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Cutting back on…sugar, and old habits

10:55 am

The past two days, I’ve tried to ix-nay sugar completely from my diet. Um, YEAH. Gotcha.

I’ve realized that cutting out sugar entirely, immediately–instead of weaning myself off–will lead to sugar withdrawal, which I guess I had a bit of yesterday: I was sad and lethargic, and felt like my brain was hovering around “off” for most of the day. Sigh. No more extremes. (And, with sugar, I don’t think it’s prudent to be so black-and-white about it.) So, I think I’m going to start by cutting BACK on Diet Coke–maybe one a day, if I need it, or two if I’m indulging. I’ve been drinking at least a liter a day regularly for about nine months?, several cans a day since I quit drinking, and at least a 20-ounce of regular Coke every day since about 2007. I’m sure I drank soda before then, but it was mainly coffee (in the day) and wine (at night).

I noticed I drink Diet Coke like I drink wine, fast and furious. However, there’s something more dangerous about drinking liquid sugar; you can drink and drink and drink, until you get sick, but you won’t black out or pass out. Which means, you can keep drinking more. PERFECT.

It was interesting to watch my mood swings yesterday, and me push through them. It was like I was on autopilot, and my sober mind had taken over. I DID have a craving to drink–a pretty big one. I haven’t really seriously thought of drinking for a while, and this was minor, but big enough to have to turn on the virtual “this is the shit that will go down if you drink tonight” movie in my mind. I counted the number of weeks I have left to get to 22, which was close to my last sober record of 158 days. But then, I took a magnifying glass to what, exactly, I wanted, and HOW, exactly, I was planning to effect that change. The “how” part was new: I’ve gotten myself to reflexively look at what is tripping my drinking switch, but never how to turn it off.

I could very clearly see that my sadness wasn’t necessarily brought on by a sugar low, though that was part of it. I was, and am, lonely. I don’t have many (any?) friends here. I don’t go out. EVER. I could admit to myself last night, on my run, that no, I still haven’t accepted let alone embraced socializing sober. It’s not as strong as it used to be, but I’m still convinced that “there is no point” to going out and not drinkin’. (By go out, I mean to bars and clubs.)

Then I thought, well, you have two neighbors who are free tonight, why not ask them to do something with you? Granted, I had planned to work yesterday, which means that Saturday night or no Saturday night, I am trolling the journals and (for a new project) slogging through complicated stories on the latest in cancer research and treatment–that’s just how I do. However, I didn’t ask, or invite. I think I might have felt better if I had forced myself to socialize instead of doing the usual, which is running alone on the beach and/or working on a Saturday night.

At one point in the run, I simply concluded that I am still living, in a way, like my “old drunk self,” simply without the booze. By that I mean, I still isolate (prefer to be alone), I just don’t do it with wine. It takes a LONG time to change our ingrained habits and defense mechanisms, doesn’t it?

It’s not easy for me to socialize, mainly because I FEEL like I don’t want to, but also because it’s just not in my nature (habit) to engage instead of isolate. “Make yourself available,” is what one of my old roommates used to tell me. That was over a decade ago. I was isolating then, I am isolating now. I guess maybe drinking gave me a way to isolate and not feel bad (or anything!) about it.

Sure, it’s nice to be alone sometimes, have a weekend by myself. What I do, though, hasn’t changed since I hung up my drinking shoes: NOT inviting people over, out, or IN to my life. I wanted to drink to avoid this realization, but that was pointless; there it was. I ran more. I wanted to drink to not feel slightly angry at myself, defeated, and sad. Within about a minute, or less, I had worked out that no, drinking would not fix any of this, and no, actually, I didn’t want a drink. What I wanted–needed–was real change. To feel better. And, how can I feel better? Change my habit of isolating.

The point is, the craving came and went, but I was able to see through it. What was making me want to drink, and what I could do–besides drink–to fix the problem. I was looking for solutions to the real problem, and not just a way to dodge the craving for wine. Wolfie has no clothes, as it were. I can see right through to your scrawny, starved frame, your salivating, dried-up tongue…FUCKING FUCK YOU, WOLFIE!

I am on Day…? 132. 19 weeks tomorrow. I suppose 22 weeks plus 4 days will be my immediate goal, but I’m truly curious to see what comes after six months. Will there be glitter? Balls of it? Will there be unicorns with sparkly teeth, smiling at me from a chorus line on the beach? Or, will it be more like a Broadway musical? Maybe a Broadway musical with glitter and a unicorn parade?

