5 Questions for an Adult Child of an Alcoholic

Author Tanya Savko has started a new "5 Questions for..." series on her blog. It is designed to highlight authors who address topics that affect family relationships. Tanya is a very generous writer friend. It was her encouragement that tipped me over the edge to go forth with publishing Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar. I appreciate her. She is a beautiful person, inside and out. 

I am honored to be the first interview. 

Check it out here.

Drinking With Men

Today, NPR ran a story on a new memoir titled Drinking With Men. I have not read the book, but based on the interview, I left this comment on NPR. 

I am author of my own memoir, Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar. I wonder if Rosie Schaap and others like her ever consider the possibility that the men she shares drinks and camaraderie with might be there at the expense of their marriages and children? If he's being the generous big spender buying the drinks, I wonder if she knows he's just blown his kid's lunch money for the next day, or the electric bill for the month? The subtitle of my book is: For every regular manning a barstool there is likely a family at home. I'm not saying it is Ms. Schaap's responsibility to know or care. I just used to get the willies when I heard someone, mostly drinking buddies, say what a swell guy my father was, when he was abusive and pissing our money and our family down the drain.

This piece seems to romanticize "bar culture." When the guy at the bar is your alcoholic dad, it isn't romantic at all.

I do realize I am seeing this through my own lens, and I can't speak to the experience of all bar regulars.  

How to help an adolescent cope with her parent's addiction

Healing is a cyclic ongoing process. During meditation today, I was surprised to note some feelings of resentment come up for my extended family when I was growing up. A specific uncle came to mind. He was always my favorite. He and his wife tended to avoid our sick family like the plague. And who could blame them?

But we'd see them occasionally, and he was funny, and fun, and I loved him and no...there is no way he could have ever saved me or my sibs from the experience we were having but here's what he could have done, had he known what to do. He could have taken me aside and said this:

"What you are going through right now, with your father's drinking and the poverty and the filth, is not your fault. It isn't okay. It sucks and you shouldn't have to deal with it. You deserve every good thing and it breaks my heart that you are living this way and I wish I could fix it, but I can't." 

He could have gone on to say,

"What you need to know is this isn't you.  You are better than this. You are not going to live like this forever. I see strength in you. I see your good loving heart. You are going to make it. You are going to excel. You are going to fly. I know this about you. I see it." 

It would have taken two minutes to have that conversation. 

Words are powerful things. 

It would have meant the world.

The Highlands, San Antonio, and Hawaii!

So, Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar continues to travel. Above she's hanging out in The Highlands! Thank you Amanda!

Here she is in San Antonio Texas. Melly left a post it note on it, inviting (or imploring) whomever found it to take it home with them and read it. She left it at an educational center, which thrills me. The idea of teachers reading my book, and possibly looking at children differently because of it. Well...I just can't think of anything more gratifying than that. It's the whole point.

And below, Janie made it to a public Library in Hawaii, courtesy of Wanda!

Makes my heart sing. And chuckle, because I would totally be that person who visited the library on a dream vacation to Hawaii.

I pray that whoever happens upon my book will read it and find a way to look at the shame they carry in their own lives, and begin to release it. We're all in this together.

Love.

Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar Goes on Vacation!

It started when my friend Betsy left a copy of Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar in a hotel library in France(above). She loved the idea of someone a world away being compelled to pull it off the shelf and then finding connection with my story.   

And then Melly, she went on vacation to my old stomping grounds, Washington DC. This is what she wrote when she posted the photo on Facebook... "Released this book on the orange line and said a prayer that the person who needs it will find it." How sweet is she? We both thought it kind of cool that "Daughter" wound up in DC, in real life and on Melly's vacation. The orange line was always my favorite. "Next stop, Rosslyn!"

Elizabeth Aquino left a copy at The China Peak Inn, near Yosemite, where she waited to pick up her son from summer camp. The copy she left had a sweet view of The Sierra Nevadas (at least 'til someone finds it).

Carrie Link reports she left a copy in La Pine, Oregon while she was on vacation. 

And I left a copy in the hotel I stayed at last weekend in upstate NY, for my in-laws 50th anniversary. She's overlooking a beautiful golf course. 

There are still a few places Daughter is headed. I'll keep you posted. Is it okay to be jealous that my book is more well traveled than I am? 

Thanks to all who are taking part in her excellent adventure. This is really fun. If you'd like to take Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar on vacation with you, and leave her for someone to find, let me know. I still have a few copies left for this purpose. 

Author Exposure Review

A nice review from the Author Exposure blog. It really speaks to why I wrote the book. After reading the review, someone asked me if I thought my book would be good to give to a friend who is considering marrying an alcoholic. I never thought about "that person" as my audience, but who better to read Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar?

If "that person" reads my book, and if it helps inform their decision and save her/or him (and any future children) some heart ache? I'd feel really good about that.  

I feel like my own mom had no idea what she was getting herself into. She was like that metaphor about the frog in the boiling water. I'm not saying alcoholics are not deserving of love. I'm not saying you shouldn't marry one. But it would be best to go in with your eyes open, and have firm boundaries about what you will and will not tolerate.

Coming Down the Mountain and Women on Writing: Nice words about Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar

It was so nice to stumble upon this blog post at Coming Down the Mountain:A Writer's Blog! Karen Gowen, writer of said post runs a website called celerytree.com, a gathering place for self-published authors to market and sell their books. I put Daughter of the Drunk at the Bar up on Karen's site a couple of months back, because I thought she offered a really nice opportunity for independently published authors to support one another. She didn't tell me about her post, I came across it when I mumble googled myself. Yes, I googled myself. There I said it. Don't act like you've never done it. It's a perfectly natural thing to do. And technically I didn't google myself, I googled my book.

I was also recently featured along with three other writers in an article by Chynna Laird for Women on Writing. It is about taboo topics. Chynna is a prolific writer and a survivor, and an amazing special needs mom. She blew the lid off of taboo topics with her own brave memoir, White Elephants. She tells her story with such grace and understanding for her mother who was mentally ill, and subsequently very abusive. I really recommend her book. The scene that is coming to me now is of a loving aunt, who took her in and loved her, and no doubt changed the way she looked at herself and the trajectory of her life.



Those of us who have survived childhood trauma know how important these people are. The ones who offer a leg up. The ones who see something of value in us, even if shame keeps us from seeing it in ourselves.

I just love writers supporting other writers in telling their stories. Thank you Karen. Thank you Chynna.

And thank you to my Grandmother Doris Wilson, who by being thrilled every time I walked in the door as a child, led me to believe I might be lovable and good.