Any man who attends Al-Anon meetings on a regular basis will hear  stories of abuse told by women.  as they effect a hard to look at vacant stare into the middle of the room. It is quiet at these times. Yes, we all learn that alcoholism is a disease, and we work hard at accepting that alcohol's first victim when it reaches the brain is usually judgement. We all know that this deadening of the humanizing chips leads to unpredictable behavior, emotional outbursts...the usual chaos that so often get's resolved by trips to the ER and the police station.

   After hearing one of these all-too familiar stories I went home and wrote this blues.

Pain don't im-press me.

At least its fa-miliar.

And rain, rain don't rush me.

A wo-man can on-ly get so wet.

There was a time you could hold me.

Less with love, more with an-ger.

But I sur-vive with the dan-ger,

Because I'm Long, Long Damned Gone!

At first I cried to my Mama, cried to my pa,

Cried to the neighbors, I e-ven cri-ed to God.

(spoken, "...and everbody but God told me")

"That man's your hus-band, the marks don't show,

He's got a good job, where would you go?"

Oh where, God where, would I go?

Framed by my family, betrayed by the system.

Will some-one some how help me,

And how man-y more women out there like me?

There was a time, we were silent.

Ground our teeth in our pil-lows.

Hey mis-ter some, now are wid-ows,

And now we're long, Long Damned Gone.

In-side we're Long, Long Damned Gone.

Inside (spoken..."and someday outside too")

We will be Long Damned Gone!

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We Codependent Men, We Mute Coyotes

By Ken P.

The coyote is a long, slim, sick and sorry-looking skeleton, with a gray wolf-skin stretched over it, a tolerably bushy tail that forever sags down, a furtive and evil eye, and a long, sharp face, with slightly lifted lip and exposed teeth. He has a general slinking expression all over. The coyote is a living, breathing allegory of Want. He is always hungry. He is always poor, out of luck, and friendless. The meanest creatures despise him, and even the fleas would desert him for a velocipede.

                                                              Taken from Mark Twain's Roughing It

   A codependent man is a man who is often a high functioning husband with a wife who has a physical, mental, and spiritual need for a mind-altering substance, such as alcohol or drugs. His wife's extreme need for her substance has caused her for years to manipulate this man by every means known to a woman who has stood up before institutions full of relatives, a respected preacher, and God pledging his total allegiance to her for life "...till death do them part."

  Almost all of the literature on codependency is written by women for women, leaving the codependent man basically unstudied. This is for a very simple reason. He is under everybody's radar screen because he has to be! Read on and learn a few of the reasons why such a man suffers like the retched coyote described by Mark Twain above...only he can't even howl; because of his disease, he is mute!

   Like the coyote, this man survives in a state of heightened diligence. He sees the other men as wolves running in their chosen packs. He sees the jocks, the golfers, the professional organizations, the fraternal clubs, the Little League Dads, and the men in his suburban neighborhood dressed in their crisp shorts.

   But the twin diseases of alcoholism and codependency have isolated him. He has no pack for protection. His preoccupation with an alcoholic wife has robbed him of the time and energy to form trusting relationships with other men, and he pays a tremendous internal price for that missing element. Here is why; because of hundreds of thousands of years surviving as the hunting half of "hunters and gatherers," somewhere down in his bones every man knows that isolation from the pack means death.

   It is not only his lack of time to develop relationships with other men that isolates this codependent man. His various defense mechanisms such as perfectionism and over-achievement serve to make other men shun him. There is also his underlying anger, mostly born of fear. Other men sense this. He is so obviously not at ease in his own skin. He over-reacts, especially to any slight criticism. Other men soon learn the basic truth summed up by a very wise counselor, who once told me, "It's hard to hug a porcupine!"

   So his ears are either perked in constant high alert, or flattened with anger and frustration. His frustration, though constant, cannot be voiced for an important reason; he cannot identify it!

   It is called denial. Denial is his most immediate and user-friendly shock absorber against the painful emotional shocks delivered at random from his first family during childhood. Studies show that most codependent men came from highly dysfunctional families that included at least one alcoholic or addicted parent.  All he ever knew was this existence, so that feels normal. He just went out and found a wife who would treat him the way the people who were supposed to love him unconditionally always did. A little boy can't win against big parents, and a beaten-down man can't win against an abusive addicted wife.

   So he becomes a mute coyote.

   He must remain silent like a mute coyote. Coyotes remain silent lest they draw attention to themselves. Attention, to a man married to an alcoholic wife is synonymous with pain, and avoidance of pain has gradually become his sole moment to moment purpose. His tail "that forever sags down" stays there between his legs because he is trying to make himself smaller. The wagging tail of his puppy hood...the spiked tail of high expectation, has been replaced. A wagging or spiked tail would destroy his "cover."

   If you can relate to this description, you may be another Codependent man. There is help.

   I am a man who has worked with codependent men for over thirty years as their "sponsor," helping them through the 12-step program called Al-Anon.  I am working with two other such men to reach out and help other men with this pitiful disease.  We are working through various means to establish men's Al-Anon meetings all over this nation, because they are so badly needed. As I write this, only 15% of those attending Al-Anon meetings are men, even though the current generation of women aged 14-22 are using alcohol, drugs, and tobacco at a rate that is higher than their male counterparts. Given this situation, along with the highest rate of alcoholism and addiction among the parents in our country's history, we see a future absolutely rife with codependency among its men.

   If you catch even a glimpse of yourself in this missive or if you suspect that you are enabling somebody close to you who has the disease of addiction, please...Call Al-Anon World Service Office to learn where the nearest men's Al-Anon meeting is in your area, or for information about how to start one!

