Between the Lines: A Memoir about Addiction, Empathy, and Evolution

By Jay Lind

For years, Jay Lind lived between the lines of society's moral and legal boundaries. But his smooth, privileged life was interrupted when his dad died and his drug addiction snowballed out of control.

Between the Lines is the moving saga of Jay's descent into addiction, his darkest choices, and his struggles in recovery, as told through short vignettes about the many people who touched his life at some of the most critical times.

Jay gained perspective and strength through the guiding words of his father, the unexpected strength of his brother's love, the heartfelt wisdom of his therapist, and the resilience of the addicts he met along the way. But he also learned from people he never thought he would know: a polygraph administrator, a humble celebrity, a veteran with PTSD, and the assistant state's attorney in charge of prosecuting him.

If you've ever wondered whether the small interactions of our everyday lives truly matter or whether a few kind words can really make a difference, Between the Lines reminds us that they do—and they can.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Mar 8, 2022
• ISBN: 9781544528007

Book preview

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Between

the Lines

A Memoir about Addiction, Empathy, and Evolution

Jay Lind

copyright © 2022 jay lind

All rights reserved.

between the lines

A Memoir about Addiction, Empathy, and Evolution

isbn

978-1-5445-2799-4 Hardcover

isbn

978-1-5445-2798-7 Paperback

isbn

978-1-5445-2800-7 Ebook

For my mom and dad,

And for my sons.

Contents

Introduction

My Dad

Dr. A: My Therapist

Randy: A Friend

Chris: My Brother

Wayne: A Drug Addict

David: A Drug Addict

Bradley: An Alcoholic

An Eighteen-Year-Old Boy in a Cook County Jail Cell

Glenn: A Friend

Daisy: An Alcoholic

Kyle: A Drug Addict

Jake and Henry: A Drug Addict and His Little Brother

A Letter to the Loved Ones of Addicts and Alcoholics Everywhere

Anne Piaccini: An Assistant State’s Attorney

Carl Mason: My Probation Officer

My Dad

Scott: A Sex Offender Therapist

Grace: A Polygraph Administrator

C.J.: A Sex Offender

Brent: A Sex Offender

Kathy: A Friend’s Mom

Mary Beth: Teacher, Mentor, Another Friend’s Mom

Max: A Friend and Mary Beth’s Son

Book Club

Dana: My Ex-Wife

Jasper and Rocket: My Kids

My Mom

Jessa: My Former Student, My Victim

My Dad

Epilogue: Jessa: A Survivor, My Partner

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Near the top of the rather lengthy list of concerns I had as I sat down to start writing this book about four years ago was my fear that the end product would be thought of as some kind of list of excuses for the mistakes I have made as a father, husband, brother, son, friend, or teacher. Or even worse, that my words would be misconstrued as some sort of denial of any wrongdoing or even an attempt to minimize the colossal damage left in the wake of my actions. So, let me say it right at the top: I take full responsibility for the monumental mistakes I’ve made in my life, most importantly for my regrettable actions in the fall of 2015. I am solely responsible for the reckless decisions I made and for all of the undeniable sadness, anxiety, and pain that I caused to the people and communities I care about the most. When 2015 began, I was happily married with two perfect sons. We had recently moved into a house just down the street from my childhood home. I was a successful and well-regarded English teacher in the high school that my brother, sister, and I all graduated from.

I really did have it all, and not in some kind of superficial way. I was living my dream in the truest sense. And I was feeling good about what I had made of myself and what I was doing with my life. I was making a difference in the best kind of way, and I was happy. But I risked it all by engaging in inappropriate and illegal sexual contact with one of my former students during her senior year of high school. I don’t believe any good would come from me writing anything else about the specific details of my offense. And I don’t intend to do that in this book. But what the local media reported about it at the time was generally accurate. I’ve never denied it to anyone. And I won’t do it here.

I did it. And I will never stop being remorseful or sorry for what I did. The guilt I feel as a result of my actions during that period of my life doesn’t weigh on me the way it used to, but I will never forget it or truly forgive myself for hurting so many people.

