"Not Like Our Mothers"
Disclaimer: I don't own SVU or the characters.
Author's Note: Story takes place around season 17 but is open to interpretation. I connected to this story and felt the pain that Olivia is going through, I hope on some level, you are able to connect in your own way. And yes, I am aware that Olivia is not an alcoholic, but the story is non-canon, ok?
Olivia always promised herself she would never turn to alcohol for comfort, for support, but here she was, in the musky basement of a small Catholic Church just off 42nd Street with free coffee and a pastry in her hands.
There were meetings all over the city, various places, everytime, everyday. Olivia picked this one because it was far enough from the precinct and her apartment that she didn't run the risk of recognizing anyone, but it was close enough that she didn't have to take a cab home.
She had never been to a meeting like this before. She's never had a reason to, until now.
She felt venerable for feeling like she had to ask for help, for getting herself into a situation she couldn't get out of on her own. Every hero has a breaking point sooner or later, hers just happens to come with sobriety coins.
She hated feeling weak, like she needed someone else to support her. She has never needed that in the past, she has always been on her own and she learned to deal with things that way. She is independent. She is a strong woman. She is confident. She is good at her job. She is one hell of a cop... most of the time, but she is not good at owning up to her feelings and reaching out when she needs help. It's a minor miracle she actually came to this meeting today.
Her mother never went to meetings, she never reached out for help, she didn't want to get better. Olivia wasn't like her mother, she wants to get better, but she needs help.
Lately things in Olivia's life have been turning upside down. She has been under a lot of pressure at work with stressful cases, deadlines, court appearances, and a double workload. She's had personal struggles with her relationship with Brian, and the situation with Lewis...
She has had a lot of obstacles she's had to overcome, that she had to survive, and she did, all by herself, but that was part of the problem, she is all alone. She doesn't have anyone to confide in anymore, Elliot left and she isn't with Cassidy anymore, she broke up with Tucker, she and Fin don't really have that kind of relationship, and she certainly isn't going to talk about her personal life at work. The only thing she had left to turn to was the bottle.
Truth is, she has been doing this for a while, she just learned how to hide it, how to put on a mask every morning and make her way through the day, anticipating when it was time to go home, to head to a bar, or time to kick back with a drink and de-stress.
It started out as one glass of wine after work to relax her mind, try to forget the horrors she'd seen that day. A beer or two with the guys during a game, or to celebrate solving and winning a case. But that one glass turned into a few, and the wine and beer exchanged for whiskey and tequila, vodka, and scotch. And just like that, before her very own eyes, she was drinking half a bottle of liquor almost every night.
She doesn't want to numb her pain, she is the kind of person who loves to overcome her problems and grow from them, but sometimes it feels good to not feel anything, to not react to what is going on in your life, to not have to be strong all the time, to be *numb*.
She has been strong for so long, she has to be in her line of work. A victim won't trust you or feel supported if you are too emotional, a suspect won't crack under pressure if they sense any sign of weakness, your partner won't be safe putting their life in your hands if they feel like you don't have your emotions in check, she knew, from experience. It was something she never wanted to feel again.
She felt the walls of her life closing in around her, she was suffocating, gasping for air, trying to find an escape. An escape from all of society's standards, an escape from the bad in the world she gets to experience first hand day in and day out, and an escape from herself. She was the hardest on herself, filling her mind with negative thoughts, telling herself that she wasn't good enough, that she she wasn't trying hard enough, that if she was a good cop and if she was good at her job, she never would have found herself at gunpoint and in the arms of Lewis. She was doing the exact same things she told the victims and the survivors not to do. She needed to escape her mind, it was too much, the emotion went too deep, she wanted to run away and scream at the top of her lungs.
But she found her escape, the same way her mother did. She was ashamed to admit that it actually worked too, for a while. When she drank, she would forget about her problems, she didn't feel stressed from her job, she felt light on her worn and tired feet, and her internal scars seemed nonexistent. It was nice while it lasted, until it stopped working.
