`Remember me one day at a time'

One Recovering Alcoholic Dies; One Fears He Should Have Helped More

Diane was a friend of mine, and she drank herself to death, just like that.

We were in alcohol rehabilitation together, a tough, intense 28 days that binds people together fast. I always teased her that she was my favorite little drunk. And she was. She was a delight -- sober, that is, the only way I knew her.

In small group sessions, when the emotional excavations sometimes got too deep, she might cry, or I might. We'd always encourage each other afterward, talking about our addictions and how they've affected us, and those we love.

Diane was sweet and pretty, but perhaps too giving. She always wanted to please others, do things they could do themselves. I recall once counseling her on this, in one of our long talks. I told her, ``Let people do for themselves what they can do for themselves.''

Then, as we approached the door, I said, ``OK, get that for me.'' And she did. I laughed and said: ``No, this is what I'm talking about. I can open the damn door myself!'' She laughed, too.

Diane chose me to ``give her away'' in the ceremony that marks the end of a stay at Saint Helena Hospital -- located, ironically, in the Napa Valley Wine Country -- to which we both went to get dry. At the graduation, all the patients gathered in a circle; Diane and I stood in the middle. I spoke about her, her character and her hope. Then she stood briefly in front of each of the others in the circle before leaving.

It has been two years since that day. And three are dead from that group of about 25. Diane's the latest, at only 43.

Her folks hit it off with my wife at Saint Helena's -- loved ones who, hurting and bewildered, had been watching people they care about slowly kill themselves. Diane's mom and dad are very polite and traditional Japanese-Americans; they loved her hard and she loved them back just as hard.

She said they hadn't known what to make of her illness. They always worried that Diane wouldn't show up for family events, well, because, sometimes she was in no shape. She said her dad would sometimes secretly take the wine bottles out of her garbage can so no one else could see them.

When Diane and I were in rehab, her parents faithfully attended the weekly family groups at Saint Helena's, trying as hard as they could to figure out this disease.

I don't know whether they ever did, but not for lack of trying. It's difficult to ``get it'' if you don't have it. Even after Diane got out of rehab, her mom kept up her attempts to understand. She went with my wife to Al-Anon, the support group for friends and family members of drunks.

A note to remember

Diane wanted to quit, desperately.

She signed my copy of ``Alcoholics Anonymous'' when she was ready to end her stay in rehab. Her note took all of the inside cover. Here's some of it: ``Dan, I'm grateful that we both got messed up at the same time, 'cause we never would have met otherwise. . . . I wish you the best in your recovery. I won't say, `keep in touch,' because I know we'll be seeing each other around town . . . AA meetings, Aftercare, etc.''

Then she added an echo of the AA motto that reminds people to keep their goals small: Don't drink today; then do the same tomorrow. Diane wrote: ``Remember me one day at a time.''

But she unintentionally put herself at risk on her return home. It was something I and others had worried about. She had enough money so she didn't have to work immediately and could stay home while figuring out a new direction in life.

She also lived alone. That can be dangerous for a recovering alcoholic, or any addict for that matter. And not long after she returned from rehab, her boyfriend cut off their relationship.

Then it was just her, the walls, and the wine.

At some point, she took a drink. That can be a deadly slip.

``People forget they have a chronic illness and picking up that first drink is one of the main risks of relapse,'' said Deborah Todd, counseling supervisor for Saint Helena's program. As another counselor there said, some people think after graduating from rehab, it's no longer alcoholism, but ``alcohol-wasm.''

But the pull never fully goes away. In Susan Cheever's biography of AA founder Bill Wilson, she writes that on his deathbed -- after decades of sobriety -- he asked for whiskey.

I still find myself plotting for a drink. What's the harm in a couple of shots after work? Who would know? But it wouldn't stop there. AA tells alcoholics that one drink is too much and 1,000 is not enough.

Avoiding that first drink is at the heart of everything AA does. The meetings with other recovering alcoholics remind you. So does a sponsor, a recovering alcoholic who is available to talk anywhere, anytime.

Drifting apart

After I got out of rehab, Diane and I talked off and on. I got her to go to a few AA meetings, but she didn't much like them -- they were too structured, too repetitive. I got a sponsor; she didn't, but she did enroll in community college. When we talked, she seemed happy, settled, her mind off the booze.

Last fall, I stopped seeing my sponsor but found a new AA group that met on Sunday nights, at a church near both our homes. I called her and tried to get her to go with me.

She didn't. I flaked out a couple of times when we were supposed to meet; she did the same. Then there were a few months of silence -- me caught up in my job and life, not having time to call my friend.

Diane died in early December. She'd drunk herself into a coma and died at a local hospital. I found out weeks later and missed her services.

When Diane and I were still in Saint Helena's, a friend, also a recovering alcoholic, sent me a letter, which I shared with her and others. It said he was splitting his life into 24-hour segments. He said he prays in the morning, and every evening he thanks God that he had that day, remembered that day, lived that day.

Just as Diane said when she signed my book: ``Remember me one day at a time.''

I didn't. I skipped some days. Now I'll never forget.

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