This loneliness drags him deeper into the family morass. He develops an enormous and distorted sense of loyalty to the only people who share his secret: his family co-conspirators. Intense, uncritical loyalty to his parents becomes second nature. When he grows to adulthood, his blind loyalty remains a destructive, controlling element in his life. This is what prevented Glenn from asking his father to leave the company, despite the fact that his business was suffering because of it.
The Little Boy Who Wasn’t There
Because so much energy is expended on futile attempts to rescue the drinker and maintain the cover-up, there is little time or attention left for the basic needs of the alcoholic’s children. Like children of deficient and inadequate parents, children of alcoholics often feel invisible. This becomes an especially painful catch-22 because the more troubled the home, the more the children need emotional support.
As Glenn and I explored the connection between his current difficulties and the emotional seesaw of his childhood, he remembered:
My father never did any of the things that my friends’ fathers did with them. We never tossed a football around or even watched games together. He would always say, “I don’t have time—maybe later,” but he always had time to sit around and get drunk. My mother would say, “Don’t bother me all the time with your problems. Why don’t you just go off with your friends.” But I didn’t have any friends. I was afraid to bring anybody home. My folks just ignored me and didn’t seem to care what kind of trouble I got into just as long as they didn’t have to deal with it.
I said to Glenn, “So you were okay as long as you weren’t seen or heard. How did it feel being invisible?” Glenn’s expression became pained as he remembered:
It was awful. I felt like an orphan most of the time. I would do anything to get their attention. Once, when I was around eleven, I was over at a friend’s house, and his dad had left his wallet out on a table in the hallway. So I took five dollars, hoping I’d get caught. I didn’t care if my parents gave me hell, as long as they’d know I was there.
Glenn got the message early in life that his existence was more an aggravation than a blessing to his parents. His emotional invisibility was reinforced by the fact that it was his safest haven from his father’s frequent violence. He recalled:
My dad put me down whenever I spoke up. If I dared raise my voice to him, he’d slug me. It didn’t take me long to learn not to cross him. If I stood up to my mom, she’d start bawling like a baby, then he’d get mad and belt somebody, and I’d feel twice as bad for the trouble I’d caused. So I learned to stay away out of the house as much as I could. I got an after-school job when I was twelve, and I would lie about what time I got off so I could come home as late as possible every night. Then I’d leave for school an hour early in the morning, just so I could get out before he woke up. I can still feel that loneliness, sitting by myself in the schoolyard every morning, waiting for somebody to show up. The funny thing is, I don’t think my parents even noticed I was never around.
I asked Glenn if he thought the same fears that had kept him from asserting himself as a child were now controlling him as an adult. Glenn admitted sadly:
I guess so. I can’t ever say anything that offends anybody, no matter how much I want to. I swallow so many words, I think I’m going to throw up sometimes. I just can’t stand up to people. Even people I couldn’t care less about. If I think what I want to say is going to hurt somebody’s feelings, I just can’t say it. Period.
As with many adult children of alcoholics, Glenn felt responsible for everyone else’s feelings, just as he took responsibility for his father’s and mother’s feelings when he was young. He went to heroic lengths to avoid confrontations with his parents because he didn’t want to be responsible for causing anyone (including himself) pain. He could not express his emotions as a child should be able to. He had to suppress them, and he continued that pattern in his adult life. When Glenn helped put his father to bed, when he took responsibility for keeping his father from getting upset, he was acting as a parent, not a child. When a child is forced to adopt the role of parent, he loses his role models, threatening his developing identity. This destructive role reversal is common in alcoholic families.
“I N
EVER
G
OT TO
B
E A
K
ID
”
As we have seen, and will continue to see, role reversal occurs in almost all families where there are toxic parents. In the alcoholic
family, the drinking parent actively usurps the child’s role through his pathetic, needy, irrational behavior. He’s such a handful of a child himself that he leaves no room for any other children in the family.
Glenn grew up believing that his role in the world was to take care of others and not to expect anything for himself.
I remember how my mother would come running to me when Dad got out of control and she’d cry about how unhappy she was. She’d say, “What am I going to do? You kids need a father, and I can’t go out to work.” It upsets me, just talking about it. I used to dream about taking her away to an island where my father couldn’t find us. I’d promise her that as soon as I could I’d take care of her. And that’s what I’m doing now. I give her money all the time, even though I can’t afford it. And I’m taking care of Dad, even though it’s killing my business. Why can’t I find somebody to take care of
me
for a change?
Glenn is still burdened with guilt over his inability both as a child and as an adult to fix his parents’ lives. Despite his dream of finding a woman to take care of him, the woman he finally settled down with was needy and helpless. Glenn sensed that she wasn’t right for him when he married her, but his need to play out the rescue fantasies of his childhood overwhelmed his better judgment.
The Myth of Fixing the Past
It didn’t take long for Glenn to learn that he had married a secret drinker. If he had known before he married her, he probably would have married her anyway. He would simply have convinced himself that he could change her. Adult children of alcoholics frequently marry alcoholics. Many people find it bewildering that someone who grew up in the chaos of an alcoholic family would choose to
relive the trauma. But the drive to repeat familiar patterns of feelings is common to all people, no matter how painful or self-defeating those feelings may be. The familiar provides a sense of comfort and structure for our lives. We know what the rules are, and we know what to expect.
