THIS IS A BEST SELLER ? That's bad news for all of those who have dedicated themselves to writing a book with substance.First there is the cover, in which Welch looks a bit like a tattooed Jesus himself - taken down from the cross.
The subtitle is "How I found God (he means Jesus) Quit Korn,Kicked Drugs and Lived to Tell My Story"
So, Welch was absolutely no doubt a total addict - speed /meth especially. His is a horror story also of violence in relationships begot by drugs or perhaps what is revealed as a total lack of inner awareness. The reportage is of Korn's success without any mention of their creative process. Highly successful, earning millions of dollars, the money and chaos indulged in allowed Welch to have a massive and steady supply of drugs. Maybe he was too obliterated to know how it was they succeeded.
So you may be wondering, as I did, where the rubber meets the road. Why do you suppose drug addiction and chaotic excess seems to be so much part of rock and roll, because - hear this IT WAS NOT ALWAYS and IT DOES NOT HAVE TO BE.
Here is a scenario from my life worthy of my TALKING TO STRANGERS series, except it happened years ago, that might relate.
In my series about friendships with mentally ill people a while back, one of the people I mentioned, a woman in an unenviable marriage, who was not on drugs nor was her husband, did not take to my loving suggestion that she try therapy. She, as is apparently typical of people with Abused Woman Syndrome, found a way to blame me and take it out on me, even though I had nothing to do with her meeting the man she married, the decision to marry him, or the decision to stay with him but have an affair with a Bad Boy to keep on in the marriage. This was all her doing.
I had been the listener for many months - years - as she described in as much detail as possible - the tiny interactions with the Bad Boy that kept her hopes going that he was Mr. RIght. The whole ordeal had been hard on me too because I did care about her and no longer lived nearby so what I was hearing and seeing was via her reportage in long distance telephone calls. Then when I finally traveled and saw her and met the Bad Boy, I knew it was all wrong and I had to say something.
So what happened was the friendship ended. After several attempts on my part to both stand my ground and let her know I cared and wanted the friendship, her onslought of punishments for speaking my truth - the truth - went on and on. I was bewildered at the turn of events.
At that time of my life I was barely aware of mental health issues or Abused Woman Syndrome and as for drug addicts, I didn't keep friendships with any knowingly and was also barely aware of their machinations to get what they wanted out of people.
One day I was sitting in a coffee house, a rather bare-bones place where there were no barristas and nothing fancy but there was an ongoing pot of your average drip coffee. When a group of AA Twelve Steppers came in and sat together having after-meeting talk, I couldn't help but listen in a bit and decided to run what I had experienced with this ex-friend past these AA people.
They told me that she had never been my friend, that she was a user (i.e. her only use for me was as an unpaid therapist substitute) who didn't care about me. They said that the Bad Boy was her drug. I felt hurt, though not by them. I knew they were speaking their truth and were not trying to hurt me.
What happened after this was that very slowly I started having contact in the very same coffee house with people who were addicts on stuff and off stuff. Over time I learned the hard way some of these people (on or off drugs) were also liars, cheats, and manipulators. I became convinced that it was this lack of integrity, this amorality, this narcissism, that was really behind an addict psychology. (I want to clarify here that I'm talking addicts like Brian Head Welch, though an addict often starts as a casual and once-in-a-while imbiber or experimenter.)
I also learned this from the AA Twelve Steppers: People who are addicts, on substances, like Brian Head Welch, are obliterating experience, they are not growing, and when they get off their drugs, they are usually at the age emotionally and so on, that they were at before they started. Which means that, if you were 16 when you started and stop at 36, well, non-addicts who are 36 don't get it right away that we're dealing with a 16 year old.
Causing oneself pain while taking drugs and taking drugs to avoid paid is an unwinnable situation.
Now, this may or may not be the case all the time, but I really do not know what comes first; Books like SAVE ME FROM MYSELF suggest that the drugs themselves are so strong, so conning, that its near impossible to talk back to them and say NO! And since I have 0 experience with meth, or cocaine, have not taken knowingly and willingly any drug* that is not a prescription, I can't say I've got any experience to rely on as a reference.
As for the conversion to Jesus, I wish Welch luck on that one, as addictions go its probably one of the least harmful. A small last portion of the book is filled with the usual you hear from the recently converted or brain-washed, bla bla bla.
So 'save yourself' some time and after reading this review, don't waste your time with this best-seller. You have better things to do.
* Years ago I did try grass a few times. I'm in favor of medical marijuana but hate the smell of weed - especially skunk - which is always drifting over my neighborhood and can incite asthma. I cannot live in a house with people who smoke weed.
C 2022 Christine Trzyna