Call 1-888-4AL-ANON.

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2. I need to stop viewing myself as a bad person trying to be good, and recognize that I am in reality a sick person trying to get well.

3. Fear is projecting within my own mind the bad things that I think may happen. This is not necessarily the truth. This is very probably NOT the way things really are!

4. I need to especially be on guard for the old sick methods so deeply engrained in me by other not-well people that allow me to continue self destructive ways. Rationalizations such as "...everybody does that," or "...I was just trying to be helpful," or "but I always had only the best of intentions" are no longer valid.

5. Our flaws did not come because of the addict. We already had those flaws long before we even met the addict.

6. We must discard the position that how we look when we suit up has any importance. What is important is that we suit up and show up...physically, intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually. This is a private process. It is between you, a single trusted other human being, and God.

7. Your personal inventory absolutely must be balanced between your weaknesses and you strengths. When you have been hurt a lot because you have gone too far in tolerating unacceptable behavior, you can pass an invisible line where you no longer have self respect. When businesses do inventories, the debts and liabilities portion is not the major focus. You have stock, credits receivable, reputation, and worth beyond what you know at this moment. In AA parlance,

"God don't make no junk!"

Find an Al-Anon meeting at 1-888-4-AL-ANON or www.al-anon.alateen.org

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   It is not only his lack of time to develop relationships with other men that isolates this Al-Anon man. His various defense mechanisms such as perfectionism and over-achievement serve to make other men shun him. There is also his underlying anger, mostly born of fear. Other men sense this. He is so obviously not at ease in his own skin. He over-reacts, especially to any slight criticism. Other men soon learn the basic truth summed up by a very wise counselor, who once told me, "It's hard to hug a porcupine!"

   So his ears are either perked in constant high alert, or flattened with anger and frustration. His frustration, though constant, cannot be voiced, for an important reason. He cannot identify it! It is called denial. Denial, his most immediate and user friendly shock absorber against the painful shocks delivered at random from first his dysfunctional family of origin, and then from his alcoholic wife is at the same time his greatest barrier to finding relief.

So he becomes a mute coyote.  

   He must remain silent like the mute coyote. Coyotes remain silent lest they draw attention to themselves. Attention, to a man married to an alcoholic wife is synonymous with pain, and avoidance of pain has gradually become his sole moment to moment purpose. His tail is ever between his legs as though he is trying to make himself smaller. The wagging tail of his puppy hood...the spiked tail of high expectation has been replaced. A wagging or spiked tail would destroy his "cover."

If you can relate to this description, you may be another Al-Anon man. There is help. We are working to establish men's Al-Anon meetings all over this nation, because they are so badly needed. Call Al-Anon World Service Office to learn where the nearest men's Al-Anon meeting is in your area, ar for information about how to start one!

1-888-4AL-ANON or go to www.al-anon.org

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   Scott Peck's first sentence in his seminal work , The Road Less Traveled was "Life is difficult." Program people understand this. Only those of us who have finally been reduced to desperation understand the internal forces that have to work  against a codependent man that finally drive him to surrender and seek help.

   I  must have really looked like the "deer in the headlights" as I sneaked into my first Al-Anon meeting in the little upstairs room at an AA club one night in Dallas, 300 miles from my home. I was there, not so much because I was seeking growth or recovery...I didn't even have those notions available at that point in my mind. I was there because, after one horrible night in my livingroom I had surrendered and found the Al-Anon office in Houston. There God arranged for my first sponsor, Scotty L., to walk into the room. It was Scotty who just stayed after me to attend a meeting. I owe him so much today.

   It was upstairs. It seems like it  always is the first time. Looking back I see the symmetrical juxtaposition of God's universal plan. I had to take those old rickety wooden steps one at a time just like I had to take the 12-steps  over the next two years.

   The upper floor was poorly lit. The room was overcrowded and too loud with what I thought as pure banter. They were all women, they were all older than I, and I knew none of them. All of these cheesy posters were stuck with thumbtacks high on the walls around the room. When they read the 12-steps I realized someplace inside that this was a terribly serious undertaking, this taking of these steps. In fact, I remember thinking to myself something like "...how could I possibly really do all of that...how could I admit even a fraction of my own faults to somebody else?"

   About this moment there was a burst of laughter from across the hall. This was where the real action was happening. The big room across the hall was where the AA's met, and they sounded like they were having a great time over there. As I sat there in this little room that felt oppressively serious I was thinking something like this; what the Hell am I doing here? I've done all of the right stuff to prove my manhood. I've worked myself through college, sired three sons, and coached, managed and umped Little League games. I have carved out a career in a gut-wrenchingly competetive profession. I once carried a drunk engineer up some rickety wooden stairs out of a dark underground bar on K street in Sacramento while drunk myself. More steps. What am I doing here?

   When it was finally over I was out the back door without a word to anybody that night. I remember nothing eccept the feeling of being overwhelmed and guilty at furtively going to this meeting while away from home. I worried about betraying my wife, and, most of all, I feared the emotional pain I knew that she would cause me if she ever found out that I had told myself  about her drinking, and then those ladies at the Al-anon office, and even Scotty!

   Thank God, the years and the program have been kind. I no longer have to live with active alcohol consumption in my home, and, because of the Al-Anon program, I am surrounded by love every day! I will never know all of the miracles that led me here, but I do know that there are other men right this moment  who are where I was then.

    If you have not yet climbed those rickity dark steps, please seriously consider doing so. You have nothing to lose but your agony. 

   Call Al-Anon World Service office at 1-888-4AL-ANON, or access their excellent web site at www.al-anonalateen.org to learn where there is a weekly meeting near you.

Ken P.

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