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A quitter takes a hard look at himself and wonders if there is really life after saying ‘Kwaheri’ to hard drinking. By David Ogot snr.
BIOSAFETY NEWS, OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2002

AN ALCOHOLIC must stop drinking if he or she is to survive, and this abstinence is the cornerstone of recovery, whether through a treatment center, alcoholics anonymous, a spiritual experience or the dreaded "cold turkey" way.

Cold turkey! Sudden, complete cessation - stopping dead! No more use of alcohol, or any other substance, without the use of drugs to reduce the sometimes agonising withdrawal symptoms is probably the hardest route to sobriety.

Yet this is the path my friend whom for the sake of this article will be called Jim, dared to tread. He felt compelled to take this way after a particularly harrowing experience, one that he totally refused to talk about, made him realise it was either sobriety or death. This then is an interview with a 40-year-old recovering alcoholic who has been six years "clean" and who although still jobless and faced with a myriad other problems, clings tenaciously to his sobriety.

Jim says he got so scared when "I looked at myself and the shambles my life had become. No house, nothing! In the middle of Soweto slums in Nairobi's ‘Kayole’ that even though I continued sleeping in the chang’aa den where I had been for a further three days, I finally managed to get Sh. 50 and came to the city center.

With a woebegone smile, he admits that one of the skills he learnt was hawking and since in 1995 this field wasn't too crowded, he managed within two days to make enough money to rent a house in Mathare Valley. It was here that Jim began the healing process or what he refers to as "re-building myself."

Ironically, now that he was not drinking, instead of a welcome reduction in problems, his major troubles came to the fore with a bang. Jim laughs sadly as he says, "the only compensation for alcohol is that it reduces all hassles like food, since you hardly eat. You don't care whether you are shelterless, homeless, wifeless or jobless. The only worry boils down to how do I get my next drink?"

But money was still a bother because although he got his survival cash from hawking, it was still a very chancy, iffy' business which could not be relied on. Thus he continued to seek regular employment.

"I was in one of the top boarding schools in the country in the late 1970s, but when I got Sh. 400 to Sh.500 a day re-opening blocked sewers, I rated that a really good job," he recalls. But this occupation too was not without its hazards and Jim soon developed boils, as he had no protective clothing. "But I did the job when I was drinking and disease did not worry me at the time. Mostly I believe I survived by the grace of God." "So you believe in God?" I pose. But he only smiles ruefully as he replies slowly: "No I would not put myself in the category or definition usually associated with Christians. Maybe this is because I smoke cigarettes and I am not affiliated to a particular church. Actually I regularly go to any nearby church."

He is quiet for a while, looking suddenly very sad, and I too sit still almost holding my breath not wanting to snap the invisible thread holding us together, and that might end the interview. Abruptly, as if speaking to himself, he mutters: "If only I had known on what a roller-coaster ride that first beer I bought with my pocket money way back in 1977, when I was in the third form, would have taken me, I would have thought again. I had jobs after my A levels, in fact in the early 1980s jobs were easy to get." Jim earlier confided in me that he had been married but that this had lasted only two years - 1982 to 1984. Then his wife left with their two little children, and to date he has seen 'neither hide nor hair of them.'

What of his immediate family then? What were their reactions when you stopped drinking? A cloud seems to cross his light-complexioned face. "When I stopped," he begins slowly as if carefully choosing his words, "it was a personal decision. Nothing to do with my family."

Since he is a very private person by nature, Jim tried to keep away from social interactions that would remind him of his drinking days.

His family came to hear about his sobriety about one year after he had been clean and then started trying to plan his life for him. "I kept distance and still do," he vows.

As for apply for work, society tends to treat alcoholics like pariahs not only because of the mess they created when they were drinking, but also historically and culturally."I have been clean for six years, but any time you approach somebody for a job you are treated like a criminal complete with a prison record."

Then laughs loudly, his face instantly looking 10 years younger while he assures me that "since I am a quick thinker, I get small but difficult jobs, which the client usually wants done by the previous day. So right now I am a jack of many trades."

In spite of all these obstacles to social reintegration which have made many a recovering alcoholic relapse, I included, Jim was hung on, arguing that "there are people who walk out of jail and then look for a chance to go back. I think that it is not normal. So the only two things I am sure of right now is that I shall die and that I shall not drink again!"

"You ask what society should do to help me? Well society owes me nothing and my family owes me nothing. I happened to walk into a situation from which it is almost impossible to escape and I'm ready to face whatever life throws at me."

As Jim sipped the last of his Coke, a subtle signal to me that he wanted to dash off, I asked my final loaded question: "What advice would you give to someone who wanted to stop or has tried to and failed?"

Slowly, but unhesitantly as I scribble away, he replies, "Alcohol, despite all the problems you might ever have or that it may cause you, will never let go of you. It’s you who must let go of it. So whatever perils there might be in poverty, there is at least one you have control over. "You can decide to stop drinking and stick to that decision. It is the one thing you will never regret, for it frees you from having to beg, borrow or steal to feed an insatiable monster.":

I watched Jim's receding back in total agreement. Thought I had gone to a therapeutic community (I use this term instead of 'rehab') I too had quit cold turkey.

Thought there were other slight variations here and there to his story and mine, I too had stopped begging, borrowing or stealing to feed the monster, because this is the only truth alcoholics need to know. The monster is insatiable and by trying to feed it an alcoholic’s end is inevitably 'JAIL an INSTITUTION or DEATH!'

Pocketing my notebook, I almost found myself wondering how I would live for the rest of my life without tripping and taking a drink. Then I too laughed aloud causing a few stares as I remembered my 'just for today' for today.

I will live through this day only And not tackle my whole life problems at once. I can do something for 12 hours that would not appeal to me. If I felt I had to keep it up for a lifetime.

I walked jauntily out of the restaurant, whistling. I was sober, my whole life was ahead of me, and the sun was shinning. Yes. I was sober! That to me was more than owning a gold mine.

David Ogot is a freelance journalist/producer who has personal experience with alcoholism. He can be reached at goinghomedotcom@yahoo.com