Symptoms of Withdrawal: A Memoir of Snapshots and Redemption

414 Pages·2005·7.16 MB·English

by  Christopher Kennedy Lawford

Symptoms
of
Withdrawal

A Memoir of Snapshots
and Redemption
Christopher Kennedy Lawford
For David, Savannah, and Matthew
So that you know who I am
We do not receive wisdom, we must discover
it for ourselves, after a journey through the wilderness
which no one else can make for us, which no one
can spare us, for our wisdom is the point of view from
which we come at last to regard the world.
—marcel proust
. . . there really wasn’t any punishment appropriate
for keeping Chris on the straight and narrow.
Presumably, he does what he wants to do when
he wants to do it, and has ver y little sense
of conscience about it.
—david sheldon, headmaster of
middlesex school in a letter
to my mother
Contents
We do not receive wisdom, we must discover... iii
Preface
On a cold fall day in 1997 I found myself… ix
Author's Note
When I was young my mother told me I was... xv
Chapter 1
What happens when you are born with the American
dream… 1
Chapter 2
My childhood on the beach in California was a utopia. 18
Chapter 3
Las Vegas was like Oz to me. A magical place… 25
Chapter 4
When I was five years old, the Democrats came to… 32
Chapter 5
Sister Agnes was one of the strictest women ever to… 51
Chapter 6
Nobody sat me down and told me my mother was… 57
Chapter 7
In my mind the entire world seemed to admire and… 62
Chapter 8
I had never been skiing before my mom fled back… 68
Chapter 9
After the beach I grew up on in California, Hyannis… 78
Chapter 10
My cousins Bobby Kennedy, Bobby Shriver, David
Kennedy, and I… 85
Chapter 11
I heard the voices of concern for his safety when… 99
Chapter 12
When you choose the beginning of a road you also… 109
Chapter 13
My grandfather believed that experience shaped character.
My grandmother believed… 117
Chapter 14
In 1993 I found myself on the show Politically Incorrect… 126
Chapter 15
In the summer of 1969, a year after my uncle… 134
Chapter 16
The bridge at Concord, Massachusetts, and the events
surrounding “the… 142
Chapter 17
I loved getting high. I was a pig from the… 159
Chapter 18
My uncle Teddy had this cool powder blue Pontiac GTO… 166
Chapter 19
I arrived in L.A. in the spring of 1972 not… 170
Chapter 20
After an exhausting year trying to keep up with the… 192
Chapter 21
Although I prayed for an intervening miracle that would
illuminate… 208
Chapter 22
So you want to be a tough guy? 216
Chapter 23
After graduating from college I found myself further
adrift… 225
Chapter 24
I was having some credibility issues. Lawyers are
credible—well… 233
Chapter 25
I met her at the Fan Club in Boston when… 243
Chapter 26
In 1980 I was a vital, vibrant fixture on the… 248
Chapter 27
I showed up for my second go-round with those massive… 259
Chapter 28
My sister Sydney married Peter McKelvy in 1983. It was… 278
Chapter 29
It took me two years to get married after my…. 287
Chapter 30
In December of 1983 my dad had his last and… 294
Chapter 31
At the end of my active addiction pretty much everything… 301
Chapter 32
God it was cold. I remember it being the coldest… 307
Chapter 33
Carl Jung said that he had never seen an alcoholic… 312
Chapter 34
We are our parents. Accept it, forgive them, make peace… 316
Chapter 35
One of the great fictions of recovery is that once… 326
Chapter 36
My uncle Sarge told me that everything he wanted and… 331
Chapter 37
After my parents divorced and I was assimilated into the… 339
Chapter 38
An alcoholic in a relationship is like flies on a… 358
Chapter 39
There is an old Sufi saying that goes something like… 362
Chapter 40
The doctor in Mount Kisco told me that my test… 371
Chapter 41
One of the great gifts I was given by my… 375
Chapter 42
Many people have asked me what it was like growing… 378
Conclusion
If I could change anything in my life, being an... 382
Index 391