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After she stopped drinking and drugging at 21, Sarah Rosenzweig described to her incredulous mother how she had spent most of the previous seven years under the influence, losing jobs and traveling across the country to escape her demons. "I said to her, 'I was high all the time-how did you not notice?'
"And the first thing my mom said to me was, 'Are you sure? Jewish people aren't alcoholics,'" Rosenzweig recalls.
This is not an uncommon sentiment. Often, according to experts on Jewish addiction, cultural norms can interfere with recognizing signs of substance abuse and thwart proper treatment. Glasses of wine, for instance, are an integral part of many Jewish religious and cultural activities, from the Kiddush to such holidays as Passover and Purim.
Regardless of how the substance abuse starts-a religious activity or youthful experimentation grown out of control-those closest to the situation frequently don't recognize the problem.
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At 16, Rosenzweig left her Detroit-area public high school to be homeschooled. She says the lack of constant supervision gave her an easier environment for drinking and getting high. Rosenzweig ran away to Phoenix at 19, thinking: "If I go there, everything will be perfect." She found out, as most addicts do, that geographic relocation doesn't help.
Finally, with a friend's guidance, she confronted her problem in 1997. Today, at 28, she is drug-free and seeking work as a social worker in the Jewish community around Detroit.
Like Rosenzweig, the luckiest of addicts have that moment when they realize, or are forced to acknowledge, they have substance-abuse problems. That moment of reflection can be a call to action.
"I don't know if there is one classic case," says Lou Abrams, who runs the Yatzkan Division for Adolescent Substance Abuse and Behavioral Health Services (also known as the Yatzkan Center), a drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility in Brooklyn, N.Y., which treats adolescents.
Many kids fall through the cracks of school systems or are able to put up a good front while they spiral downhill in the shadows, Abrams says. "A lot of the kids come with emotional problems that lead to substance abuse. Which comes first is hard to determine."
Spirituality vs. Recovery
What comes next can make the difference between life and death.
Recognizing the signs and providing proper treatment has brought many in the Jewish community back from addiction. But there can be religious and cultural roadblocks.
Too often, experts say, rabbis and other Jewish leaders want substance abusers to find help through their religion, dismissing established 12-step programs like Alcoholics Anonymous, which some perceive as making Christian overtures (see sidebar, page 21).
Jews who need help also often see themselves as different from the addicted population at large. "They want to use Judaism to recover. They think they're different; they're Jewish," Rosenzweig says.
"That is fatal for a lot of people. You can have recovery and not have religion, but you can't have religion and not have recovery."
Guilt and embarrassment issues are common in many incidents of drug or alcohol addiction. The "shanda [shame] factor," the concern that a family member's addiction may be a mark against the family in the community, further delays recognizing and treating addiction.
"When it comes to Jews…the denial tends to be 10 times larger," says Dr. Abraham Twerski, medical director emeritus of the Gateway Rehabilitation Center in western Pennsylvania, which he founded in 1973 as a secular treatment facility.
"[Addiction is] seen as a moral weakness, and people don't understand that it's a disease," Twerski says. "It's ignored and put under the rug until something happens that is like a rock bottom-until someone makes a spectacle of themselves."
When addicts first seek help, often from a rabbi or spiritual leader, the messages can be mixed. "Rabbis who know very little about addiction may be the ones giving wrong advice," Twerski says. "Some Jews, especially with the help of rabbis, believe that Judaism is all they need and they shouldn't go to any treatment programs that are alien to the Jewish faith."
Belief in God alone cannot "cure" alcoholism, says Yisrael Pinson, a Chabad rabbi who directs the Daniel B. Sobel Friendship House in West Bloomfield, Mich., a club for Jewish recovering addicts. The house draws about 80 guests each month for Shabbat dinners and holds weekly Sober Nights Out, where recovering addicts meet for meals, meetings, and social events.
Pinson also notes that some rabbis might be the last people to approach for objective guidance. "I know plenty of Orthodox rabbis who were totally addicted to alcohol," he says. "And the fact that they were in synagogue three times a day and they prayed fervently didn't change the fact that they had alcohol in their pockets."
