The other side...

Since my last post there has been a Cubs win for the ages and a electoral loss that has thrown the country into the 5th circle of Hell.  I fear we are headed for the 7th.  And so for the last week I have warred within myself, feelings of hope vs. feelings of rage and despair.  

I am so very angry with half of my countrymen, so desperate for change that they willfully ignored monstrous, hateful, bigoted, painfully small minded rhetoric.  How....HOW does that petulant, poorly spoken fool make sense to anyone?  How does his puritanical running mate bring a sense of country and correctness to half of my fellow citizens?  I am stunned by the scope of the hate in my beloved America, I knew it was there, I had no idea of the scope and the strength of it.

I have read the posts begging me to reach out to those who oppose my views in order to find common ground.  I have also read the posts of those who are having none of that and are ready to tear the other side down.  I do not know where I fit, I cannot fathom the mind of the Trump voter and right this moment I do not want to.  But I refuse to rage wildly either as it is now, more than ever, very important to be clear and be steady.

I will find my way, I am just not there yet.  I truly hate that man all the way through.  He is the antithesis of all that I am and of all that I thought my country was made of.  It actually hurts, this actually hurts.  So I will grieve a bit longer, but not much longer - because I sense that there is no time to waste...

Peanut butter

So I realized today that if I decide to have peanut butter on a spoon right out of the jar that I cannot stop with just one spoonful.  Even if I close the jar back up, I open it and have more every time.  It is the same with chips and salsa, whatever is put out, I am pretty much guaranteed to finish it.  But then I can go days and days without thinking of peanut butter at all.

And now that I am thinking about it, I have been that way in relationships.  If I hone in on somebody, if I decide that I want to be on their radar, then I go too hard.  I give up too much to 'make them want/like me'.  I want them to need me, and then if they openly tell me that they do need me, I feel put out.  Overwhelmed and irritated by the 'need'.

OR, I twist and bend myself into a pretzel to be the person I think they want me to be.  Then after a time I despise them for not seeing the real me.  Whoever that is...

Thoughts to ponder, eh?

How do people stay sober in an election year?

That's it, that is all I have to ponder today.  It would seem that to have a fighting chance for sobriety I need to tune out of of this year's election and it's endless parade of horrors.  What a clusterfuck that is, eh?

Just.  Fuck.

I was going to shut this down...

I fell apart two days ago on Day 19.  Yep.  Just a few days ago I wrote about how I was rolling right along, feeling like I got this shit handled, and two days later there was a nice bender.  Really nice.  So good that I am still feeling a bit hungover today....48 hours later.  So here I sit with my shame, wondering how stupid I looked and acted at the party I went to on Saturday night.  Wondering how poisoned I was to still feel so shitty today.  All sorts of regret, because I was so close to 20 days!

Lets think back to yesterday morning.  Day 1 (for probably the 50th time).  Woke up at 4 AM, still drunk and feeling horrendous.  Crawled out to the couch to watch TV, had some water, fought the urge to vomit (repeat for the next 3 hours).  Realized I needed some aspirin and that in order to keep it down I needed to eat something.  Had the aspirin with a small glass of kefir and spent the next two hours fighting the urge to vomit and was still afflicted with a nasty headache.  Add in the wretched, sour rummy taste in my mouth and the wretched sour mess I made in the bathroom and I looked and felt about as pretty as 5 day old roadkill in July.  Need I mention the depression, and the achy body and the lost time as I whiled away 15 hours of a beautiful Sunday laying on the couch and watching Golden Girls reruns?

Don't get me wrong, I love the Golden Girls - but laying on the couch in misery due to self inflicted rum flu for an entire gorgeous sunny day on earth is fucked up.  It just is.

I am beginning to get very, very scared because it seems that every time I get some momentum going, and then succomb to the booze again the bender is a little worse.  And I don't want to die some sort of John Bonham, Janis Joplin type of death.  I am genuinely scared of myself.  The drunk is reckless and greedy and she does not give a shit about sober me at all.

Oh yeah, and what set me off on Saturday?  What was the last straw on my sober camel's back?  Fleas.  The dog groomer called to let me know that my beloved dog had fleas and I lost it.   Spiraled out like the Tazmanian Devil.  Yesterday, as I wallowed in self-loathing I decided I was going to shut this blog down,  I kept thinking, "How humiliating to have to write about yet another Day 2, it would be too much!!"  But I have to start really looking at myself, I have to see what I really am.  And deleting the past is impossible anyway - I can shut down the blog but the events remain fact.   Maybe that can be a new tool, I will look at this whole thing every couple of days to remember what I don't want to write about any more.

