Weekly Reflections

My new friends in AA suggested placing my focus on what was needed in terms of new behaviours in the light of this discovery. The first, of course, was not to take the first drink. Much more was to come later, in the form of a new design for living as described in the Big Book of AA and summarised in the Twelve Steps. That work is still ongoing today, one day at a time. I also had a bizarre hunch in those first months, one that has been recently confirmed in my heart and soul, without solid external evidence: That I am the grandchild of one or more alcoholics.

From the child’s perspective we could apply the Zen proverb: `We never step into the same river twice.´ It is not the parent, per say, that determines the experience, but the relationship between the child, at any given moment, and the parenting at that same moment. Each interaction between a parent and any one child is a reprise of stepping into new waters, and for each parent-sibling combination there is a different river. In the overall picture, my impression is that our parents always acted with the best of intentions. Like all human beings they had their good days and bad, and sometimes their actions were determined by inner Saboteurs of which they had little awareness…

The only explanation I could find as to why this `unbearability of being´ had become my daily reality was that there must have been something inherently wrong with me. The only alternative explanation, — that my parents were so overwhelmed that they could not meet my basic emotional needs — would have been too much to endure for a child still dependent upon his parents. Add to these internal ruminations the messaging common in any group trying to function as best it can under severe pressure and it is no wonder that some of us arrive at the conclusion that we are useless, not good enough, that the world would be better off without us…