In AA, each alcoholic is not only encouraged to see how they are like their fellow alcoholics, drug abusers and addicts, but they are actively dissuaded from thinking that they are different. It is said that a reason for many alcoholics’ failure to get and stay sober is that they think that the rules of the program don’t fully apply to them; that they are special. AAs have a term for this phenomenon which they call ‘terminal uniqueness’. The terminally unique are believed to have lower rates of success because they justify and rationalize their actions because they are “not like those other losers” or they might even believe that they are unlike any other human being on earth. They don’t conform to the program, and, believe it or not, accepting (conforming) to the program is pretty critical to achieving success within it.

Nevertheless, the fact of the matter is that AA is a bit conceited in a their terminology. It is a fact of biology that all humans are, in fact, unique. This is simple science. For instance, have you ever met two individual human beings that were identical in all ways? No, because no two humans are exactly the same.

The problem comes from the fact that people have different depths to which they sink in their addiction. For some, they might have a drinking problem that is getting excessively worse, to the point that their spouse recommends (strongly) that they attend a drug and alcohol rehab. But, this person, may only drink at night, may not be suffering at work, may not have any health problems, etc. On the other hand, you can have a destitute drug addict or alcoholic, living on the street or in a shelter, dependent on charity to eat (and, of course, get high) and suffering dramatically in countless ways.

Both of these individuals can get help. Both can become more productive, healthier and happier. But to assume that the treatment model should be the same for both strikes me as foolish.

There is an old saying: They don’t want spiritual fulfillment in Ethiopia, they want rice.

It is important that you recognize where you are and where you are headed. In AA, it is usually said, that the true alcoholic will always end up on the street, given enough time, opportunity and alcohol. It is a truism, that the disease is progressive and gets worse over time, never better. In fact, it is this metric which old-timers use to decide who is a “true” alcoholic – as if this is a desirable trait – and who could have sobered up on their own.

The “true” alcoholic is a hopeless case without a program, or so the reasoning of the 12-step programs go. On the other hand, a hard drinker or problem drinker may want to stop drinking and can use the principles of the program to do so, but they are not doomed to alcoholic death if they do not.

Now, the point I am sidewinding towards is that there are many steps towards realizing that you have a problem and a lot of the process will depend on where you were when you started, where you are now and where you feel you will end up. It can be a tragedy when a mentally ill person loses years of their life living on the streets using and abusing. But it is, perhaps, a greater tragedy to see a mentally healthy person lose their career and possessions and end up on the street as a result of their addiction.

The point is that not every alcoholic, even without treatment is going to end up on skid row, regardless of what the dogma says. But every alcoholic, even every serious drinker, will suffer consequences as a result of their drinking that are serious and unnecessary — that is to say that these consequences would not have occurred if they had not been drinking or using. I don’t want to have to say something as basic as this, but I will: Drugs and alcohol are bad for your health, wealth and happiness. In short, drugs (alcohol is a drug) are bad.

So, when does one decide to seek help for their problem with substances? The answer is simple actually. I would recommend that one seek help for their addiction the moment that they realize that they have a problem. But this does not happen, so I propose an alternative. Try getting help when the suffering of using exceeds the suffering of not using.

As a final word, there is no point in reaching your potential as an alcoholic or drug addict. You do not need to destroy your health, career, become a prostitute, become a criminal, become destitute, etc. before you decide to do something about the problem. In fact, the earlier you are able to intervene on your own behalf and attempt to achieve sobriety, the more likely you are to achieve success.

Nobody gets a prize for hitting the lowest bottom.

In fact, nobody ever gets a prize when it comes to alcohol and drug abuse. It is simple equation: abuse + time = consequences. Of course, given enough abuse and time the consequence is always the same, that is death. Which will occur whether you abuse drugs or not, but it is likely to happen at a much later date with the intervening time being more productive, rewarding and pleasurable for you.

This post, has been a bit of a rambler. The thing about addiction recovery is that the solution is not linear. There will be good days and bad and sometimes a bad week will follow a good week. But over time, things get better, there are more good days, and life improves.

