In the Beginning: Part 1

I'm a very good actress. In ancient Greece, the term for an actor was hypokrites, the root for our word hypocrite. Addicts are good at that. And as I said, I am a very good actress. For years, everyone thought I was very in charge of my life - they even thought I was happy. To be honest: I was such a good actress, I even fooled myself a lot of the time.

The problem was the part of the time I couldn't fool myself. During that time, I lived in a black hole of absolute despair that I kept carefully hidden from the rest of the world - along with my addiction. And the awful part was: I couldn't understand why I was so broken, why I was... well... crazy. All I knew was that during those times, I felt like a razor blade was dissecting my heart from the inside. But when you are an actress, you can't let anyone know. So I didn't.

My addiction and I entered what I called my Spockonian period. If I didn't feel emotion, then I couldn't hurt. In fact, the only time I felt any emotion was when I was deep in my addiction. And then I felt guilt and shame, but at least I felt something, I guess.

Usually, when we self-medicate, we are trying to kill the pain. I guess I was trying to kill an emotional pain I hadn't discovered yet. But with my addiction, I was trying to do just the opposite: I was trying to create pain. My addiction started at a ridiculously young age and as I grew older, I tried more creative ways to hurt myself - not harm myself - there is a difference. But my desire for pain absolutely convinced me that there was something very wrong deep inside. All I knew was that, after I had given in, I hated myself with a passion - the limit of the emotion I would allow myself.

Some people would say this was just a choice, but they would be wrong. There was an agony deep in my soul and something dark that I felt a need to punish. And the guilt I felt caused a continual grief that eventually drove me into depression so deep that I finally had to seek help.

Most frustrating was that I had tried over and over and over to stop the behavior and I had won the victory over and over only to have my monster rear its head a year or two later, leaving me bleeding my soul out from my own betrayal and my weakness.

Still, I had no clue as to why I was so broken, why I was so weak. And I certainly didn't consider myself an addict! Depressed yes, addicted no.

So I began a new part of my life.

I started therapy and, for the first time, gained some insight into my downward spiraling life. It was not something I wanted to face, not something that can ever be proved, nor anything now that has to be proved. But it helped me to understand why my life had become a living hell, even though most people around me still thought I was the happy person they saw.

(Continued in "In the Beginning: Part 2 - Revelations)