Treatment specialists like Abrams believe the Jewish community must be taught the bigger picture on recognizing and treating addiction, and how to embrace 12-step programs like AA.
The phenomenon of denial, which can be seen throughout substance abuse, has become particularly problematic in the Jewish world. Pinson suggests that, instead of educating all rabbis, communities create "recovery rabbis," like himself, to be a resource for synagogues and other pulpit leaders.
"We always talk about hitting rock-bottom, but we are there as a culture to try and help the bottom rise," Abrams says. "We don't need to wait too long. The more information the communities have, the more they can [prevent] the loss and the consequences that would occur if they didn't have this information."
Before entering high school, many Jewish youth have been given wine or hard alcohol by synagogue elders and in family settings to celebrate holidays, mitzvahs, or the Sabbath. While most don't become addicted, some do.
And then there is Purim, a holiday that many believe glorifies alcohol use. The Talmud says that Jews are supposed to drink enough alcohol on Purim so they do not understand the difference between "cursed is Haman" and "blessed is Mordechai." The holiday is further described as days of drinking and rejoicing.
"You have a situation where it is almost a religious prescription to get drunk," Weinreb said. "While rabbis have said for centuries that it doesn't mean 'get drunk,' it has been very much abused."
Now, in many Orthodox shuls, religious school programs before Purim include alcohol education.
Incorporating Judaism into Recovery
Among groups working in the direction of incorporating Judaism into recovery efforts are the Brooklyn-based Yatzkan Center and the Orthodox Union (OU), which has created guidelines for yeshiva high schools.
The new guidelines allow students who admit to drug or alcohol use to receive treatment while remaining in good academic standing at the school. Those suspected of using illegal substances are screened by a counselor, and school officials and parents work together with the student to craft an intervention plan.
The onus is also placed on parents to monitor their kids' interactions with drugs and alcohol outside the yeshiva. Students could still be expelled or face other disciplinary actions if they do not admit to substance use, or if there are other behavioral or academic issues.
"We'd love to see tremendous communal awareness," says Frank Buchweitz, national director of community service and special projects for OU.
He expects six or seven schools in the New York City area to begin implementing the OU guidelines this coming school year. Some have said they will adopt the guidelines verbatim, while others will incorporate the guidelines into their current policies.
"We want to help these kids. This is a therapeutic model, rather than a punitive model," says Buchweitz.
The Yatzkan program, like others that are becoming more prominent in large Jewish communities, is offering treatment that allows Jews to embrace religion on their own terms. It is not a substitute for 12-step programs, rehab organizers quickly caution, but a product of that model.
Patients attend weekly Shabbat services that link worship to recognizing and accepting a higher power that can restore them to sobriety-the second and third steps of AA's 12-step philosophy. Rabbis come in daily to work with the kids and to link their recovery to spirituality.
"Often, a lot of these kids had religion in their life without spirituality," Abrams says. "We [discuss Judaism] with a lot of love. We don't lay a lot of guilt on them. We invite them."
The new Yatzkan inpatient facility is, indeed, an inviting place. Each of eight four-bedroom apartments is equipped with a lounge, library, and kitchens for meat and dairy. The facility's first floor features recreation rooms with ping-pong and foosball tables, exercise equipment, and other amenities, as well as rooms for therapy and vocational training.
Abrams says most adolescents come into Yatzkan ambivalent, at best, about their religion. "In most cases, they are no longer practicing, but they have deep feelings. Some feel alienated by the religion. What we find is, once they are not forced to practice, but see the practice around them, they start to gravitate back," he says.
There is kosher food, and rabbis are present onsite. "We also expose them to religious people who are not shaming them, but are accepting [of] who they are and working with them. They start to see role models that are very positive, and it starts to diffuse some of their notions. They are starting to get desensitized to the alienation."
Several young Jews in Yatzkan and similar programs across the country have said they have become more religious, and certainly more spiritual, than when growing up, and several said they were considering the rabbinate.
Joshua,* who at 28 has been sober for seven years after drinking and drugging heavily throughout college, says that alcohol filled a "God-shaped hole" in his life.
"I got to the place where I was sort of able to reconnect with spirituality. At first it was broad-based, a connection with a higher power. But for me, it meant re-exploring the religion that was familiar to me, and [it] culminated in me recently becoming a rabbi," he says.
