Episode 4 - It's okay to ask for help

Today, we will talk about how asking for help is one of your most powerful tools. It might be hard, but we will address some of those concerns.

Episode Transcript

Microphone Array (Intelr (00:13):
Hello there everybody.
This is em again with anotherepisode of thoughts of an
addict.
Feeling super lucky to be hereagain with y'all today started
school today, and I am.
Really fired up right nowbecause I am indeed a nerd and I
do love school and I'm superthrilled to see all of my

(00:36):
classmates.
So I'm in an especially goodmood today.

Microphone Array (Intelr Sm (00:40):
I'm certainly not planning on
launching another episode everysingle day.
As school really starts to getramped up.
I'm sure this is going to lowerinfrequency, but right now,
while I've got the energy andI've got the vibes, I'm going to
keep turning these things out.
And yeah, I hope everybody outthere is having an excellent

(01:03):
day.
At the very least baselineyou're alive right now.
So I'm super happy about that.
I hope you are too.
And if you're not, let's talk alittle bit today.
Maybe, maybe something I saywill activate something.
Maybe something I say today willhelp you.

Microphone (Yeti Ster (01:20):
Alrighty.
So where did we leave off in ourjourney back to regaining a
semblance of sanity, regainingan inkling of control over our
lives.
In learning how to live with,but arrest.
This addicted part of our mind.
So now we have acknowledgedthat.

(01:42):
All right.
This thing's got control overme.
So, what do we do now?
Do we just throw in the toweland say, well, yep.
I'm PERMA.
Fuck.
This is it for me.
This thing's going to control meforever.
No.
Absolutely not.
If we were to.
Say okay.
Now I know that I'm an addict.

(02:03):
Now I'm going to fix it.
A hundred percent on my own.
Yeah there.
I think we might start runninginto some issues.
So.
This is the rub of today'spodcast.
And that is.
We got to get help.
Okay.
We got to ask for help.

(02:24):
Out from outside of ourselves,we can't just look within,
because like I alluded to in thelast episode, If we were to look
within and we were to find theanswer.
Eh, we probably would've done itby now.
And all of our addicts have.
Pretty, uh, depending on thekind of addiction there, there's
a very real expiration date onthis thing.

(02:47):
So we don't have a lot of timeto dental around.
It's time for us to ask forhelp.

Microphone (Yeti Stereo M (02:57):
Makes me think of a quote by one of
our, my favorite contemporaryartists.
Who said when I was younger.
So much younger than today.
I never needed anybody's help inany way.
That of course is.
The Beatles.

(03:17):
And I think this resonatesdeeply with me.
And I think it resonates deeplywith all addicts.
Maybe there are a lot of pointsin our lives where.
Yeah, we actually really didn'tneed any help.
A lot of the issues that we had,maybe we were able to overcome
through the pure power of willalone.

(03:40):
Through willpower, we could justpush through those issues.
But this is a different kind ofanimal.
Because addiction.
Is intricately linked.
To ourselves.
So all of that willpower that weuse, uh, try to defeat our
addiction.
Is also willpower.

(04:00):
That's being extended to keepthe addiction alive.
So we need to look outside ofourselves.

Microphone (Yeti Stereo (04:09):
Asking for help.
Can be incredibly difficult.
For anything really, but.
I think it's especially hard togo out and look for help.
And when it comes to addiction.
And there's a few reasons forthat.
So the first one.
At least for me.

(04:30):
Was it's a tacit admission.
It's a true admission that I aman addict.
You can muse.
Upon it on your own and think toyourself.
Th you're an addict, but onceyou tell another person, once
you put it out into the world,It becomes that much more real.

(04:53):
And to a lot of people, myselfcertainly included.
I didn't want to do that.
I didn't want to make this areal thing.
My really an addict.
If I never tell anybody, thenmaybe it'll go away.
No.
I put it out into the world andit became.
More real than it seemed before.
Which was crate news that meantI could finally do something

(05:15):
about it.

Microphone (Yeti Stereo Mic (05:18):
The second reason that I didn't want
to go look for help.
Is the fucking deep visceralguilt and shame.
That comes along with admittingto another person that you're an
addict.
You have this image of an addictin your mind that it's the

(05:40):
person climbing out from behinda dumpster.
You know, the homeless personthat you're walking over to get
to work.
That's a lot of peoples.
Version of an addict.
And you think to yourself, will.
That could never be me.
But as I've alluded to inearlier podcasts, There's a lot

(06:01):
of different versions ofdereliction.
And the more obvious ones.
Are actually in a lot of ways,easier to resolve because,
indeed they're obvious.
But.
It is really fucking hard.
And let me tell you, it takes.

(06:22):
A lot of humility.
To be able to sit down.
And admit that you have thisproblem to another person.
So why do I bring up humility?
Because I think that leads intothe third reason why it's
incredibly difficult to admit.
That you were an addict.

(06:43):
And that's because of our egos.
It's because of our narcissism.
And I've said this before, andI'll keep saying it.
One of the cornerstone pillarsof being an addict is.
Narcissism.
And.
You think to yourself?

(07:03):
Or else I'll speak from thefirst person here.
Okay.
I would always think to myself.
Em.
You are excelling in college.
You're doing well at work.
From the outside people, pat youon the back and your mom and dad
say, oh, you're doing such agreat job.

(07:23):
I have.
I'm not an addict.
I don't need help for this shitand hell.
Even if I can admit that I'm anaddict, I don't need help for
them.
Better than that.
I'm stronger than that.
But it's that narcissism, it'sthat huge ego of mine.
That prevented me from going andseeking the help that I really

(07:44):
needed.

