Who She Was: A Cleansing of One’s Self

whoshewas

**It was the request of my interviewee that I keep their name anonymous in the writing of this project. To keep their identity private, I will use the name, Jackie Ross, in place of her real name. That is neither her first nor last name.**

Alcohol and drugs are often things that play a major role in the self-destruction of one’s life. The ability to overcome those types of addictions is amazing in itself and it is a feat that it is often extremely difficult for people to do. For my podcast, I will tell the story of my Aunt Jackie and how for a major part of her life she battled an addiction of both drugs and alcohol, but how that addiction has made her to be a better person today. This is a somewhat sensitive subject to her though, being that I have lived in the same house with her for eighteen years and even I had never heard about her story until this assignment was given.

Growing up as one of ten children in an Irish family, Jackie Ross didn’t always connect well with her family. She wasn’t one of the youngest in the family. She wasn’t one of the oldest. She was the fifth child born and often did her own thing in the household. She said how she was the quiet one in the family and at times was very insecure about herself. This led to her drinking at an early age. She had her first beer at the age of twelve and she immediately liked the feeling it gave her. She said that alcohol helped her cope with her insecurities with school and home. Around the age of fourteen, she started going to bars every weekend. The drinking age was eighteen back then. Her drinking habits got to a point where her life revolved around alcohol. She didn’t want to do anything if it meant she couldn’t drink. She compared her life to my life in Macaulay. She said that if her class ever went to Broadway shows back then, she wouldn’t have gone…because that would require her to be sober, and she didn’t see that as a possibility.

After a few years of drinking, my Aunt Jackie came upon drugs and became hooked on it. She said that cocaine eventually went hand in hand with alcohol. If she did one without the other, she wouldn’t feel complete. It was around this time when she started getting massive hangovers every morning. She said she would throw up a few times a week and be sick basically all the time. Jackie knew it was a problem but couldn’t find it in herself to quit. She tried multiple times to stop but it wouldn’t work. It just made her crave drugs and alcohol more.

It wasn’t until Jackie Ross went to Brooklyn College to get her Master’s Degree in 1987 where she eventually made a transformation. She was failing in school and had gotten fired from her part-time job at a corner grocery store. She came to a realization that she literally could not go on living like this anymore. She felt if she stuck with her drinking and drug abuse, she would end up dying at a very early age. That sudden self-actualization and I guess you can say, “epiphany”, changed her life. Jackie went to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings for several months afterward and eventually moved past her struggles and overcame them. She noticed a difference in her life right away. She became an overall happier person once she quit and became better for it. She ended up getting her Master’s degree and landing a good job at Baruch College where she remains today.

It was in 1989 where she finally quit all drugs and alcohol and hasn’t consumed any since. Jackie Ross described herself as being a selfish person at the earlier stages in her life. She almost lost her family and herself. But with her recovery and experiences, she says she is a better person for having gone through it all. And although she admits that these are mistakes in her life she is not happy about, she does not regret them. It has made her a much stronger person, both physically and mentally. She says how today she loves the feeling of not being tempted in the slightest to drink alcohol and she has her past to thank for that. My Aunt Jackie ended the interview humorously by saying how now when she goes out to restaurants and travels, she doesn’t have to buy $15 drinks that are being served. Plus, it keeps the calories away!