Lifeisforliving

It's Friday night - the end of a long day and a long week. It's the beginning of an entire week off (one of the perks of working for a school district). It's also coming up on the end of day 4 of my sobriety. It's raining & cold and all I want to do is get home and snuggle up by the fire. I first have to stop by the grocery store. I don't worry or feel tempted at all. I am; however, thankful that none of the items I need will take me anywhere near the beer & wine aisle.

I start to look around at my fellow shopper and notice that over half of them have cases of beer and/or bottles of wine in their baskets. Suddenly that urge tries to overtake me. My AV (whom I told you is a cunning & baffling "B") tries to seduce me and tell me how romantic & comforting it would be to sit by the fire while watching a movie with a glass of wine. Suddenly the feelings of jealousy, envy and even rage start to bubble up to the surface. The feelings are so strong that I feel my eyes brimming with tears.

"Why can't I just be normal?!?! Why do I have to go the rest of my life without drinking?!?! How will I ever make it?!" Those are the thoughts racing thru my addict mind.

Then I stop and breathe.

"You don't have to go the rest of your life. You just have to not drink tonight," I tell myself. "One day. One minute. One hour. One day. That's all you have to do. Tomorrow and the rest of your life will take care of itself. All you need to take care of is tonight." It calms me and I am able navigate my way thru the rest of the store. I am still resentful and I give myself permission to feel that emotion. Yep, it sucks to be an alcoholic in the early days of sobriety and recovery and I'm pissed about it this Friday night.

On the way home I realize just how delusional my AV is. I know how my night would end up if I gave in. We all know how it would end up, don't we? With me drinking half a box of wine until I pass out on the couch completely ignoring my children, fiancé and that fire all night long. Then I'd stumble to bed and make a drunken half-hearted attempt to seduce my fiancé only to pass out in the middle of what I think is intimacy. Not tonight. Tonight I'm rewriting my history. Tonight I will attempt true intimacy by interacting with my family as a sober person. Tonight I will make day 4 just as successful as the previous 3.


Thanks to all of you here tonight & every night. Good luck and sober thoughts go out to all of us embarking on not only a weekend but a hectic holiday week.

Blessings.

anyistoomuch

Great post life! Weekends and holidays will give our AVs a ripe time to poke and bully. I'm not going to drink. Hope your week is great and sober.

Bird800

Hi Life. It was really helpful to read this. So many times I've entertained the illusion in my head of how a night with "a glass" of wine should go, and when thinking that way, it's so easy to gloss over the reality of how miserably such a scenario would play out in real life. I'll try to remember this post the next time I have a similar tempting moment at the store. Congratulations on day 4!

Anna

Enjoy your weekend!

Charliee

Great post! I have felt exactly this same way tonight, thanks for the motivation to stay on this track

malcolmsloan

I relate to this post very much. I too enter the market in the evenings with the best intentions and notice the hootch in everyone's carts. I'm right behind you: day 3 for me. Thanks for expressing what I'm sure many of us feel. You are not alone.

Leana

Everyone in Pennsylvania moans about our state controlled alcohol system but I am thrilled we can't have it in our stores to tempt me.

ZeldaFan

That was a fantastic post! You are doing a great job keeping your AV at bay so early in recovery and on a night where it is probably louder than ever. Save this post for yourself and look back on it the next time you feel tested. Sometimes the best motivator in sobriety is ourselves! Congratulations on four days sober and enjoy that fire and your time with your fiance. It's well deserved!

Hevyn

I felt exactly the same way early on. Sorry for myself that I couldn't just have 'a few' to celebrate or take a little vacation from the stress in my life. Of course in the end it was never 'a few'. It was the whole bottle, and then another. A horrible hangover and 'hair of the dog' the next day. It's what led me to nearly 24/7 drinking.

A bit of envy crosses my mind, especially this time of year - when I see people having their civilized couple of drinks. I never knew when to stop - it was never enough. I have to always remember I can't be trusted.

Loved the way you expressed your feelings. Glad for you that it's Day 4 and you are doing this thing!

Dano1975

It's impressive that you seem to "get it" so early in your recovery, keep going, it does get easier.

Brian316

Thank you for your post Life. One thing that I personally have noticed in my experiences at the grocery store (and it may be different around the holidays) is how many people DONT have alcohol in their check out carts. Sometimes I feel sorry for the ones that do because my mind wanders into thinking if they are a normal drinker, or a suffering alcoholic as I once was. Just my experience but sometimes (especially at night) if it's a guy by himself and he's not getting booze I think damn most people are normal and I was the one whose thinking is/was screwed up!

Lifeisforliving

It helps that I've been in recovery before, Dano. My ex-husband was a sex addict so I've worked recovery from the co-dependent family member side of things. Lucky me I get to now work it from the addict side, huh?

Lifeisforliving

Thank you, Zelda. I actually thought the same thing. I'm going to put this one in a special place as I know I'll need it again.

Lifeisforliving

Thank you, Bird. Why do my images before I start drinking involve me sitting on a street corner in Paris drinking wine & eating cheese? Somehow they're never me blacking out and waking up with the hangover from hell. I've got to keep the reality of my drinking in the forefront of my mind. This helps me remember.

Lifeisforliving

We can do this, Malcom!! Congrats on day 3!!

Lifeisforliving

I like your perspective much better, Brian.

Lifeisforliving

Thanks so much, Hevyn. For whatever reason you are one of those posters where I can find something in each of your posts that resonates with me. Glad to be here with you.

soberclover

Great post to remind how easy it is during the holiday season to gloss over the fact that we are not like normal people and cannot have that "one glass of wine". I feel like I have finally found another level of understanding to this. I am not/was not/will never be a "one glass" gal. I'm an alcoholic. Even during the holiday! Thank you for the reminder!

chaili05

So true. And even when I think it'd be nice to be like those people to sit at dinner and have one glass of wine... that really doesn't sound fun to me. What is ONE glass going to do? Empty calories. Lol.

bigsombrero

Great post! And well done! This is exactly the way you need to think - it sounds like you have some really good tools that will serve you well in recovery. I am 1.5 years in, and I just had a post the other day about this - I had seen the holiday lights in a bar and it looked so cozy....but, just like you, I knew how it would end up. Don't we all? You said it very well. Thanks so much! Stay true to this recovery, you owe it to yourself....don't we all?