Finding Your Balance: Learning to Live Beyond Survival

On November 7, 2026, I spoke at the 45th Annual Chicagoland Families Anonymous Convention at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church in Downers Grove, Illinois. Drawing on my own family’s experience with addiction, I reflected on learning to care for others without losing ourselves—and making room for connection, joy, and life beyond survival. These are my remarks.

Remarks delivered by Keith Burton at the 45th Annual Chicagoland Families Anonymous Convention

Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, Downers Grove, Illinois

Saturday, November 7, 2026

In January 2006, I found myself climbing Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.

I was fifty-one years old. I had spent years building a career, leading organizations, solving problems, and being someone other people could count on.

But several days into that climb, none of those credentials could give me more oxygen.

On our fourth day, we crossed a barren stretch of mountain called the Saddle. Ahead of us were hours of walking toward a camp more than fifteen thousand feet above sea level.

The summit was visible. Getting there was another matter.

My friend Peter Hammerschmidt had organized the expedition. Before we started, he reminded us that an adventure involves uncertainty. There are risks. You don’t know how it will turn out.

I understood that intellectually. The mountain was helping me understand it in a much more personal way.

Later that night, after only a couple of hours of fitful rest, we got up for the final ascent. It was around eleven o’clock. We dressed in our warmest clothing and stepped into the darkness.

There was wind. Snow. Thin air. The small beams of our headlamps.

We moved slowly.

For someone accustomed to making things happen, “slowly” can be uncomfortable. You want to know how much farther. You want reassurance that the effort is working. You want to see the whole route.

But in the darkness, I had to pay attention to the ground immediately ahead of me. And I had to accept the guidance of people who knew that mountain better than I did.

Looking back, I recognize something familiar in that experience.

Many of us arrive in a room like this after years of trying to find our way through uncertainty. We love someone. We’re frightened for them. We’ve tried things that helped for a while, and things that didn’t help at all.

Sometimes we can barely see beyond the next phone call.

I’m grateful to be with you again. Thank you to everyone who has made this annual Families Anonymous gathering possible.

When I spoke with you last time, I talked about breaking the silence surrounding addiction and family pain. Today, I want to take the next step.

Once we begin acknowledging what we’ve carried, how do we learn to live differently? How do we care about someone else without losing our own footing? And how do we begin making room for life when we’ve become so practiced at survival?

I grew up in a home affected by my father’s alcoholism. There were some good moments. There were things about him that I have come to understand more fully with time. But there was also fear, unpredictability, and violence.

As a child, I sometimes stood between my parents during their arguments in the middle of the night, trying to bring some calm to the house. Then I would go back to bed, sleep for a few hours, and get up for school.

That was part of my childhood.

I didn’t have the language then to describe what I was doing. I knew that things were wrong and that I wanted to make them better.

My mother called me “the best little boy in the world.” I became the good child. The responsible one. The one who tried to keep the peace. I apologized for things that weren’t my fault. I paid attention to other people’s feelings and learned to put my own aside.

There was a kind of purpose in that role. If I could be helpful enough, perhaps I could make the next hour easier. But there was a terrible burden in it, too.

A child cannot make a parent stop drinking. A child cannot create stability between two adults. A child cannot earn a peaceful home by behaving perfectly.

I understand that now. The boy I was did not.

Perhaps some of you recognize that boy. Or perhaps you came to this responsibility later, as a parent, a spouse, a grandparent, a brother or sister.

You became the person who answered the phone. Made the arrangements. Smoothed things over. Remembered the appointment. Found another resource.

You became very good at handling what happened next.

There is love in that effort. There is also exhaustion that other people may never see.

For me, the difficult part was that I carried my childhood role into places where it no longer belonged.

I left home. Built a career. Married Sue. Became a father to Jarrett, Jordan and Tyler. Yet I continued to measure myself by how well I performed, how much I accomplished, and how successfully I kept my private struggles out of view.

As a public relations executive, my work was in communications. I knew how to ask questions, listen carefully, and help other people tell their stories.

Telling my own story was much harder.

In my memoir, Shadows of Sobriety, I describe how I would keep a conversation focused on the other person. People often appreciated what a good listener I was.

And I did care about them.

But keeping the attention on someone else also protected me. They could tell me what was happening in their lives while learning very little about mine. I could be useful without being vulnerable.

Years later, on a predawn flight to New York, I came to a painful realization: I had no close friends. I knew many people. I had relationships across my profession. But I had kept the private parts of myself at a distance.

Being capable had become a way of staying hidden.

In Shadows of Sobriety, I wrote that my life had stopped being an adventure to be lived and had become a problem to be solved.

