Cessation denial is a state of disbelief. The denial phase of emotional recovery questions and challenges whether a long and intense chemical relationship is really ending.
Cessation denial is almost the opposite of active dependency denial, where distortion and blocking techniques provide cover and insulation, so as to enable continued use.
Denial is the unconscious defense mechanism - just below the surface - that allowed us to resolve the emotional conflict and anxiety that would normally be felt by a person living in a permanent state of self-destructive chemical bondage.[1]
While using, we were protected by a thick blanket of rationalizations, minimizations, fault projections, escapes, intellectualizations and delusions. Our denial helped insulate us from the pain and reality of captivity. For most, it also helped us pretend that the problem would somehow soon be solved.
But here, during recovery, those same anxiety coping defenses begin to distort reality about what's really happening.
As mentioned, I start seminars by asking for an honest show of hands to the following question. "How many of you feel that you will never, ever smoke again?" Rarely does a hand go up. Even though all attending came wanting to stop, then and there, all were in denial, as none believed they would.
Although we want to stop, on a host of levels the mind isn't yet convinced. If convinced, why do so many of us treat recovery as though some secret? And why leave an escape route such as that one hidden cigarette, or a means to quickly get more?
Denial is normal. But if allowed, it can transform disbelief into failure.
"I don't want to stop just yet," decides Ryan. "I am perfectly healthy using, so why now," asks Emily? "I'm different, I can control use and keep it to just one or two a day," asserts Ashley.
Regrettably, relapse is at hand for Ryan, Emily and Ashley. While denial acts as protective insulation in allowing us to get our toes wet in beginning this journey -- including allowing you the courage to reach for this book - cessation disbelief can easily become a path of betrayal.
The denial phase protects us against the immediate emotional shock of leaving the most intense relationship we've likely ever known, even while embarking upon a journey from which there should be no return.
It's a shock buffer that allows us time to come to terms with where we now find ourselves. It operates unconsciously to diminish anxiety by refusing to perceive that recovery and success will really happen.
A number of times I went for three days and then "rewarded" myself with that one puff that always spelled defeat. Clearly, I hadn't made it beyond denial. But if I had, the next phase encountered would likely have been anger.
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