Umbral Echoes Blog

This post is mostly to get some things off my chest about the situation with my father, and also to let everyone know what's happened and how things are going. More important points in bold, for those who just want the bullet points.

The History

My father is an alcoholic. Has been for most of his life. But the story starts even before that. His father was also an alcoholic. He would work long hours at BF Goodrich, come home, have dinner, then drink. Grandpa didn't drink to get drunk; he drank to pass out. My father has told stories like once when playing cards with grandpa when he was a kid, granpda just passed out in the middle of it.

Dad also became an alcoholic. I'm not sure when he started drinking, but I do know that it was before I was born. For years he controlled it pretty well, but then it seemed to get out of hand. His second wife divorced him because of it, but it didn't get really bad until grandpa died. Not long after that, dad spiraled downward pretty fast. So far that grandma and one of his sisters put him in the hospital and forced him to take Antabuse. My memory is honestly a bit hazy, but I recall him being in and out a few times before he decided he wanted to get better. For the next 10 years, he kept his sobriety.

Recent News

But for the past 6-7 years, my dad has again been losing the battle with alcohol. I think it started when I moved to Atlanta. Part of me can't help but feel at cause, but the rational side of me knows that it's not my responsibility to be around to keep dad sober. He had some ups and downs, at one point had 2 years sobriety, but then began the downward spiral again. His alcoholism is compounded by depression and anxiety issues, as well as sleeplessness (he uses the "I drink so I can sleep" excuse that grandpa did). He also got involved with crack-cocaine, which would be more worrying to me than the alcohol if the alcohol issue weren't life-threateningly bad. Dad's AA friend Jeff started getting in touch with me to let me know when things got bad.

A few weeks ago, things got really bad. Dad called into work for an entire week, and during that time pretty much subsisted on beer alone. If you've seen Leaving Las Vegas, it was a lot like that. Only in real life, it's a lot more messy. Jeff said that when he went in to check on my dad (I'd given him a key to dad's house some time ago), he found him unconscious naked on the couch, with beer cans covering the floor, and fecal matter all over the kitchen floor, living room, hallway, and bathroom.

It was never this bad. The next day Jeff roused my dad so that he could talk to me on the phone. Previous to this, dad had always said that he just wanted to be numb, but that he didn't want to die. This time he told me, "I just don't want to live any more."

The Saga

That was all it took. The next day I drove up to Louisville and took out a mental inquest warrant on my father. That is a warrant saying that he is a danger to himself or others due to a mental illness. Alcoholism is considered a "voluntary mental illness" so warrants are only issued in cases where people are suicidal, homicidal, etc.

The warrant was completed that night, and within 45 minutes the police were on my father's doorstep. My father's condition was so bad (a few of the cops uttered such phrases as "holy mother of god") that they called an ambulance for him, which took him to the ER in the hospital. After they got him in stable condition (which took about 24 hours), they moved him to the psychiatric ward. The psych ward upheld the mental inquest, and sent him along to a rehab facility.

It took dad almost 2 weeks to completely sober up and come out of the mental fog. The facility he was at is supposed to be one of the best in the region (dad mentioned people from a few states away being there), and his therapist/social worker Maria seemed to be very experienced and skilled with people in dad's situation (though they said he was among the worst that they had to deal with). She knew exactly the sorts of pitfalls that he would face after coming out of rehab, and wanted to prepare him for those.

I could probably write several thousand words about this, but to sum up, dad wants to get better. At least, he says he does, and I hope that's true. The doctor told him that he doesn't have another run like that in him — if he goes back to drinking, he will die. He's currently in a transitional living house, supervised 24/7 but the guys in the house go out to a few meetings a day and have other scheduled activities, so it's a little more freedom than the intensive inpatient ward. They're basically teaching dad how to live sober again. When alcoholics get to the point my father did, they forget what it is they love in life. Their life becomes a cycle of drink, sleep, work. So they are going to teach my dad how to break that cycle, and form new habits of living. Dad also volunteered to go on Antabuse, which I think is a great sign.

He's been keeping in touch with me every day. There were (and to some extent, still are) concerns about his work,but I think everything will be fine there. He has a medical doctor saying that he needs to be under this care, and his work has a strong union, so I doubt that anything bad will come of it. Then again, they did fire him for going into treatment a decade and a half ago due to some loophole they have where you can't get more than one instance of temporary disability for the same mental illness. But he fought the man, and actually won that one after an 8-year-long battle.

Things are looking up. Let's hope they stay that way. My friends have all been very supportive, and I am truly blessed to have the great people in my life that I do.

Idea for a next post: With my parents, how did I end up not completely screwed up? Or am I?