June | 2012 | Drunky Drunk Girl

Archive | June, 2012

It’s gonna be a bright, sunshine-y day!

Well, sort of. I mean, it *is* sunny, and warm, and well, I’m not hung over anymore, but… 😉

Usually I feel extremely elated to not be hung over, but today I simply feel at ease. No pounding “full body gross” to impede happiness, thought, ambition. Drinking does, in fact, prevent you from doing what you should, what you want, but what you’re too afraid to do. After looking at my meager freelance portfolio and realizing that I “should have done so much more by now,” I cringe. And the more days you move forward into detox, the harder you cringe because the clearer you see the fruits of your labor — or in my case, oftentimes, the non-fruits of my avoidance — rotting on the vines.

Oh, well. Luckily for me, I’ve faced this countless times and so am not frozen by despair over my “lost years,” so to speak. And, perhaps all this happened for a reason? Perhaps all my drinking, thinking, avoidance, and then fastidious journaling about the drinking, thinking, and avoidance *will* put me ahead? Has already proven to be worthwhile? Was unavoidable anyway, was my path…and now, well, at least I’m still here, somehow making the best of it and learning from the situation?

The burning question in my mind at the moment, however, is, Can two liters of Coke Zero a day really be better for me than a bottle or two (or three) of red wine? Really?

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, detox, drinking, wine, women

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Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Detox, Sobriety

Tick tock, tick tock, what’s in the fridge tonight?

14 Jun

Nothing. There is absolutely no booze in the place that I can drink. (The girl I’m subleasing my place from has a few bottles, but I’ve already downed four of hers, which totals *at least* 50 bucks, so I’m considering the remaining stash off limits). Really, though, it’s OK. I don’t have the energy to drink. In fact, I almost feel…*too depressed* to drink. Huh?, say you. Like, even I’m not sure how that’s possible.

For me, drinking after a day of work *or* play, especially if I feel tired, sad, or excited, even, has felt for the past several years almost…a necessary end, or piece, or part of a “complete” day. It’s habitual, ritual, my way of making a concerted effort to “make the best” of the day. If I skip the wine, then somehow, I’ve given up on making things better when I feel sad and anxious *or* celebrating when I feel happy or glad for my day’s accomplishments. It’s all so fucked up that even I wonder which end is up most of the time.

Tonight, I’m depressed. I feel spun, I feel unwound. Drinking would definitely fix one or the other or both.

Tonight, I’m thinking again about my own mortality. Isn’t it better to contemplate your death, in stark reality (not just something that might happen, but the honest-to-goodness cessation of your heart, your lungs, your brain), *now* rather than 35 years from now? And, by God, in 20 or so years I’ll be 60 years old!? How could I *not* feel anxious, or at least mentally vexed, by this…concept that will, day by day and year by year, become an absolute reality? How could I *not* feel sad, truly mournful, of my friends’ certain passing, of my parents’, my brothers’, my own? How little time we have, and what happens after? What happens not only after we die but to the living, the remaining, who have become so attached that it’s literally unbearable to live without these people?

See. This is fucking why I drink. And, I’m not sure if it’ll get better, as in, I’ll gravitate more toward positive thoughts than negative the further on I get in sobriety, but I sure to fuck hope so. Right now, all I want to do is take a deep breath, sigh, and go to sleep for a long time. Which makes me feel even more depressed.

Sit, I must. Wait, I shall. What else is there to do?

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, anxiety, depression, drinking, panic, wine, women

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Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Anxiety, Binge drinking, Cravings, Depression, Detox, Sobriety

Drunky drunk girl says, I’m still drunk!

14 Jun

This isn’t a blog about drinking. I’m not going to list my top ten rock bottoms for you — crashed a car, went to jail, lost my job — in fact, I’ve done all of those already. This is a blog about a *drinking life* and ultimately, the struggle to let go of that former life in being both a city dweller and woman. So, a drinking life, then: drinking and not drinking, getting shitfaced and drinking the promised “two glasses,” blacking out and feeling remorse beyond what even your closest friends/mother can empathize with. It’s about staying sober *and* staying drunk.

Right now, I’m trying to quit. For what seems like the millionth time, and which may very well be. What I hope is that this blog will help both drinkers and their concerned friends alike feel less lonely and less alone in the process. Because right now — well, for years, actually — I feel pretty much on my own. Straight-up *alone*. Dead-solo on this journey that feels like a desert trudge with a long lost beginning and no end in sight.

—

I woke up today hung over. And it’s going on oh, about 48 hours or so since I had my “last” drink and I still feel like ass. My belly is swollen and my liver hurts, which, this morning makes it hard to fit into my interview clothes. My pants are too tight and my underwire bra is pressed so tightly against my aching liver that it makes me cry. So now I am crying and I’ve got less than 10 minutes to pull it together and all I can think is, Fuck, I wish to Jesus on the Cross that I hadn’t poured out the last third of that “last” bottle of red that I had stored in the fridge two nights ago when I binge drank.

I also woke up feeling depressed. Uninterested. No glee, no glitter, no sparkle. Just grey. This, however, is not unusual. The first few days of sobriety go like this (at least for me): six hours after waking up from my two-bottles-of-red-induced blackout, I’m still drunk…and will continue to be for the next at least six to 12 hours. Yes, it normally takes me *12 fucking hours* after my last sip to process the alcohol to the point where I don’t feel drunk. During this time, I endure a plethora of awesome wine hangover goodness, which I affectionately call “full body gross.” Lately, and this has made me take pause, I’ve felt rather…anesthetized, I guess is the right word. I can’t think, can’t do math, can’t really make plans or remember things clearly. I also sometimes feel depressed to the point of contemplating suicide (it really does seem OK to think that there is nothing to live for and no reason to be alive when I’m having these dark thoughts) and anxious to the point of having a panic attack. If I’ve said or done something horrible, I’ll feel utterly remorseful for the next, oh, at least 12 to 24 hours, before my mind allows itself to ease up and move on. Cuz, really, a functioning alcoholic *has* to move on, otherwise she’d be able to say, God damn it, I’ve had enough, when the urge to binge drink strikes again. And it will. It always does.

But, on day two, it’s easy not to drink because you’re still hung. Easy to pass by the hundred bars on every street and think, Nah, I’m *so* over it. However, I do feel anxious as a result, I guess, of coming off the booze, and instead of letting my mind discover what *likely won’t happen* if I just take a deep breath and wade through, I just want to shut the whole thing down with a drink.

But I’m getting sober, so I won’t, right? I’ve had enough, haven’t I? I’m sick of my weakness, sick of others’ judgments and quite frankly, sick of failing in their and my own eyes. I’z gonna prove all y’all wrong, I think to myself as I go back and forth, amidst the puffs of unwelcome anxiety sneaking up from my stomach to my heart, wondering if I can’t just have *one little glass* to make it go away.