More important, we reenact past conflicts because this time we hope to make it come out right—we’re going to win the battle. This reenactment of old, painful experiences is called a “repetition compulsion.”
“T
HIS
T
IME
I’
LL
G
ET
I
T
R
IGHT
”
I can’t emphasize strongly enough how much this particular compulsion dominates our lives. Almost all self-defeating behaviors, particularly those involved in establishing and maintaining intimate relationships, begin to make a lot more sense when seen in the light of repetition compulsion. Glenn provides a perfect example:
When I met Denise, I didn’t even know she drank. When I found out, she gave up trying to hide it. I’d see her drunk three, four times a week. I begged her to stop. I took her to doctors. I pleaded with her to go to AA. I locked up all the liquor, but you know how drunks are . . . she’d always find a way. The only time she’d stop is when I’d threaten to leave. But after a while she’d fall off the wagon, and we’d be back to square one.
Since denial and cover-up seemed normal during his growing-up years, Glenn moved easily into an adult relationship where the same elements recurred. Only this time he thought he might succeed at rescuing his wife where he had failed, as a child, to rescue his parents. Glenn, like almost all adult children of alcoholics, had made a fervent promise to himself: he would never have another
alcoholic in his life. But a deeply ingrained repetition compulsion is a lot stronger than any conscious promise can ever be.
“W
HY
D
O
I K
EEP
G
OING
B
ACK FOR
M
ORE
?”
Another promise that often dissolves because of the power of the past is the promise never to repeat the violence and abuse that are often an integral part of the alcoholic household.
Jody, a petite, black-haired, wide-eyed 26-year-old, came into one of my therapy groups at the suggestion of her supervisor at the private substance-abuse hospital where she worked as a rehabilitation counselor. As with many counselors on the program, Jody was herself a recovering alcoholic and drug abuser. I first met her at a small staff party celebrating her second year of sobriety.
Jody had recently ended a relationship with a violent, abusive man. Her supervisor was concerned that she might be tempted to return to that relationship and suggested that she see me.
In our first private session together, Jody was tough and belligerent and not at all convinced that she needed help. I wondered about the pain behind this facade. The first words she said were, “They told me I better get my ass into therapy or else I’ll get canned. Why don’t you give me a break and tell them I’m doing great and don’t need to come back.”
“I can see that you’re really thrilled to be here,” I replied. We both laughed, which helped ease the tension. I told her I knew she wasn’t seeing me by choice, but since she was here anyway, she might as well try to get something out of it. She agreed to give one of my groups a try.
I began by telling her how concerned her colleagues were that she might go back to her abusive boyfriend. Jody admitted that they had reason to be concerned:
I really miss that turkey. He’s basically a terrific guy. It’s just that sometimes I open my big mouth and it pisses him off. I know he loves me, and I keep hoping we’ll be able to work it out.
I suggested that she had confused love with abuse, as if she unconsciously needed to elicit extreme anger from her lover as proof of his intensity and passion. I asked if this felt familiar to her, if it had happened to her in other relationships. She thought for a moment, then replied:
I guess it was like that with my old man. He was a grade-A, fourteen-carat drunk who used to beat the shit out of us. He’d come home drunk maybe five out of seven nights a week. And he’d find any excuse to beat us. He’d beat my brother until he bled. My mom couldn’t do anything to stop him. She was too scared to even try. I would fuckin’ plead with him to stop, but he was like a crazy man. I don’t want to give you the idea that he was some kind of monster, because when he wasn’t drinking, he could be cool. I mean, he was my best friend. I loved it when we’d pal around together, just the two of us. I still love it.
Many children of alcoholics develop a high tolerance for accepting the unacceptable. With no idea of how a loving father behaves, Jody could only assume that if she wanted the good times with her father, she had to put up with the bad times. She formed a psychological connection between love and abuse. She came to believe that you don’t get one without the other.
The Buddy System
Jody’s father taught her by example that she should do whatever it took to keep a man happy so that he wouldn’t beat her. To keep her father happy, she had become his drinking buddy at age ten.
My dad started off by giving me a sip of booze maybe once a week. I hated the taste, but it always made him real happy when I had some. By the time I was eleven, he’d go into a liquor store and bring out a bottle. We’d sit in the car and share it, then we’d go for a joyride. At first it was exciting, but after a while I’d get pretty scared. I mean, I was just a kid, but I could tell he didn’t have such great control of the car. I kept doing it because it was something I had with him that nobody else had. It was this special thing between us. I really got to like drinking because it made Dad like me more. It got worse and worse until I finally drank myself right off the deep end.
At least one out of four children of alcoholic parents become alcoholics themselves, and many of these adults were given their first drink at a very young age by the alcoholic parent. The drinking creates a special and often secret bond between parent and child. This particular type of conspiracy feels like camaraderie to a child. It is often as close as the child can get to something approaching love and approval.
Even if a child has not been actively recruited by the alcoholic, he or she remains especially vulnerable to eventually becoming an alcoholic. We don’t know exactly why this happens—there may be a genetic predisposition to addictive behavior or a biochemical disorder. I also suspect a strong factor is that many behaviors and beliefs are formed through imitation of, and identification with, our parents. Adult children of alcoholics have been handed a legacy of rage, depression, loss of joy, suspiciousness, damaged relationships, and overdeveloped sense of responsibility. They have also been handed a method of trying to deal with this twisted legacy: drinking.