3:37 pm
It’s been a while since I’ve posted, but with draft posts titled “Feeling like crap,” “Pangs heard around the world,” and “Where am I?,” I figured I would let whatever this is pass, continue to solider on, and spare you my annoying diatribe(s).
I’m still sober, going on a day after 18 weeks today. But, the other day when I looked at the calendar and it read February 12th, I thought, Wait, I’m ONLY at 4 months? So, how can I also be at 18 weeks, which would be 4 months…PLUS 2 weeks. Um, hello? That PLUS 2 weeks is kind of huge. Le sigh.
I’ve really wanted to drink the past several weeks, but I haven’t. I feel quite practiced at saying no through most of my pangs, cravings, and “thought ditches”…until PMS rears its ugly head. The past week has been bad–sometimes I wonder if it isn’t something in my new environment that is messing up my hormones. I literally felt hung over the other morning, as if I was coming down WAY TOO FAST off a “good” drug–crashing. However, it wasn’t a drug, it was my own internal chemical fluctuations which were off schedule and which, instead of letting me down easy, came to a screeching halt a week early. Hmm. I know it sounds a bit melodramatic, but when I was drinking, I really hit the wine hard when I was PMSing; and, I know it’s difficult to believe, more often than not I never connected the two until after the fact. Duh. Every month it became, Oh, shit, no WONDER I felt so horrible, drank so much, and could SO not even deal with the booze (I always blacked out hard when I was PMSing). Now, I’m hyper-aware of the fluctuations because I can feel every single one of them.
It’s not that life has been bad, at all; I’m grateful that work and dinners and walks, days and nights and everything, well, has been passing smoothly. Sure, there are moments (nightly, lately) when I find myself saying to myself, Do I really need to stay sober, like Sober Sober, anymore? Aren’t I healed? Hasn’t this 24-7 sobriety shit gone on long enough?! I need a BREAK! Just one glass…
I had major pangs last night, which sort of took me off guard. I felt a little bit like crying inside when I looked at the menu and realized that once again–even at a nice restaurant on a nice Valentine’s Day date with my nice manz–I can’t have wine. Not even one glass. And to make it worse? I end up ordering yet another Diet Coke, which I have to say, did not go so well with the pasta. The good news is that I did muster the sense to realize that I wouldn’t really enjoy the wine because I’d be thinking of the next glass, and the next, and the next. It’d be more of an annoyance than…whatever I’m imagining it’s going to be.
What’s the point? The point is, I’ve learned that even IF I want to drink, NO GOOD CAN COME if I do it when I really want to. Because, when I really want to is always when I’m feeling really bad. My strategy is to wait: until tomorrow, until the next project, until the race, until this or that or the other. And, if I wait–even a night–most likely I’m going to feel both happier and less desperate the next day, at which point, even if I drank it’d much likely be a better outcome than if I drank when I was in that desperate state of mind.
Anyway, it’s Friday! And I haven’t even started my work. Wah wah. Catch y’all later!
Drunky Drunk Girl 
right there with you. my day is 10/1/2013. i had to play the tape all the way through the other day, too… and i realized that i know if i drink then it wouldn’t just be one night. it would eventually be back to every night which was such a horrible way to live. so here we are. and life is good, right? yes it is. and i am grateful too. and i am grateful i have sobriety back. i never thought i would make it back. yay us!
Yay us, indeed!!! So far, I’ve been super-duper glad every time I resist. The next day I can see just how much MORE I have, how much fuller and well, better, my life is by simply not drinking alcohol. So, to give all that up for a quick fix, a quick buzz that will come and go–I’m always grateful to get through the pangs.
Congrats to you! Let’s stay strong. We can do this! 🙂
I don’t know what it is but something happens between about 12 and 20 weeks (roughly) that’s makes relapse an option. Both times I relapsed was during this period. That beast of mine would start whispering in my ear, “we’ll you’ve made it this long with no problem…you’re FINE! Just put some rules in place and you’ll be able to MODERATE.” Or my personal favorite, “See…you’re not REALLY a full blown alcoholic. You didn’t need to go to rehab after all. You just lost your way for awhile. You’ll be FINE. Just remember your rules and you be FINE!”
For me, it was the biggest load of big fucking batshit I’ve ever told myself. And so I relapsed. And then I relapsed again. And then, blessedly. Some one told me about this danger zone so that the next time that bitch started whispering, I told her to shut up and I dug in my heels.
And I stayed sober.
I’m not saying this is what’s happening to you, only you can decide that. I’m just offering it up as my experience like someone did for me.
You’re doing AMAZING! You can do this.
Sherry
Hi, Sherry,
Wow. Thank you so much for sharing your insight. YES, it’s true: I was rolling along well and good until 90 days, and since then (that was about 13 weeks) I’ve had such pangs! “Oh, you’re healed you can drink; Oh, come ON, maybe once or twice, it’s not going to kill ya.” And, it’s true, it won’t affect me THAT night, per se, but I just have this feeling that…I shouldn’t. And, while it’s been a real bitch the past weeks 13-19, I haven’t caved into my desire to drink because something deep down says, NO.
So, GLAD to hear it gets easier and that I’m not crazy for feeling like I just quit drinking a few weeks ago. 🙂