Checking in at 2 days into Month Two.
Feeling pretty proud of how far I've come vs where I came from - stay strong everyone, if I can get to the One Month mark, everyone can - wasn't so long ago that I found the idea of going one day without drinking 3 or 4 big bottles of Leo beer unthinkable.
Though admittedly I do sometimes feel that if I didn't have 1) my teaching jobs keeping me on the straight and narrow, and 2) Wat Tam Wua to go to - the meditation retreat being basically a free rehab, with free accommodation, vegetarian food, and the meditation to deal with and examine the mental phenomena which led to my wanting to drink, things would be a load worse now.
I'm basically incredibly lucky here, on many levels. But on other levels, quitting drinking in Thailand is no small feat - drinking is well and truly part of the lifestyle here, especially among westerner backpacker/travellers - and whilst there are places like Wat Tam Wua, formal alcohol services are few and far between, for Thai-speakers as well as English-speakers (for anything to do with the mind, the standard practice here is to send the sufferer to the monks).
And when you're a teacher here, you're expected to work, barring obvious physical sickness - teachers are expected to be Role Models, so if I was visibly struggling with alcoholism, smelling of beer, visibly hungover etc, chances are my rep would suffer.
Though like I've said before, Thailand is ultimately what you make it. You've got more or less complete freedom to make a new life for yourself, and if you want to, find something to replace drinking/partying. Which is more or less what I've done.
Big up da sober crewdem yo xxxxx