Ride the Tiger
Hunter Biden said, "The problem is not that the drug fails. The problem is that what it does is unrepeatable, and you will burn your entire life to the ground trying to get back to a place that no longer exists."
I’d argue, as someone who has never tossed a match to their life chasing a high, that Nicholas didn’t want to “get back” to that initial high, because Nicholas was smart. He had to know after doing it a few thousand times that if he didn’t feel it then, the next time wasn’t going to happen either.
Nicholas could settle for close, less than, or good enough. He settled with his morals, expectations, and relationships. So settling makes sense to me. He was trying to titrate medicine to the exact line of not noticeable on the outside but soft and safe on the inside.
To misquote Brene Brown, all of us are driven to want to feel love and belonging.
Why he didn’t feel like the planets circled him is beyond me.
Gabor Mate says most people with addiction are trying to soothe trauma. Maybe Gabor Mate is right and I, the mother, will never be open enough to sort through and find that trauma.
Or maybe Mate is wrong.
What if addiction happens? That drive is a cauldron of genetics, dosage, social pressure, mental health issues, environment, and sinister magic. And everyone knows that it is in the parasite's best interest not to kill their host.
This all could be bull shit. Again, I’ve never felt like burning my life down in return for being out of control because I'm in Al-Anon. And people like me love being in control.
The definition of addiction according to Merriam-Webster: : a compulsive, chronic, physiological or psychological need for a habit-forming substance, behavior, or activity having harmful physical, psychological, or social effects and typically causing well-defined symptoms (such as anxiety, irritability, tremors, or nausea) upon withdrawal or abstinence :
I would argue instead of “typically causing well-defined symptoms” it should read ending with either death, continuing the cycle, or becoming someone different. Those are the choices.
The thing I keep going to is the randomness of life and death. My therapist says, this wasn’t personal.
Nicholas was on the back of a Tiger, and he went out with one hand in the air, and the other holding on to the nape of its neck; fur dug into his fingernails.
Ride the tiger, Nicholas.
If you’re interested in preordering, The Trimesters of Grief is available anywhere books are sold.
