Detach With Love

That term is a gift from Alanon. Detaching with love is like the gold standard of recovery, and it’s something we aim for but rarely achieve perfectly.

Years ago in Baltimore where I attended my first meetings my Alanon home group was one of the oldest Alanon meetings still in existence. Weekly I met with a group of women who were “Black Belt Alanon”. They had each worked the program a long time and many of them were still living with active alcoholics. They were tough. They were wise. They talked a lot about detachment and how they worked “detachment with love.”

I remember one of the examples they gave to newcomers who found this whole detachment thing confusing. This is what they would say:

If you come home from your meeting and the drunk is passed out in the driveway—again—detachment is stepping over them and going into the house and going to bed. Detachment with love is rolling the drunken person on their side so they don’t choke, covering them with a blanket and then going into the house and going to bed.

A pretty graphic example, but it is one that sticks in my head. For you too?  I found I could translate that driveway scenario into other situations and use it to sort out, “What would be the equivalent in my situation of providing the blanket and still going to bed?” 

All these years later, long into recovery, I still have to ask myself that question. And then pray for the courage and wisdom to act.

Today, on a little card, I wrote this note to myself:

What would detachment…

Look like?

Sound like?

Feel like?

Think like?

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Read more about detachment and the lessons of Alanon in "Out of the Woods" published by Central Recovery Press.

Black Belt Detatchment

This is a gift from Alanon. Detachment and “Detachment with Love”. That last one is the gold standard and not easy to accomplish. Years ago in Baltimore attending my first Alanon meetings I met weekly with a group of women who were “Black Belt Alanon”. They had worked the program a long time and many of them were still living with active alcoholics. They were tough. They talked a lot about detachment and working toward “detachment with love.”

I remember one of the examples they gave. It went like this: If you come home from your meeting and the drunk is passed out in the driveway—again—detachment is stepping over them and going into the house and going to bed. Detachment with love is rolling the drunken person on their side, covering them with a blanket and then going into the house and going to bed.

A pretty graphic example and one that stuck in my head. I found I could translate that driveway scenario into other situations and use it to sort out, “What would be the equivalent in this situation of providing the blanket and still going to bed?”

This week I am asking myself:

What would detachment look like? Sound like? Think like? And feel like?

Come back to Yourself

"You cannot hear your inner voice if your mind is on someone else."

That gem is from Hazelden writer Karen Casey. And it's a reminder to mind my own business and to come back to myself. When I detach with love it's so much better for the people around me but it's also wonderful for me too. When I stay out of his/her business--even in my head--then I can access my own creative thought and that still small voice of God.

Fatal Flaw Progress

Well, two more days to go in my new behavior practice I’m calling “No-Her”. So far so good but it’s not easy. What I’m learning from zipping my lip is that I am very judgmental, very opinionated and just chock full of ideas about how other people should live. This practice of not-saying makes it clear that while I’m not saying certain things I’m thinking them—a lot! Next practice is going to be quieting the voice in my head as well as the one connected to my mouth..

But I have to say, this is progress. This weekend we spent a lot of time with family where “her” was a topic of conversation and I was very worried heading into Saturday—I prepared though and had my strategies. And I prayed. I don’t want to miss that point: I prayed. And there was grace in that the usual chat was limited and I only needed to deflect one time to not be engaged in any gossip. I came home very very grateful.