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, binge drinking, cravings, Diet Coke, drinking, habits, isolating, old habits, psychology, recovery, running, sober, sobriety, social anxiety, socializing sober, sugar, sugar addiction, sugar craving, sugar withdrawal, wine, women

Comments 12 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Change, Cravings, Habits, Psychology, Recovery, Running, Sobriety, Social Anxiety, Socializing, Sugar addiction

Getting through, over, or past it…sober

17 Jul

3:06 pm

Just checking in. So tired. Sad, happy, confused, relieved. I’ve been entertaining an old classmate/friend/drinking buddy for the past five days–and I’m so. Very. Tired. And sad. I don’t know, maybe just drained.

This was a hurdle, and I guess I did good. I think I’ve hit a new place in my sobriety where the cravings are secondary (practically nonexistent) compared to my desire to move through things sober in order to learn what I know I need to learn.

Like, how to make small talk with someone whom I just can’t reach…the way I want to/the way that makes me feel safe and good and good about myself. Yeesh. I felt like the entire weekend was trying to make contact through bubble film between our two ENTIRELY SEPARATE UNIVERSES. Sometimes I wonder if I’m unique, if this is my own personal dragon to slay–always in my head and worrying what someone is thinking about me, whether they’re having a good time, whether they’re feeling a connection to me or feeling like I’m a cartoon character who projects my thoughts into clouds above my head.

I didn’t react to these feelings of discomfort and disconnection by wanting to drink, though. I know I can’t, I know I shouldn’t, and that’s that. It’s that easy now. Plus, she’s seen me at my worst, and neither of us want to go there again (she didn’t drink the whole time either, so that made it even easier). However, getting me through it was this newfound sense of knowing that it’s these moments, and events, and people that I NEED to “do” and “get through” sober. I can’t drink to avoid the reality that, connecting with other people is hard. It’s a big deal-thing for me, it’s something I’m constantly worrying about: is it me who can’t seem to feel anything but trepidation and lack of familiarity around people I don’t know? I mean, it’s a visceral relief–and always has been–when I can finally be alone again. Do others feel this way? Sigh. I drank a lot over this, and now I can’t. So, I do my best and hopefully, is it good enough.

This was hard to learn about myself, though. Re-learn, I should say. I mean, I really SAW it this weekend with my friend in town. I never would have had to face it and accept it if I had allowed myself the option of going around it by getting drunk.

My friend and I were drinking buddies in graduate school, and we never hung out much outside the bar. I’ve changed a lot, and I don’t want to say that she hasn’t; but what I noticed was how much chaos she was holding onto (for protection?); chaos in the form of bad relationships, a job that doesn’t pay her what she’s worth, a disrespectful roommate, comparing herself constantly to others, passive aggressiveness.

Let’s face it, though: getting sober has not only made me see these things more clearly, but allowed me to see that I deserve better in a friend AND, that I can and will (uncomfortably and clumsily) stand up for myself. Anyway, the point is, I see these things in other, non-sober people, and am somewhat astounded that getting sober has offered me a way out. By no means am I free and pure and enlightened, but at the very least, I NOTICE the chaos and I make attempts at not living in it anymore.

I think it was Day 120 for me yesterday! The cravings have subsided, that’s for sure. I no longer really fantasize about that “glass” of wine because, well, it’s sort of getting pointless/boring to do so. Yes, at times I felt bored, agitated, and exhausted this weekend, but I knew in my gut that THIS was the only way, getting through it all sober. And, I have the feeling that sobriety is going to start resembling this more; the cravings seem small-fry compared to the “real work” that lies ahead. And, the rewards of this supposed “real work” are bound to be much more substantial–a true high–than resisting the cravings. I can feel it.

Onward…

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, binge drinking, connecting with other people, cravings, drinking, drinking buddies, friendship, making a connection, psychology, reaching other people, recovery, sober, sobriety, social anxiety, socializing sober, wine, women

Comments 14 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Change, Cravings, Drinking buddies, Friendship, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety, Social Anxiety, Socializing

Recovery is as competitive as Alcoholism; don’t play into it

12 Jul

1:33 pm

So much science news. So many scientists, and science journalists, all vying for that same small slice of the pie. It might even come a close second to “addiction and recovery”–all the blogs, the books, the memoirs, the “solutions.”

So much noise. Mind officially blown. No fucking wonder I drank.

Is it just me, or are we totally off track on WHAT causes addiction and WHY? It’s not always about acute trauma.

Competition. Ego-worship. Winning and me, me and winning. Just because you get sober and “win” a newfound grace, doesn’t mean you’re out of the matrix. It seems apparent to me when I see just how many people are still seeking to acquire things, places, trips, experiences, states of being–after they get sober. I mean, working the steps is a form of mastery, and isn’t that striving for mastery a form of ego enhancement? It’s like getting an A+ on your homework assignment; are you doing it for you, and more importantly, what does it allow you to acquire? The ego remains. In my HUMBLE (and irritated) opinion, unless we address this, which unfortunately seems to thread through every area and endeavor, whether “altruistic” or not and whether recovery-related or not–and stop feeding into it–true healing is never going to be possible.