So Day 2.  AGAIN.  Fucking hate this....

I hope this isn't the 'real' me yet.

So here I am at Day 16.  A full fortnight of sobriety under my belt and here is what I know so far:

1)  I feel like I totally got this schizle handled....right up until I don't.  Seriously, I am fine so long as there are no bumps in the road, and I am still no expert in preventive bump identification.  But so far, when I DO hit them I have been able to stop myself long enough to listen to a podcast. or read a sober blog, or to administer a piece of chocolate or an olive or a shot of chocolate milk, etc.  So far.
2)  I am having to say no to a LOT of things.  No more Facebook, CNN or New Yorker (esp. with this m-f'ing election in full swing).  No going to certain restaurants where I always had a mai-tai, or vodka cranberry or Captain n'diet.  Never Captain n'diet.  Never.  Just NO.  No concerts, no parties, no brunch anywhere I have ever had brunch before (because of the shady little mimosas- sneaky little bastards).  In addition there are a couple of friends I will be avoiding for at least another month.
3)  Boyfriend drinks a lot more than I realized.  This is readily apparent over the last week and it is extremely troubling.
4)  When I subtract my drinking friends from my friend total, I have very few friends.  Oddly, I am ok with this, I truly am.  Why is that?  Well, I think it is because it is going to take a while for the 'real' me to show up.  I am very excited to find out who she is, but I also know that this process is going to take a while.  I left 'real' me behind waaaaay back in high school, when I decided to become some twisted version of a chameleon.  A girl who would go to any lengths, bottle up any unwelcome emotion/reaction/opinion, twist herself up into any shape necessary to stay invisible and avoid conflict.  A girl who would happily trade self for affection.
5)  All TV shows from this decade have their characters walking through life with a glass of wine or a bottle of beer in their hand.  WTF?  How did I never notice this?
6)  It is too early to look back at all of the many, many, many mistakes and what-ifs of my life with alcohol.  Looking back at past behavior, incidents, disasters is akin to looking directly into the sun.  It burns and I know that if I contemplate all of that now, I will get a wicked case of the fuck-its.  The only way to look right now is forward, what's next, what can I contribute now?  And most importantly:  how long until I can go to bed and get to Day 17?

This is hard, but I want it more than anything.  So fuck how hard it is and do it anyway.

Two weeks down and I feel like a raw nerve.

So here I am on Day 14.  I made it through the weekend, I even got a lot done.  (I followed some sober advice from Belle and cleaned out 2 closets and went through some giant rubbermaids full of crap and donated a bunch of said crap to Savers.)  While I was doing all of that I was ok, and while I was working out I was ok.  All of the rest of the time I continued to be the Raging Bitch of the Morning from Friday whom I shall now re-name the Raging Bitch of Early Sobriety.  This morning I was in a fantastically horrid mood and took it out on my boyfriend, my dogs (who thankfully do not speak english) and anyone who had the audacity to be on the roads between 7:15AM and 8:00 AM.

To be brief, I hate this.  I hate this and I want it to stop.  I am not sure what 'this' is, and I am not really looking to drink, at least not this very second, so I have no idea what to do.  I am just so very uncomfortable.  I had a lunch date with a couple of friends yesterday.  They are running friends, so they don't drink much and they have never seen me in my fully f'ed up glory.  My running friends and my drinking friends are separate you see...   Anyhoo, the restaurant they chose does not serve alcohol.  So this should have been a fun, low stress adventure.  But I spent most of the morning being angry that I HAD to go to this lunch, I mean I was straight up put out!  How dare these women impose such restrictions on my time? Right?

See!  Raging Bitch of Early Sobriety (see also:  Ungrateful Barely Sober Bitch).

There has to be something that is scaring me, because that is where most emotional discomfort comes from, right?  So what am I so afraid of?  Or is this really just Me without alcohol?    YIKES.

Ok, well.  There are about 3-1/2 hours to go before I can go to bed (even then there will be comments from boyfriend).  I can do this.  I have to do this, and maybe Day 15 is the Day of Feeling Better.....?