So much has happened in the years that have passed since I walked out of my old school for the last time. I was charged with several felonies as a result of my actions that fall, and I was subsequently convicted of one count of aggravated criminal sexual abuse. If convicted on all the charges against me, I was facing decades in the state penitentiary. But thanks to my family, friends, colleagues, and privilege, I was spared any time in prison. In the end, I was sentenced to two years of sex offender probation and ordered to complete eighteen months of intensive sex offender therapy. I lost my job and my teaching license. And after months of counseling, my wife and I decided that our marriage was over as well. Thankfully, my ex-wife and I have remained close, and we work very well together, co-parenting our two sons.

My dad passed away about a year before I unraveled and dismantled the life and career I had spent so much time and energy building. And my dad was my hero. He battled brain cancer for about a year before he eventually died in bed at our family farm, surrounded by all the people who cared about him the most. I loved my dad very much, and losing him was devastating in a million ways. And my general coping mechanisms for dealing with that loss can only be described as dangerous and unhealthy. Most notable of my many unhealthy coping mechanisms and strategies to process my grief was my abuse of drugs and alcohol. What began as a temporary escape ended up being my demise. As it turns out, to nobody’s surprise, I am a drug addict. And there is no other way to say that.

When my dad got sick, I let my addiction take hold of my entire life. And I never asked for help. I guess I had to hit the proverbial rock bottom that everyone talks about. This is at least part of the reason why it has taken me years to process and eventually accept my dad’s death. I miss him just as much today as I did the day he died, and I will never stop grieving for him, but that is part of the human experience. And I am grateful for that. I am in a much better place with my sadness today because I have finally learned how to grieve for him and miss him in a healthy and appropriate way. I am no longer trying to get over it. I’m just trying to find a healthy way to carry it with me forever. And after countless hours of therapy and pages and pages of reading and writing, I have come to find great value in what my dad taught me while he was alive. In many ways, it has been those very life lessons that have guided me through my personal journey to recovery from my addiction and, eventually, to making amends with the people I have hurt.

My dad’s learned willingness to own his mistakes and flaws, along with his ability to examine those mistakes and to use them to become a better man, may be two of the most valuable lessons I’ve ever learned. But along with his painful but useful self-awareness, my dad also passed on to me his desire to collect the stories of everyone around him and learn from those stories in the same way he learned from his own experience. My dad taught me to look for myself in every person I meet. These inherited character traits serve as the inspiration and backbone of Between the Lines. And while my dad’s illness and eventual death were the catalysts for what proved to be a devastating and destructive downward spiral for me, what he taught me while he was alive was, and continues to be, an integral factor in my continued recovery and evolution as a human being. Sometimes, the worst thing that ever happened to you is also the best thing that ever happened to you.

Between the Lines is, in part, my story of addiction, relapse, and continuing recovery. On a different level, it’s about my experience in Cook County’s criminal justice system as a very privileged, straight White man—a man born with any and all of the advantages needed to live a happy and successful life. I cannot deny that I belong to that small subgroup of Americans born on third base. And if you’ve ever seen me run, you’d know I sure as shit didn’t hit a triple. But as I approach fifty years of age, I’m still trying to find my way to home plate without leaving the basepath or tripping over my own ignorance.

On yet another level, Between the Lines is a retelling of my experience in sex offender therapy and as a father who will most likely remain on the sex offender registry for the rest of my life. But it’s also the story of the extraordinary mistakes I made and the damage and pain they left behind. And, to a lesser extent, Between the Lines is about my very public fall from grace in the community where I grew up and where my family and nearly all of my friends still live.

Each chapter of Between the Lines gets its title from a person or group of people who have played important roles in my story. I have known some of these people for my whole life, but some of the others are people I would’ve never known if I hadn’t fallen so far and so hard in the years surrounding my dad’s death. Some of these important people went out of their way to look after me, hold me up, and encourage me when it would have been understandable and probably easier to let me sit in my own mess until I figured out how to clean it up myself. But the undeniable truth is that I couldn’t have found the renewed happiness and purpose that I have in my life today without the love and support of these extraordinary people. Most likely, I wouldn’t have survived much past my first court date without their help. These people quite literally saved my life, or at the very least, allowed me to save my own life.

