I Know What the Answer for Charlie Sheen Isn’t

These baby/warriors must be approached in a very different way — you can’t relate to them as a normal adult

Charlie Sheen needs help.  

Once again we are witness to the story of a young and talented actor, played out in sound-bytes: incoherent, disoriented, half-naked, in the company of a prostitute.

As a father I first feel for what Martin Sheen must be going through. The frustration of wondering what the right answer is to the question of his son’s life challenge is painful and frustrating. As a therapist, I know what the answer for Charlie isn’t.  

It isn’t traditional treatment. To send Charlie back to a 12 step in-patient rehab program would be more insane than the names they are calling him now.

On the surface, Charlie Sheen seems powerful. A young, successful performer who has racked up a string of business and creative successes, that is obviously fueled by a desire for fame and recognition is the mask that hides an undercurrent of psychosis that ultimately led him to a hospital for psychiatric evaluation. His dance with alcohol and substance abuse will ultimately end in his death if he doesn’t’ come to terms with his own character.

Charlie Sheen needs help.

An individual that mixes cocaine with alcohol fuels the body with the potential to ingest more alcohol.  It’s a lethal ladder of consumptive excess that tricks the body into thinking that more is less, until the more becomes too much, and the body shuts down.

Think back to the '70s when Led Zeppelin’s drummer John Bonham was found dead. Beginning with ingesting four quadruple vodkas at breakfast (480 ml), Bonham then continued his drinking excess later that morning at a rehearsal. Later that evening, Bonham was found dead. No other drugs were found in his body other than the ridiculous levels of alcohol. However, his past prodigious cocaine use had created an ability to consume amounts of alcohol that were many times the lethal level for other humans.

John Bonham had ingested over 40 shots of vodka in a short period of time.

We are fooling ourselves if we think that performers, whose creativity and passion for "playing out," react in the same way to treatment as mere mortals.  

Actors are not like ordinary people. Actors typically have split or multiple personalities. On one hand they are infants playing games, having every wish granted and every need catered to, feeling omnipotent and not really aware that life has rules and punishment. They are encouraged by enablers that support their inflated egos.

On the other hand they can be viewed as modern-day warriors, that in spite of how they feel, rise to the occasion and perform with all their might. Millions and millions of dollars are riding on their heroic performances. A production, employing hundreds of people, is often built around their ability to perform no matter what the personal toll it takes on them physically, or psychologically.

They are different from other people in other ways as well. They don't have the typical job schedule where they wake-up each morning, go to work and then clock out each evening at the same time. They live under a microscope where mundane tasks like going to the grocery store can become a major circus or ordeal.

Their wealth and power dramatically affects how others relate to them, follow-them, engage them or confront them. Their wealth and power also cause them to be the target for other people's agendas.

These factors make them much less able to relate to the traditional threats or contingencies that would lead to someone else feeling the need to change their behavior. So these baby/warriors must be approached in a very different way. You can't relate to them as a normal adult.

You wouldn't approach a baby in the same way you would approach a responsible and functioning adult. A baby cannot relate, much less comprehend, the need for a higher power — they are the higher power. Babies don't understand concepts like personal responsibility or impulse control. Nor would you expect a warrior to understand the wreckage of their actions in the same way as an ordinary person might. Lastly, these celebrity’s schedules make living a regimented lifestyle nearly impossible.

Remember, these people went into their field because they crave the attention, adulation and comfort that children do.  And like the class clown you remember from grammar school, junior high, and high school – they often don’t care if the attention is good or bad. 

Both infants and warriors need to be related to at their level. If we wait for the infant warrior to come to our level before we will help them, we may never connect. We must be the adult in our relationship and put our own needs aside in order to tend to theirs.

Treating the infant warrior is a slow but rewarding task. However it will not come using shame or the typical contigenies we would use for a ‘normal’ adult. How do we teach children to not touch the stove top. By punishing them? If we approach Charlie's relapses as opportunities for him to learn something new rather than running around hysterically we might actually see healing. These methods are "Harm Reduction" methods. Children make mistakes and often learn at their own pace.

Charlie, like other actors who have failed at sobriety, need an approach that is unlike the traditional 12 step program. These people are human beings, and are being treated by the courts and the court of public opinion as fodder for our titillation. Are they that disposable, or do we reach out with alternate therapies that identify, treat their addiction, and return them to the stage?

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