Greetings from Day 11...

So far today is irritating.  I was irritated that my alarm went off, irritated that my boyfriend took forever to get out the door and we did not get to the gym before 6 AM (why get up at 4:50 if we are not going to leave the house until 5:50??), irritated that the guy in the Cadillac tailgated me for 2 miles because he felt I pulled out in front of him, irritated that all of the TV's at the gym had the Tangerine Menace front and center, irritated with Jimmy Fallon for rubbing the Tangerine Menace's hair and then acting like the douchebag was some sort of good sport for allowing it.....

You get the idea - today I was back to the Raging Bitch of the Mornin' I mentioned a couple of days ago.

But then I remembered that I had a podcast from Belle about 'irritation' to listen to, and so I did.  Now I am still all crunchy, but with the knowledge that my current status is normal for someone who has given up her bestest and favorite-est coping mechanism for 100 days, and who still has 88 days to go.   Thank you as ever Belle for being out there, you have helped more than I can express.

So yeah, 7 hours left of work, followed by a game of cards with boyfriend's family.  Not sure about that last part, I may have to bow out because cards = drinking.  There will be special get-together cocktails, there always are, and I don't think I can be there tonight.  I will decide later this afternoon because right now I am just irritated.

Did I mention my high level of irritation?     GAH!

Pleasant morning (WTF??)

So today I woke up a few minutes before the dreaded alarm went off.  Just woke up.  Just like that. I opened my eyes EARLIER THAN NECESSARY.

This is a monumental statement coming from me.  I generally loathe mornings.  I hit snooze a lot, I wait 'till the very last moment and then I run around all pissed off and crabby because I am late and my stuff is not where I thought it was, and why am I out of Diet Pepsi?, etc.  Generally, I am a rabid bitch in the morning.  Now I am not saying that I was a ray of morning sunshine today- honestly when I first realized that I was up early I was momentarily irked that I could have slept for 8 more minutes.  But I just sort of woke up, and got up, and got ready and even had time to do one of those 5 minute pre-shower workouts on Pinterest and listen to one of Belle's lovely shorty podcasts.

"On Day 9 I woke up early."  To me this sentence has a musical quality, I shall make a point to use it as a line in the epic poem I plan to write about my life (not).

In other news, I have made a point to stop looking at my phone at 8 PM.  No Facebook, no Pinterest, no headlines, no text messages.  Nada.  So far, it has made going to bed easier because I am not riled up about something I read that outraged/offended/irritated me.  I will let you know if this lasts.  I will let you know if any of this lasts...

Monday, Day 7

I made it through the weekend.  I actually made it through the weekend without having any alcohol.  Was it easy?  No it was not.  Not at all.  Belle got back to me with an opening in her Sober Jumpstart class on Friday and I am pretty sure that is the extra bit of chutzpa I needed.  Belle is the lovely human who authors the 'Tired of Thinking About Drinking' site, book and program that I have added to my arsenal this time around.  If you are contemplating a sober existence, I highly recommend a visit to her site.

But yes.  An entire weekend without alcohol.  Who knew it could be done?  And I got a lot done too, because I made sure I had a task or a chore or an errand to keep me busy until it was time to go to sleep.  I had to!   It seems that my sobriety's biggest enemy is boredom and or silence.  This is not the time for me to sit quietly and reflect.  But I can read.  Reading is escape, which I definitely seek.  Right now I am the antithesis of mindful, I am wholly unable to live in the moment at this moment.  But I will learn, I know I will learn.  When it comes to understanding how I feel - all I can do now is dip my big toe in the emotional pool now and again.

7 days without alcohol and I feel like an exposed raw nerve.  The world seems scarier - and bigger - Twice now I have cried over Facebook posts that barely merit a glance, let alone an emotional response.  Once I cried because news of the presidential election here in the US overwhelmed me with hopelessness (although I doubt I am alone there...WTF America?) and another time I cried because a lawn mower wouldn't start.

Also I learned how fucking crazy my brain is.  This morning I woke up, feeling pretty good about making it to Day 7, and the first thought that popped into my brain was, "we should celebrate after work!".  This begs two questions:  1)  Who is the other member of 'we'?  2)  What is wrong with me?

S'ok though.  I am not falling for it.  NOT TODAY.  