Some of the other people featured in the chapters of Between the Lines taught me some essential truths and helped me evolve simply by trusting me with their stories. It is my sincerest hope that sharing my story with them had a similar impact on their lives. Anyone who chooses to read Between the Lines will learn about my journey in bits and pieces as they take in the stories of some of the significant and unique people I’ve encountered along the way. So it could be said that Between the Lines isn’t really about me at all. It’s about everyone else and the perspective I’ve gained by listening to their stories…and learning from them. I really do consider it a gift. And I feel obligated to pay it forward.

Between the Lines is a memoir, albeit a memoir with a slightly unconventional structure. And to respect the privacy and confidentiality of the people whose stories I’ve included in the following chapters, I used pseudonyms and changed other identifying details when necessary. The last thing I want to do is hurt or re-traumatize anyone involved. That would be the exact opposite of what I’ve always hoped to accomplish with this book. Between the Lines is meant to be an act of empathy, compassion, and understanding, and that applies to each and every person whose story appears in the following chapters, along with anyone who chooses to read them. I consider writing this book to be part of the ninth step of my recovery. In more ways than one, this is only the beginning of what I plan on doing to make living amends for the undeniable and unnecessary pain that I’ve caused over the years.

My mission in writing Between the Lines was clear to me when I scribbled the first words of it into my journal during a group therapy session in one of my multiple stints in a drug abuse rehabilitation facility. And I’m confident that it will be worth it. There is a saying about smooth seas not making strong sailors, and I couldn’t agree more. When I encountered dangerous waters for the first time in my life, after forty years of clear sailing, I just curled up below deck and hoped that the storm would pass. Instead, I was thrown overboard, and I nearly died. My experience treading water and doing my best to stay afloat over the last seven years has given me a truly unique perspective on life, a perspective that I surely wouldn’t have gained had the seas remained smooth for the rest of my life. The mistakes I made at sea and the consequences that I faced as a result left me with a newfound perspective and an ability to shed some light where light desperately needs to be shed. And that is precisely what I set out to do when I put pen to paper and started writing Between the Lines.

Grief and loss are human and universal, and there aren’t any silver bullets for dealing with them, but if sharing my experience can help even one person cope with the loss of a loved one, it will be more than worth it. And sadly, addiction and alcoholism also affect the lives of just about everyone on the planet in one way or another. If you are lucky enough not to have the disease, then chances are someone close to you does. And the impact that addiction and alcoholism have on our loved ones can be just as serious as the impact on the addict or alcoholic. It’s like cancer that way. Writing Between the Lines has been key to my recovery, and it will be one of my greatest accomplishments in life if what I have written in these pages provides even a sliver of hope to someone suffering under the strong thumb of addiction, be that an addict or anyone who loves one. A little hope goes a long way.

I decided on Between the Lines as the title for my memoir just a few short days after I came up with the idea for its content and structure. It occurred to me then that the title could work on a few different levels. And keeping it in mind has guided me in my writing. It has served as a constant reminder of my original mission. In one way, the title is my announcement to the reader that my story exists between the lines of the other stories I tell in the book. But the lines in the title also allude to the moral and legal boundaries I’ve had a problem abiding by throughout my life. Lastly, cocaine was my drug of choice, the drug that dominated my thoughts, feelings, and behavior for so many years. But the uncountable lines of cocaine I snorted during those years are only part of what happened back then. How I felt and what I did between those lines are at the core of my story. I do have to say, though, that I have been worried from the start that people might see Between the Lines on a bookshelf somewhere and think that it’s some kind of driver’s education textbook, or a book about football, or maybe even one of those new adult coloring books. But I was willing to take that risk. And, in the end, I’m glad I did.

For almost as long as I can remember, I’ve had a sometimes debilitating fear of being exposed. My dean in high school once told me that I should always act as if my mom was secretly watching my every move. I remember thinking how horrible that would be if everything I was doing back then was suddenly brought into the light, especially if my mom could see it. This fear of being exposed probably doesn’t haunt the average person how it haunted me for so long. But what I have learned through all of this is that my fear of being exposed in high school came from a very real place. It was almost solely based on the fact that the way I was living my life didn’t match up with the core values I believed in. It was an issue of personal integrity…an issue much more common with the rebellious teenager than the fortysomething, suburban high school teacher.

Most

Reviews for Between the Lines

[Jay Lind · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

As a completely unbiased reader who knows nothing about addiction or Lind's story....I have to say, I'm glad I read this book. Consider my eyes opened....