Believe that life will get better on the other side of your addiction, because it will.
When people are trapped in a severe addiction, it can feel like there is no way out and there is no hope for a better future. This is of course not true. Millions of people are in recovery from an addiction and they go on to lead successful, fulfilling and inspiring lives.
Authority Magazine started a new series about women who were able to achieve great success after recovering from an addiction. The premise of the series is to offer hope and inspiration to people who feel trapped in similar circumstances. As a part of this series we had the pleasure to interview Maura Casey.
In a journalism career that spanned more than three decades, Maura Casey wrote opinion for four newspapers, including as a member of The New York Times editorial board. The winner of more than 40 journalism awards, Casey writes a weekly substack column called, “Casey’s Catch,” with thousands of subscribers. Her book, “Saving Ellen: A Memoir of Hope and Recovery” (Skyhorse Publishing) will be released on April 1, and you can read the first chapter on her website, www.caseyink.com.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood “backstory”?
I was the youngest of six in a big Irish family and grew up in Buffalo, NY. When my sister Ellen contracted kidney disease in the 1960s, before transplants were common, the illness was considered fatal, My father collapsed into alcoholism and a very public affair with a married woman; my mother, a wise-cracking WWII Army vet, became determined to save Ellen no matter what. Some of the decisions she made to help save Ellen, including donating her own kidney in a then-rare transplant, she kept secret, but they had an impact on all of us.
No matter how sick Ellen got, she was courageous and smart, and never, ever complained. It was beautiful, and also a burden. I grew up thinking that nothing I went through was worthy of attention unless it was a matter of life and death. Even when I was raped at the age of 12 by a stranger who mugged me on the way home from school, I felt like I was one more burden and had to act like I was OK, when in fact I was traumatized and depressed.
What saved me was writing. A teacher assigned us to keep a journal, and told us not to worry about spelling or grammar. He said just to write. He would check to see that we were doing the assignment, but otherwise, it was something we should do for ourselves. That became my therapy, and in fact, I have never stopped keeping journals.
Do you feel comfortable sharing with our readers how you were initially introduced to your addiction? What drew you to the addiction you had?
Alcohol was the most beloved member of the family. We were all angry at Dad for drinking because his behavior became abusive when he was drunk, but we never blamed the booze. Heavy drinking was normalized and parents in our circle then thought if a young person started drinking at home, they would learn how to “handle it.” One of my brothers gave me a bottle of beer for the first time at the age of 13 and I loved the feeling it gave me. I felt that all my problems melted away. So I began to drink at home once in awhile, then regularly, and by the time I was 16 I was drinking a lot. My parents thought it was no big deal. Yet it was a very big deal.
As you know, addictions are often an attempt to mask an underlying problem. In your experience, what do you think you were really masking or running from in the first place? Can you explain?
Honestly, I think the theory of addiction taking place to cover up another problem is a little bit overdone. The fact was that alcohol made me feel absolutely marvelous, and that was more than enough. Yes, I was traumatized by being sexually assaulted. I was worried about my sister all the time. My father would go into alcoholic rages and life at home was a Roman circus. But even if life was easier, I might have become an alcoholic anyway. As I have heard in more than one AA meeting, and I agree with, there is ALWAYS a reason to rationalize drinking. The cat died; the cat lived. Both good reasons for a drink.
Can you share what the lowest point in your addiction and life was?
I have a really boring drunkalogue. I didn’t rage out of control. I didn’t go on benders and upset my family. I will say that I realized in college that I was drinking every day and that wasn’t good. After college at the age of 23, I worked for a homeless shelter and management sent me to the Rutgers School of Alcohol Studies for training to be a drug counselor. It’s a very intense, three-week summer school; literally courses and seminars on all aspects of addiction go on from 8 am to 9 pm every single day. It opened my eyes and made me begin to realize that I was developing a serious problem, that I had been in denial and it was part of the family disease that had afflicted my family for generations. But still, I didn’t stop. I told myself that I could control it.
Was there a tipping point that made you decide that you needed to change? Can you please share the story?
I am married to a lovely man of Italian descent who is just as happy having one beer a week, or none at all. He really doesn’t care about drinking. So my truly heavy drinking was limited to my attending journalism conferences without him, otherwise his own lack of interest in drinking would have wrecked my fun.
