Evoo

Hey all --

Well I know it's been 18 months, but I still do consider myself very much a "newcomer." I first posted here over a decade ago (wow) -- and it was a struggle, but it was the February 2019 class really helped me get off the ground and stay focused on health.

The months since then have been both wonderful and hard -- but thankfully not because of any relapses. I treasure my sobriety. But my auto-immune disease (UC/crohns) has gotten out of control again and landed me in the hospital recently, this time for a week. I've lost a bunch of weight, but I'm hanging in there and steroids have me feeling like myself for now. First biologic failed, but I'm optimistic the next one will get me in remission (here's hoping).

I've really tried in recent months to understand what caught me in a cycle of drinking for so long. In the years before I was diagnosed with IBD, I was often symptomatic, but I was terrified that I had waited too long to go to a doctor, or that I had cancer or something else.. and so overwhelmed with paralyzing health anxiety, I would just drink. I never went to a doctor until an ER stay in 2016. Then withdrawals and shame and peer pressure and whatever else kept me on awful, functional benders -- a mix of alcoholism and workaholism that I never slowed down from.

But life, today, is much slower. I've had to really quarantine because of my immunosuppression and I work with computers so most of what I do is from home. My son is amazing. My wife is amazing. We moved somewhere quiet with trails and parks nearby. I cook, cycle (when I have the energy and can eat solid food) and I focus hard on my work and family.

I'm very blessed.

In an odd way, it's weird -- but sometimes I'm glad I have IBD because I really *can't* drink anymore. Not without becoming violently ill. That was part of what had me stop back in Feb 2019... the hospital. And now nobody questions it anymore, none of the people who would've pressured or pushed me to have "just one beer" do anymore because of the condition. With the pressure gone, I feel free to focus on health and getting well.

Don't get me wrong, crohns is the hardest thing I've ever had to deal with. Even harder than the alcoholism of my 20s in many ways. But the temptation to drink being so divorced from my existence now feels like a silver lining.

Anyway, I haven't posted here in awhile. I just wanted to say thank you -- and to send a note of encouragement to folks here who are struggling.

If you're in withdrawals today, if you're shaking your way into another drink... if you're in a dark cycle of binge, hangover, repeat... you can escape from it, and man -- it's worth it.

Every day I look at the life I have because I made this decision. My little boy will never see his old man drunk. My wife will never see my personality shift into some person I barely recognize who only cares about the bender and stopping withdrawals.

Nope. I get to hold and play with my little boy sober, *really* feel the air on my skin, *really* taste good food, *really* live.

Thanks for the role all of you have played over the years talking to me, encouraging me, and keeping me strong. Bless you. Bless all of you.