That sentence still saddens me. Because problems never run out.

There is always another situation that needs attention. Another reason to postpone rest. Another concern that seems more urgent than spending time with someone you love.

I had learned how to keep going.

I still needed to learn how to let someone care for me. That became especially clear after Sue’s heart attack in December 2022.

She received treatment and was recovering. I was grateful beyond words.

During those days, I was going back and forth to the hospital, keeping family and friends informed, looking after our dogs, and continuing to consult with clients.

I was doing what I knew how to do: managing.

Then my own anxiety began to overwhelm me.

I wasn’t sleeping. I was frightened by what was happening in my body. During that same period, I slipped on black ice while walking the dogs and fractured my wrist.

Eventually, after a visit to the emergency room and follow-up with my doctor, I was encouraged to seek counseling.

Sue was recovering, and I was struggling to hold myself together.

That was humbling.

I wanted to be strong for her. I had trouble accepting that being there for someone else and needing help myself could both be true.

For so much of my life, I had treated my own distress as something to contain until I finished taking care of everything else.

But everything else was never finished.

Counseling gave me a place where I could begin speaking without having to organize the story into something reassuring.

I could talk about fear. Anger. Shame. The loneliness beneath the professional exterior.

I could begin looking honestly at the experiences I had minimized because I had survived them.

Over time, I began to see the child I had been with more compassion.

He was frightened. He was confused. He was trying very hard. He wasn’t responsible for what the adults around him were doing. And he had needed care.

That may sound obvious when I say it about a child. It was much harder to accept about myself.

I had spent decades judging myself for the ways those early experiences still affected me. Why was I anxious? Why did I keep people at a distance? Why did I feel so much responsibility for everyone around me?

Understanding where those patterns began helped me respond to them differently. It also helped me appreciate what they had cost.

The habits that helped me get through childhood had followed me into my marriage, my friendships, and my work. Some had become strengths. Others were keeping me isolated.

I needed help recognizing the difference.

I’m still learning.

Writing the book was part of that process. So were conversations with my family. So was allowing people to know more of me than the version who could always be counted on to manage.

I began to understand that I could tell the truth about my pain without offering a solution at the end of every sentence.

Someone could sit with me while things were unfinished. That was a new experience of support.

And it brings me to something I want to say clearly to this room: Our own need for care deserves attention, even while someone we love is struggling.

We don’t have to wait until we are falling apart to acknowledge that we’re hurting.

Of course, when the person struggling is someone you love, that can be difficult to put into practice. I know something of this as the son of an alcoholic father and as a father whose son has experienced addiction.

Love and fear can become tangled together.

We want to help. We want to protect. We want to know that we did everything possible. And sometimes we begin living as though our constant attention is the thing keeping disaster away.

It can feel disloyal to step back, even briefly. It can feel selfish to enjoy something. It can feel dangerous to stop watching.

I have had to examine what I mean when I say I’m being responsible. Am I responding to what is actually mine to do? Or am I trying, once again, to manage uncertainty by taking responsibility for everything?

That question doesn’t always produce an easy answer.

There are real needs. Real responsibilities. Decisions that deserve careful thought. But I have learned that caring about another person does not give me control over that person’s choices.

And exhausting myself does not create that control.

For me, finding balance includes recognizing where my responsibility begins and where it ends.

It includes being honest about what I can offer.

It includes asking for help when I don’t know how to respond.

And sometimes it includes tolerating the discomfort of a boundary without immediately withdrawing it because someone is unhappy.

A boundary might sound simple when we rehearse it.

“I’m willing to talk when we can speak respectfully.”

“I need some time before I answer.”

“This is what I can do.”

Actually saying those words to someone we love can be very hard.

I offer them as examples, because each family’s circumstances are different. There is no sentence I can give you that will settle every painful decision.

But I know how easily I can confuse someone else’s disappointment with proof that I have done something wrong. I learned that confusion early.

I’m trying to respond more thoughtfully now.

I also want to make room here for the people whose stories remain unresolved.

Your loved one may still be using. You may be separated or estranged. You may be grieving someone you have lost. You may have tried to begin an honest conversation and found that the other person was unwilling or unable to have it.

I would never want my story to suggest that if you find the right words, seek enough help, or have enough faith, every relationship will become what you hoped it would be.

I cannot promise that.

I can tell you that my own understanding has changed, even where the past cannot be repaired.

I have come to understand more about my father’s experiences and the pain he carried. That understanding has made room for compassion.

It has also left room for the truth about what happened in our home.

I can recognize his suffering and acknowledge mine. I can accept that there are things I will never fully understand. And I can decide how I want to live with what I do understand.

That is part of finding my footing.

