Break Glass In Case Of Emergency
Receiving a frightening diagnosis, taking a Fear Inventory, living one day at a time
It’s been a few years since I’ve logged time in the rooms of AA. But recently, a theme I’d often hear has been tap-tap-tapping on the window of my soul like a nosey neighbor.
“Will this be it?”
I’m not one of those people in recovery who fears that alcohol is lurking behind every dark corner, waiting to pounce on me as I walk idly down the street. But ten years in, I know that the urge to drink and, more specifically, the urge to check out, to not feel, to be anywhere but here, can waylay me.
I know because it’s happened. It’s often an acute reflex that takes me by surprise, and while I’ve yet to give into the urge to drink since quitting on July 13, 2014, flight is my preference among the “F” stress responses.
“Will this be the thing that takes me out?”
I appreciate the honesty this question conjures. Would it be a terminal diagnosis? Death of a partner or, God forbid, a child? I’ve witnessed folks that had the worst thing happen, the thing that held the Number One spot on their list, and they stayed sober. I’ve also witnessed events that seemed benign in comparison, like rejection or financial loss, trigger folks to take flight back to their drug of choice.
I’ve heard Queen of the Memoir, Mary Karr, say off the record more than once that, in the face of an approaching apocalypse, she may pass the bottles of Johnny Walker but would damn sure be leaving that convenience store with a carton of Marlboro Reds tucked under her arm.
In the last decade, I’ve personally experienced a few scenarios that could have inspired flight: death of a parent, a child’s mental health crisis, menopause (IYKYK).
In 2021, twenty-five years into a photography career, I lost an entire set of wedding photos to a technical glitch. I’ve never wanted to fly so desperately in my life. I didn’t drink over it, though. Instead, I screamed. I called a friend, and then I called many friends.
With help, I came up with a list of possible solutions and then I acted on those until the problem was solved. (If you’re panicking too, I get it. The photos were rescued by some digital forensics guy in LA two weeks later. It cost what I made shooting the wedding, to the penny. My recovery community pitched in to help me recoup my loss, one $5 Venmo at a time. Deep breaths.)
I really wanted to drink but I didn’t because I have tools in a glass case that’s labeled: “Break Glass In Case Of Emergency.” I remembered to break the glass.
This year’s sobriety milestone landed smack in the middle of neurological testing I was undergoing to solve the mystery of strange symptoms I’ve been experiencing the last three years.
After congratulating myself that I didn’t have to suspect it was the drinking, after an MRI to rule out a brain tumor, after a few clinical tests and something called a DaT scan, it was finally determined that I have Parkinson’s disease. If you’re unfamiliar with that diagnosis, it’s basically a neurological disorder that affects the nervous system, which then affects movement. It’s caused by a dopamine deficiency. And it’s progressive.
Once I had a good laugh at the irony of once being someone who willfully abused her dopamine to now having very little—like, I wore them out and they packed up and flew to Aruba—then the dread set in.
Having this new lens on the last few years of my life was helpful at first. There are many non-motor symptoms that are associated with Parkinson’s—depression, anxiety, gastro issues, loss of drive (in all departments), inability to find words—symptoms that I assumed were menopause-to-the-extreme now had a confirmed source.
Looking back at my history, it was hard not to chastise myself for the decades I neglected my health before I got sober. Recovery for me is about speaking the truth, and I needed a good wallowing in the notion that I had made my bed.
Though I occasionally visit the past for writing memoir, for therapy, or for an 80s New Wave nostalgia trip, the past isn’t a very hospitable place for my thoughts, and I don’t linger long. But I do have gold medals in Future Tripping, even though it’s rarely a friendlier place.
When I’m not working, hands-on creative projects fill my summer days. I’m a slow fashion designer and maker and have a cozy lime green studio in the back of our overgrown yard. It’s filled with thirty years of collected reuse textiles, with an abundance of beauty and possibility. It’s also a place to lay my anxious thoughts down; each stitch I make serves to repair the tears from which they leak.
When I first entered recovery at age forty-five, I called it my Midlife Solution rather than a crisis. My creative work became part of that solution. Whenever my heart lurched forward, it was the response to the call.
Slowly, it gave me confidence in handling a crisis. But with this new diagnosis, the progressiveness is on slow-release. While my logical brain loves a solution, there isn’t one for so much uncertainty. I’ve yearned to be in my studio, but days off have found me doing laps around my home, spinning and circling all the What If’s. For the last ten years, my journal has been the place I can tell the truth to an audience of two: Me and God.
Again, I broke the glass and began.
If you’ve never heard of a Fear Inventory, it goes something like this.
Take the idea, person, or circumstance that has settled like a pit in your stomach. Write it down. Then ask, “And then what?” Then follow the thread to the next logical (or illogical, as is often the case) fear.
Continue this call and response until you reach some finality, which for me, usually involves isolation and death.
The point of the exercise is to diffuse the fear, like who isn’t afraid of dying alone? And a Fear of the Day that’s had the piss taken out of it is a fear that you don’t have to drink or use over. So hopes the Fear Inventory, anyway.
Mine read more like I was interviewing a roommate after they’d already moved in. When will the tremor move to my right hand? Who will I be if I can’t do the work I love? Will the depression swallow me whole? Who will take care of me? Will I be expected to go on living? How can I go on living? Will I want to drink again?
There it is.
The Fear Inventory helped. I also spoke to myself like I would to a good friend: “These are legit fears, kiddo. Let’s not get too teed up over what has yet to happen.”
Taking things one day at a time is another tool that’s proven universally useful.
Tools are only as effective as the power we give them. In the end, they are all conceptual: a call to a friend, a crystal tucked in a bra, a list, a stitch, a prayer. We hope they work but there’s no guarantee. It’s the act of engaging them that makes them pragmatic.
When one stops working, I’m willing to give another a try and then another until, here I stand, glass everywhere.
Your turn.
We’d love for you to share in the comments:
If you take a Fear Inventory, what do you discover?
What’s your version of “Break Glass In Case Of Emergency” in recovery?
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Such a beautiful, powerful share and practice, Sondra. Sending heart-sourced blessings for grace, steadiness, and serenity. ❤️
“Midlife Solution” yes!!!!👏🏼