Hello from Day 3.  So far, so good.  I woke up in a decent mood (I actually took a moment as I woke up to appreciate NOT being hungover - and smiled) and am still not feeling panicky about 'will I make it through today'.  Here is the deal though, I am moments from the danger zone.  It is 10 minutes to 4:00, and I will leave work in a little over an hour and I will drive by my favorite 'sit by the river and drink' bar.  And it is warm and lovely out, there will be people there appearing to have fun and I will want to stop.  Just for one.  To celebrate warmth and having had a good day.

Screw that.  I will take a different longer route home, avoid the stupid scene at the river entirely and .....  feel like I might just have a drink at home.  Hmmm.

Nope.

OK.  I am going to go to the library which is nowhere near my home or the stupid bar and I am going to sit in one of the big chairs and read a cheesy romance novel until dark.  Seriously.  That is what I am going to do.  Because why not?  How is sitting at the library reading any more ridiculous than sitting by the river wasting money, time and liver function?  Then I will go home and go to bed.

I got this!  I will not drink today.  Not Today.

Back to Day 2 again.  The usual disgust, mild horror and body encompassing eye roll apply.

For this time around I will make a list of things I am really sure to miss about drinking.  As a problem drinker, a binge drinker, the little drinker that couldn't stop - I have decided to make a list of things I will miss while not being a drinker.  Here are the first 10 items:
  1)  Pretending to remember a conversation we <friend and I> had while drinking, when in all reality I have no clue what you <friend> are talking about.
 2)  Pretending that the ridiculous bruises I am constantly discovering all over my body are funny.
 3)  Sacrificing an entire tomorrow to a miserable, thought sucking hangover so that I can have a 'really good time' tonight.  (Such a good time that I won't remember most of it!)
 4)  Waking up and walking outside to the driveway to make sure the car is there, and parked straight, and not in the yard, or left running, or left with one of the doors left open.
 5)  Spending a nice, nauseous/headachy morning fishing through my purse looking for receipts to see if I can figure out where I went the night before.  And, oh yeah.....how much money did I spend?  Hopefully not more than I owe for rent!!  Gosh I love a good mystery....
 6)  Coming up with the 1 millionth excuse for why I missed a morning running date with a friend.  (Surely she has no clue that the real problem is yet another hangover, because I am an academy award winning liar pants text-excuse generating machine!)
 7)  Waking up to find an empty pan with dried up mac-n-cheese sludge in it, because I came home after drinking a shit-ton of empty calories and thought the only way to top off the night was to eat a whole box of mac-n-cheese by myself. Besides, everyone knows that cooking on a gas stove while blackout drunk is genius!
 8)  Waking up and realizing I slept on the landing of the stairs and my daughter saw me.
 9)  Repeating myself, constantly, because I don't remember to whom I have told what.
10) Not achieving goals.  I cannot even get myself to the movie theater to see a movie I wanted to see half the time, because I am too hung over from the night before, let alone achieve a long term goal.
 
Honestly, the list goes on and on.  Why on earth is this difficult to give up?  GAH!
  So yes, day 2 is today.  Again.  C'mon day three!!

August 9th - another Day 2

If at first you do not succeed, try, try again.  And again.  And again.  And again.  I hate alcohol, I really do.

Anyway, here I go.  This time I signed up for the 100 Day Challenge (thanks again to Belle at TiredofThinkingAboutDrinking.com).  This time I am listening to PodCasts and this time I am reading the comments of others as they pick their Day 1 too.  And I am not the only one starting over, which is heartening.

Also, a person close to me was in a motorcycle accident on the way to work this morning, and he is more ok than I would have hoped.  And that makes me really grateful.  And so today's sobriety is to celebrate this latest turn, a broken wrist is nothing compared to what could have been.  We are lucky to be here, and I would like to actually be here, rather than wherever I go when Captain Morgan is driving my little ship.

The Cap'n is not my friend, the Cap'n doesn't care about me - he is the worst boyfriend I have ever had.  (And I've had some doozies.)

So hello from day 2, already doing better than I was on day 1 - see how quickly that momentum builds?  I am rooting for all of us out there fighting off our own worst enemies.  We got this.  :)

Recovered a bit of dignity....

