Jun 22, 2015 | By Jeannette Quinton

The Ugly Truth About Lying And Addiction

Addiction Resources

Being honest, open and willing are key concepts to “HOW” many promising roads to recovery are paved. Right?

I can’t fix what I don’t acknowledge is broken. So why did it take me so long to clench the concept that addicts don’t necessarily get along well with the truth? Denial and a good old fashioned white lie mixed well during cocktail hour; about as well as tonic water and a hypodermic needle. Deceit was the bloodline which kept my disease flowing. Learning to be forthright and sincere was a rough lesson. Tougher than learning to walk upright without some chemical in my system. One of the nurses at my detox said to me, “The truth will set you free.” What she neglected to explain was that it would hurt like a bitch and feel fairly foreign as it floundered off my lips. It felt just down right uncomfortable to be candid; like driving on the wrong side of the road. Even growing up as the baby of my family I witnessed my older siblings getting in trouble for telling the truth. Massaging the truth allowed my addiction and casual relationship with reality to thrive. The longer I am sober, the more I understand how full of shit I truly had become.

Robin Williams said, “Reality is simply a crutch for people who can’t handle drug addiction.” Quite the statement coming from an addict. Especially from a fine, brilliantly talented soul who fooled us all. How devastated I become when I hear the news of a fellow addict passing away. Why does it take horrible time stamps in history to really hear the truth?! It hurts! Why does it take a drastic event for me to take drastic measures? Death evokes anger at this disease and a long line of questions about why we can’t be honest with one another. When I was using, the amount of lies I generated was in direct proportion to how alive and hungry my disease was; dishonesty was another drug. It was a murmur from the bottom of my deceitful heart. The worst was the domino effect of my dishonesty. Reality was never my friend. I avoided it at any cost.

As I entered my second tour of duty in recovery I was told to find a sponsor, mentor or spiritual advisor who I could be honest with regardless of what was going on in my life. I knew that I had to find someone that I could be brutally honest with no matter how scared I was of being judged. In order to divulge my authentic self I first needed to look inward. So the truth will set this addict free, huh? Freedom? Freedom from what? My addiction, my physical cravings? Freedom from the way that drugs and alcohol had dictated my every move?

RELATED: 3 Best Reasons To Be In Recovery

I knew when I was in my early 20’s that alcohol was my master. I remember getting up in the middle of the night to take a few shots from a vodka bottle I had hidden in my closet. I was living alone and hiding bottles from myself!

My emotions and behaviors became robotic. Like an episode of The Walking Dead; I was a zombie. I was being lulled by a dirge. I knew that I was no longer drinking because I wanted to; I was drinking because I needed to. Hindsight is extremely humbling. When I glance back at my history I can see several times when my addiction was taking over more and more areas of my life. So many people would ask me “Are you ok?” “Oh yeah, I’m good; everything is under control”, LOL. But nothing was under control. Until eventually my addiction owned everything. It had its claws and paw prints on every aspect of my life. Someone asked me the other day what was the longest relationship I had ever been in; and my answer was “the sick, love-hate relationship I had with drugs and alcohol”. Boy I was committed! It kicked my ass every night and I still woke up each morning and sang “Yes sir. I would like another!”

In order to keep this abusive relationship alive I needed to become the grandest liar in the land. I had crowned myself the master of disaster. I was always letting others know how I had been wronged or cheated. I never pondered my own truth or part in anything. I needed to keep my life so compartmentalized. It was essential that no one really know how sick I was or how far down I would bend and beg for my addiction. I couldn’t lower my standards quick enough to actually match my behavior. Which is why I would wake up feeling vile and then sadly thank my Higher Power for blackouts. I was like a drone seeking death. I ran head first towards any wall built on chaos. I was equally addicted to avoidance.

As a teenager I was caught drunk in the girl’s locker room before field hockey practice. My parents took me to see a shrink. He suggested that I attend an AA meeting. So, I avoided him like the plague. I was constantly dodging questions from family and friends. Every day felt like a series of really bad job interviews. I was making shit up and selling myself to people I didn’t even like, constantly stuck, frozen in fear. A procrastinating perfectionist. If I couldn’t do it right away, my way; with a 100% guarantee of accuracy (and return of my energies), I wasn’t doing it at all. I wasted all my faith based resources I had generated and bet the house on my drinking and drugging. No wonder I trusted no one; I was praying and begging with the wrong deity! A lower power, my addiction.