She had to drink more and more to feel less and less. The more she drank, the less she felt, and then, it wouldn't work anymore. She had built up a tolerance.
But, Olivia longed for that escape, that momentary freedom that the alcohol gave her. The liquid that coursed through her blood and blocked her urging sensations. She couldn't stop.
She hated her mother, but here she was, just like her. No. She wasn't like her mother, her mother never wanted help, but Olivia is here, in a meeting, 1 day sober. She isn't like her mother.
Part of her does blame Serena for her decisions to turn to alcohol, since alcoholism is considered a genetic disease. She should blame her rapist-father too, but she knew better than that.
Her whole life, she hated that her mother relied so heavily on alcohol for support when there were so many opportunities to get help. Olivia never believed that alcoholism was a disease, she always thought it was a choice, that her mother had a choice and always picked the easy way out.
She still felt that way, only now, she was a little more understanding. She understood why her mother drank and why she was such a miserable person who pushed people away when she wasn't drinking. But even though she understood what her mother did, it doesn't mean that she forgave her.
She spent her whole childhood trying to run away from her mother, to run away from the alcohol that she was drinking, when Olivia found herself running straight to it.
Olivia chose to drink, she chose to self medicate, and she is choosing to get help. She is not like her mother, she is better than her mother.
She would be damned if she let herself come to an ending similar to her mother's.
But not all endings are the same, she's known quite a few extraordinary people in her lifetime that are recovered alcoholics, Donald Cragen and Sonya Paxton for example.
She knew Cragen after he became sober, but he wasn't bashful about his addiction, he used to share stories about pain and the losses he experienced because of his drinking. He was there for Olivia when her mother died. He was like a father to her and she respected the hell out of him. He was able to overcome his drinking problem, rebuild his life, and advance in his career to become captain. She looked up to him and valued the lessons he taught her while they were working together. He always cut her slack, which was exactly what she needed to do, cut herself some slack, give herself a break. She could hear him telling her, "You aren't invincible, Olivia, you can't do everything, and you CAN'T choose the victim." She needed that advice from him back then, and she still needs it today.
With Sonya, it was a different story. She had seen this all too familiar tale with her mother. Sonya was mean and angry when she was drunk, she always wreaked of alcohol, she couldn't pull herself together without it, and she couldn't get anything done while she was drinking. Olivia used to hate Sonya. Since the first day they met, Sonya was bossing people around and telling them how to do their jobs. She was pushy and Olivia didn't like that. Turns out, it was exactly what the unit needed, what she needed, someone who wouldn't take no for an answer and wouldn't let you stop until you got one. Sonya finally got her answers, and she sobered up, took a break from work, and came back a better person because of it, because of everything that she went through. Olivia started to consider Sonya as a friend, she reminded her of her mother, and she needed that motherly presence again. So she welcomed Sonya into her life and learned to care for her deeply. Until she got carried away and had to watch this woman literally die in her arms. It devastated Olivia, she was crushed for days after that moment. She told herself she was fine, but she wasn't fine, she was anything but fine. She started to lose hope that people can get everything they strive for, everything they want, and deserve. If Sonya couldn't find happiness, Olivia never would, no one deserved a happy ending like Sonya did.
So Olivia drank.
But she could also recover. She can survive this too.
She has been lying to other people and lying to herself trying to tell them that,"She has everything under control" or that "She is careful and monitors how much she drinks" or that "She was having a moment. That there was nothing to it, it was a moment, it was just a moment."
Even Tucker had concerns. He confronted her about it once and she lied to him then, just like she's been lying to everyone else. But she was tired of lying. She was ready to get the help she knew she needed, she was ready to start healing.
She knows this road is going to be difficult, but the first step along the path to recovery is admitting and knowing you have a problem.
She stood up from her chair, smiled shyly, and said, "Hi, my name is Olivia, and I'm an alcoholic."
Day One, sober.