Another part began with something very small.

In 2013, I returned from a rafting trip in Alaska with Peter and a group of outdoorsmen. When I came home, there was a wooden block on our kitchen counter in Naperville. Sue had left it for me.

On it were the words:

“I want to have adventures with you.”

That year, I had traveled for work forty-eight out of fifty-two weeks.

Forty-eight weeks.

I had become accustomed to that pace. Airports, meetings, hotels, deadlines. There was always somewhere to be and something that needed my attention.

Then I came home and found that message.

“I want to have adventures with you.”

Sue was inviting me to spend my life with her in a fuller way.

We had built a family. We had shared responsibilities and weathered difficulties. But she wanted time together that wasn’t simply whatever remained after work had taken its share.

That small wooden block made me stop.

I had been treating time as though there would always be more of it later.

Later, when work slowed down. Later, when the next challenge had passed. Later, when I could finally relax.

Sue was asking me to pay attention to the life we already had.

We began making more room for shared experiences: hiking, traveling, exploring, spending time together. Some were wonderful trips. Others were simply opportunities to walk alongside each other and be present.

The important change was in what I made room for.

I began giving our life together the attention I had so readily given to other demands.

I recognize that “adventure” may sound like a large word in a room where some people are just trying to get through the week.

It doesn’t have to mean a mountain or a trip. It might mean coffee with a friend you haven’t seen in months. A walk with your spouse. An afternoon with a grandchild. Returning to something you once enjoyed. Making a plan and allowing yourself to look forward to it.

When a family is living with addiction, there can be a feeling that pleasure must wait.

How can I enjoy this when someone I love is suffering? How can I make plans when I don’t know what tomorrow will bring?

Those questions come from love. I understand them.

But waiting for every part of life to become settled can turn into years of postponement.

I am learning that I can carry concern and still be present for something good.  I can love someone who is hurting and enjoy an afternoon with Sue. I can acknowledge grief and still laugh when something is funny. I can have an unresolved relationship and continue building other relationships that matter to me.

There is room for more than one feeling in a day.

And there is room for more in my life than the problem I cannot solve.

I want to return now to Kilimanjaro.

Around five-thirty in the morning, my guide, Edward Ernest Kutingala, and I reached Gilman’s Point.

The sun began rising over Mawenzi Peak. After hours in darkness, the horizon was filling with light.

We rested briefly, then continued around the rim toward our summit at Uhuru Peak at 19,341 feet.

When we reached it, I grabbed Ernest and hugged him. I said, “We did it, Ernest! Thank you for helping me every step of the way!”

That is how I remember the moment: reaching the summit, and thanking the person who had helped me get there.

Peter was nearby. He came over, gathered some of us for a photograph, and said, “Well done, friend! Well done!”

I treasure that memory.

I also think about how much support was part of that climb. The guides. The group. Peter’s preparation and encouragement. The people whose experience made it possible for us to attempt something unfamiliar.

I had to take my own steps. And I needed those people.

Both were true.

My faith in Jesus Christ is central to my life. Prayer has helped me speak honestly about fear and loosen my grip on things I cannot control.

Help has also come through people: Sue, my family, friends, counselors, and others willing to listen.

I have needed encouragement. I have needed honest feedback. I have needed people who could see that I was struggling when I was still trying to look capable.

Some of you have found that kind of support in Families Anonymous. Someone listens without requiring you to make the story sound better. Someone understands why an ordinary phone call can leave you shaken. Someone helps you remember that your life deserves attention, too.

For a person accustomed to carrying so much, receiving that support can take practice.

It takes practice to say, “I’m having a difficult day.” It takes practice to accept care without immediately trying to repay it. It takes practice to let someone walk beside us.

I’m grateful for the people who have been patient while I learn.

Before we finish, I invite you to consider one question quietly. You don’t need to share your answer.

What is one small step you could take toward caring for yourself this week?

Perhaps you already know.

Perhaps it is making an appointment you’ve postponed. Calling someone who knows the truth. Returning to a meeting. Keeping a plan that matters to you. Or telling someone, honestly, that you need support.

Choose something small enough to be possible.

For much of my life, I tried to make myself worthy by being helpful, dependable, and strong. I’m learning to care for the person beneath all that effort.

The frightened child deserved care. The capable adult does, too.

And so do you.

Whatever brought you here, whatever remains uncertain when you leave, I hope you carry that with you.

There may still be hard ground ahead. There may also be people ready to walk beside you, and parts of life waiting for your attention.

I think of Sue’s message on our kitchen counter.

“I want to have adventures with you.”

I’m grateful she left it there.

And I’m grateful I began to listen.

Thank you.