Thank you so much for your comments SugarScars.
It is really complicated.
I just started drug and alcohol counseling classes last week. I went to an information session about a month ago and they were talking about how it was a growing field— trying in a way to attract people in this dwindling economy. They talked about how the number of people diverted from jail to treatment programs was increasing and there needed to be places to put them because of prop 36 here in California. All placements for the internships were in prop 36 places or community non-profit type clinics. There was a definite emphasis on the traditional "underserved" population. When I went to therapy a few days later I was talking about prop 36 and the like because I used to work at a criminal defense law firm and the emphasis on the "underserved" population and I suddenly realized that in this field, I actually am the "underserved" population. While I may have the financial and other resources to get health care (minus the fact that it was extremely difficult for me to get health insurance but that is a whole different story...) in terms of my alcoholism I have been missed so many times. And like you talk about— when I started to take it seriously, the health professionals did not take me seriously. I remember telling my primary care doctor that I really wanted to work on my drinking, that I thought it was a problem. Her response was that was a good idea because she sees people who are high functioning my parents age who struggle with it. Ok, that was it. Wait, now that I think about it, she is a doctor should she not have pointed me in some sort of direction, not just told me "good idea!" Exactly, she treated me like a peer. That conversation was five years ago. Conversely, if I had been arrested for some sort of drug or alcohol related issue maybe prop 36 would have taken me seriously but one of my top priorities was not driving at all. I had enough money to support my habit. The likelihood of my arrest was very, very low. In a way the only option I knew about were those fancy malibu overpriced rehabs that seemed like a joke and part of me didn't feel that far gone. What I really needed was someone that knew about addiction to talk to me, to be pointed to a counselor who specialized in alcoholism. I feel like I did my part more than enough. I realized I had a problem. It was the health professionals who did not quite know what to do with me.
I see people my parents age who are extremely high functioning alcoholics. I just feel in a way there are so many different presentations of the disease and that to not allow those different presentations to exist keeps people in the emotional pain. That makes me so sad. I didn't link the emotional pain I was in to my alcoholism until I got sober and I just want everyone to have that chance.