Yesterday after work I popped into my favorite drink-by-the-river establishment and recovered my debit card.  I walked up to the same bartender I had in essence 'stiffed' during my bender on Sunday and he did not even bat an eye.  When I asked if I had perhaps left my card at his fine establishment he just said, 'let me check the wall' and there behind him was a small collection of forgotten cards and unsigned tabs.  I was one who had left my card and not signed for my tab, basically I had just gotten up and gone home.  Nice, huh?

But here is the thing, apparently this happens all the time at my favorite drink-by-the-river establishment.  "People always come back for their cards." he said.  Here I had been so embarrassed,  feeling like the worst human on the planet, and they did not even care.  And therein lies the problem for me;  I have been frequenting this bar (and others before it) because it is a safe place for a drunk like myself.  I am not the only one staggering out of the place completely potted with an open tab and forgotten personal items left in my wake.  If I acted in such a manner anywhere else I would be on a 'do not serve' list, right?  If I drive off from the gas station having forgotten to pay for my gasoline a police officer would come to my door to escort me back.  If my non-problem-drinking friends heard the story, they would worry about me.

I am tired of hiding from everyone.  No one in my life has the whole story, everyone gets bits and pieces of my doings and thoughts.  Why?  Because I am so afraid that if any of them find out who I really am, they will be disgusted, alarmed, angry, etc.  This sort of life is exhausting.  I am a walking classified document, I black out the classified information before I show myself and I am so, so tired of fearing that I will miss a line.

The lines I have to black out and disappear are almost always the drunkety parts.  I wonder if I have been fooling anyone?  Well there is a question for another day.  Today the only question is:  will I be drinking?  And the answer is "NO."

Thank goodness it is not yesterday.

Today is so much better.  I am not 100%, but the hangover is gone.  I got out of bed and went to workout and everything. (throw me a parade, right?) Yesterday was pure misery, I truly do not know how I have been doing this for all of these years.  It is amazing how after just 20 days of hangover free wake-ups what used to be barely notable to me was pure illness.  I think I am more devoted to quitting than ever.  I sure hope I am, I like waking up feeling good and I am lucky that after all I have put my body through that I still can...

Scuffed and bruised

So I totally flung myself off of the wagon last night.  Hurled myself off the damn thing and wow do I hurt today.  Twenty days waking up without a hangover really highlights how horrible it is to feel this way.  I am nauseous, I cannot think straight, I am exhausted and I feel like a complete asshole.  In addition I have no idea how much $ I spent and I am missing my debit card.  I am sure it is at my favorite drink-by-the-river bar, and I know it is safe there and I look forward to popping in with my tail between my legs to pick it up.  Shit, I am not even sure if I signed for my tab.  God I hate myself right now. F'ing drunk.

I am training for a 50 mile race and I have been feeling so, so good.  WHY DID I LOSE IT YESTERDAY?  I really have to wonder WHY?  Self sabotage?  Am I really a slave to my addiction.  Maybe I do need to go to AA and give myself over to a higher power and admit I am 'powerless' over my addiction....

No way, no how.  Not happening.  I am not helpless, powerless, enslaved.  This is a monumental problem of my very own creation and if I can create it then I can un-create it.   So I will not drink today.  I will not.  And I will write a little something in here every day and I will not give up.  I quit.  I quit.  I f'ing quit.

The Ides of July

Here I am in the middle of my 30 days - Day 15 - and I feel really good.  No troubles staying out of trouble last night and this morning I got out of bed a little bit easier than I have in a long time.  I only hit snooze once and Boyfriend only had to talk to me once.  (Normally waking me is a ridiculous procedure involving flashing the lights in the room, turning up the volume on the radio, telling me to get up 3 or 4 times and suffering through my alarm going off every 9 minutes for 27 minutes.  It is a wonder Boyfriend has not just thrown a pot of water over my head like my dad did in 1986.)

But today I got up and got dressed and was even civil.  Someone give this girl a gold star!   <insert eye roll here>  Someday I hope to be able to wake up and get going like a grown up, I tell myself every day that I am not hung over (15 mornings in a row lately!) that it will get a little easier every day and so it shall!

