Back in 2019, I was running a drug and alcohol treatment group in a rehab, and I made a mistake.
Our group was about a dozen people who had completed the inpatient part of their treatment. My group, called Intensive Outpatient (IOP), was part of the process of stepping people down from the safe confines of a rehab back into the world. It’s one thing to be clean and sober for 30 days while spending every day and night in a rehab; it’s another thing to maintain that new sobriety out in a world with readily available alcohol and drugs.
Among the patients in the group was a young man in recovery who also happened to be a counseling intern. This field has people from all walks of life, and it certainly makes sense that alcoholics and addicts who decide to help others sometimes slip or relapse altogether.
This fellow was engaged, humble, and seemed to be soaking up everything he could in our group.
And it was he who caught it when I paraphrased the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual IV to everyone in the group. By then, the DSM V was out, and though I can’t recall specifically what I said, it was outdated.
The intern caught it, and was polite and diplomatic as he brought it up. There he was, actively hitting the books in college during the day, with fresh knowledge of the latest diagnostic information available in our field.
By that point in my career, I’d run countless treatment groups. I’d created programs on my own, written curriculum, participated in studies, and run my own private practice since before this fellow had lost all of his baby teeth.
I got something wrong right there in front of everyone, and the newbie caught it.
What could I do but own it? I’m fallible, human. What I’d said was not wildly off the mark, but it was outdated nevertheless. I was transparent, and gave him an attaboy for his keen observation.
We can’t bluff in this field. We can’t tell the future, can’t promise miracles, and we remain aware that our field is ever-evolving and improving.
I share this to emphasize how critical transparency is in PLACE. Our community seeks answers and healing, and those things simply aren’t always available. I certainly won’t claim to dispense them in our meetings. I’ll be just as critical and analytical regarding what we discuss as any of you. Therefore, when I endorse an idea, opinion, or consensus on estrangement, it is always as both a counselor and as a parent. I am a counselor, a scientist at heart, and I am a father with a broken heart. As tragic as it is, the experience I share with you lends to my ability to collaborate with you. And that collaboration will always be honest and transparent.