I was 28. Journalists, then and now, love to drink. And it was early December. The conference took about 20 of us to Annapolis for a fabulous dinner in a private room, with a bar, overlooking the harbor. The Christmas lights, the water, the company, the convivial atmosphere, all made it a memorable, and marvelous, evening. I was drinking whiskey but promised myself I would just have maybe two. Of course I blew right past that. Then on the bus ride back to our Baltimore hotel, someone brought a case of chilled champagne on the bus. We all began to drink, singing Christmas carols, and by the time we got to the hotel I was hammered. About 6 of us decided we would finish off the case. So we proceeded to do exactly that. I have rarely been so drunk as when I fell in my bed at 3 am. Every time I closed my eyes I felt nauseated. Every time I opened them the room would spin. It was awful. The next day I was really shaky. I looked in the bathroom mirror of that hotel room and saw an alcoholic looking back at me. I knew that I had set a limit, couldn’t keep it, and that it was a huge sign of being an alcoholic. I knew then that I was done.
Can you tell us the story about how you were able to overcome your addiction?
Being married to someone like my husband made it really easy. I wasn’t in a situation where I was living with a heavy drinker. Pete didn’t care about booze. He didn’t care if we had it in the house. That helped me a lot. The only hard thing was the fact that I gave it up at Christmas time. I walked into my neighborhood bar on a visit to Buffalo, and the owner, who was Greek, sent to my table a tray of 10 shots of ouzo. I nearly had a heart attack and gave away those shots as quickly as I could, but it was a near thing. Mostly, talking to others about my alcoholism helped, and eventually, getting friends in AA who I could go to AA meetings with. I never wanted to go alone in the beginning. My friend Kate and I used to go to meetings on our lunch hour from work, and that was great.
How did you reconcile within yourself and to others the pain that addiction caused to you and them? Can you please share a story about that?
I didn’t really hurt anyone as much as myself. I embarrassed myself with my drinking. I got stopped by the police once and I could not believe that they didn’t arrest me for drunk driving, just told me to drive home. It was before the act of drinking and driving was taken so seriously. I was lucky I didn’t hurt anyone then.
When you stopped your addiction, what did you do to fill in all the newfound time you had?
I didn’t have that much extra time. Just reading, writing free lance articles. Alcohol sapped my ambition. I knew if I kept drinking I would never be the writer I wanted to be, and when I stopped, I was able to feel that ambition and act on it.
What positive habits have you incorporated into your life, post addiction, to keep you on the right path?
Meditation. Walking dogs (we have two)
Can you tell us a story about the success that you achieved after you began your recovery?
Like I said above, sobriety enabled me to feel ambitious again. I started taking work home from the paper and really work on editorials — rewriting some, until they were as good as I could make them. Then I began to collect writing awards for my editorials. The Walker Stone Award from Scripps-Howard, then considered second to the Pulitzer prize, which I won over 127 other newspaper entries. The highest award for public service in New England journalism, the Horace Greeley award, for an editorial campaign to toughen laws against those found guilty of sex crimes against kids. Not drinking really helped me hit my stride. I began freelancing more, and eventually, the NY Times noticed me, and my writing, and offered me a job on the editorial board.
What character traits have you transferred from your addiction to your current achievements? Please share both the positive and negative.
I used to think that drinking made me more outgoing, but I learned that I can be outgoing with a glass of water in my hand. Sobriety is beautiful. I don’t need to drink, frankly, and never did. I can’t think of any character traits I transferred that were negative that I brought along into sobriety.
Can you share five pieces of advice that you would give to a person who is struggling with some sort of addiction but is ashamed to speak about it or get help?
- There are many, many ways to get sober. Find yours.
- Never stop trying to stop. It is a fact that it often takes more than one try. That isn’t failure. It is delayed success — as long as you keep trying.
- Believe that life will get better on the other side of your addiction, because it will.
- Find an example of a sober person you can emulate and admire. I had a journalism friend who stopped a few years before I did. When I attended journalism conferences I would practically tie a knot to Joanna and hang on. She helped me by her example; she taught me how to turn a wine glass upside down at dinners to signal to waiters that you did not intend to drink. Finding a positive example in your life is a very powerful and inspiring thing.
- Shame is a liar. Who you are is nothing to be ashamed of. When you feel shame, understand that it is your addiction talking, and not reality. Who you are, in truth, is a beautiful and strong, sober person waiting to take that first step and change the course of the future. Do it. Take that step. I will be waiting for you on the other side.
We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.
Mika Brzezinski, because her “Know Your Value” campaign is so positive for women of every age to understand that to get ahead, you have to be ready to negotiate and have confidence in yourself. Love that.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
Casey’s Catch on Substack, https://maurac.substack.com/ I would be honored if readers subscribed.
My own website, www.caseyink.com
My book is coming out in April: “Saving Ellen: A Memoir of Hope and Recovery.” Check it out!
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.
Author Maura Casey On How To Achieve Great Success After Recovering From An Addiction was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.