Day 17

 I am truly amazed that I have gotten this far, and this fact has actually begun to hold weight for me with my nightly drink-or-don't internal dialogue.  It really does, because every stinking night I have to have this stupid debate with the voices in my head:  "Should we just have a couple?  We've been so good for like a million days IN A ROW - we totally DESERVE a couple, right?!"  And every night I have to ignore their weirdly enticing argument.  They don't even whisper at me in the morning, I don't  really hear boo from them until between 4 and 5 pm ... and then suddenly they cannot shut-up.  But now I can say, "we are past halfway through 30 days, it would be stupid to give up now because if I give in now, we will just have to start all over again in another 6 weeks or a month or whatever."  Because I will keep trying.  I have to keep trying to quit until it works because I do not want my funeral to be populated by my sad and angry daughter, a couple of friends who did not realize that I was 'that bad' and some drunks telling stellar drinking stories about me.  "The bar won't be the same without her." they'll cry, and then in a week I will be forgotten.  Because drunks like to drink with other drunks and I cannot drink if I am dead.

So here I am, at the beginning of today's argument between the voices and my desire to be sober.   I have to tell you that I am sick of this whole thing, but I also know that if I just say 'f'ck it - I'm drinking!' that I will feel like a piece of poop.  I am too far in to give up now and that helps me keep saying no....then....Phew!

And let me also say that the pipe dream of losing weight by not drinking is a total bust.  At least it is a bust as of this moment because my sweet tooth is raging now that there is no liquid sugar in the mix. Chocolate?  Yes please.  Belvita breakfast crackers all day?  Yes please.  Ice cream?  Yes please.  It is delightful to be eating like an Oompa-Loompa, just spectacular.   <eye roll here>

Speaking of Oompa-Loompas  - I have officially removed myself from my beloved country's presidential election until September.  All that happens now when I watch the coverage is that I get a huge surge of anxiety and disgust, then I start raging at the media for spotlighting an orange lunatic right into legitimate candidacy.  I fell my blood pressure going up as I type for heaven's sake.....so yeah, taking a BS break from the election.  

Have a good evening all, I shall see you on Day 18!

Fortnight

Day 14 and there have been some developments.  Well no, not developments, more like some lessons learned.  And there is a confession.  So here it is:

Friday was pretty easy (Day 11) I had planned a really long run for Saturday, and we went to dinner at a restaurant that does not serve alcohol for dinner and I was exhausted so I had dinner, packed my supplies for the long run and went to bed.  The cravings were there, but they were quieted by my desire to feel good for the run

Saturday after the run?  Well there was the voice, "you DESERVE a reward for running so far and sticking to your plan don't you Alicia?"  "You did all of your chores today in addition to running so far - you earned a treat didn't you?"  It was ridiculous, and I was all sorts of agreeing with the voice.  I had even decided that I really, really wanted a martini with lots of olives in it which was really weird because I have never in my years of drinking even thought about having a martini with lots of olives in it.  Never.  This seasoned drinker sticks to mimosas, Captain and diets with lemon, Stoli and cranberry no lime and in the winter...white russians.  Sweet drinks all the way baby!  So what up with the dirty martini craving?  Well, my theory is that my alcohol brain is trying to trick me somehow, Perhaps my alcohol brain thinks that I do not know that a martini is a 'drink'.  Perhaps alcohol brain thinks if it craves a drink in a smaller glass that I will run right out and get one.  Alcohol brain is getting desperate and uncomfortable, that is for sure.  But Boyfriend saved the day by suggesting that we go to dinner and a movie and what I did do was have a virgin pina colada, told myself that was a wonderful treat (which it was, the thing was delicious and brutally high in calories even without the rum).  We had steak, we watched an adorably funny movie and by the time we got home all I wanted was to go to sleep.  And so I did.

But Sunday came, I woke up so happy to feel good, went for a walk with friends, trained my clients and then BOOM - the voice came at me hard.  This time I fell down, this time I had a beer at my favorite sit-and-drink-by-the-river outdoor bar.  There was a good band and I had run far the day before, I had cleaned the apartment, I had run errands and life seemed to be in control.  So of course, why not have a drink, right?  I had a Blue Moon with a big ole' orange in it and I did not even feel bad.  But then I got the buzz, and this time instead of just kicking back and feeding that buzz I just felt bad.  Guilt, remorse, and self-loathing came back at me really hard.  It was horrible and it actually stopped me.  I switched to diet Pepsi and I watched kids play in the river and then I watched all of the people around me.  Older women dancing all sexy, like the real Rascal Flatts was actually right there playing (when really it was a fairly good cover band made up of pudgy middle aged men). Younger women adjusting their bikini tops without noticing they were flashing everyone while they did it.  So many people excitedly making plans that they were clearly too drunk to remember with people they clearly only sort of knew.  A woman saw another couples' puppy and staggered over to play with it without knowing them, the couple was also tipsy and in 45 seconds they were all hugging each other with the couple promising to provide the breeder's number.  I realized that none of these encounters meant anything, none of them will carry over into tomorrow.  Then I realized that the kids I had watched playing were now playing with a clam they had found in the river and a beer bottle they found somewhere, and that no one was stopping them.  These kids were with someone at this bar, but I had no idea who because in 2 hours, not one soul checked on them.  The whole scene bugged me.

