In commenting to Kramer that forgiveness is a hard thing for people to do and the fact that he was able to forgive the people that hurt him the most was, indeed, amazing, he mellows a bit more as he comments, “Yeah, especially in the section that concerned my father – forgiving him before he passed.  That was really important to me because, otherwise, I would’ve really been stuck there.  It really was an amazing moment for me.  After doing a lot of therapy, I just came to him and – well, the reality of it is that I was doing it for myself but for him as well.   It released him and cleaned the slate for us both before he passed.”

People like Kramer who have a lot of international fame, money and influence, have a lot of people who derive their own power and prestige by being associated with them.  Joey was no exception.  Lots of people controlled him and filtered what he heard and who he heard it from.  This skewed his view of life.  With that thought in mind, I asked him, “Once you took control of your life and your relationships, what technique, what attitude or what actions have been successful for you in standing up to those who have wished to dominate you or new relationships that tried to dominate you, things like that?  For others that need that kind of advice, what’s been successful for you in that area?”

“Well, that’s a very interesting question, Randy.  My answer to that would be to own yourself; to own your own feelings, your own emotions, and not let co-dependency get in the way - with co-dependency being that you’re dependent upon someone else to feel good about yourself.  It’s very important to own your own feelings and to stand up for yourself. 

“In the past, I’ve always had a difficult time standing up for myself and, by virtue of that, sometimes you establish relationships with people who are not even conscious or aware of their taking advantage of you or your emotions.  If things go a certain way for them and they get certain perks – from me anyway – they get certain perks by being your friend and then all of a sudden, when you take back the turf that you let them own, they don’t like that and it makes people very uncomfortable.  And that in itself is a very difficult thing to deal with.  But you have to own your own emotions and your own feelings and basically, for me, a big part of it was learning to stand up for myself. “

I asked if he had been hiding behind the drums.  He replies with a laugh, “Well, where I really hid the most, I found, was in my drug addiction and in my alcoholism and once that was gone and I got rid of that, there was no place to hide.  Then I really came into the depression and the anxiety.  I think that was the lack of being able to deal with the stuff that we’ve been talking about.  Because I think depression and anxiety, which goes hand-in-hand with it, is un-dealt-with anger that reverts back inside you.  If you can’t be outward with it, then it comes in and attacks you inwardly.”

Clearly comfortable with discussing what he’s learned, he continues, “I was just really emotionally distraught and bankrupt when I had my breakdown back in 1995.  That’s when I dealt with all of that.  I was already 9 years clean and sober. So I was really wondering, ‘Wow, I’ve been clean and sober for 9 years and now, what is this all about?’  Because people are under the impression that getting clean and sober is the answer itself which it really isn’t.  It’s only part of it.”

I was curious if Kramer felt that he has uncovered all the skeletons in his emotional closet or was he still discovering new ones.

“Well, no, I know what I need to work on, which is a constant battle every day.  And there’s also new stuff that comes up just as well.  So, you know, it keeps it fairly interesting.  It keeps me on my toes all the time.”

While the letter to Joey’s father represented dealing with the pains of his past, he writes about walking away from his beautiful estate and his marriage – the symbols of his fame and his toxic relationships - in order to come to complete terms with his life.  I commented that those acts had to be incredibly tough for him to pull off.

“Well, yeah, it was because I was very preoccupied in thinking that, in believing that being involved in an abusive relationship was just part and parcel – that was part of doing business.  I just thought that was the way it was supposed to be – the way that it is – because I didn’t know any better. 

“I was preoccupied with all my stuff:  the money, the houses and the cars.  I thought that if you have all of that then you’re happy regardless of what your relationship was like.  That’s just not what it’s about.  That’s just not the truth of the matter.  Now, when people are ready to get honest with themselves, you can get honest with yourself and that’s half of it.  Then the other half is actually doing something about it. “

“And, boy, that you did!  And, aside from the letter to your dad, to me that was the most compelling part of the book - the stand you took in doing that.  It must have been a very tough thing to do.”