WHATEVER IT TAKES

         

“Good afternoon, my name is Shekhar Sharma. I am a 52-year-old alcoholic. Today is my first attempt of ‘legal separation’ from alcohol.” He smiled feebly at his joke and was gratified to see some faces breaking into one.

They were gathered in a small room of a nearby neighbourhood church, just enough to hold 12 people assembled in a circle. There were nine men and three women. He had walked in after a lot of trepidation, not knowing really what to expect! To his immense relief, he had been warmly welcomed by the group leader and with a matter-of-fact acceptance by the members. They had drawn another chair and made space for him by expanding the circle. He had looked around and found some dejected faces, some hopeful faces and some relaxed faces. Different phases of de-addiction, he guessed.

The meeting had begun with the group leader welcoming all and asking how their week had been. Everyone spoke at their turn, some happy that they succeeded in achieving their goal, some still struggling to achieve theirs. But the will to succeed shone through. His turn came at the last. He stood up and introduced himself.

“I am an alcoholic, have been for the past five years. My story must be like many of us here …that is to say, I don’t even know when I started drinking heavily and it spiraled out of control…...but I knew I needed help when I almost lost our son. But I am getting ahead of my story …let me begin from the beginning…,” so saying Shekhar took a big breath and looked around. Faces around him looked at him with empathy, eyes reflecting the same sadness and awareness as his; some smiling at him encouragingly, some as if saying you will overcome this, don’t despair! Just don’t give up, however tough the journey is! You have begun it, now see it through….

“I come from an upper middle-class family of four. I have an elder brother, an IIT engineer settled in USA. My parents, both academicians, now retired and stay few houses down the lane from where we stay. I studied in Delhi Public School, RK Puram; considered one of the best schools during our time. I had always been a good student, by that I mean, good in academics, regular with my assignments and vying for top position. I was not into contact sports, though played chess and table tennis and participated in Sports Day activities like the house March Past, relay races etc. on Sports Day at school. Though not entirely nerdy, a lot was expected of me from both my parents and school and I delivered. I topped the school in commerce stream and got into SRCC (Shriram College of Commerce), Delhi University. While graduating, I started my Chartered Accountancy course and cleared it in one go; in fact, I came in the merit list. So, within four years of passing out of school, I was a B. Com and a Chartered Accountant.

I got a job in Hindustan Levers, Delhi. Those were good years, where I also met my future wife Sadhna Iyer, three years my junior. A brilliant student, she had done her B.Com from Hindu College and LLB from Delhi University. She a Tamil Brahmin, me a UP Brahmin. Her father was a practicing doctor and her mother a housewife. She has a younger brother, settled in USA too. Our parents met, the families approved of each other and within a year we were married. We lived with my parents and continued with our jobs. Life was good.

After being in the company for almost ten years and climbing steadily, I soon realized that if I wanted to be a big player in the changing economic scenario of the country, I needed to have a MBA degree too. I applied and got through IIM, Ahmedabad. Sadhna too moved with me and picked up a job in one of the local firms to keep herself occupied. She ran our lives and home with clockwork efficiency and looked after all the odds and ends to leave me to study in peace. I owe her a big one for that.

I was picked up by Citibank, Mumbai, to work in their treasury department. This was a huge break and we re- located to Mumbai happily. Sadhna too got a job with Godrej, at their head office in Vikhroli. We rented an apartment in Bandra; it was an easy commute for both of us, my office being at BKC (Bandra Kurla Complex).

 Our son Dhruv was born soon after. Three years later, our family was complete with the birth of my daughter, Pihu. We were earning well and decided to invest in real estate. By the time Dhruv was five, we had shifted in, a roomy three-bedroom apartment in Khar, still close enough for the daily commute.

My work in treasury was very demanding and stressful. Citi was busy expanding its geographical footprint in the country and the business was blooming. The focus of my work was on accounting and I was a core member of the bank’s financial strategy organization. To manage the financial risk of an organization is a daunting task and needs skills and sharp bent of mind. Treasury is the backbone of a bank. It is a bank within a bank. Banks need to make money, and that was our job. Targets difficult to achieve had to be met, life was being lived from ‘one quarter’ to another.

The first few years are unforgettable. I did extremely well, was praised for my ‘grasp’ on the market pulse and I was the management’s ‘blue-eyed’ boy, who could never take a wrong step. Lots was expected of me and as usual I did not disappoint. I rapidly climbed the corporate ladder and was soon a part of senior management team. Work- Life balance was little skewed, but that did not matter in those heydays.

In this highly volatile and ‘dog-eat-dog’ world, you can never predict when the tide will turn. And in my case, turn it did. Your career depended on how you performed in last quarter and whether you delivered your given target. I was expected to be ahead of the game and to ensure that the bank does not go down under in times of economic or financial uncertainty. To put it bluntly, it was one of my tasks to optimize the returns on investment and maximize profits.

In my optimism, I started taking bigger risks, miscalculating the market trends, which led to some huge losses for the bank. When you are responsible for making investments that are profitable to the company, when you don’t have much leeway to dance and party like it was in days before the economy opened up, one slip and everyone is baying for your blood.

The bank hires the best financial brains there are who are expected to bring in business. I often found myself floundering to deliver. This was something I had never experienced before, and quite frankly, it was unnerving to say the least.

I started staying longer and longer in office. The pressure to outperform my colleagues, to satisfy the demands of seniors, to not to ‘slip up’ took a toll on my health and family. I was always short with Sadhna, had no time to spend with her and children, even on weekends. I could see Sadhna was trying her best to cope up, to take up for me when children complained, but I was helpless. Monthly expenditure and huge EMI for the house loomed large on the horizon.

