Day 407 – Culture
This is the shit I think about when given the time, am I normal? No far from it, but I understand that what is important is staying quit and improving myself along the way.
I began looking at the culture of my family and identifying habits and beliefs that formed and shaped my life and habits. My hope is that I will be able to correct these so I don't pass them on to my children.
There is a culture of addiction in my family. My father and his wife are “functional” alcoholics. They hold jobs, own a home, go on annual vacations and all that, so when I say functional I mean they appear to have it together. But they really don't, they consume alcohol daily and are drunk multiple times each week. Looking back I realize that growing up in that environment has really had a negative impact on my ability to have strong healthy relationships with people.
My dad was a smoker when I was growing up. He stopped smoking cigarettes when I was somewhere around 13 years old, just about the time I picked them up (I gave up the smokes for the can about a year later). Next Dad started smoking cigars around 1998 when they became cool for old fat golfers and still smokes them to this day and has no intentions of ever stopping. If you ask him, he thinks he is still a non-smoker because he doesn't inhale. What a cop out, but that brings me to my next point.
There is a culture of blame in my family, a complete lack of self responsibility . I feel that this one is ubiquitous in American culture and is not unique to my family. There is no personal responsibility within the family, negative outcome are always the fault of someone else. Conversations are always about how other people are doing this or that. It is victim based and non solution oriented.
My quit has clarified a lot of things in my life, some are not that fun to look at and deal with, but it's necessary, otherwise It will just be a matter of time before I'm buying a can.
Shortly after I quit, I decided to stop drinking alcohol too. At the time, I stopped because it was a trigger for dip. After a while I realized it was bigger than that. Growing up in a alcoholic household, I have the ability to drink large amounts of alcohol and still "function" just like my dad. Addiction is addiction whether is nicotine or alcohol it felt the same to me, I felt controlled by it. So I didn't touch a drop of alcohol for over 6 months and since that time I have kept a very close eye on the way I consume it.
I am breaking the culture of addiction in my family, I am tobacco free for the rest of my life. I also do not keep alcohol in the house nor do I ever go out to drink. Instead I focus all of my attention on my family and my life. I can't even begin to explain how much of a positive impact this has made, it is profound.
I only get one life, and I will make the most of it. The sad thing is, I would have never realized any of this without deciding to quit and having the support group here at KTC to make my quit a reality. Without this place I would be passing on the culture of addiction and blame to my kids. Not any more, not now, not ever.
