I got drunk for the first time at 14. I was at my oldest brother’s wedding reception. Nothing in our childhood or home life suggested I’d be susceptible to alcoholism. My mom refused to take communion when the church switched from grape juice to wine, and my dad would only have a drink if somebody insisted on buying him one. Even then, I never saw him empty the glass or have more than one in a year’s time.
My brother married into a family with other ideas, and they celebrated wedded bliss with alcohol for the masses. I got my hands on more than a drink or two, and I discovered this liquid changed the way I felt about myself. Suddenly, I was at ease. I was fun, witty, the life of the party. I loved the euphoria, and I wanted that feeling to last.
But to bring it back, I had to drink again and again, more each time. I got suspended from sports and picked up as a minor in possession of alcohol. But those things didn’t matter. Nothing was more important than trying to regain that feeling I experienced the first time I drank. Sometimes I came close to getting it back, but it was always just out of reach.
When I was a little older, classmates of mine were coming back from Vietnam, and I discovered the mind-altering magic of marijuana. Just like that, I was 14 again, taking my first sip of alcohol. I was always looking for my next high, and I found it again and again. Using cocaine. Heroin.
The first time was always the best. But the drug-induced feelings of euphoria would never last.
Little by little, the reason why I injected, sniffed, snorted and smoked drugs into my body seemed to change. They became the crutch I leaned on to feel like I belonged. But using quit working for me. The drugs and alcohol became my albatross.
I could no longer control when or how much I was going to use or how many days I would be on a bender.
One weekend, a friend had left some drugs in my care while he went to work on a Saturday. It started out as just a little sample. My friend wouldn’t notice. But that turned into another hit and another. Like a little kid left alone with a tub of ice cream, I was couldn’t stop. I was hearing noises and getting paranoid that the cops were outside. I had to escape. I couldn’t get caught!
I left the house and got lost in the cornfield for two days, chasing things that were not there. I might have died out there if my roommate’s dog, Booter, hadn’t found me. The gluttonous mutt was named after a method of doing drugs where you draw blood into the syringe before and after injection. Everything we did during those years revolved around the subculture of using. I followed Booter home. I staggered inside and woke up my roommate. “I can’t take anymore,” I said. “I’m going to treatment.” He told me, “Go to bed. When you get up, we’ll go get drunk and talk about it.”
I called my folks instead. I admitted that I had a drinking and drug problem and needed help. They didn't really ask a lot of questions about any of my behavior. My family never really discussed feelings or fears. They picked me up and dropped me off at a treatment center in Sioux City. I was put on thorazine, a powerful drug used to treat psychotic disorders like schizophrenia and manic-depression. My first week there was a blur – the details lost to detox.
After about nine days, if you were good, they would let you walk down to the convenience store to get a pop or a snack. While I was out, they ransacked my room looking for drugs. They were sure I was still using. I said,” Hell, I’m still coming down!”
The argument got heated. I was getting kicked out or I was leaving – I don’t know which – but either way, suddenly, I was out the front door and walking down the street again. The counselor yelled after me, “You’re going to the bar! You’re going to get drunk again!”
And she was right. I was heading down to Fourth Street, to the bars where I used to drink.
Her words caught me at just the right time and stopped me in my tracks as I was passing by a pay phone. Furiously overcome by an I’ll-show-you attitude, I called a friend to pick me up and give me a ride back to my parents’ house. I knew they were out of town, and I could try to figure out what to do.
When I walked through the front door, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror in the entryway. For the first time, I saw what I had become. I was no longer the middle-class farm kid that I had grown up as in lily white Iowa. I was an alcoholic, drug addict with long hair, a full scraggly beard, and sunken eyes with black rings around them. I feared myself and how I looked.
From this point on, I started to attend AA meetings, sometimes four to seven times a week out of fear of relapse. I had done this for about six months when I was at an AA meeting with the counselor that had ousted me from the treatment center. I was surprised at what I did next. I walked up to her and said, “I’m sorry about how things went down. I wanted to thank you for helping me find the courage to stay sober.”
From that moment on, I found a sense of serenity in my sobriety. I finally started to work on all 12 steps of recovery. I continued to go to meetings and to practice the program’s principles in all areas of my life. I read the Big Book and got a sponsor, who helped me articulate the fears and insecurities that led me to love the magic of drugs and alcohol in the first place.
That phone booth, the mirror on the wall, all those AA meetings – they moved me to get and stay sober for the past 37 years. Since then, there have been moments of sheer joy that didn’t need to be swallowed, smoked or injected but rather just acknowledged and experienced for what they were – and boy, did it feel good.
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Brian McNaughton from Lawton, Iowa, has owned Mac's Heating and Air since 1981. Hemade an unsuccessful bid for a seat on the Woodbury County Board of Supervisors last year.
Ode is a storytelling series where community members tell true stories on stage to promote positive impact through empathy. It is produced by Siouxland Public Media.
The next event is 7 p.m. Friday, April 7 at the Peirce Mansion. The theme is “Growing up Is Hard to Do.” Tickets are available at kwit.org. For more information, visit facebook.com/odestorytelling.