I sense that recovery, for many people, is as competitive as anything else. And, I see a society ideal–ours–of competition, of winning, of having and acquiring more than others as being one large root of dis-ease. I’m barely able to, but when I extract my own self from this reality that I’ve been socialized to think is OK, well, it’s a bitter smack in the face.

I almost want (need) to withdraw from the noise, and all the shaming and blaming and theories; all the pathologizing of human nature–in order to maintain my sobriety. I get angry, and I get sad, and I get jealous. Why do we pathologize these things in “recovery?” More importantly, why do I get the sense that there are so many people looking to acquire the opposite of these things?

Example: Facebook. To me, Facebook seems to feed off our worst–but innate–human traits: the tendency to compare, the tendency to want to have what others have in order to acquire a sense of completeness, or to feel good about ourselves. To feel SAFE. The fact that membership on the ‘Book is so prevalent illustrates how pervasive these tendencies actually are.

Another example: To hustle to publish a piece before (or instead of) someone else? To me, that’s also about fear: if you get the story, you get to subdue that fear of “losing,” and you get to build your ego. What if there was no byline, would you still write the piece?

Gah. I’m either going to have to accept that I’m just not that competitive, or, learn how to deal with my competitive nature better. Get off Facebook. Restrict the “recovery” work. Focus on what interests me in the science news, but don’t invest more than a disposable amount of self-validation from this work. At the end of the day, I am happiest–most sure of my growing sense of peace in the cosmos (the order of things, my own life and death, literally)–when I am not thinking about either my defects or my strengths. Neither matter. What matters is that I am here, for however long, and there is nothing to gain, no one to beat, no ego or defect to ponder, no right recovery to make.

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, binge drinking, competition, drinking, ego, psychology, recovery, science journalism, science news, sober, sobriety, wine, winning, women, work

Comments 17 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety, Society, Work

Everything scares me…a little bit

10 Jul

12:57 pm

Well, we all know that I spend a good part of my day inside my head. Does that mean I, myself, am oblivious to this? No! Does that mean that I don’t believe it serves my recovery? Hell’s no! Which is why, I beg of you, to bear with me on this post; I promise, there IS a point.

Everything scares me…a little bit.

Just what I said. I have a friend coming to town this weekend, and instead of being excited (which I am), I’m nervous. She and I have never really hung out, sans booze, in any kind of “domestic” capacity. We never went over to each other’s apartments, we went to the bar! In fact, our entire friendship was based on nights out, mutual commiserating. It scares me a little bit to socialize, in general, but it also scares me to anticipate what I’m dreading might be a lot of awkward moments, pregnant pauses, and maybe even some insistence on “what the fuck happened, your life is WAY different now, WAY better!” Maybe I’m scared of holding my own in the face of my successful recovery–I’m so used to being down, I guess, that it’ll be weird to “show off” my new life. (Maybe success makes me feel uncomfortable?)

I’ve got some decisions to make soon, one of which involves biting the bullet and likely getting back into the full-time workforce, maybe going to school part-time on the side. Which will involve a LOT of people, and places, and things I’ve been avoiding as triggers since I got sober last summer.

Deep breath. I’m sure I’ll rally, and take this as it comes. One of the things that getting sober has allowed me to see about myself is that, I want to drink when I’m confronted with something that scares me. And, quite frankly, everything scares me…a little bit.

I don’t know if it’s FEAR per se; it’s more like doubt (uncertainty): Can I do this sober? Will the stress be too much?

I have to re-learn how to learn new things, I think.

Sobriety is not just about avoiding the “people, places, and things” that made you want to drink; it’s about crafting a new life, and one that includes new people, places, and things–that don’t make you want to drink. And what, pray tell, ARE these things that don’t make me want to drink? Discovering what those are is, in a nutshell, LIFE.

I mean, I used to be (am?) a science reporter, and I think aspects of that career drove me to drink. Yet, I am used to the sense of accomplishment I got from this career, and I am used to knowing how to apply this to my framework of the world. I know, though, that if I am truly committed to a “new” way of life, I have to confront the possibility that this career might be more harmful, painful, and addictive than anything else (it involves a lot of competition, a lot of ego, a lot of outside validation).

On the other hand, do I have it in me to switch careers? Do I really want to? How accurate are my projections of having the money, the time, and the focus, at 39 years old, to earn another degree? I don’t know myself that well right now, is what I’m saying. I know how “old me” would have tripped through these decisions, what framework of the universe I was working with. Now, I’m not sure what I hold most dear, what my universal laws of personal physics are! It’s like, I am learning not just new ways of coping, but new ways of learning how to cope.

