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Chapter 11
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Beautiful Boy, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Addiction, Ruin, and Redemption
Responsibility and Blame
Parenthood and Control
Support vs. Enabling
The Disease Model, Stigma, and Treatment
Summary
Analysis
When Nic vanishes from Ohlhoff, David “know[s] the drill.” He calls the hospitals and the police, and talks to Jasper and Daisy. He realizes how preoccupied by Nic their lives are becoming. He sometimes snaps at Karen, and she gets particularly exasperated by David’s preoccupation. They cry together, unsure of the path forward.
The fact that David “knows the drill” in this situation suggests that he’s becoming accustomed to his son’s disappearances. This illustrates the extent to which Nic is already trapped in a cycle of relapsing, trying to recover, and relapsing again. Karen and David’s reaction, in turn, shows how much they have already been affected by Nic’s lifelong disease.
Themes
David decides to drive to San Francisco to find Nic, scouring the neighborhoods in which he thinks Nic might be. David even asks some kids on the street if they know Nic. One waifish young woman, who is clearly high on meth, says that Nic sounds like most of the guys she knows. David offers to buy the girl some food, and she agrees. As they eat, she tells David about her life: how she used to be good in school until a boy gave her meth at 14 years old.
David’s decision to simply go looking for Nic is another reinforcement of the idea that he is feeling completely helpless and out of control—desperate to have any means of understanding where his son might be or what he might be doing. He then approaches another meth user as a kind of proxy for Nic, trying to understand what Nic might be thinking and feeling through her story.
Themes
The girl continues, explaining that even though she knows how awful meth is, if she had the chance to start over, she would do it again. She tells David about her parents, who live in Ohio and who hired a private detective to find her when she ran away. She tried a rehab center but ran away from that as well. The tells David that she uses crystal almost every day. She has been in the emergency room three times and even stabbed a guy once, and she makes money by dealing or prostituting herself. David asks the girl if she misses her parents. She says that she does, and David suggests that she call them, at least to tell them that she is alive.
While this girl’s story is more extreme than Nic’s, it has the same hallmarks that his does. What was once a life filled with promise has been essentially ruined by drug addiction. While Nic’s morals and wellbeing have not yet deteriorated as severely as this girl’s, he is on a similar path to make worse and worse decisions. David’s counsel to the girl to call her parents is also a kind of wish fulfillment for himself: he knows that Nic will not call him, but he hopes that he can help other parents who are feeling as helpless as he is.
Themes
David drives home, thinking that he is probably exactly like the girl’s parents. He again is consumed by guilt and self-blame, wondering what he could have done differently. After a few days, he hears from Nic, who is calling from an ex-girlfriend’s house. Nic says that he has quit and has been sober for five days, but he is talking fast and obviously lying. David says that Nic has two choices: rehab or the streets. Nic says that rehab isn’t necessary, but when David insists, Nic begrudgingly agrees to try again.
By now, David is able to recognize Nic’s deceptions more clearly. Rather than allowing Nic to simply come back and continue living the way he has been, David insists that Nic must get help. This is another example of David distinguishing between supporting Nic’s recovery and enabling his drug addiction.
Themes
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David picks Nic up from the girl’s house. Nic has a bruise on his cheek and a gash on his forehead. Nic says he was robbed, and that it was no big deal. David is shocked, feeling like the boy in the car is not Nic. On the way home, Nic grows angry, saying that he just wants to go to Paris. David lets him rant and rave. Nic claims that he doesn’t need rehab and insists that he is sober. He curses David, and finally he says that he needs drugs to survive.
David recognizes Nic’s declining sense of normalcy and morality, as he is desensitized to being attacked and robbed. Nic’s anger helps David understand his problem further, as David is better able to see the influence of the drugs on Nic’s thought patterns and behavior.
Themes
David enrolls Nic in a program at Saint Helena Hospital, located in Napa Valley. David and Vicki’s insurance pays most of the cost of the program, which is $20,000. He says he is not sure what they would have done without this coverage. At the hospital, Nic fills out forms and undergoes a physical exam. When Nic returns, he says that it’s time for him to go to his room. David and Nic hug and say “everything.”
Here, David emphasizes that while addiction may affect a wide variety of individuals, treatment is more accessible for some than others. Nic is fortunate to come from a privileged background that allows him to get treatment, rather than having no support and winding up in jail. This is another implicit call for a reform of how the government treats drug addicts; David argues toward the end of the book that all addicts should be able to receive treatment, regardless of their ability to pay.
Themes
The following weekend, David and Karen visit the hospital for family sessions. First, he and Karen attend an educational forum on the disease model of addiction. David is at first confused by this, believing that Nic’s addiction is a choice: cancer patients are not responsible for their condition, whereas drug addicts are. The lecturer explains that the predisposition for addiction is actually genetic, and roughly 10 percent of people have it. Drugs and alcohol then activate the disease.
This lecture serves as David’s introduction to the disease model of addiction, which argues that addiction is not simply a moral failing or a choice. This is another important step in understanding addiction better, because it reduces the stigma. Although Nic has agency to choose between worsening or healing his disease, the underlying cause is biological.
Themes
One man argues with the lecturer, saying that the disease model lets people avoid responsibility, because no one forces addicts to do terrible things. The lecturer agrees that people have choices about what to do about their illness, but they still have a disease. A diabetic, for example, can choose to monitor their insulin levels and take medication; an addict can choose to treat their illness through recovery. No one wants to be an addict, she emphasizes, but the drugs are in control.
The lecturer’s points illustrate the complex idea of responsibility when it comes to addiction. The disease model helps people like David understand that it is not his fault that Nic has a drug addiction. Yet at the same time, it emphasizes that addicts are still responsible for making choices that set them on the road to recovery.
Themes
After the presentation, families sit in a circle and share stories—stories which have become very familiar to David and Karen. Afterward, they meet Nic for lunch. Nic moves slowly: he has been given sedatives to help him detox. After lunch, Nic shows them his room, which looks like a modest hotel room. Finally, Nic blurts out how sorry he is about everything. David and Karen look at each other, unsure of what to say.
Nic’s apology is a meaningful one, as it is the first time he has really taken responsibility for his own disease and the choices he has made to relapse. Yet at the same time, David’s hesitation demonstrates that while he holds out hope that Nic can recover, Nic has also caused tangible emotional harm to the family in ways that Nic cannot fathom.
Themes
