UA communication experts helping traumatized students rebuild lives

She sits up in her chair, gesturing with her hands occasionally as she describes the experience of giving up alcohol.

"My whole life changed," said Denise, 37, who asked that her last name be withheld. "I had to let go of all of my friends who were drinking and using."

Denise had to end a five-year relationship with her boyfriend, who still wanted to drink and use drugs, and she moved into a rehabilitation center.

She could not even communicate with her closest relatives, who were also alcoholics.

"When I got sober, I lost my family," Denise said. "Now I had to trust these new people."

People who experience a life-altering event, such as a disease, disability or substance-abuse recovery, often begin to feel isolated from friends and relatives, said Michael Dues, associate head of the University of Arizona's department of communications.

If loved ones don't recognize the changes and try to adapt to them, the relationship may be lost.

Dues is conducting research, along with two graduate students, to see how a major life change can affect a person's relationships.

During the study, which concluded in November, they interviewed two groups of recovering alcoholics, drug abusers and patients who have become visually impaired - about 10 people in all.

The common thread between the two groups is that the patients no longer know themselves.

They think, "I don't know who I am, and all of my relationships are messed up," Dues said.

Recovering addicts were afraid their friends and families would pull them back into a life of abuse, while those who were blinded feared they would be ignored and forgotten.

Dues said it is important for communications researchers to understand the feelings of those who endure a dramatic change.

"We try to ground our thought in the actual experiences that people are going through," Dues said.

The subjects of his study had trouble discussing feelings of anger, sadness and frustration with loved ones. Dues noted that it was almost just as difficult for them to express positive feelings.

From the study, Dues and his team have learned much about how to deal with patients who have gone through traumatic experiences. For instance, friends and relatives should be encouraged to actively participate in a traumatized person's recovery.

But there are still many unanswered questions.

Dues plans to repeat the research with new subjects in the spring, in the hopes of helping people communicate better.

"This way we can devise training to teach them to communicate at a interpersonal level," Dues said.

Communications graduate student Mary Brown worked with Dues on the study. They also co-wrote a paper that focused on recovering alcohol and drug abusers.

"The focus groups had different examples of the same phenomenon," Brown said. "All of a sudden people's identities change and they're no longer whole."

Patients recovering from disease or those who have been afflicted with a disability have similar problems, said communications graduate student Micheal Peters, the other researcher helping to conduct the study.

Peters focused on those whose lives were changed by disease or debilitating injury.

Denise will graduate from the UA this month with a bachelor's degree in communications. She plans to help others do what she could not.

"I want to teach communications one day, and I want to know more about the aspects of communications," she said.

Denise hasn't spoken to her mother in 10 years, but she plans to visit her soon.

"I'm planning to get together with my mother in the spring - just to have a cup of coffee with her," she said.

Irene Hsiao can be reached via e-mail at Irene.Hsiao@wildcat.arizona.edu.