Journalism is exhausting, but it’s the ultimate high. Can–and should–I relinquish this for something “less” rewarding? I could, for instance, teach, or do grant writing, or write fiction (yes!). A part of my mind–that part that is the source of some of my avoidance/addictive behavior-cries out, Nooooo, DDG! You can only do this one thing, because this one thing is what you’ve always done!

Ugh. “Alcoholism” is SUCH a mental game; I’m beginning to realize it has nothing to do with wine and everything to do with long-held “life philosophies.” Trying something new is often what caused me to drink–not because I don’t like it or I’m afraid of it, but because I believe that I’m wasting time NOT doing what I “should” be doing, what became “too hard,” what I KNOW I can win at, if “just keep trying.” Life philosophies like this are hard to even articulate let alone begin the process of overhauling.

A simpler–and more positive–way to approach this is: My work might not be healthy for me; a relationship might not be healthy for me–do I have the courage to try (to learn) something new, something different?

I had a friend whose literal life refrain was, It’s a process. And, if I can keep that in mind over the next few weeks and months, I’ll consider myself “successful.”

On a final note, you know what’s crazy? I’ve been so busy thinking about other stuff that I haven’t even checked my day count in at least a week! September 9th will be 25 weeks, so that makes today…114 days! Woot! Rock on, me, and fuck you, wolfie!

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, and things, binge drinking, career, career choices, choices, coping mechanism, coping skills, cravings, decisions, drinking, fear, inside my head, learning how to not drink, people, places, psychology, recovery, sober, sobriety, social anxiety, socializing, socializing sober, wine, women, work

Comments 4 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Change, Choices, Coping mechanisms, Goals, Life, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety, Social Anxiety, Socializing, Work

Now I chase the reprieve, not the buzz

8 Jul

11:56 am

There was a very brief period–an interlude–either around the time I quit or right before or after, where I didn’t want to drink. I mean, Didn’t Want To Drink. I mean, no idea what drinking was. It was like, I had never drunk, so I didn’t even know that there was something to turn to! It lasted for five hours, to be exact, and it was the most enlightening experience I’ve had to date with regard to cravings–they are not invariably hardwired forever into our brain circuitry.

It was like I had been transported back to my childhood, when there was nothing to do and nothing to try to do. There was nothing to think about, mull over, ruminate on; nothing to escape from, nowhere to go anyway. Life just was, and you just lived it. And it was Good. Good in the way that you don’t know it’s good: the world is round, spinning on its axis, inside the meteor belt, millions upon millions of planets and solar systems and galaxies and clusters of galaxies doing their thing. I could look up at the Milky Way (my dad was a sailor, a merchant marine to be exact, and he relished pointing out the stars) and go, Wow, and Ooh, and Aah, and these were my only thoughts. No, What am I supposed to be doing with myself? No, Arg, I don’t know, and I’m such a loser because I don’t know! No wanting to escape, to be relieved of the responsibility. For what? To be alive? To figure out the meaning of life?

I think when we stop drinking, a lot of us turn to AA. This isn’t a bad thing, but it forces us to focus on our “problem” and our “issues.” To step up and embrace our “responsibilities.” Aside from the fact that I believe in rehabilitating my relationship to (with?) wine, I’ve come to see this as one of the main reasons I stopped going to meetings. We drank, a lot of us, because we had too many responsibilities. We drank, a lot of us, because our egos had already been crushed–by ourselves!

I’ve spent so much of my time trying to “save the world” (in my head, at last)–overachieving, reaching and grasping for what can only be called validation from the outside. And, when our society (Western?) is built upon this ideal, who hasn’t been there? We are socialized to believe that we have to work hard, have kids and sacrifice, play even harder; compete, judge, and compare; self-improve; and yes, even figure out the meaning of life. Um…OK.

I grew up an introvert. I grew up the twin of an extrovert. I have always been artistic, and therefore, likely pre-wired to be self-centered, ambitious, and controlling. I have had to work not on feeling empathetic, but expressing empathy, mainly because I am shy. I have had big problems in my life with being ashamed, secretive, and self-loathing. Depression followed, but that has, I know now, alternated between being influenced by my innate character to being influenced by my choices and my reaction to those choices.

Without going into too much detail, I drank because I could not express myself, would not allow myself to express myself; I drank because it assuaged my depression; I drank because it stifled my existential panic; I drank to procrastinate being creative, which is an expression of fear (of failure, of success, who knows?). I drank because I felt excluded by my introversion, by my smarts, by my androgyny. I drank I drank I drank.

The point is, didn’t we all? Is a loathing of self inseparable from being human? Don’t we all chase a buzz–the buzz of getting what we want, of “fixing” our desire? Mine happened to be a desire to be more comfortable in my own skin. We are shy, or embarrassed–why? I have no idea where my discomfort comes from; my brother never had it. If he did, it was minimal. Maybe it’s an irrational hatred, archetypal? I don’t know.

