By Tanya Hazelwood
Idle Threats
I am going to be completely honest with you. I am a self-pitying, brat. I always have been. If I didn’t get my way as a child, I threw fits until the adults around me gave in and most of the time it worked. I guess that is a habit I never let go of, even as an adult.
I find myself sometimes becoming angry when things don’t go my way or someone doesn’t act the way toward me that I feel they should. Granted, I no longer throw myself on the floor, kicking and screaming, but it’s the same thing. My tactic now is self-threatening. “well, I’ll just show them, I’ll go drink, that will teach them.” Who am I freakin’ kidding here? How in the world is that teaching anyone a lesson? How in the world would that make anyone conform to my ideals? Is this my own bratty behavior or is this my disease? This is one I have yet to figure out.
I get angry about being the “good guy” now. Sometimes, I have to admit it’s very overwhelming and exhausting. Sometimes it felt easier to be the hot mess of a drunk. I don’t recall so much pressure being put on me by others and myself. Perhaps, I was just blind to it, but none the less, sometimes I just want to give in, throw in the towel and say “screw it”, and head for the nearest bar or liquor store.
Yeah, I’ll show them alright. What a dummy. What exactly would I accomplish by having a drink? All the effort I’ve put in. All the friends I’ve made. All the people I have inspired and look up to me. How would I affect them? Why am I wanting to punish them? Or myself? I know, really I do, how very simple it would be just to undo all that I’ve accomplished. One simple drink isn’t just that. One simple drink, ends it all.
It’s almost like threatening suicide for me and believe me, I’ve done that. I spent 24 hours in the psych ward at University of Maryland Hospital for cutting my wrists. The local police and ambulance have showed up at my house because I took pills and had a butcher knife in my hand when I passed out. I have cut my wrists and tried overdosing more times than I care to count. It was always drug and alcohol induced. I once believed that death was the only way out of the misery I was living in. BUT NOW??? I have no misery and threatening to drink, even in my own head, is a death sentence. How dare I?
I read somewhere that “anger is like holding on to a hot coal and expecting it to burn someone else”. So who am I really angry with, so much so that I threaten to pick up a drink? Is it really my friends, who hang out with someone else and not me? Is it my husband who works so much and isn’t around to give me 100% attention? Is it my dogs that leave hair all over the place? Is it my work place and the stress of starting my new business? I don’t think it really is. I think those are just all lame excuses that I have created in my head for pity sake.
So I have to stop putting that bottle to my head and threatening to pull the trigger. I need to grow up and stop being that little brat with the pouty lip and crocodile tears. I must remember that this is the life God wanted me to have all along and beating on the doors that He closed only invites the devil to open them.