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Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) and other 12-step programs have a reputation for being Christian-oriented, but Jewish addiction specialists say they are the best place for substance abusers to start seeking help.
Convincing Jewish addicts that such programs will not proselytize can be difficult, especially in parts of the country without large Jewish populations.
"I think it's a huge sticking point for Jews, and I think it bothers a lot of people," says Joshua*, a 28-year-old Orthodox man who has been in AA for seven years. "I think there is a gut feeling that this is wrong-you shouldn't be in a church, talking about God. Jews shouldn't be holding hands with people and, of all things, saying a prayer."
The organization, founded in 1935 by two self-described "hopeless drunks," now estimates having more than 2 million members worldwide. Its program revolves around 12 steps of recovery, which force members to admit they are powerless over alcohol and make amends to those they have wronged through their addiction. The organization stresses it is not religious, and many of its members agree.
"AA, as a program, is very non-religious-affiliated," Joshua says. "It is very explicit that there is a healthy respect for religion, but no religious affiliation."
But at the same time, God is referenced in five of the 12 steps; each meeting usually ends with a serenity prayer; and, while some communities hold AA meetings in synagogues, most meetings are in churches, which were among the first to rent the group space.
Adverse to AA
Many Jews are reluctant to attend AA meetings at first, says Rabbi Yisrael Pinson, a "recovery rabbi" and director of the Daniel B. Sobel Friendship House, outside Detroit. But, he says, the religion issue is just a smokescreen.
"The person who resists the most and says it is not a place for Jews is the addict who doesn't want to get treatment," says Pinson. "He's going to get his family off his back by talking to the rabbi."
And many rabbis, uneducated in the philosophies of 12-step programs, steer addicts away because of the perceived religious overtones.
The fact is, Pinson says, AA is the only thing that really works. "The best way that a true addict can recover, Jewish or non-Jewish, is from AA," he says.
Ideas have been broached about forming a Jewish alternative to AA. But Dr. Abraham Twerski, founder and medical director emeritus of Gateway Rehabilitation Center in western Pennsylvania, says it wouldn't work.
"A Jewish program would give the belief that there is such a thing as Jewish alcoholism," he says. "But there is no more a Jewish alcoholism [than] a Jewish diabetes."
Twerski and others say such a program would create a self-perception by Jewish alcoholics of being "terminally unique" and believing their illness, and their recovery, is different.
"I am afraid they will use their Jewishness as a way to allow themselves to become social drinker[s] again and to nullify the teachings and practices of AA," Twerski says.
A Complementary Approach
Sarah Rosenzweig, a former addict who has attended "12 Steps in Judaism" programs with Pinson for several years, says that approach gives her a better understanding of her religion. "I feel the Torah helps me understand the tenets of the 12 steps, and the 12 steps help me understand the Torah," she says. "For me, they go hand in hand."
Most Jewish recovery programs are done as complements to 12-step programs, not as alternatives. Rosenzweig says she needed both to make progress in her recovery. "It's very important to find something in a 12-step program that supports what I grew up with. Everything I have learned in my Judaism, I have connected in my 12 steps," she says.
One long-established program is JACS-which loosely stands for Jewish Alcoholics, Chemically Dependent Persons, and Significant Others-runs retreats and other programs that allow Jews in recovery and their families to connect. The program was founded 28 years ago to be a support group for Jews in recovery and their families in New York City. It now operates across the country, including offering crisis hotlines and educational programs, and serves more than 7,000 people.
"People wanted a safe environment that wasn't in a church, and where they could throw in a Jewish spin," said Sharon Darack, JACS program director. Discussions often cite Torah text and end with the Shema.
For some, JACS is a lifeline to those with a common understanding. For others, like Joshua, it just didn't fit. "For me, it was very uncomfortable," he says. "JACS felt strange in that it was affiliating with a specific religion, which seemed to go against the spirit of AA. What's so beautiful about AA is that it's just alcoholics, with no particular religious affiliation."
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Pinson of Sobel House says the recovering addict is continuously working on his spirituality, and thus could be putting himself on a much higher spiritual level than other practicing Jews.