Microphone (Yeti Stere (07:47):
Everyone tells a story about themselves.
What they are.
What they are not.
Who they want to be.
But for the addict.
Part of that story and indeed avery large part.
It's very dark.

(08:08):
And being able to admit that.
Man.
That's one of the biggestobstacles of that in this entire
process.
So once you're ready to gethelp.
I think that's going to be thenext turning point.
The next cornerstone.
And your journey of beating thisthing.

(08:31):
And the fourth reason peopledon't ask for help.
And the final reason is.
They don't know where the hellto go.
Shit at first, I didn't know.
I talked about this before Itried church.
And.
Christianity and, the God stuff.
It was helpful.

(08:51):
But it doesn't.
Exactly.
Speak to the disease ofaddiction, for example, you can
go to church and you'll get alot of great things from the
sermons, but that's not going tocure your diabetes.
And exactly the same way goingto church.
It's not going to cure youraddiction.
Maybe it'll make you feelbetter.

(09:12):
But the problem is still goingto be there.

Microphone (Yeti Stereo Mic (09:19):
And after that I tried therapy.
I would highly, highlyencourage.
Everybody to do therapy.
And this doesn't just go for theaddict.
This doesn't even just go forthe recovery on it.
This goes for everybody.
And then I, this has always beena strong, maybe hot take of
mine, which is if you have theinsurance to cover it and you're

(09:40):
paying what, 15,$20 for a copay.
You're spending an hour eachweek.
Literally just talking tosomebody who understands your
mind better than you understandit.
You might have every singlething in the world going for
you.
But how could it hurt to talk tosomebody who studied the human

(10:02):
psyche for 10 years?
It just makes no sense to me.
Why you wouldn't do it?
But yeah, for the addict.
I would recommend therapy.
I think it's incredibly valuableto do cognitive behavioral
therapy.
I don't know if that's enough inits own, right.
To get you over addiction,meeting with somebody for once a

(10:22):
week for an hour might not beenough.
But it's certainly a goodstarting point.
And in the same vein of therapy.
I don't hate psychiatry.
Sure.
It's drugs.
I'm an addict.
Shouldn't be doing them, but.
I think that there can be a lotof value in psychiatry if, and

(10:42):
only if you're honest with yourpsychiatrist about what your
problem is and what youraddictions are.
Your addiction is going to tryto.
CAEP itself out as hard as itcan.
When you're at that psychiatrylist in the back of your mind,
you might be wondering who let'ssee if I can get the doctor to

(11:03):
prescribe me X, Y, and Z.
Ugh, that's just going tocompound the problem.
If you do go to psychiatry,you're going to have to go in
there.
And be more honest than you'veever been in your entire life.
Like your life depends on it.
And indeed it does.

Microphone (Yeti Stereo Micr (11:20):
So I tried all these methods and in
their own right.
Even combined, it simply wasn'tenough for me.
What I ultimately needed was acommunity.
Uh, community.
Of addicts.
They constantly supported eachother and had their backs.

(11:41):
So I started going to.
Narcotics anonymous.
It's a 12 step program, as I'msure I've mentioned.
And I remember that first day Iwent in this individual, greeted
me there.
And.
For no reason.
He had a smile on his face and Iwas messed up, man.

(12:01):
I she's as Christ probably myfirst day being clean in.
At least a month.
And I did not want to fucking bethere.
But.
At the end of the meeting.
This nice friendly older guywith a smile on his face.
He tells me young man.
I want to see you back here nextweek.

(12:24):
I'm thinking to myself, fuck.
I don't want to fucking comeback here.
And it starts getting closer andcloser to Sunday.
And I'm thinking to myself.
Damn.
I don't want to let this olderdude down.
And of course.
Wanting to go to not letsomebody down.
Isn't the best reason tocontinue seeking help for

(12:45):
addiction.
But Hey.
It got me back into that, thatnext meeting and the rest is
history here.
I am.
About to be five years clean andit wouldn't have happened.
If I didn't have a community.
I'm not suggesting that.
Everybody you a hundred percentneeds the narcotics anonymous

(13:05):
community.
There's plenty of othercommunities out there.
There's rehabs.
You can go to, there's a new wayof getting clean.
I hear called smart.
And if you just Googlecommunities for addicts.
There's other ones that exist.
But my key point today, Is youneed to find.

(13:28):
Uh, community, you need to findother people that you can relate
to with this problem.
Because if you can't relate toanybody else, you're just going
to continue to feel alien andyou're going to continue to beat
up on yourself.
And the more you beat up onyourself, guess what?
The more you're going tocontinue to use.
That is indeed.

(13:50):
A vicious cycle.
One that needs to be broken.
Because your life depends on it.

Microphone (Yeti Stereo Mic (14:01):
And sorry if this, because your life
depends on it.
Sounds so fatalist, but.
Man being part of these roomsfull of addicts for the last
five years, I've seen people.
Come go.
Dive left and right.
And.
Yeah.
I, if I have any opportunity toprevent what happened to my best

(14:23):
friend.
I am going to take it.
And I'm going to fucking tellyou how it is, and I'm going to
tell you that people fucking diefrom this, and you cannot take
any of this stuff lightly.
All right.
That was kind of a heavy onetoday, everybody.
But.
If you've managed to stay withme.

(14:44):
I am incredibly grateful thatyou've given me the opportunity
to help you today.
And I hope you have anabsolutely blessing and
wonderful rest of your day.
And please keep tuning in ifyou're finding this helpful.
Maybe you just like the sound ofmy voice.
I know I have a nice tambour toit.
And I will see you again, nexttime on thoughts of an addict.

(15:05):
This is M.