"Honestly, drinking would be a really shallow response to what is a profound event."
Well said, Dee!
I went through a serious family trauma over the weekend. It is something I would have had some drinks to cope with in the past, and it inspired those thoughts (which I don't often have in sobriety). But I didn't drink, and the GIFT from staying sober through it is that I connected deeply with other family members who were also having the experience and the grief. I even spent hours on the phone talking to my ex-husband (from very long ago), who is someone I value greatly. He is remarried and lives far away, but this issue involved one of our children, and my sobriety allowed us to share throughout the experience without the conversation degenerating into conflict.
Waking up on Tuesday, I find some of the trauma is resolved, some will never be and is just heart-breaking, but I came out of the last couple of days with a new depth of relationship with people in my family and a new sense of connection. That would not be true had I drank through the feelings and experience.
And of course, there's all the other stuff - still in recovery, proud of that, feeling healthy , etc. - but what I most value is the deepening.