
Plenty of people have probably stopped reading my blog because all of a sudden in forty-seven days I have become ‘the sober blogger’ and I am sorry and I hate it, too, because in some ways (and of course not in others, but still) I literally tripped and fell and got sober but also I don’t hate it at all. I need sobriety like I need air and if I cannot write about it I will stop breathing in all the poetic metaphoric ways that kill you off long before you die your actual physical death so like it or not here we are.
Also, also, and furthermore, I must tell the following story because the facts of the case are all true and I can’t promise it will “help” anyone else (that whole concept freaks me the fuck out but that’s for another day I suppose) but I know it will help me because I will be able to remember it. I will be able to reach back and say, yeah, yes, I did that right there.
Let’s be honest, there is nothing special about forty-seven days sober except everything. I mean, I am doing it and to get beyond six weeks to damn near seven feels like home and also a literal out-of-body experience. Yesterday was HARD af. Had a lot of shit come down on me at once (life, I think they call it, as in life is gonna life at you, sober or plastered, either way) and it was rough scene after rough scene.
By the time I got home after work all I could think was Fuck, a drink is exactly how I would have ended this particular day if I were still drinking. But I had this wild glittering sobery thought as I drained the spiral pasta for dinner and it was this: wine would make this day even exponentially nauseatingly worse. Because I know me drunk. I would have used the shit events of the day to justify my inhaling wine because it was a really hard day! *pouts* and wine was the medicine I deserved. I would drink so much to numb the pain that I wouldn’t be able to breathe through it to get to the other side. The other side being the internal mental meadowy-picnic-like place where I can see as softly and warmly as a goofy little fuzzy puppy sipping water from a babbling brook in the sunshine that I’m gonna be okay. Because I’ve got me. And no matter what, I am not ever leaving me. With the alcohol thrumming through my veins, I’d never get to that place or that part.
Instead I’d have picked a fight with the husband, blamed him for what was happening to me (nothing he could possibly control, it’s a work thing), gotten righteously angry, cried, felt misunderstood, and quite possibly threatened in so many words or insinuations to end the marriage. Then. THEN. Then, tear stained and rage-petrified, I would sleep like shit. Then wake up feeling like total shit and have to work all day feeling like upset-world-collapsing helpless hopeless terrified jittery trash.
But. I didn’t let any of that happen. I drank sparkling water and I breathed and I made pasta and I even smiled about the absurdity of this life and my beloved said kind wise words like ‘you have time to decide what’s best for you’ and ‘we will get through it no matter what’ and all such things that make him the absolute kindest rock star rock solid support in the universe. And I slept like a perfectly angelic little green silky caterpillar inside her warm and mysterious milky cocoon just waiting and life-ing and readying for a brand new day.
And so here we are.
If others quit reading because you are now sober, fuck βem. It’s inspiring to read your newfound ideals. It’s humbling to count your days with you. And mostly, you are the gentle reminder that still, after almost seven years, I need to remain sober. That having a drink is never the answer. That despite the days I do have, I am still fragile; and still an alcoholic. Perhaps you have lost a reader but you’ve gained one in me. π€
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Thank you so much for this. ππ€π
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Keep at it, Allison. Writing in this part of your life is good and needed. To me, it is revealing the self-awareness you are developing and seeing. It is hopeful. It’ll more than likely give others hope. Keep at it. Much love and respect to you.
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Thank you so much for this. βLove and respectβ means a hell of a lot to me, Tom. ππ€π
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This makes me want to leap to my feet and give you a standing ovation love π€
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Thank you so ever much, my dear love. It means worlds to me. ππ€π
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You are such a beautiful warrior goddess, Allison. It ainβt all roses without thorns; life has beauty and it also has pain. Thank you for your vulnerability and your honestyβ€οΈβ¨π
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Thank you so much, angel. ππ€π
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Your words are words and they sing regardless of circumstance. Write on!
Ray
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Thank you ever so much for this. ππ€π
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Every day of sobriety matter. Starting at day 1 and continuing on
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Truth. Thank you. π€π€π€
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I rediscovered you after a short hiatus… only to discover I was discovering you… the real you… beyond the hazy filter of the bottle… you haven’t lost anything in your writing that I could detect, but you’re finding you… how beautiful…!
π―π²ποΈ
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Thank you π€
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