Thinking about a slip requires intervening on our own behalf.
Ever since Pavlov studied conditioned responses in rats and dogs, science has uncovered what many sensed but never articulated, we are all creatures of habit. By ringing bells with intermittent rewards or punishments, he caused his lab animals to run towards anticipated pleasures like food and flee anticipated unpleasant negative stimuli like pain. In this regard, we humans are no different than his animal subjects.
12-step parlance calls such stimulation “triggers.” A characteristic common to all addicts is that “euphoric recall” highs, if we let them, like the proverbial “siren,” lead us into temptation again and again. Drug and alcohol abusers can try to reimagine an intense wild all-nighter, gamblers can remember one of their few and far between jackpots, overeaters can pine for one of their last sumptuous buffets, and ex-smokers sometimes only have to smell someone else’s cigarette smoke to trigger a desire to return to the dog that bit them. These urges to re-use are impulses that all of us in recovery need to learn to cope with. No matter how much sobriety we have accomplished, our personal history is such that these memories never really leave us, ready to tempt us back to our addictions in a weak or unguarded moment.
I once attended a meeting in San Diego where a member confessed that when she was having difficulties in her life, she would seek reasons to “act out.” Despite the fact that she knew better, she would create a case to ignore her higher angels. She called this a “hall pass to a slip,” permission in fall off the wagon. Once she was committed to this onramp, she avoided any rational assistance to stop her destructive impulse to relapse. This was always followed by self-hatred and regret.
I know this first hand, having gone through several years where I repeatedly slipped back into my addictive patterns. I returned to so many meetings with yet another day 1, I earned the nickname of “Mr. In “N Out Burger.” It took many revisits to recovery to resolve to get past this personal subterfuge. Over 21 years ago, I finally saw the light and stopped this downward spiral, hopefully for good.
Nowadays, I recognize when my mind starts playing tricks with me. As much as I could indulge in some ecstatic memories of my previous wild times, I know that those extreme highs only lead to extreme lows. An onramp to a slip is a one-way ticket to the ultimate destination of an addiction-ruled existence — prison, insanity, and/or death. Today, I value my current increasingly serene and reasonably normal life so much more without those risky and dreadful outcomes. I strongly advise anyone susceptible to succumbing to a slippery misdirection to do whatever it takes to do the same.
DAVID CAT COHEN In Recovery blogs 