richard Meryman
(Little, Brown & Co.). The anonymous woman in this book was a composite
of several women, including Sandra Simpson LeSouid.  From materials
distributed by Rogers Memorial Hospital, Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.

12 Romans 7:15.

13 2 Corinthians 10:5.

14 Affirmations by Ann Larson from Compulsivity Clinic materials.

Book Two Anderson Spickard, M.D. and Barbara Thompson, Dying for a
Drink (Waco, Tex.: Word Books, 1985).

2Charles W. Crewe, A Look at Relapse (Center City, Minn.: Hazelden
Literature, 1974).

3From USA Today, September 16, 1987.

4 Geneen Roth, Breaking Free from Compulsive Eating (New-york:
BobbsMerrill Co."  Inc."  1984).

5 Winifred Gallagher, "High Anxiety," Rolling Stone (March 12, 1987).

6 Robin Norwood, Women Who Love Too Much (New York, New York: St.

Martin's Press, Inc."  1985).

7 Lois Leiderman Davitz and Joel Davitz, Living in Sync: Men and Women
I.n Love (New York: Bergh Publishing, Inc."  1986).  '3 Susan Jacoby,
"Compulsive Shopping," Vogue (April 1976).

9 Frank B. Minirth, et al."  The Workaholic and His Family (Grand
Rapids, Mich.: Baker Book House, 198 1).  '0 Ernie Larson, Stag@kI
Recovery: Life Beyond Addiction (New York: Harper & Row Publishers,
Inc."  1985).  From booklet about Families In Crisis, 7320 Ohms Lane,
Edina, Minnesota 55435.

12 Christine Adams, "Parenting the Drug-affected Youth," Marriage and
Family Living (Abbey Press, March 1986).

13 Brennan Manning, poems by Sue Garmon, Souvenirs of Solitude
(Denville, NJ.: Dimension Books, 1979).  Used by permission.