Dr. Bob, Phobias and Functionality

Since I began writing here at A Dozen Steps one of the more controversial posts I’ve made was about a “Functional Alcoholic.” I feel I am able to speak on the topic because I was more than happy, as a newly sober person, to make claim that I had been influenced by alcohol in a “dysfunctional family” which had a lot to do with my drinking. That is until an oldtimer refused to cosign my bs and interrupted my sharing one night to inform me, in no uncertain terms, that the reason my family was dysfunctional was because I was in it.

I know we’ll continue to hear this in meetings – ““I was a functioning alcoholic – I had a job, went to work, made money,” etc. etc. And I know those folks will hold fast to that belief. So be it.

Dr. Bob knew…

Pages 175-176;

“I developed two distinct phobias. One was the fear of not sleeping, and the other was the fear of running out of liquor. Not being a man of means, I knew that if I did not stay sober enough to earn money, I would run out of liquor.”

What Bob did was exactly what I did – substituted.

“Most of the time, therefore, I did not take the morning drink which I craved so badly, but instead would fill up on large doses of sedatives to quiet the jitters, which distressed me terribly.”

I had found a different “sedative” but it worked the same.

Then;

“This routine went on with few interruptions for seventeen years. It was really a horrible nightmare, this earning money, getting liquor, smuggling it home, getting drunk, morning jitters, taking large doses of sedatives to make it possible for me to earn more money, and so on ad nauseam.”

Yeah, functional.