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A prison of alcoholism
This is the second of three stories in a series about alcoholism in the NWT

Andrew Livingstone
Northern News Services
Published Monday, April 6, 2009

SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - For John, becoming sober was the beginning of a transformation.

"It's almost like I was a beautiful statue stuck inside a rock, waiting for the master sculptor to form me by taking away little bits of rock from here and there and making me what I am today."

NNSL Photo/Graphic

Building on fellowship and strength through experience, Alcoholics Anonymous is one way for a person to escape the grasp of alcohol addiction, something Jason Franson is using to take back control of his life, and something John has looked to for 18 years. - Andrew Livingstone/NNSL photo

Turning into that statue within the rock of alcoholism is a difficult process to make. Taking the steps to bring change to a life plagued by alcohol can be terrifying.

Change in general can be hard to handle, not knowing what will come next. There is a sense of loneliness when the idea of giving up alcohol is pondered, a horrific feeling of failure can deter someone from even making the first step of accepting the idea of change.

It's making the choice to change that will start a person on the path to a healthier life. For John (anonymity is a pillar in the philosophy of Alcoholics Anonymous, so to honour its ideals, News/North will refrain for revealing John's last name) it took 10 long, agonizing years of struggling with who he was to finally take that leap of faith to rediscover who he really was.

"The first 15 years of my drinking were quite enjoyable," John said. He drank for 25 years before finally getting sober in 1991. "I didn't get into serious grapes, but the last 10 years were the complete opposite. They were a living nightmare."

In November 1991, John received news that his 18-year-old son had frozen to death in Yellowknife.

"I can't really say it was his death that made me want to quit drinking. I saw the world in a different way and realized I could die like my son."

Born on the land just shortly after The Second World War, before Inuvik was a town, John said all he ever knew was his traditional way of life. His mother died giving birth to his younger brother when he was five and a half.

He spent almost five years drifting between aunts and uncles before he was taken away to residential school in Aklavik.

"We were picked up by the Beacon and the Messenger, boats used by the missionaries to bring a lot of our young people throughout the region back to Aklavik. That's when I was separated from my existence as I knew it then. I learned to speak English and lost my own language."

He moved to Inuvik in 1959 where he was adopted by the school administrator and took their name in 1960. He completed his schooling there and he said it was then that everything changed.

"I turned my back on everything," he said. "Since the death of my mom, I went through a lot of trauma. The loss of language, traditions and culture - I felt displaced.

For the past 10 years before his sobriety in 1991, John watched his life crumble, as he battled with his alcoholism.

"I tried to raise a family, have a relationship, work," he said. "In the end, alcohol took that all away from me. I was caught between wanting and needing a drink to feel good and wanting not to drink anymore and change."

The whole transformation from the day John took his last drink 18 years ago to today was a long process. In and out of AA for years, trying to find salvation and a guiding light to support him in his change, John finally embraced the fellowship of the organization.

"I became part of it instead of being on the outside looking in," he said. "I started to look from the inside out. I look at the fellowship as the perfect parent. It allows me to be who I am, the way I want to, and yet, being open enough to let the program change me."

In the beginning, John hated being at meetings, exposed for everyone to see, to be vulnerable and open for others to see.

"Being as sick as I was, I didn't want anyone to know that, to invade my privacy of who I really was on the inside. I became aware of all the negative emotions, to accept I was full of rage and fear, and slowly those meetings started to make sense to me, and I figured out what I needed to do to get better."

Being aware of the fact he was not alone, that there were others just like him, struggling with demons, was part of his ability to accept who he was and move forward.

"Through listening to other peoples' stories and then relating their experiences to who I was, I started to accept that I was an imperfect person and that I needed to be put back together."

Looking at his life through sober eyes for the first time in 25 years, John began to face his past and the experiences he had suppressed for so long. For the first time he was able to face the loss of his mother.

"Through AA I stopped blaming my mother for dying and leaving me an orphan. I dealt with the pain of having been left alone at a young age. Having listened to people and how they dealt with pain and loss, I came to terms

"It's a beautiful thing to be able to release those tears that had been pushed down because I didn't want to feel it.

It was a new sense of peace and accomplishment for John, a strong step forward in dealing with who he was, letting the five-and-a-half-year-old imprisoned inside of him all those years out to express itself.

"I had attained a sense of acceptance, a sense of joy and release," he said. "It was like a big weight had been lifted off my shoulders. The fellowship was the backbone of my transformation. It became the vehicle, the means, to allow myself to change."

It will work for you if you work with it, he said. The want to get sober has to go hand-in-hand with the support you seek and being able to accept a higher power, not necessarily one of the Christian perspective.

"It's got nothing to do with being religious. It has everything to do with being spiritual," he said. "Religion is man-made. Spirit comes from a concept of a persons own creation of what they of a god or a creator or the great I am.

"AA is made up of every type of person you can think of. A higher power crosses all cultures and languages, rich, old, young, poor. They all find a better life through AA no matter who might be."

Jason Franson has been attending meetings now for about a month now, and said the support available through the people and experiences he encounters has been a guiding hand in understanding his alcoholism.

"We talk about whatever we want there," he said. "It's really helpful to know people are on the same page you are in some ways. You chat with like-minded individuals and share your experiences and you're more likely to find that your experiences, are similar in some ways.

Franson said the opportunity to meet others who aren't interested in drinking helped him understand there are other things in life besides alcohol.

"That's the choice, to choose not to drink," he said. "I know when I drink I have a tendency to overdo it and it just came to that point where it was the end of it. AA has been really helpful in opening me up to support.

"You need to make that change to make things change. The problem will continue to happen if you don't do anything about it."

Today John is a relatively sane, happy individual, he said, someone who has found a way of life without drinking. He said his sobriety has to stay intact for him to keep progressing.

"It's the foundation of my journey," he said. "I cannot go in and out of the bars, in and out of AA, in and out of the church to find answers. I can only do that if I have found sobriety one day at a time.

"The master sculptor has almost completed his job, by bringing me out of a rock into a person that is today, and that's me."

The third and final story of the feature series on alcoholism in the NWT will look at how communities deal with the issue and the struggles they face.