Drugs and alcohol may have dulled the pain of Ben Heldfond’s youth, but they did not make the pain go away.
In recovery he learned lessons about accountability that finally helped him process the pain – lessons which he would apply to all aspects of his life.
“Our Happy Divorce,” the book he co-wrote with his ex-wife, Nikki DeBartolo, about their journey to successful co-parenting and a lasting friendship, was published in October 2019.
+ Read Full Transcript
One of my favorite sayings is, Pain is mandatory, but suffering is optional.
Life has its bumps and bruises and people get banged up. And it's just about what we do with that.
Getting through that pain is a process.
And unfortunately I'm not wired for process. I'm not wired for going through things. I've always been wired to go around things.
My first reaction is, What can I do? What can I take to get through this quicker?
And that, that's not the way that life works. There's no like 26.5 miles, whatever a marathon is. Like,if you run it, you're going to be done.
In every experience in my life that I've had a hard time, there's been no timetable. But eventually I get through it.
My story of using alcohol and drugs, luckily, wasn't that long because I got involved with heroin in my late teens, and that brought me to my knees very quickly.
I entered my first rehab when I was 21 years old. Didn't stay sober, but eventually at 22, I ended up staying sober. And I'm sober today 25 years later.
So my dad moved out of the house a couple of weeks before my bar mitzvah. And at 13, I was a little confused on what exactly that meant or what was going on in their marriage. I do remember at my bar mitzvah was the first time, since he had moved out, that my parents were together. And it was a really awkward feeling, for myself,but I think everybody involved, because when they were together taking pictures, you know, there was a palpable feeling in the air that everybody felt.
And unfortunately that feeling, or that tension, lasted for 30 years, and all the way through growing up. And I think at the end of the day, they handed us-- me and my brothers and sister-- a huge emotional bill to pay, in something that we had no choice in.
I don't think they did it intentionally. You know, this wasn't a premeditated, How are we going to screw up our kids? Let's plan this out.
But, you know, resentment, anger, fear, blind people to their actions. And I think that's what happened to my parents.
I have always been a person who's been able to stuff their feelings. And I think that that happened from an early age, and being dyslexic, and not getting the stuff as quickly as the other kids.
And so my parents' divorce, you know, it's a very, very uncomfortable position to be in when your moms -- or dad --are talking so badly about the other one, that you just sort of have to sit there and take it. Because, you know, if you say anything, it's going to make things worse. It's going to throw gasoline on the fire. And so you just sit there and take it, where if anybody else were talking like that about your parents, you'd probably get a punch in the face.
I stuffed that just like I'd stuffed every other sort of negative thing in my life, and thinking that it went away or – just pack it down deeper. I was like a trash compactor, you know, just pack all those feelings down and, and...
But what happened with drugs and alcohol is they didn't make me feel those feelings anymore -- whether it be my parents' divorce, whether it be, you know, my low self esteem, the dyslexia and not feeling smart enough -- every single fruit salad of emotions. I didn't feel them anymore.
The end of my drinking and using, it wasn't because of an overdose, which I had had. It wasn't because of arrest, which I have had. It wasn't because of a car crash, which I had. I just woke up one day and I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. I was done.
One thing I've learned as a parent is one of the most important things we can teach our kids are consequences. Every action has a consequence. And, and growing up, my mom was always there. My dad was always there to bail me out of trouble.
It wasn't premeditated. They weren't doing this because they were trying to screw up life or you know, stick a needle in my arm or whatever. But they were doing it because they loved me and they didn't want to see me get in trouble. So when I got arrested or I got in trouble in high school and almost didn't graduate, somehow all this stuff just went away.
So I didn't really ever face consequences growing up. And I'm actually grateful for all that because it's taught me so much about life, and it's also taught me so much about parenting.
And it's also taught me so much about, you know, my divorce, eventual divorce to my ex-wife because everything happens in life for a reason, you know? And if we just are able to take a step back, and be open and aware enough to what those experiences mean, we can learn from them and not repeat them.
I think, you know, my story of marriage and then unfortunately, divorce is a tale of two sides.
One side of that story is a Ben who doesn't take care of himself and do what he's supposed to do in order to be spiritually grounded. And by that I mean, helping out other people, going to meetings, being honest.
I was abstinent from drugs and alcohol, but I would say I wasn't sober. And I actually caused more wreckage with people around me than I did when I was using drugs and alcohol.
I had become a miserable person.
So I got sober, November 3rd, 1994. I met Nikki I think around '97, '98. You know, looking back on it, it was always trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. We wanted to make it work. We'd been dating for a couple of years, and society sort of tells us, okay, we're in our mid twenties. We been dating a couple of years, let's get married.
I, I kind of knew that it wasn't the right thing. And, and if you had asked Nikki, she probably would've said the same thing.
But you know, again, this was at a point where I had slowly started doing less and less, sort of auditing recovery. That's when decision making gets skewed for me.
We get married. We move to Tampa, Florida. You know, a couple years go by. We have a beautiful son, but it's always this square peg round hole. I think what happened was we kept on trying, but at the same time we're getting madder and madder that this square peg won't fit in this round hole.
I was not going to meetings at all. I was not connected at all. Behaviors, the truth telling it was nonexistent.
It was not a great way to end a marriage.
The other side of that is the story of the Ben who at some point during our separation reached a point of honesty, and I could see for the first time in a long time, the person that I actually was.
And that was not a very good person.
I wasn't drinking, using drugs, but it still was somebody who needed to get back to basics, and have the humility enough to realize that I was broken. And could potentially do the same thing as my parents did and stick my son with this huge emotional bill.
You know, luckily I just had enough program in me, or enough foundation or whatever it was, to get back to basics. And I simply did that, started going to meetings and started working with another man, and we got to the root of some of my issues.
And at the end of that process, it was very clear I wouldn't want to be married to me either.
Our marriage was over. We finally were honest enough to both realize that we were not put on this earth to be husband and wife. But we were put on this earth to have a beautiful child and to be best friends.
The other part of this process is getting right with the person that you've harmed. And so I asked Nikki to coffee.
First thing out of my mouth was I told her I loved her.
And I also then went into my amends. My part. Period, hard stop. You know, I'm sorry for what I did. And I went through, you know, all this stuff, and became accountable for my actions. And there wasn't, But you did this. Or, If you hadn't done this, I would....
But it was just my side of the street. I needed to clean up my side of the street.
And she then in turn apologized to me.
Twenty-two years we've known each other, it's the first and only time that either of us have said we're sorry to each other!
That was a turning point in our relationship. And we then turned from, you know, two people who are bitter, hatred, resentment -- just sort of like my parents -- to a road of trying to do something different.
I'd asked her, I said, "Do you have any problem with joint custody?"
She said, "Of course not."
I said, “Nikki, all the other stuff can be worked out then.”
Our relationship going forward was built on a foundation of accountability, love, and forgiveness.
I am now 46. I've been sober for 25 years. And today I am remarried, with two other kids.
My son Asher's now 15 years old, and I co-parent him with my ex wife who just happens to live five doors down.
Pain is in life whether you're sober or whether you're not sober -- you're going to go through it in life.
We all have the capacity to be happy. And we all have the right to be happy.
The common thread of happiness is being present and accepting the moment exactly as it is.
Once I start living in the past, or in the future, I have lost my ability to be happy.
And so, you know, one thing that I really try to work on today is being accountable, and the admission that I'm flawed.
And we all are flawed! And we're going to make mistakes along this road of life.
But being able to clean up at least your side of the street makes that road life a little bit easier.
My name is Benjamin Helfond, and this is my story.