So here’s the truth. After working in healthcare for twenty-four years, in emergency rooms and psych wards, coupled with my numerous experiences in dealing with alcoholics, I’ve learned a few things: Let’s see, my list covers most bases: I grew up with alcoholic mom, my first husband was an alcoholic, several of my siblings are either in recovery or need recovery, I’m in recovery, and God willing on June 22, I will have twenty-eight years of sobriety. I could go on about the other family member who appear to have the disease as well, but since I can’t label anyone else an alcoholic—I won’t go there. All I can say is that I have several family members on an urgent prayer list. I can’t help but see what I see. You spot it—you got it. We tend to know these things as anyone in recovery will tell you … it’s only natural that we recognize the disease, and this is why most doctors, therapist, and CD counselors don’t. Unless they are in recovery and understand the disease on an intimate level, what can they offer?
What do doctors know about alcoholism? The truth is that most know only a little if anything at all. They’ll never tell you that, but once you work in healthcare and realize that the system creates and supports addict behavior, the more you’ll understand that if you do want help, stay away from hospitals and doctors.
Their typical way of treating the addicts and alcoholics is that the person rolls through the doors, gets and assessment and a bed, and the prescribing begins. Never mind this is the fourth time this year that the same person has shown up with a dirty urine. The underlying substance abuse issue is never addressed. Depression and/or anxiety is the go to diagnosis. A common trifecta of medications that I see prescribed over and over are Effexor (an antidepressant), Buspar (for anxiety), and Neurontin (for nerve pain or neuropathy), I have no idea why Neurontin is tossed in the mix, but it seems to be more often than not.
This sort of treatment of the addict/alcoholic makes little sense to me. It is not effective, the patient stays stuck in their misery, and the hospital makes a lot of money. This is the truth of what is happening out there, and sadly, in the last forty years, not much has changed. How do I know? Well, back in the day, my mother was one of those patients. The doctors “treated” her for over twenty-five years without her showing any improvement whatsoever. In fact, she continued to get worse and worse. It was only when she crossed paths with a physician who was also a recovering alcoholic, and who pegged my mother for what she was—an alcoholic, that my mother got the help that she needed. She went to rehab, and after thirty days when she was released, she jumped into AA, worked a program, and stayed sober for thirty years, until she died. She was so grateful for a solution to her problem, and went on to help hundreds of women to live better lives.
There are too many doctors out there who are ineffective for a number of reasons:
- They aren’t interested in addiction, and therefore have no understanding of the disease.
- They have addiction issues or behavioral issues of their own, and are blind to the illness.
- They enable.
So what does this look like in the medical setting? Doctors are disinterested in addiction because it’s not all that profitable to heal people. Once people are healed of their maladies, whether it be addiction or not, doctors and hospitals realize that they are not going to have a repeat customer. There’s no profit in cures. Doctors also realize that someone who has found a solution will not come back to the hospital, and they probably will no longer want to come to the doctor’s office for prescriptions.
Was He a Psychopath?
I worked with a resident, this was years ago—but his mindset was scary. This doctor was charming, good looking, and had all the wrong motives. In fact, he confided to me that cocaine helped him stay awake to study, and that his goal was to finish medical school and head south to Naples, Florida. His plan was to prescribe medications like Ativan and Xanax, to the “rich” old women in Florida. This is the truth, I kid you not! I have no doubt, this is exactly what that doctor went on to do with his career. He also pointed out that he became a doctor because then, “I’ll have a candy store at my fingertips.”
The last camp of doctors are the ones who truly cannot sniff out the addict. This is the doctor who feels sorry for these poor pitiful addicts/alcoholics, and buys into all of their sob stories. He or she will keep them as a patient for years—all while trying different medications to help them feel better.
There you have it. What I’ve described is the truth about doctors and how they view the addict. Most doctors are like lost boats on a roaring sea. They would help a lot more people if they would be willing to either admit that they don’t understand the disease, and then point the patient in the direction of someone who does, or talk about their own addiction issues and share their experience with their patients on where and how to find meaningful help.
I guess that whole approach makes too much sense, and it would also require the physician to swallow their pride and come clean. What doctor will ever do that? The stigma is so great in the medical community, that few doctors, if any, will admit that they are addicts/alcoholics, and this must change. If we ever care to move forward and provide people with the help they need, we need to first, change the destructive attitudes that are so prevalent in the medical community.