In a way that is what I do with this blog. I do not write a step-by-step guide to getting sober. There already is one of these (hint: there are twelve steps). I just write about issues that people considering drug and alcohol rehab might be thinking about. I try to share my experience as a person who is very experienced in this world and try to put things in perspective, especially for the newcomer. As a result, many of my posts are disorganized. I am going to try to make my posts a little more focused in the future because I think that they will be of more benefit that way.

For now, in the beginning, it is important that you become willing to consider the idea that your life doesn’t have to be the way that it is now. There is a way out. But the choice is yours alone and, sometimes, you need to think about it for a while.

Doing drugs is a tough business. Sure, it’s all fun and games at first. But, in time, it becomes a lot less fun and a lot more of a nightmare. There were times towards the end of my using days that I would actively hope that the cops would bust in arrest me. I was that miserable. I just needed something to happen, an event, that would allow me to break out of the lifestyle that was destroying me. I’ve been there. I get it.

So, there are a couple of options for those seeking drug addiction help. There is the most pressing, immediate need to get you off of drugs safely and then the more long term goal to provide you with an environment that supports your recovery. In my opinion, the best option to accomplish both goals is to check yourself into a drug rehab center. The reason that I can recommend rehab so wholeheartedly is because rehab will both get you off of drugs safely and with minimal discomfort and provide you some sort of framework to help ensure that you don’t wind up back on drugs when you get out.

If you are searching for drug rehab information, a good site to check out is drugfree.org which can provide you with a lot of baseline information about what type of services are available in your area. Drugfree.org can start to give you a glimmer of hope back. And rehab will really come through in this department. When I was in the midst of my active addiction, life seemed hopeless and meaningless. One of the great virtues of rehab is that, in very nearly every case, you are able to re-discover your hope and begin to think that life is worth living again.

I recognize that at this moment, if you are just beginning to look for addiction help, that life is probably not very rosy. I just want to remind you that your current feelings are not facts. No matter how bleak the situation looks right now, you will find that if you give yourself a chance to get some distance from it, gain some perspective, that you will start to see why life is worth living. I don’t suggest that this is likely to happen. Regardless of your present circumstances, life will surely get better if you take the steps to better yourself. Again, this is a guarantee.

But, there are those for whom rehab is simply not an option. Sometimes the cost of treatment is prohibitive and, for whatever reason, they don’t want to head off to a state subsidized rehab. First, of all, I want to reassert that even if you have to go to a free rehab center you chances are better than if you simply try to combat the beast on your own. Rehab separates you from the environment and circumstances that are killing you presently. If it has to be a free rehab, so be it.

Now, for those who simply refuse to enter rehab, I have a couple of suggestions. The first thing I would advise is that, regardless of the consequences, that you separate yourself from the present environment that you find yourself in. The fact of the matter is that your present environment contributes to your addiction. As they say is NA, you need to find new playgrounds and playmates. Therefore, if you can move in with your parents, sibling or sober friend, you should, by all means, do so.

Once you are out of the poisonous environment, you need to start inserting yourself into the solution. You need to attend as many twelve step meetings as possible. Go to AA, NA, CA… whatever. Just start to immerse yourself into the solution and the best way to do that is to surround yourself with people who are not drinking or using. You need to move in to the club. Go to at least three meetings a day. Hit a morning, an evening and a late night. Whatever. Just drink the fellowship like it’s water to a thirsty man. Find a sponsor, go to the coffee shop after the meeting, get as many phone numbers as possible. In time, you can return to your life and start to tie up the many loose ends that you have left behind.

But it will take time. You don’t want to ever return to your old, poisonous environment. You are not going to want to go back anyway. There may be a few friends or a girlfriend that you feel you can just not live without. However, I want to remind you, that you cannot only live without them, you must live without them. It may be a tough pill to swallow, but I know that if you continue to put one foot in front of the other, you will come to agree with me that a new life is the best solution.

If you find yourself in this desperate situation today I would advise you to pack a bag immediately and start looking for a rehab. Don’t worry about finding the perfect treatment center, you can almost just pick the first one that you see online. In many respects, most rehabs are the same anyway. So, don’t spend days or weeks doing research. Pick one. Call them. Drive there. End of story. You will be happy that you did.

