A non-comprehensive list of things that feel different, almost 3 years sober

I want to give some hope to people who may be sober curious or attempting to get sober for the first time. And I also want to caution you that when I heard shit like this when I was first getting sober, I was both resentful, jealous, and maybe a little afraid.

A little afraid that this just wouldn’t happen to me.

In AA (which I know isn’t for everyone), there is a part in How it Works where they say some people are “constitutionally incapable” of being honest with themselves — those who are bound to die of alcoholism. “There are such unfortunates,” the writing concludes.

Bummer city, I would think after stringing together 4, 5, 6 days and then yet another relapse. It’s me. I’m just going to die of alcoholism in this life.

But I won’t. I got sober, and I intend to die sober.

But — when I first began even thinking about quitting drinking, there were so many things that I couldn’t even begin to conceptualize as not involving alcohol.

It was so intrinsically tied to so many things that I did (and as mentioned in a previous post, it was not all bad) that it felt nearly impossible to move through the world.

How am I ever going to do this, I would think.

And when people who were a little bit further along than me, a few years or so, even a few decades, would look so serene and just say things like, Easy does it, I would think to myself, Okay, but the thing is, I’m dying in the here and now, so what about that.

But I read books and blogs and spoke to and listened to people who were that much more sober than I was, so — for anyone starting out, here’s a few things that I thought would be insurmountable and what it was like then and what it’s like now.

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Restaurants

I remember when sitting down at a restaurant and ordering a soda for the first time, trying to be a sober person.

Surely they must think I’m pregnant, I thought, not ordering a cocktail with dinner.

When I saw the cocktail menu, my mouth watered.

It was a thought that I had to actively fight — not now, not now, not now. Every minute that passed while I was in a restaurant.

Then for a while, I didn’t go to restaurants. It was too much to fight against those thoughts.

And today: my husband and I recently went out to a steakhouse. I think there is a growing mocktail culture, but I am hesitant as I never quite know what to order, what to describe. When I was pregnant, I would say, I loved a martini, what can you make me, and the servers would just stare at me, and my ex-husband would shake his head.

But now, with my new husband, I looked over at nearby tables, though, I saw fancy cocktails and beer and wine. I can recall, of course, a bold, full-bodied Cabernet Sauvignon, the feeling of it burning in my chest — but what I also remember is staring at my glass, is watching the wine bottle drain as it sat on the table, is wondering is this too much wine and when might I be able to order another martini, and would that be too tacky, and as we were leaving the restaurant, where might I want to go to get more wine? Or gin? Or beer?

I don’t miss any of that. And I don’t really miss the cocktail. It just is something other people are doing, and that’s fine, but it’s not for me.

The restaurant is the old city library downtown (the restaurant is called The Library). This was our first overnight away from the baby since she’s been born, and I forgot to pack my makeup.

Celebrations

This 4th of July, I found myself on the same patio where I had gotten wasted a whole lot with my dad. I watched their neighbors bring over cases of beer, everyone settle in with a drink.

My kids (and stepkids) were in and out of the hot tub. Just before the fireworks started, there was a huge storm.

We saw lightning strike and we rushed to get the kids out of the hot tub. We all huddled, the seven little kids all wrapped in towels, watching this downpour. What a gift for them to be my priority. What a gift to not be worrying about where my drink was or how much was left in it. What a gift to not be thinking, well, whatever, I’m sure it’s fine — and then tomorrow, waking up, terrified : did we get them out in time? Was I paying enough attention?

And the storm let up and the kids got back in the hot tub and the fireworks carried on. A metaphor, I suppose. Perhaps a little too on the nose, universe.

And without me knowing, my husband Billy Crocker got this shot of me and our baby girl watching fireworks at my parents’ house, while other grown ups drank Modelo’s and a couple big bottles of tequila and giant ice cubes nearby and me : not worried about my kids, or even tempted by the drinking, and with enough self worth to allow myself to be loved by a man who just sees me and our daughter and thinks, I’ll capture this moment.

