Originally Posted by
MrPL 
As I said in previous posts, at some point in my recovery I realised I wasn’t happy with who I was.
I remember finding this particularly strange, because the feeling wasn’t there when I was drinking. I mean, of course I knew something was very wrong, but there was some kind of drinking related numbness, that stopped me from seeing what was really happening with real me.
So here is the important point. To be able to work on the changes I needed for real me,I had to THINK DIFFERENT. This is the only way to break the cycle, alcohol can’t be a possibility, ever.
Great post MrPL. As I dry out, I find myself dealing with fairly fundamental, weighty questions of identity and it's become necessary to reframe my thinking on the subject.
Drunk me was definitely not the 'real' me, but as I remove alcohol from the mix, do I suddenly revert to a truer version of myself that alcohol merely suppressed?
The more sober time I accumulate, the more I realize there never was such a thing as a 'real' me that I can easily step back into. Determining who/what I am as a sober person is where recovery becomes very real and very challenging.
Who I am at any given moment is a much more fluid and dynamic thing than I used to think. At any given point in time I am a mix of many things - some good, some bad, most somewhere in the middle - with some parts of me that cannot be changed, but other things -- especially in regards to how I respond to events in my life -- that are under my control.
Over the last couple of decades, alcohol has built up a distorted personality in myself. As alcohol is removed, the 'fake' alcohol-flavored personality/identity collapses and I am left standing in a pile of mental debris. Who I am now that I'm sober? The answer isn't immediately obvious, and not knowing is an uncomfortable feeling as you said.
The trick, then, is realizing until I build back a healthier personality/identity to replace the alcohol-flavored one that collapsed, things are going to be uncomfortable.
I can drink to numb the discomfort, but that only keeps me stuck in a cycle that never goes anywhere. OR I can realize that I am a work in progress and, though things are a bit uncomfortable now, I can keep working on myself and build up a personality/identity that is more emotionally mature, more adaptable, more content.
I will never be perfect - far from it - but if I'm patient, I can become someone I will be happy living with.