falling out of the middle class

[Hopalong]

My little community is sad this week and it's started a lot of serious conversations.
A woman I knew, not extremely well but I had been out with her, been to her home, and listened to her stories on some long group trips when I was driving...committed suicide this week. She was new to the church--about a year. Turns out she was severely alcoholic, had hidden it from most but one woman knew it all.

The things I remember from talking to her were her desperation to get a good job (she looked for 9 months--so many people in this economy have looked for YEARS). She had once had a fine house, a marriage, etc. She has two grown children in their 20s, both accomplished and okay. But evidently about a decade ago she began drinking and it became completely uncontrollable. She sabotaged herself in many ways common to the disease--finding fault with AA, trying the church but rejecting it as not like her old one, even finding a job and leaving it (or perhaps urged to leave, I don't know) a few weeks later. She was arrested for DUI once, then again, and after the 2nd time was facing jail time next week. Her lease was up, she'd burned through her 401K and just didn't want to live any more. Another friend found her.

Some of the convos have been about "middle class" people who've never experienced poverty and who have no resilience...no way to re-envision their lives on a much lower economic scale and still find them meaningful. How one has to rally one's spirituality, find meaning and purpose--apart from money.
(Easy to say, if one has shelter and some prospects for survival.) What I picked up on from her was a form of denial--I think she could not tolerate her losses of status because to do that would be to accept where she was now, rather than try to pretend she was going to find a way to reclaim it all. She did not feel connected to her own inherent worth and dignity. And so she lost her life and her kids lost their mother and have that tragic legacy now.

It's incredibly sad. The alcoholism was the dominant thing--my friend asked her recently how much she was drinking, and C. said, I can't tell you how much because I am drinking all the time. She had had a few periods of sobriety, maybe one rehab, I don't know.

She was extremely smart, and beautiful, and very talented. She had taught in China, the Middle East, and had a tremendous amount of communications and business skills. She was 53.

My other friend, with whom I'm staying, wanted to make "Falling Out of the Middle Class" a discussion topic. It's ironic to feel sympathy, in the world, for folks who have fallen down a couple rungs but who, by most standards, are still ON a liveable ladder. But it's interesting to hear my host-friend say, but they have no experience being poor...and some, just can't take it.

(And, I wanted to share this: http://www.salon.com/2012/07/12/someone_to_hold_me/).

love,
Hops

[lighter]

Hops:

I'm so sorry your community lost a member.

So tough, and her children will never get over it.

I don't understand your host's desire to approach the topic as "falling from the middle class."

There were so many dynamics involved, the least of which seemed to be money, IMO.

Lack of money was a symptom, not a cause, as I see it.

Lighter

[Hopalong]

Yes, I agree.

My friend just resonated with that one piece of it--I think it touched on some of her own fears.

Alcoholism was the big engine that ran C. over.

Hops

[sKePTiKal]

Oh Hops... this is going to echo around (emotionally) and trigger some very interesting conversations in your group, I think.

I agree with you and Lighter, that drinking only amplified and focused that poor woman's despair.

I'm also hearing LOTS these days around the topic of "middle class", and whether one falls into that category... how to measure... etc. Much of it is simply political discourse... which completely misses the point, I think. (and I've participated in the political discussion, oh - since about the time Twigs disappeared; there is no political solution). The point is much closer I think, to your perception about how your friend couldn't adapt her inner sense of self, to her current circumstances. Astute, as ever, Hops...

sad as it is.

I think... hold to the shaky theory... that anytime people solely define themselves by any kind of material, external, societal measures, it only creates a point of anxiety or sadness or fear or needing emptiness. In the context of what the world seems to be approaching & going through these days these are going to be the most emotionally, "at risk" people. Coping will include denial, as you mentioned and somehow living with the surreality of cognitive dissonance. The stories will be heartbreaking... and sometimes heroic.

If you see this book: The Age of Miracles, by Karen Thompson Walker -- indulge yourself; it's her first novel and it's a short read. It's an apocalyptic, sci-fi tale told from the perspective of a 12 yr old girl, over the space of the last half of the school year. What is brilliant about it -- is the ability to put into words the complex emotions and reactions of the girl-woman to some pretty amazing phenomena... including the human condition, from the inside out. It's an overall warm and inspiring book. And it'll add something to your conversations, I think.

(((((Hops)))))

[lighter]

Our ability to adapt to changing factors in our lives is very important, goes without saying.

I was just researching the OODA loop created by John Boyd, in reference to being proactive, and effective decision makers in our lives.


"Boyd hypothesized that all intelligent organisms and organizations undergo a continuous cycle of interaction with their environment. Boyd breaks this cycle down to four interrelated and overlapping processes through which one cycles continuously:
 Observation: the collection of data by means of the senses
 Orientation: the analysis and synthesis of data to form one's current mental perspective
 Decision: the determination of a course of action based on one's current mental perspective
 Action: the physical playing-out of decisions
 
Of course, while this is taking place, the situation may be changing. It is sometimes necessary to cancel a planned action in order to meet the changes.[/b]
 
This decision cycle is thus known as the OODA loop. Boyd emphasized that this decision cycle is the central mechanism enabling adaptation (apart from natural selection) and is therefore critical to survival."


Lighter

[BonesMS]

(((((((((((((((((((((((((Hops))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

[JustKathy]

Oh Hops, I'm so sorry for the loss of your friend. Even though you weren't close friends, it's impossible to not be deeply affected by something like this.

I have to echo the others in saying that this probably would not have happened if not for the alcoholism. Our problems always look worse behind a bottle, and our coping mechanisms becomes nonexistent (or drinking becomes the coping mechanism). I know several people who are on hard times, myself included, but a rational mind thinks about the positive, especially when there are family members who love you and need you. I have a good friend who just left her abusive husband, and is living on bread and water, in an elderly neighbour's basement, but she gets up every morning and does whatever she can to go on because she has a nine-year-old son who needs her. If alcohol were added to the mix, you can bet her story would be a different one.

If there's a lesson here for those of us who suffer at the hands of our N parents, it's to seek support and help from friends, even online friends, like we have here. Once someone has turned to drugs and and/or alcohol, there's little chance of a positive outcome. The money spent on alcohol could have been spent on therapy. Easy to say, but once your mind goes to that other place, things are done that can't ever be undone.  

[Hopalong]

So honestly stated, Kathy.

Church is going to do a quiet gathering where folks can share their stories
of her, and also talk about how they are reacting to this particular loss.

I am glad they're doing that, I'll be there.

I'm okay about it personally but it's been causing a lot of reflecting.
The article in Salon.com called "Someone To Hold Me" was pretty amazing to read that same day.

love,
Hops