I now have a clear view of what I want, I want to be sober.

I want to be sober, I want to be real.  I honestly do not know what that means yet but I desperately want to find out.  So I am going to accept yesterday's choice to drink a beer and I am going to keep moving forward.  I am still calling today Day 14 because after yesterday I want my little car (thanks Belle) to keep rolling down the hill.  I messed up, but it was more of a speed bump than a brick wall.  Agree with me or don't, but I intend to keep going forward because I woke up today feeling good.  No hangover and I will wake up with the same beautiful feeling tomorrow - c'mon Day 15!!  :)

TEN! 10! X! Diez!

Welcome to my Day 10.  So far it has started much like the last 9 days - I am all assured of my decision, feeling bulletproof, thoroughly enjoying the hangover free mornings.  But later this afternoon it will bite back. I will drive home after work, right past my favorite sit-outside-by-the-river-and-drink bar and I will get nearly irate because I am not 'allowed' to sit by the river and drink. The sensation of discomfort, and wanting and displeasure because I cannot have it is overwhelming.  Why is it so very difficult to shut up the voices and still the inner turmoil?  Rational brain can explain why sober is better until it is hoarse from talking, but alcohol brain just wants and wants and wants and wants.

I want to not want it so badly.

The good news is that today I have my workout stuff.  This means I can go straight from work to the gym and so I shall not need to drive by the sit-outside-by-the-river-and-drink bar at all.  Yeay!!  Since going dry, I have had a horrible time getting out of bed in the mornings and there have been too many days with no exercise.  So today, I will try hitting the gym right after work.  This could end up being a big help, as it would seem that once I get home and eat, I no longer need/want/obsess about the drink so much.

Fingers crossed!!  Good luck to anyone else in the fight.  :)

Unchartered waters

Just double checked and here I am at Day 9, a place I have definitely not been to in 19 years and at least 3 months.  It is odd to think about it, and disturbing to think how casually I make that statement. To my mind, it sounds like going 9 days without drinking one time in 19 years is a huge accomplishment of some sort.  It certainly seems akin to climbing a mountain.  The hard truth is that for me (and many others like me) it really is a big hairy deal.  What is difficult for me to accept and embrace is that in order to change this one behavior, repair this one chip in my teacup - I am having to funnel about 85% of my mental resources to the project.  I cannot believe how much energy this has taken!  And so I keep reading ahead in others' recovery blogs hoping to find proof that this will one day be less of an energy drain.

In addition I continue to remind myself that I quit smoking 10 years ago.  That was ridiculously hard, probably harder than this, but I did it.  And I never look back anymore, I don't miss the smokes - when I see a box of the brand I used to smoke there is no desire to pick them back up.  So it can be done.  I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.....

I also imagine my bloated, exhausted, overworked liver working overtime to fix itself.  Mr. Liver has not had this much time to make repairs in decades.  I would imagine around Day 4 he sent out patrols to make sure the rest of the body was still up and running.  "Did she finally kick?",  "Are we brain dead?", "Are we lost at sea on a booze free inner tube?"  he would ask.  Once assured that the whole operation is still running, he probably began clean-up in earnest.  And who am I to screw up all of that hard work?  Who am I to interfere with healing?  If Mr. L is willing to attempt to fix the mess I have made of him then I owe it to him to stay out of the way!

On to Day 10.  TEN!  Double Digits!!

