Why Is It So Much Harder for Some People?

I remember when I had my first anniversary of sobriety. I was excited to go to my home group and celebrate. When I got there, I was sad to see that a man who had come in the same time I had was once again saying he had just a few days.  For the next five years I watched his desperate struggle to pull together more than a few months of sobriety.  It saddened me, but also terrified me. I could not imagine coming back over and over to say I had slipped, once again.

In some ways, my understanding that I would have trouble doing that kept me sober. I know myself – I would be too embarrassed to show up time and time again with the same story.  My terror was that if I slipped that would be it for me – and that fear has worked for me for more than two decades. Healthy fear is good fear.

I often still wonder, though, why it is so much harder for some people. I have my theories, but they are, of course, colored by my own experience (and my personality), so they might not be true for everyone.  But I still think it’s important to talk about it – so that maybe we can find a way to help others walk through that door, especially those like the man I remember who clearly desperately wanted it to work.

My first theory is that it has something to do with denial. You can recognize and accept you’re an alcoholic, but still have plenty of denial about what that means.  I know I had zero denial about my ability to handle alcohol. I handled it poorly from the beginning. I had absolutely no illusions about my ability to control my drinking. I think that total acceptance of the fact that I’m an utterly incompetnent drinker made it a lot easier for me not to romanticize what it would be like to have another drink.

My second theory is tolerance for pain. I have extremely low tolerance for any sort of misery. Relapsing sounds miserable. No thank you. It was hard enough to get me in the door the first time; would I even be able to do it a seconde time? I would rather not find out the answer to that.

My third theory is maybe a bit more controversial – I’m competitive. I like to do things well.  That’s not to say I don’t do some thinks really not so well, but I prefer to do things the best I can with the tools available to me. I have made a point of getting really good at certain things – and I always liked the feeling of excelling at something.  Maybe there was a part of that competitive nature that helped me in early sobriety. I was really young, and I wanted to be really successful, not just at staying sober, but in my career and life. Drinking was definitely not taking me there. It was an utter waste of my life.

I think there are some personality characteristics that really help with staying the course.

Not being an absolutist. In other words, understanding that everything is relative. Superficially, my life might not seem as good as Sober Joe’s, but that doesn’t mean my life is not perfectly fine for me. It’s all relative. 

Another trait – open mind. You need to be really open to new ideas, and not get all bent out of shape if you don’t like a particular idea. Just let that idea be and don’t worry about it. Maybe one day it will make sense. If not, maybe that’s okay too. Just ride it out. I learned that pretty quickly, because all the little sayings that are so popular in the rooms drove me nuts. They sounded like cliches.  I had to learn to let it go really quickly, and understand that under those annoying jingles there was wisdom and truth. I just needed more time to understand them.

Know yourself. You have to really know yourself. Know what gets you into trouble. Know what puts you in a tailspin. Know what types of people lead you down the bad path. Know when you are lying to yourself. Don’t let yourself get away with bs. Understand that everytime you deceive yourself, you risk a real life.

I don’t know if these ring true to others, but they certainly seemed key for me.  I’d love to hear your ideas!