What I guess I’m trying to say is, instead of chasing a fleeting “buzz” called my “fix” on wine, now I’m striving–chasing sounds lame–for that reprieve, that interlude of light, of fancy, of play. I REMEMBER that it exists. I remember not wanting wine, and I remember not associating wine with reward, or pleasure, or escape, or reprieve. In fact, if there is anything that I would put outside the realm of ordinary, it would be this experience. It was, I have to say, like God rained some fairy dust down on me and allowed me to see it–to remind me that once upon a time, wine wasn’t a part of my world. And, I did just fine. Can I do just fine again? Yes. YES.

Tags: AA, alcoholic, Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism, binge drinking, Buddhism, Buddhist approach to recovery, childhood, coping mechanism, coping skills, cravings, depression, drinking, ego, existential crisis, introvert, introverted, lack of craving, meaning of life, psychology, recovery, reprieve, responsibilities, self-loathing, sense of purpose, sober, sobriety, why I drink, wine, women

Comments 9 Comments
Categories AA, Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Coping mechanisms, Cravings, Depression, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety

Anger, Buddhism, and the 12 steps, oh my!

6 Jul

1:11 pm

As I posted yesterday, The Fix published a piece I wrote about blogging myself sober. Obviously, it’s not the ONLY thing I’ve done to “get and stay sober,” but that’s beside the point. I think connecting with others who share your problem, and who can help you DEFINE its gray areas, is the key. So, thanks to all of you out there who continue to help me stay the course.

There were some negative comments posted in response to the piece, which I found, for the most part, to be instructive (thankfully!).

Why are some people so angry about a seemingly-successful recovery that either does not involve meetings or the 12 steps, or does not involve “as much work as someone else” or “the way that they did the work?”

What can I glean from the 12 steps, and why do I keep coming back to them, feeling like I’ve got some unfinished business? Maybe I AM a dry drunk?

If it wasn’t the personalities in AA, or the sharing, or the group therapy aspect that bothered me all that much, it must have been the steps, right? What am I afraid of? What about the steps hangs me up?

It’s those words: powerlessness, God, higher power. To me, the 12 steps are not rocket science; in fact, in order to get sober, EVERYONE has to do some version of these “steps,” I’ve come to believe. You might not KNOW you’re doing the steps, but you are. We admit we can’t drink anymore; we accept this fact. We feel remorse and say we’re sorry. We work on our relationships, we question our sense of purpose–why are we using booze to avoid or hide from what we know, deep down, we should and could be doing? I used wine for YEARS to avoid writing; yet, it’s the one thing I knew that if I just fucking DID it, I’d be free. Free of both the urge to drink away my fear and sensitivities surrounding “putting it out there” and possibly failing, and free from the self-loathing brought on by not doing it!

I wondered, how do atheists approach the steps? Do Muslims go to AA? What do people who come from non-Judeo-Christian backgrounds and worldviews think of AA? I mean, people all over the world have drinking problems–how do they approach the steps if they don’t, actually, believe in “God,” per se? What–or who–IS God? A quick Google search made me realize that the concept of God is extremely broad, and can range from an overlord or all-knowing being to, well, “being” or “existence” itself. Huh. As a scientist, I am not a theist, but neither am I convinced that “being” or “existence” does not hold a higher order. The whole is, most of the time in the biological sciences anyway, greater than the sum of its parts. Systems biology takes advantage of the FACT that studying systems of genes, or proteins, or cells can lead to surprising insights into how things actually work when we’re not reducing them to their parts.

At the beach yesterday, I felt the need (and this is usually accompanied by a lot of gesturing and loud talking to myself, so my apologies to the boyfriend–LOL) to tease out my “official” definition of these words. And, here’s what I came up with:

Powerlessness: To me, this is simply my desire (key word) to drink more than just one. I can never drink one. Why? Because I don’t WANT to. And this, I think, is where the neurochemistry of addiction comes in: my brain is wired–at the moment, at least, because I’ve abused wine for so long–to want more than one. It’s an urge that is VERY strong. And, already after one, my “rational brain” is starting to become overpowered by my “irrational brain.”

This is actually the opposite of the general idea that most people, including myself, have of powerlessness. I have a choice, yes I do; and that choice is to drink a second. Whether or not that choice is a good choice, well, morals aside, the powerlessness lies in my reward system being fucked up.

God: Well, since I do not believe in a deity or any sort of omniscient creator being, I would say that “God” is the order of the universe, being, life itself.

