Help?!? Who needs help?

People are willing to ask almost anything of another person. Without blinking, a friend will ask to borrow money or crash on the couch. They will ask for you to spend some time and energy helping them move or maybe to watch their kids for a date night. One thing that most are reluctant to request is a bit of real help- the kind of help that reaches past the superficial level.

Why are we so slow to ask for help, waiting until the ship is overrun and sinking to call in the rat-catcher? As addicts we are especially predisposed to this foolish way of  refusing to recognize the depth of our challenges and ignoring the need ask for outside assistance. We will drink ourselves out of house and home or use until we have lost nearly everything before we can even open our minds to the idea of asking for some help. That requires that we humble ourselves and admit wrongdoing first, and that is much to ask of an egomaniac- one who is just as addicted to his or her own bloated self-image as he or she may be to emptying the whiskey bottle.

The whole idea of hitting bottom comes into play at this point, and that brings with it myriad questions that can only be answered by addicts themselves. How much do you have to lose before you have lost all you are willing to see go? How foolish are we? Is our pride worth more to us than our very lives, because that is truly the choice to which it all boils down?

Do we not see that this stubborn pride has brought us nothing but unnecessary heartache? No, we really don’t while in the haze of active addiction. Once the fog has lifted, we can gaze into the past with 20/20 hindsight and realize it, but during the tempest that is life in active addiction we cannot see anything outside of the easiest way to the next drink or fix.

Something has to “break” us to get us to the point of being willing to not just seek but accept real life-changing help from anyone else. What that breaking point may be is as individual as a fingerprint and perhaps more telling.

The next step after realizing that you want and need help is figuring out from where you can receive the kind of help you need. Where do you look then? For many it will (and should) be a higher power of their understanding. Beyond that, the easy answer is a 12 Step Meeting, but for many the more realistic one is a person whom you respect, trust and maybe admire. Someone who is where you’d like to be is the best source of wisdom available; someone who has lived your struggle and made it to the other side safe and thriving.  The quickest route to the life you want for yourself is to be surrounded by people who are where you want to be.