I’d always thought that I could dip my toe into the pool of illicit drugs. I, of course, never wanted to become an addict. I thought, maybe I can just use drugs occasionally. I’ll be a weekend warrior, I thought. And for a while I was able to contain my use.

I was slow in some ways to develop full blown addiction symptoms. I didn’t become an addict overnight and I sure wasn’t going to admit my problem that quickly either. For me, it was a slow progression from regular drinking to occasional marijuana abuse to heavy marijuana use to sampling harder drugs. Once I got to the street drugs it actually didn’t take too long for my world to begin to unravel. It was the getting there that took a moment however.

For me it was cocaine that eventually wrought havoc on my life. But it really doesn’t matter what your drug of choice might be. The progression generally follows the same path into greater despair and unmanageability.

Before cocaine I had been able to hide my bad behavior quite well I thought. I was drinking a twelve pack or more of beer a day and smoking marijuana about as often. I could sense, in all the little ways, that things were getting worse. There had been the DWI, the semesters I had to withdraw from college, and of course the frequent nights riddled with embarrassment. But I was just having fun, I thought.

But, if I was to be honest, I needed help for drug abuse before I even started abusing cocaine. I had become the picture of unmanagibility, but I wondered if anyone else had noticed.

Shortly before I first sampled cocaine I went to a meeting with a psychiatrist who himself is a recovering alcoholic/addict. I’d never discussed my binge drinking, pot use or general mismanagement of life with him. Still, he knew something was wrong. He asked me pointed questions about my drug and alcohol use and I answered half honestly.

He was alarmed. He recommended that I check into a treatment center, a drug rehab, for treatment of my addiction. But, it was too soon. I was not ready to listen. I calmly turned down his offer of rehab. I may need to quit, I thought to myself, but I certainly don’t need to check into rehab to do it.

Within a couple of months, while on vacation and at an inebriated moment, I was presented with the chance to try powder cocaine. I had this feeling that things had already gone to hell and I figured what do I have to lose?

As it turns out, I had a lot to lose. Though my drinking and pot use had progressed to the stage that professionals were suggesting that I enter rehab, I was still holding it together pretty well. I had even quit drinking and using altogether on my own for a short stretch. My finances were holding up and, though I felt terrible, I thought that I was managing just fine.

Everything changed when I first tried cocaine. Within a few short months, I had picked up a serious coke habit as well as nearly drained my bank account. I had found new “coke” friends with whom I had little in common and my behavior was becoming very erratic.

Within eight months of that first vacation use, things had completely flown off the handle. I was in a serious financial hole. I had lost weight and was beginning to experience concerning health problems. I was getting desperate.

But I was still too stubborn to accept help for drug abuse.

Looking back it was indescribable. I was miserable, I mean really suffering. However, I held on to my ego with both hands. If I couldn’t do this myself what kind of man was I?

Things got quite a bit worse and finally I called my psychiatrist and asked him about rehab. I felt so humiliated, so defeated. But, I was contemplating suicide I was so miserable. Things had truly hit rock bottom.

With my heart in my throat, I asked my shrink for help for drug abuse. I realized that somewhere, deep in my heart, I wanted to regain my hope for life. I knew that I could find it if I just gave myself a chance, a break from the three day binges, thousand dollar nights, and strip club ridiculousness.

He recommended a top treatment center and I packed a bag and made my way there. I was too defeated at that point to find my hope yet. I was simply hoping that if I could get away from the disaster that I drugs and alcohol had made of my life that I might give myself the chance to want to live to again.

What happened was remarkable. It wasn’t overnight and it wasn’t without work, but I found my hope at that rehab in Texas. Away from the hectic life I had been living, I got a break from the insanity. Within a couple of weeks I came to realize that my life had not always been a panicked hell.

There had been moments of serenity in the past. I had simply lost my way. It was a refreshing feeling that I obtained, learning once again that life can be worth living. I had regained my hope.

Going to rehab, actually turned out to be the best thing I had ever done for myself. It’s funny that I had needed it for several years before I finally got there. I was somewhat upset with myself that I allowed myself to waste so much of my life drowning in misery.

But, for me, it took what it took. I needed to fall down to the point that I was defeated, that I was willing to accept the help that was being offered me. Once, I got to that point I had nothing left to gain from holding onto my pride. I was ready to make a change.