Higher power: I’ve always thought that this is simply my higher self, a literal higher consciousness. In fact, I now believe that when we “bottom out,” or hit our lows, we’re actually becoming our most self-aware. Our wake-up calls are just that: we snap out of it, we awaken, we’re fully conscious of just how bad it is. We’re at the top of our game then, not the bottom. This higher consciousness is our most aware selves–the self that knows better, wants the best for us, sees our potential, follows that “order” of the universe, or at least, of being human, which is to protect our bodies and minds from harm, to sleep when it’s dark, to wake when it’s light.

Defects of character: This was a hard one, but I figured it out on the ride home, with the help of my boyfriend. My biggest problem in this whole nightmare has been learning how to forgive myself. I realized that IF, in fact, I viewed my higher power as myself–the best version of myself, the mindful, awakened version–then, couldn’t asking myself for forgiveness be the same thing as asking “God” to remove my “defects of character?” YES, it really could.

In my research last in night, I came across Kevin Griffin, who founded the Buddhist Recovery Network, who has written some excellent pieces for HuffPo on the Buddhist approach to recovery, and whose work I can’t wait to read more of. It sort of helped to confirm some of my new ideas, which, apparently, I’m not the first person to have. 😉

I guess maybe a step meeting could’ve helped me wade through the murky semantics of the steps, or a Google search earlier in my recovery, but so it goes. If I look at the steps with my new definitions in mind, they might read as such:

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol—that our lives had become unmanageable.
(I am powerless to not want that second drink…and then, it’s all downhill because my rational brain turns off the warning and my irrational brain turns on the “It’ll be different this time, it won’t hurt you, you can drink as much as you want, forget about last time, there is no last time…”)

2. Came to believe that a power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
(That power is myself–my aware, awakened, mindful self; the one who’s looking at me when I’m jogging in the hot sun thinking, Good job, and, You deserve to be awesome.)

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
(Wonderfully explained by Kevin here.)

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
(Among a lot of other things, this would include shit I did that I still haven’t forgiven myself for…because I have offended others and hurt myself.)

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
(Admitting to ourselves, really, the things that we haven’t forgiven ourselves for having done. I have a few select people who know EVERYTHING, and I’m grateful that it’s been easy, in a way, to “unburden” myself to these friends.)

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
(Ready to forgive ourselves, to stop caring if others have or will forgive us, to really let it all go, and to start moving forward in our emotional lives. Self-actualizing?)

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
(Asked ourselves for forgiveness, and the power to let it go.)

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory, and when we were wrong, promptly admitted it.
(Being aware of our thoughts and feelings, of our actions and especially, REACTIONS, to these thoughts and feelings. To live in the world without taking anything personally.)

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
(Staying aware, practicing mindfulness.)

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
(This one, I’m not sure about. Maybe just helping others see their problem is not necessarily about moral flaws, it’s about fear of living and fear of self-discovery–and, the truth (your personal truth) will set you free…?)

What do you think?

Tags: 12 steps, AA, alcoholic, Alcoholics Anonymous, alcoholism, binge drinking, Blogging Myself Sober, Buddhism, Buddhist approach to recovery, Buddhist Recovery Network, drinking, God, higher power, HuffPo, Kevin Griffin, mindfulness, neuroscience, powerlessness, psychology, recovery, sense of purpose, sober, sober blogger, sober blogging, sobriety, The Fix, wine, women

Comments 10 Comments
Categories 12 Steps, AA, Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Definitions, God, Higher Power, Meditation, Mindfulness, Neuroscience, Psychology, Recovery, Resources, Sobriety

Binge drinker, or alcoholic?

2 Jul

6:46 pm

I’ve been reading a lot of posts lately that are asking that same pesky question: Am I really an alcoholic?

I’ve written about it here, and there. And, like a lot of things, my idea of what the answer to that question is has changed over the course of getting sober. One thing, however, has remained consistent in my mind: It doesn’t matter. If you were running around town with a bleeding abscess on your leg, would you spend your last hours trying to figure out what it is, or would you stop running around and bandage it up?

If I only binge drink, am I truly an alcoholic?, I used to ask myself. I know plenty of binge drinkers, and I’m sure you do, too. Not all binge drinkers are the same, though. I was a binge drinker who blacked out and did and said crazy-belligerent things. Did I ever drink more than two bottles of wine? No. I’d drink a full bottle, and was blacked out either before or no later than the end of the second. Might someone consider me a “binge drinker” but not a “full-blown alcoholic?” Probably.

I remember feeling like a fraud at AA, when I’d leave meetings after conversations with men who drank like, WAY MORE than I did (one guy said he could drink 40-something shots and still be standing). However, whether or not I binged, sipped, skipped days, never drank before or after this, that, and the other–I used wine. I drank it compulsively (with a powerful, distracting psychological “need”), and it turned me into a crazy bitch with hangovers from the veritable Pit of Satan.