One would think my world would have opened up wide when I got sober, but it didn’t. Not initially. Why? Because I was still imprisoned. Not by a bottle of booze or pills this time. But caught, trapped like a caged animal, by my own addictive thinking and behavior. When I first entered a halfway house after detox I used to complain about all the rules. The counselors and program were very strict. This wasn’t a country club type rehab with flat screen TV’s on the walls or day trips to the beach. This place dictated where you worked, how you spent your money, how you spent your free time; even when you were allowed to use the bathroom. And I fought this process. I thought to myself, “You’re a grown woman; how did you mismanage yourself into such an institution”? Until one day I was walking down the street and heard a large bang. I turned around to realize it was the sound of my head popping out of my ass. I realized that I had spent decades being told by my addiction who to love, and where to work, live and play. I had thrown all my passion, blood, sweat and tears down the wrong shute. And when I finally began to chisel away at my sobriety, I was clueless how to manage my emotions or life. I was like a baby dropped in the forest. With a boat load of debt to clear up, a huge ego to wrestle with and a bad case of “why me”.

I remember my sponsor asking me, “Jeannette, how free do you want to be today”? Silly question posed to an addict like me who spent 30 years in her own special version of hell. Of course I wanted to be happy, joyous and free! Bring it on! But this would require work. “I wish you a long, slow and painful recovery,” claimed my sponsor. Cheerful right? This from a women who has over 30 years of sobriety and is the closest version to a female Buddha I have ever encountered. It made sense to me though. I didn’t read the “promises” on that window shade back drop and think; “Ok, if I take these steps, make amends and stay sober I will acquire a better job, cuter boyfriend and larger bank account.” I dropped the expectations of what I thought being sober would mean. Being in recovery was now about me being able to process an emotion properly. I wanted to experience laugher through tears. I didn’t want to be reactive like Pavlov’s dogs. Being sober is finding my true voice. It’s about learning to take a compliment or follow through on a commitment.

I’ll admit I can have a hard time trying to distinguish between being honest with people vs. sounding good. When I was a kid there was a tree house I used to run away to when my parents were fighting. I used to wonder why no one would come looking for me. Or if they did come looking for me I would beg them to leave me alone. I was so unsettled. “What is it, Jeannette? What’s finally going to make you happy and content”?, queried my folks. The God’s honest truth is that I didn’t know. My arrested development was so intense I was an old soul running around with an animal like addictive nature. Perhaps that’s why people pleasing is so common among addicts.

Denial and dishonesty were two huge muscles groups that I exercised daily. Why identify a problem or honestly tackle it when I have the option of pulling the covers over my head and hiding in shame? “Name it and you can tame it” was certainly not on my list of things to do. I needed a drug sniffing dog to run through my house and another to sniff my soul to identify all the bullshit I was slinging. I’ve heard a hundred times “we are only as sick as our secrets”. I see now that silence equals death. My disease loves when I isolate.

RELATED: Is Addiction Really A Disease??

The recovery movement needs to come out of the closet, up from church basements and onto our front porches. I have a hard time telling the truth, or even recognizing it when I’m staring it in the face. It’s like a long lost relative that sort of looks familiar but feels uncomfortable to talk to or entertain. I couldn’t even tell you what time it was when I first got sober. If you asked me I would respond, “what time would you like it to be”?

Finding a voice of truth and hope in recovery is so essential. Years ago I use to read the line in the Big Book that states “some of us are constitutionally incapable of being honest with ourselves” and think of this as an alibi if I failed. I would think that maybe I was just one of those folks; a drunk who would die covered in a cloak of shame and lies. But now I try to slowly but surely nuzzle up to the truth. Waft the scent of it like I did a fine wine or scotch. I enlist the help of my friends, sponsor, and teenage daughter to tell me the truth about how badly I’m lying to myself and others. The sooner I accept my truth the quicker the lies in my life fade away. My truth is that I am a mother. I am a daughter and a sister. I am a friend and writer. And I am an addict; one who’s completely incomplete; always inhaling this new language of recovery – one breath at a time.