Slowly, in the beginning just to unwind, and later on to forget the harrowing day, my drinking increased. I had always been a social drinker and was not fond of drinking alone. But now, I found pouring myself a drink at the end of a grueling day and nurse it over a better part of the night.

To make things worse, my ratings in the annual appraisal slipped. My seniors, who had never hovered over me in the past, started micromanaging my current tasks. Not being used to ‘not perform’ ever, this feeling of being somehow ’inadequate’ made me make rookie mistakes in my nervousness. I realized to my dismay, that though academically I had always excelled and had done well in my previous job, treasury in a leading private bank required a sharp mind or maybe a different set of skills that I either lacked or was failing to employ.

The only thing that gave me joy so to say during this distressing time, was my ‘date’ with my drink. I never really understood when I became a serious drinker, to the extent that it started interfering with my work. I started finding excuses to drink. Extended lunches with the client became a norm. I thought nothing of having two gin cocktails for lunch on a working day.

Weekends became a drinking fest. Gins in the afternoon, single malts at nights. This was my way of ‘relaxing’ and no amount of cajoling, anger or ‘cold silences’ worked. As was to be expected, my drinking spilled over to working days too and it was not long before hushed whispers followed me in the office corridors. My work slipped further and one day I was summoned to my boss’s cabin. I was given a severe talking to and put on PIP- ‘Performance Improvement Programme’.

The writing was clear on the wall when they started excluding me from the weekly ‘Monday’ morning meetings. I knew it was now just a matter of time when Citi and I would part company. The axe when it fell, was almost an anti-climax. One busy morning in the bank, I was summoned by my boss. I was ‘advised’ to put in my papers by the end of the month.

I was now officially ‘unemployed’ and still drinking. In fact, it worsened. After Sadhna and the children left for the day, I would have my first drink by 11.am and drink steadily through the afternoon. By the time children returned, I would be ‘pleasantly drunk’. Evenings I would be seen ‘nursing’ a glass of scotch.

As expected, my money soon ran out. We had a joint account for sundry expenses and I started withdrawing money from there. Sadhna had no clue as I had the ATM card and the notifications came on my mobile. I had fallen to such depths that cheating my wife also did not deter me from drinking.

My half-hearted attempts to find a job came to naught as I was always in a drunken haze and pitifully unprepared for the questions thrown at me. Sadhna was a ringside spectator to all this farce and her worried face spoke a lot. Her entreaties fell on deaf ears and she gave up. Her primary concern was to shield the children from me.

I stand here before you today because of an incident that totally shook me up and woke me from the stupor I had fallen into. Last Thursday, our driver, Ravi did not come as his father was hospitalized by a ruptured appendix during the night. Sadhna had a very important meeting which she just could not miss. So, she requested me to pick up Dhruv at 4.00 pm from school after his football coaching. She reminded me to be remain sober and be there on time.

Remember I did. Go I did. But after a ‘few’ drinks in the afternoon. I picked him up, he was surprised and happy to see me. I was in great spirits. He sat in front with me and we took for home. As we neared the Linking Road traffic signal, the light turned yellow. Ideally, I should have stopped. But drinks dull your senses and give you a false sense of confidence, invincibility …. I continued driving. A car suddenly loomed large on Dhruv’s side…. frighteningly close…….

My son’s anguished and horrifying scream is still echoing in my ears. “DAD! Dad, lookout …. DADDDDD….” Dhruv screamed! ……. Shaken, jolted out of my stupor, as if on auto, I swerved at the last minute and we missed the oncoming car by a whisker. Cars honked, brakes squealed …. horns blared from all sides…. tyres screeched as the cars jerked to sudden halts….

I cleared the crossing and screeched to a halt on the kerbside. My hands were trembling…...Dhruv was still shivering. We stared at each other in shock. I reached out and took him near, checking to see whether he was hurt. By God’s mercy, he was unhurt I cursed myself for the ‘near miss’. My befuddled brain suddenly cleared up. The permanent fog surrounding my brain dissipated as if by magic. I held on to my son and cried bitter tears of anguish, remorse…….”, I slowly stopped talking.

A silence reigned. The group leader got up and took me near. “You are at the right place mate! Don’t worry…everything will be fine. It’s long arduous journey but achievable ……stick to your resolve …it will be hard, many times you will be tempted to drink, but you will have to be firm…. remember, you have friends here, reach out to us when it becomes unbearable…YOU can do it, WE can do it ”……, so saying, he gestured for everyone to join them.

Shekhar left the building feeling light and relaxed after a long time. He knew there was would be pitfalls on the way, but now he was assured that he could reach out for help. He knew the withdrawal would take a toll on him and family but then this was their combined fight. Sadhna had almost collapsed on hearing their mishap. He was full of regret and remorse on what he had made his family go through.

His heart broke on seeing his family’s hopeful but questioning eyes. He had sat them down and assured them that he would get over his addiction with alcohol. He promised them he would fight his craving for drinking and with their help he will succeed, whatever it takes! The first thing he had done was to pour all the liquor stacked in the bar, cupboards, lofts even down the kitchen sink drain. Sadhna’s look of astonishment made him smile even today. Next, his LinkedIn profile was refreshed, a long pending task! He emailed his friends and acquaintances, enquiring about any openings, any job opportunities. A lifestyle change was needed. Meditation, yoga, pranayama, morning walk …. anything to get his life back on track!! The idea was to keep himself too occupied to even think of a drink……

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The main door of his flat opened even before he rang the bell. His wife and two children stood in front of him; arms wide, their faces split in happy smiles. He gathered them in his arms and hugged them close. The door silently shut itself as the family huddled together tightly.

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