Day 8

Here I am at Day 8.  I would love to say that this has been easy and I am fast and sure in my decision to dry out and that I am looking just soooo..... much better.  But none of that would be true.  I am not mad though, I am a little bit proud.  I made it through a trip to Summerfest and an entire concert that I did not really enjoy, I made it through a BBQ where everyone else had a cocktail (although nobody was drunkety-drunk-drunk) and I went to watch fireworks on July 3rd and no alcohol.  I realize that that last one probably sounds like it should have been easy, but I cannot remember sober fireworks, EVER.  I would imagine the last time that happened I was 16 years old.  So 30 years ago.  Wow.

Well they were lovely, and although I thought I was going to come out of my skin while we walked to our viewing area and for the entire hour we were there waiting for the show to begin, I did not get a cocktail.  And I could have bought beer ACROSS THE STREET.....so yes, I thought about all of the options.  I wanted and I pined and puled and expressed irritability with everything from our spot, to the kids behind us to the chilly temperature.  Really I was just mad because I had to sit there with no booze.  Which is sad, because the show was beautiful, the other people were funny and summery and my boyfriend was doing his very best to be supportive even though I know he wanted a cocktail too.

But it is over, and I woke up on July 4th feeling clear and good and not hungover and I was truly grateful for that.  I went for a long walk with a friend followed by a long run with my MP3 and it was warm and green and lovely.  On to Day 9.

I think I'm gonna' need a bigger boat.....

Days I have lived with an alcohol addiction problem:  somewhere around 10,666 (which is more than 29 years)
Attempts to quit:  at least 20 serious attempts, all solo, all failed
Longest stretch without drinking since I was pregnant 19 years ago:  7 days
Blackouts:  so, so many
Crippling hangovers:  even more than the blackouts
Car Accidents:  1 (the tree won, thank goodness it was just a tree)
# of times finding out when/where AA meetings are:  10
# of times attending an AA meeting:  0

My rap sheet goes on and on, and yet it is really only in the last couple of years that I have begun to sense the precariousness of my position.  I am now a middle aged woman with a solid but mediocre job, very little saved for my future, very little to call my own (except for a mountain of debt), a boyfriend who lets me get away with awful behavior and a two adorable dogs.  Most importantly, I have a wonderful adult daughter who still loves me in spite of everything.

Oddly, through all of this I am a distance runner.  Weird, yeah?

I have to change, I have to stop drinking and it has to be now and so here I am on day 4 of not drinking.  I have found a blog that has given me hope and right out of the gate I want to thank Belle of tiredofthinkingaboutdrinking.com .   She has been a huge help to me, I have been binge reading her blog posts from when she quit drinking and will keep looking for other bloggers that speak to me about finding and keeping sobriety.

So far it has been mind blowing to realize how much time I have spent in the last four days simply mulling over this topic.  I am all resolve for a couple of hours and then halfway though my 15 minute commute home I am contemplating having 'just 1'.  Idiotic as I cannot remember the last time I had just 1 drink at a time.  I cannot remember the last time I planned any sort of activity without giving thorough consideration to when and how I could fit in drinking time.  I plan my running schedule around my nights out.  I decide who I will spend time with based on how intoxicated I feel I can be around them.  I tend to only go places I know will have alcoholic beverages (Will there be beer at the zoo?) Last weekend I found myself looking for receipts in my purse/pockets/car because I had no idea how much money I had spent the night before - or where I had spent it.  That was not the first time and even when I found the stupid receipts I had to wait for the charge to clear my bank account so that I could figure out what I tipped the bartender.  (BTW I am ridiculously generous when I am tanked, which explains the big smiles I get when I return to the bar days later just SURE no one remembers me.)

While drunk I have sprained my ankle, chipped a bone in my other ankle, exploded a bursa in my knee, fallen in a stone bathtub and hit my head and have had more "mystery bruises" than I can count. Honestly, I rarely if ever know where any of my bruises come from.  My last car was also extremely bruised; 3 dents in the front end from whacking the frame of my garage door on my way out, a dent on the hood because I did not have it backed in far enough one night and the garage door came down on it, and unspeakable internal injuries to the motor from the pathetic battle with the felled tree minding its own business on the side of the road (where my poor car should not have been).

Fuck yeah I have to stop drinking.  Duh.  I have never itemized the above list before and it would seem that the question of  'Do I need to quit?' requires as much thought as 'Do I need to breathe?'

The answer to both questions is a resounding YES!  so here we go....Yeay day 4!!