Addiction and Schizophrenia in an American Family, Part 9 of 9

      ADDICTION AND SCHIZOPHRENIA IN AN AMERICAN FAMILY, Part 9 of 9

            (Adapted from “A NEW AMERICAN FAMILY: A Love Story,”      

             Published by University of Arizona Press, 2011.)                

Part 9    

     This story of our family’s trials with mental illness has played out in a larger society that has yet to come to grips with such problems.

     As the nation’s “drug czar” in the 1980’s, Bill Bennett invited me among others in a small group of college presidents to a private hearing in Washington, D.C., seeking counsel on strategies to combat drug use on college campuses. When we went around the table for testimony by individual presidents, every one of us independently characterized alcohol as the “drug of choice” on campus and the source of the greatest danger to individuals and institutions.  This was not what Mr. Bennett wanted to hear because his focus was understandably on illegal drugs, beginning with marijuana.  The meeting was not very productive.  Twenty-five years later we are not doing much better.

     The language we use to describe America’s drug problem is often confused and confusing, but words are important.  When we speak of “drugs” do we include all mind-altering substances, or merely those that are illegal?  Do we mean to include only substances that are addictive?  What about substances that seem to cause addiction for some individuals but not others?  Are we dealing with mental illness or just bad behavior?  Are we concerned about “drug abuse” or just “drug addiction”?  And what do we mean by the terms “abuse” and “addiction”?  Before we have any hope of solving a problem, we must learn how to talk about it in language we all understand.

     If we use the term “drug” to describe any mind-altering substance, we have included a very wide variety of chemicals, some of which are medically prescribed or generally acceptable for social and recreational use.  Alcohol is a drug by such a definition, but so is caffeine.  I am comfortable with such a broad use of the term, but I use it in this way with no stigma attached.  America’s drug problem is not drug use but drug abuse, particularly by people addicted to certain substances.

     When Mr. Bennett’s panel of college presidents described alcohol as the number-one problem on campus, they were reporting widespread and dangerous use of alcohol to the point of extreme drunkenness and associated violent and destructive behavior, such as rape or assault.  In general, they were reporting alcohol abuse, which only rarely was explained by yet-undiagnosed alcohol addiction.

     I have often wondered about some of my college buddies at Stanford who seemed even then to drink excessively.  Were they budding alcoholics?  I do know of one example at Lehigh of a very impressive student leader who told me in his sophomore year that he needed alcohol to handle the pressures of student life, and told me years later at an alumni affair that he was then a recovering alcoholic.  Alcoholism on campus can be veiled by the prevalence of hard drinkers who establish a false sense of what represents a “normal” amount of drinking.

     I use the term “drug addict” to describe someone who chronically feels compelled to use drugs even with the knowledge that such use is destructive to the user and to other people who should matter to the user, such as family and friends.  I see drug addiction as a chronic mental illness or brain malfunction that we do not yet understand in physiological terms and consequently cannot yet cure.  As research into brain function yields better understanding of mental illnesses in all their variety and complexity, I expect addiction to be better understood in this context.

     Alcohol seems to be a drug that can be used extensively by some people without addiction, but some people are rapidly addicted even in adolescence.

     Nicotine seems to be almost universal in its powers of addiction, but the negative consequences of tobacco addiction are generally delayed and therefore less immediately destructive to the user and others.  Nicotine addicts may also pay with their lives, but they pay later.

     Marijuana is potentially addictive by the definition used here, but it seems to be less powerful in its addictive grip than alcohol. 

     We are all sadly familiar with the litany of deadly drugs whose addicts populate our prisons and emergency rooms, drugs like heroin, crack cocaine, and methamphetamines. Their destructive influence on our society is disproportionate to the numbers of users because of associated criminal behavior.             

     Any frank discussion of addiction to alcohol or other drugs must first acknowledge the seriousness of this affliction and the extreme difficulty of overcoming such a pernicious chronic illness.  It would be wrong, however, to end in despair.  Although programs for recovery fail to achieve permanent success more often than they succeed, it is important to the prospects of recovery that the family and friends of the addict never abandon their love and never give up the hope of recovery that keeps the possibility alive until death intervenes.

     Pat and I never gave up on our kids, even as addictions early in their adult lives made it easier to just walk away.  Tough love is sometimes the necessary alternative to enabling the addictions of family members, but it is love nonetheless.  Pat and I managed to preserve our loving relationships with three children who battled through alcohol and drug addiction as young adults.  Two of the three fought their way to recovery.  John died at thirty-three, still in the bosom of his family.

Peter Likins