Gifts of sobriety, to be sure.

When I Get Pissed Off

I think the Gottmans describe it as flooding. When I become overwhelmed (and I will say I can definitely get overwhelmed with the amount of noise in this house (in fact, as I type this, the baby is pawing at my computer).

In the early days, I still had cigarettes, too. When I would feel like I was just going to explode with anger, I could step out for a cigarette.

Today what I’m looking

An escapier escape.

I don’t want a drink. I want to not feel what I am feeling.

This too shall pass, and other bullshit, I say to myself. But it does pass. The cloud lifts, even it just feels like it won’t ever lift while I’m in it.

Sadness

There is new depth to my sadness. I sometimes don’t remember being this deeply sad when I was drinking, but I think I was just not present, ever, for a very extended period of time.

I remember being deeply sad when I was hungover. I remember the absolute hopelessness that I felt when I couldn’t quit drinking. That was the lowest low. But it was also abbreviated, brief — it dissipated each night when the immediate release of dopamine from a drink outweighed what I knew to be a healthier choice for myself. I was sad that I couldn’t quit drinking, but : I cannot do that again, I would say, and then, inevitably, I would do it again.

While I have sadness, I no longer have hopelessness, not like that.

But sadness in this phase of early-to-middle sobriety is a bit of a liminal space : here is something I have not had to endure at length, or perhaps something I long endured but effectively drowned out until the drowning method began to create its own kind of sadness, but still : learning how to feel my fucking feelings, for the first time, as a late thirties mom of many.

Sadness is my girl, but Anxiety is probably more my jam (Inside Out 2)

Free Time

When Billy and I had been dating for a few months, and I was about six months sober, we got our first free weekend in 6 weeks, we went to our favorite Mexican restaurant and I remember sitting in the parking lot and crying.

I was so overwhelmed.

That happened for some time. When we didn’t have any of the kids (which was rare, as our exes then had every other weekend at best), I would just collapse. We were so tired. And we decided to have a baby not so long after we met, and so we hadn’t had a night without a baby until our steakhouse dinner mentioned above.

But with the free time : it’s just wide open. When I was drinking, free time was exactly that — it was wasted. I was wasted. What was time, I would say, anyway.

But now there’s not a reaching for anything — I can find a way to fill the time. I can fill the time with things I love.

We make crafts with the kids. When I get frustrated with their ridiculous requests to hot glue or use pom poms or googly eyes or folding or taping or whatever it is they want : it’s not because I’m hungover, or because I want to drink.

I don’t even think about it anymore. It just isn’t an option. And it’s not something I actively fight.

There is an awkwardness where I both don’t actively fight this fight and I also am not wanting to become complacent. Stay in gratitude, they say, another oft mentioned phrase that used to piss me the hell off.

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For those just starting out — people will say to you, it gets better. And when I was just starting out, I wanted to say to those people, go fuck yourself.

I think that’s a reasonable response in the early days. It’s all reasonable.

It might feel like an out of body experience the first time — here I am, at a restaurant, ordering water with lemon. Here I am, leaving the restaurant, driving home, not worried about being pulled over, not stopping anywhere along the way.

Here I am getting into bed, totally stone sober, with brushed teeth and a washed face and sitting in the bed opening a book, thinking, god. Here I am.

The neural pathways moving toward a drink were deeply entrenched. It will take time for the neural pathways of not drinking to be entrenched, too.

The muscles will build. And then, it’s just, I don’t drink. It’s nothing to say. It just is.

That’s not to say it’s all a cakewalk, but it’s different. It’s not the thing — it’s not so much a temptation, a thing to fight against. It’s just, well, that’s not an option — so what else am I going to do. How else am I going to survive this moment.

Sometimes healthy choices, like going on a walk, or taking a bath. Sometimes several handfuls of peanut butter M&M’s and maybe some ice cream, too.

As the joke goes: it’s called balance.

***One final thought : I am closer to 2 1/2 years sober but I am counting time as my husband does, rounding up generously.