The Cracker Factory

This is a book that changed my life. It is an entertaining, though painful, story, and manages to be quite funny at times. Cassie, the lead character, confronts her addiction, and actually changes. It is the first time I got the concept that someone could actually, really change. In reality, she may not have changed that much, but had been buried under addiction, and then her true self emerges. An inspiring book.

From the very beginning of the book, we are faced with Cassie and her alcoholism. She has been committed to the psychiatric ward of the local hospital but is soon released with a prescription for Antabuse, an antialcoholic drug.Cassie's self is the observer of the self from start to finish. Her ego rationalizes and mediates between the Id and the outside world, tests, organizes, inhibits and thinks as when, after a drink and no housework done, Cassie silences the morality of her Superego by telling herself: "What the hell, I can open a couple of cans for dinner and if Charlie doesn't like the way the house looks, he can clean it up himself." Such conversations with the self are the means which her Ego uses to retain a hold on reality (albeit, a subjective reality), on sanity, and to control her often overbearing Superego. In this way, Cassie constantly attemps to shift any blame from herself onto others. She accuses the doctors of all being alike and of prejudice against their patients, construes excuses for her remaining in an unhappy marriage, and explains away her behavior when hospitalized by telling herself that she is reacting in such a way because "...If it's crazy you want, it's crazy you'll get."Initial contact with the family gives the impression that Cassie's alcoholism is the main problem. HER problem is the main feature and her husband, Charlie, is pictured as the self-sacrificing husband, who silently endures his plight.The children are mentioned only for the demands that their existence makes on the couple. For this reason, they are both a source of conflict and of concern. They seem to be more or less aware of their mother's "problem" since her apathy is viewed as her normal behavior.Although Cassie and Charlie are convinced that the problem lies with Cassie, on into the book we become aware of unclear family boundaries. It seems that Cassie is not viewed by Charlie, nor by herself, as a wife and mother, BUT, as her mother's daughter and the ugly duckling of her family. Cassie's mom is continuously interfering in her life and has even gone so far as to have taken over her household duties. Mother compares Cassie's ineptitude with her sister, Mary Kay's success, as she did when she was a child. In short, although everyone views Cassie as the source of difficulties, no one is able to see the triadal transactional pattern that exists between Cassie, Charlie and mother. Their inability to relate realistically to one another, according to their objective and factual roles, is a major problem and the cause of family dysfunction. In the end, though, Cassie learns to think of others as well as of herself, thanks to AA. She is better able to function in society with the option to continue her marriage or to begin a new life for herself. Although not certain about what she will live tomorrow, Cassie finally knows that she has a choice because she has learned to integrate the Id, the Ego and the Superego thus leading toward the possibility o