"Addicts and non-addicts are equally spiritual and non-spiritual. The problem is that an addict cannot afford not to grow spiritually."
* Some names and identifying characteristics of people in this story have been changed to ensure anonymity.
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For decades, Orthodox men had been leaving their seats in the middle of Saturday morning services, retiring to classrooms or other small areas-and drinking.
While the congregation was reading from the Haftorah and listening to the rabbi's sermon, the men were imbibing single-malt Scotch, and then returning to the service.
Rabbis say the so-called Kiddush Clubs began as a way to give small amounts of food and drink to elderly and diabetic men who could not make it through an entire Saturday-morning service without sustenance, especially since the Orthodox do not eat before morning prayers.
But, as time passed, the small gatherings became larger and soon Kiddush Clubs morphed into exclusive get-togethers for the senior men of the shul. Sips of kosher wine and small pieces of cake became expensive scotches and more elaborate spreads.
Supporters say Kiddush Clubs increased synagogue attendance among men and created a spirit of camaraderie. But others say it was just an excuse for synagogue patriarchs to both get drunk on the Sabbath and exclude themselves from the rest of the community.
Rabbi Tzvi Hersh Weinreb cannot forget the Purim more than 20 years ago that forever changed his thinking about alcohol in the Jewish community.
A group of young men came to his home in Baltimore for the holiday, clearly intoxicated. Although Weinreb's wife confiscated their car keys, one of the young men became defiant. The young man grabbed his own keys, took his car, and was killed in a car accident.
"I was the last person to see him alive," Weinreb says. "It really sensitized me to the issue. Once I began to study it, I realized this is a serious problem; we can't avoid it."
Now executive vice president of the Orthodox Union (OU), Weinreb says he has made curbing alcohol abuse within the community one of his hallmark issues.
His commitment came at a time when more community leaders were beginning to recognize the problem and search for solutions. When Weinreb invited 65 educators to the OU offices in New York in late 2004 to discuss security issues in homes, schools, and shuls, everyone expressed concerns about the growth of substance abuse.
"I said, 'In my seat, what can I do?'" The answer he received from the educators was almost unanimous: End the "Kiddush Clubs."
"This set a terrible example for children," Weinreb says. "They see the most important people in the community leaving in the middle of the service and coming back obviously affected from the alcohol."
Moshe,* a 23-year-old recovering substance abuser, says he got his first taste for alcohol when he was brought into the Kiddush Club at an Orthodox shul on Long Island in seventh grade.
"My father wanted to show me how to use alcohol as a responsible human being. He wanted to show me we could have a shot and not get drunk, and not be frat boys," he recalls.
But before he had reached high school, Moshe had started sneaking shots at home and at school, and eventually began bringing a flask to his Long Island yeshiva.
Moshe said he twice tried to commit suicide while studying in Israel, and would go on three-week benders. "I didn't have the ability to take one [drink] and be happy," he said. "If one was OK, 10 must be great. There was no such thing as overkill." He advanced to heroin and other drugs after graduating yeshiva, "because alcohol wasn't doing the job anymore."
When the OU board voted to end Kiddush Clubs in 2005, uproar began. Many congregations said it was a harsh response to some isolated incidents of alcohol abuse and that the punishment did not fit the crime.
But Weinreb says idealizing drinking in the Jewish community was sending the wrong message. "We are not against Kiddush Clubs because we are killjoys," he says. "We are against Kiddush Clubs because [they are] a symptom of a serious and growing problem in our community."
Weinreb and others say the clubs are just a part of a larger concern about community complicity in alcohol abuse. They say religious ceremonies that encourage alcohol use have led children to experiment with substances at increasingly young ages, under the guise of participating in family and religious rituals.
In the two years since the OU spoke out against Kiddush Clubs, Weinreb said many synagogues have agreed to disband them. He believes the issue has awakened parts of the community to the example they are setting for their children.
Weinreb says he recently received a call from a man who took his children to a basketball game where clearly drunk fans started to get rowdy. When the Orthodox man muttered to his children about the poor behavior, he was shocked by one child's response: "But they look just like you guys when you come back to shul … after the Kiddush Club."
"We often think our kids don't take lessons from what we do," Weinreb says. "And that's very, very wrong."
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