It was only after I left the rooms, after I cleared out the noise–the steps, the labels, the comparisons–that I was able to see a glaring fact: I drank alcoholically. Maybe I was a binge drinker, or an alcoholic, no matter. I drank alcoholically. Maybe I’ve simply been a lightweight my whole life? Maybe not. It doesn’t really matter. The point is, I was drinking to blackout almost every night, and I needed to make a change.

That’s not to say that binge drinking isn’t a common thing. Most–or at least, many–people simply GET TO THE POINT QUICKER, as the comments in this story at Jezebel suggest. They realize that the tradeoff for getting buzzed simply gets to be too much, unbearable, and/or unmanageable. How is that different for any of “us?” We’re not that different from others, actually. We use booze to fix shit, just like them. We bounce around finding the best ways to not have hangovers, or to avoid debilitating ones after we turn 30. The difference seems to be, we don’t stop using booze even when the tradeoff gets to be too much.

I am a binge drinker and therefore, I binge drink. I am an alcoholic, and therefore… What? The closest I’ve come is: and, therefore, I DRINK ALCOHOLICALLY. Each and every one of us, however, has to define exactly what *drinking alcoholically* means. For me, it means that I drink to fix, to numb, to avoid. To excite, sure, but it’s become more of a psychological crutch than a way to get high. At some point, the fact that I was using wine instead of food, or whatever, stopped being as important as my growing need to start living better, stronger, freer.

Here’s the thing, though: at 100-some days, and, minus a few slips, over a year of sobriety; I no longer give a shit to define “what I am.” Who cares? Drinking makes me feel “good” for about an hour, and then it makes me feel tired, fat, unhealthy, hungover, remorseful, etc. Drinking almost always leads to me blacking out, which is not uncommon, but which is cause for concern for anyone, whether a once-in-a-while drinker, binge drinker, or “alcoholic.”

I don’t have any apologies left, which is why when I’m around people who are drinking, I don’t care who’s got questions. I’ve got answers, though. Why don’t I drink? I don’t want to feel like ass the next day. I can’t drink AND go running. I literally don’t have the time. Why should I consider these excuses rather than simply pretty good answers? And, should I turn it around and ask, Why are you drinking? It’d be interesting to sit back and watch most people find it difficult to avoid the obvious: we’ve all been socially indoctrinated with the idea that it’s not only encouraged, but advised to drink to fix, to celebrate, to numb, to have “fun.”

I think what I’m saying is, it just doesn’t matter what you “are.” You don’t have to “be an alcoholic” to stop drinking alcoholically, or, to stop drinking, period.

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, Am I an alcoholic?, binge drinking, definitions, drinking, Jezebel, psychology, recovery, sober, sobriety, socializing, socializing sober, wine, women

Comments 19 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Definitions, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety, Socializing

I have power over my cravings…

29 Jun

12:07 pm

And, that power is the power to forget about them! Or, to laugh in my own face and say to myself, Drunky Drunk Girl, this IDEA that you have that drinking will “fix” things? You’re cute.

My cravings, to reassure you, have DEFINITELY subsided. I still have thoughts of drinking, but the thoughts are much less distracting and come much less frequently (like, once a week, or twice a month, instead of every day). Smaller. They take up less space in my head, and when they do invade–or worse, start needling their way in–I know how to stomp them out. And then, I move on with my day.

I used to have to brace myself against the disappointment that followed me “out-thinking” my cravings–WHAT? No buzz?–but now, that disappointment has subsided, it, too, having been tempered by the rational FACT that wine is just not that great (compared to real treats!). And, well, I have better things to use my brain for, like, figuring out what caused me to start drinking in the first place; why I drank the way I did; and what I can continue to do, in my life, to make sure I stay full so that I don’t “need” wine to fill me up.

The thing is, you have POWER over your cravings.

Cravings are thoughts. Thoughts make feelings. Thoughts and feelings go away. You can wait and watch them leave. You can force them out of your mind. You can distract yourself and sneak them out the back door. But, they go away! Brilliant.

You have the power to let them go. And that is your biggest, bestest tool! Cravings are tied up in the neurochemistry of your addicted brain. I had pretty significant cravings up until about, oh, three or so months ago (nine months after my quit date)–they didn’t just go away. They turned much less severe, though, over those nine months, and it became more or less a psychological battle: me versus thoughts that drinking would be a good idea.

But, thoughts create feelings, which might actually be the more “real” of the two. However, like the power to let go of your thoughts, you have the power to transmute your feelings. Into? Well, into a big pile of poop (which is OK, too) or something new, like understanding. Understanding. Sitting through those thoughts, feeling that anxiety and tension in your gut–after it all goes, you might be able to say, ‘So, this is what I’m actually thinking about. THIS is what I’m actually feeling. I can deal with this!’

