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Content note: rape/sexual assault
Hi SL,
I’m in Narcotics Anonymous, and as I go through the steps, I’m thinking about my 9th step. I know I caused harm when I was using, and I’m eager to make amends to most of the people I hurt. I started using when I was in an emotionally abusive relationship with the guy who introduced me to coke. I know I chose to use it, but he quickly started using it as a form of control, making me feel dependent on him.
When I tried to stop using, he called me boring and said he missed his fun girlfriend. When I strung together a few weeks of sobriety, he’d tell me the couple of pounds I put on were unattractive. It took me a year and a half of wanting to get myself out of the relationship before I actually did it, and I was only able to get help for my addiction once he was out of my life. He’s reached out a few times since we broke up—always when he’s high—but I haven’t responded.
I know there are things I did during our relationship that I truly owe him amends for. I’m not pretending that I was perfect, but I also feel like a lot of the “bad” things I did were to try to protect myself from his cruel tirades or from him humiliating me in public. Anyway, I’m on my 8th step, and I think my sponsor just assumes that I’ll be making amends to him. I feel really uncomfortable with the idea. Do I really have to do this for my recovery?
Sincerely,
Sober Ex
Hi Sober Ex,
I’m very glad you wrote in, and congratulations on your progress in NA. For those who may not know (or who have seen questionable interpretations in media), making amends to those you’ve harmed is Step 9 of the titular 12 Steps. Generally speaking, I am a fan of the process.
I don’t know of anyone who goes through a period of substance addiction and doesn’t—at a minimum—leave collateral damage in their wake. It’s not a value judgment; it’s just the reality of being addicted to a substance. With time, distance, and sobriety, you can see those harms clearly, and instead of running from them, you acknowledge them, accept responsibility, and commit not to repeat them. All good stuff.
I believe there are exceptions to this step, not just the ones listed in the Big Book (i.e., when doing so would harm the person you’re making amends to or third parties). No one should ever pressure you to make amends to your abuser. When I was sponsoring people, I made this clear during the 8th step (making a list of people they’d harmed), too. If I had a sponsee who was raped when she was passed out drunk, I would not, under any circumstances, suggest she look at “her part.” Someone criminally violated her.
Survivors of abuse are often too focused on what they believe is their part. They shouldn’t have gotten so drunk; they shouldn’t have been so loud; they shouldn’t have put on so much weight—whatever BS the abuser used to instigate the abuse. My sponsees were free to handle amends however they wanted—as are you—but I strongly encourage you to listen to your gut here.
I refuse to believe that your recovery will be better off if you reengage with someone who a) was abusive, b) is still using cocaine, and c) was never supportive of your efforts to quit. In fact, I see it as antithetical to the spirit of the 9th step.
Often, when people think about amends, they assume the process exists to benefit the person who was harmed. That isn’t entirely accurate. First and foremost, you make amends so you can move forward without being plagued by your past.
Every time I woke up and found out I’d told a group of people something that was supposed to be a secret, or made a mean joke only a very drunk person in the aughts could find funny, I’d feel a little worse about myself. I did countless small, shitty things, and every time I learned about them, my shame and self-loathing increased.
The little crappy things led to big ones, and ultimately, I woke up each day feeling like an exponentially worse person than I was the day before. Naturally, my solution was to drink. On and on it would go like a game of Chutes and Ladders, until one of the chutes dumped me into the Psych Ward.
With amends, the general idea is to use neither chute nor ladder and simply walk from square to square along the board’s path. When you find a spot littered with your bottlecaps, baggies, and other detritus from your days of climbing up ladders and falling down chutes, you clean it up. If you knocked over flowerbeds, you replant or replace them. Then, you walk on, doing your best to avoid creating any new messes. (Sorry for the prolonged board game analogy; I’m taking care of my nieces this week, and my brain is tired and has limited points of reference).
That’s how amends are supposed to work—unfortunately, I think your ex is less a part of the path and more like a sinkhole. You may find a few scraps of old trash around the edges that you could tiptoe around and clean up without falling in, but is it worth the risk?
Nothing you said in your email suggests that engaging with this person is a good idea. If you felt strongly that making amends with him was crucial to your recovery, I could suggest ways to do that while minimizing the risks. But you don’t want to, and you should absolutely listen to that voice—your voice.
It’s also worth remembering that not all amends have to be “direct” amends; AA literature makes that very clear. There are indirect amends (for example, donating to the favorite charity of someone who died before you could make amends) and living amends. Living amends are as simple as they are powerful: They’re an ongoing commitment to change the behavior that caused harm. For example, if I made my sister’s life a nightmare when I was drinking, I can make living amends by staying sober and being a safe and reliable adult for her kids.
Even with indirect or living amends, I wouldn’t necessarily think of it as making amends to your ex. It can take a long time to parse what happened in an abusive relationship, and that work is best done with a therapist, not a sponsor.
In the meantime, think of it as making living amends to the version of yourself who was trapped in that relationship for so long. You can make living amends to her by maintaining the boundaries she couldn’t. You can make them by listening to the voice inside that says, I do not feel comfortable making amends to this still-using abusive ex-partner and holding that line regardless of what your sponsor says.
This is your recovery. A sponsor can guide you and offer advice, but ultimately the choice is yours.
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I always tell my clients the others in step 9 is sometimes you. In some cases, you can be harmed in making the amends so you need to make sure if you are going to make amends then can I do it safely for me and anyone else? I believe you should make things right, but if I hurt you by making you cold, I shouldn't try to fix it by lighting myself on fire.
That was really a wonderful overview of what the amends process actually is, who it is for, and the different and personal ways it can be navigated.
When I sponsor people, I have them break up their 8th step list into people they feel ready to make amends to, people they know they should make amends to but are not ready to, and people that, in this moment, they feel as if they could never make amends to.
Those they are ready for, we tackle immediately, making sure the amends are honest and focused on our part, not the other person. Those they need more time on, we continue to discuss, attempting to identify where the fear lies and work from there. Those they feel they can never do, we allow to stay in that category, the only caveat being that they must stay on the 8th step list until the question is resolved in one of three ways: we decide an amends is actually not warranted, we decide a non-direct amends is best for everyone involved, or, finally, after enough distance for honesty and clarity, a proper amends can be given.
In my experience and way of thinking, it is often the case that even when an amends is necessary, when a person is new enough in recovery, and the relationship is fraught from both sides, it can put the recovery in jeopardy. I don't believe it is ever the right course to put recovery in danger to check a box. If an amends isn't made today, it can always be made tomorrow.