Hi folks, today begins day 7. This is the first full week I have been sober in literally years. I have gotten through 3,4,5 days, but never a full Mon > Sun.
Last night I went out to dinner with my GF and met her best friend + best friend's fiance. About 6 or 7 years ago, being in a restaurant while sober was the bane of my existence. I had severe social anxiety, and other people watching me eat was very painful. My hands would shake, not from booze (my abuse was just beginning then), but from pure nervousness of being in public. I always tried to convince people to find restaurants that had big booths, so I could hide from the other patrons. It led me to a lot of discomfort, and then self medicated alcohol abuse to hide my self loathing later on.
Last night went very, very well. The 3 of them split a bottle of wine, I drank ice water the whole meal. The restaurant was a tiny little hole in the wall place in Brookline that was very hard to get into. We had to make reservations days in advance. The atmosphere was crowded, hot, loud, within close proximity of other customers, and the meal took about 2 hours. All triggers for my anxiety, I would have been miserable several years ago. I would have been miserable 4 days ago! I did fine. I have been taking anxiety medication for a few years, and it seems when you stop drinking it actually helps. (of course it does!). However, the end of the night brought me back to reality. Driving home went straight through the city and my irritability really slammed into me. I was so angry with the lights, the traffic, the potholes, and how long it took. It was uncanny. (deep breaths)
Anyway, this morning my mentor picked me up at 8am and we went to a meeting. He has been talking to me about getting to this meeting since Wed, as it has very powerful speakers. If you don't get there by 8:30, you will be standing. We got there at 8:15 and grabbed 2 seats 4 rows back in the direct center so we could see and hear perfectly. At 8:50 I look around and am stunned that there are people crowded into doorways, standing outside in the hall, piled up everywhere. Probably 200-250 people in total. HUGE for a 1 hour meeting, I am thinking.
The meeting starts. There were 4 speakers, each with ~15 minutes. I won't go into detail about each of their speeches, but suffice to say that these 4 were incredible human beings. 2 of them spent about 10 years in prison, 1 of them was my mentor's godmother. There was solemn understanding as they brought us to their low points, there was roaring laughter at the jokes - one of them was particularly good at working them into his story - there were tears during the tales of recovery. It was incredible. One of the women who spoke related her AV to
Gollum battling Smeagol in the Lord of the Rings movie. Not only an effective comparison, but it got the room worked up into a laughing frenzy as she explained it and immitated it.
I took notes, and found a lot of very good lessons in what they told me. Things to relate to and things I learned.
- how some of us hated seeing the sun come up.
- how we are unavailable to show up for important events.
- how succumbing to the addiction makes us feel dirty.
- how recovery will allow us to begin taking healthy risks and how we need those risks.
etc...
I'm overwhelmed.
Tomorrow will be Monday > Monday for me. I return to the beginners meeting where I started last week, where I walked in as low as I have ever been in my life. I cannot wait to walk in that door and show them someone who is not sweating, shaking, stinking, crying, and pleading for help. I still need a ton of help, but I feel I am getting it. I saw several members who saw me in that terrible state this morning, they all told me I looked so much better. It made me beam from ear to ear.
Still battling sleep issues, but off to the gym and then to a sober super bowl party. Have a great day folks.