These days, I have exhausting dreams. And, these dreams are like, really obvious. Like, big block letters-obvious. I mean, they’re not even representative of what I’m actually going through; they’re like, the same things that happen to me in real life. For instance, this morning, I had one in which my boyfriend and I couldn’t agree on what to do, so we sat around getting frustrated (with each other) trying to figure it out. (There were scary cliffs, and riding a bus at night, and flirty “other women,” all of which meant something, too, I’m sure.) I mean, that’s what we do in real life! In my dream, however, I experienced all these clear, cathartic, and HEAVY emotions related to this experience. I never would have been able to feel that in my real life (I’m not that “enlightened”), and it really hit home, as in, Ahh, so THIS is how that makes me feel. I get it. I kind of think that’s what sitting through and then, discarding, those thoughts of drinking does for me: it allows me to transmute the blunt thoughts of “I want wine” into “Oh, THIS. Ahhhh, THAT.”

Saturday morning. Well afternoon, thanks to the heat and my dream and going to bed at 3 am last night. Did I mention it was hot? Wow, some days, it makes it hard to even breathe. Guess I’ll HAVE to hit the beach instead of working…

Happy day, friends!

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, binge drinking, cravings, dreams, drinking, emotions, feelings, neuroscience, psychology, recovery, sober, sobriety, thoughts, wine, women

Comments 2 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Cravings, Neuroscience, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety

And yet…

28 Jun

12:27 am

I still fantasize about drinking. Many days. Not every day, but many.

I still tell myself (subconsciously) that maybe I’ll be able to drink again some day (soon)–and that is what keeps me sober, honestly. For someone who used wine to self-medicate depression–anxiety, existential and creative angst, deep feelings of self-loathing, boredom–no, the urge has not left. But, it IS easier to deal with when I have a huge to-do list, goals; I ignore the voices that keep poking at me, telling me I can’t, It’s not going to happen, etc. etc. etc., and, well, just get to work. And then, I take breaks, I eat and drink way too much sugar, and before I know it, it’s midnight and I’ve gotten a lot on that to-do list done and it’s time to go to bed. And, I have no wine and even if I did, I know that now would not be a good time to drink it. (Going to bed kills wolfie; you can go to sleep and count on the fact that he will be gone in the morning.) So, I go to bed. And in the morning, I’ll get up, make my decaf iced coffee, walk the dogs, and gear up for another run and another long day of editing work and then, (likely) another night of on-and-off cravings.

I’m not sure they’ll ever go away. A part of me wonders, maybe I just need something bigger to invest myself in, something mightily distracting? Like, volunteering in a foreign place, or, going back to school. Both are in the works, actually. Another part of me then wonders, well, maybe I’m still running, just replacing one escape (wine) with another (being busy, biting off so much that I can’t chew let alone drink wine)?

It’s like, I cannot seem to connect “fun” and “reward” in my brain as strongly to anything as wine. Only wine will do. I know, even to me it sounds absurd. But, that’s how it feels. Even now, a year later. There is no buzz as great, as satisfying, as wine. There is no reward worth having as much as wine. I enjoy things–everything, actually–IN SPITE OF IT NOT BEING WINE. I know, I know, there are plenty of treats that I can now partake in, give myself, now that I’m sober and have the time and extra money. What I really want, though, is to end my days drinking wine; more than that, I want to not want wine; and MORE THAN THAT, I want to be able to enjoy other things as much as or more than I enjoy(ed) wine! I’m tired of this–will I ever truly enjoy life again?

I used wine to self-medicate my depression, my restlessness, my anxieties–yes. More elementally, I used it to medicate my boredom, which, according to a recent article I read, is a pathological state of mind and not simply a passing mood. In this article, they find a link between agitated boredom (where you’re actively looking to not be bored, and not finding anything that will stimulate or excite you) and damage to a small area in the brain located above the eyes. It’s the same area that is involved when your brain makes the faulty connection between wine and reward. Great. I actually AM brain-damaged!

I’ve spent my entire life trying to not be bored. Which is why I wrote; which is why I danced; which is why I excelled at school, and sports, and everything under the sun that I could throw myself into. Which is why I’ve lived in about 30 apartments in six different cities since I graduated from high school! This is, however, not all that remarkable, except in the most literal sense of the word: someone who is not inside my brain might remark, Wow, that is fucked up. To me, it’s just that I need more. I need more. Some of us just need more.

What if I drank again to overcome this pull? I mean, maybe I’ve been obsessing precisely because I’ve been withholding booze. What if I started treating it casually, and in that way, it would become casual? Prohibition was an absolute failure. Tell kids they can’t do something, and they’ll go out of their way to do it! Maybe that’s what going on now, with me? The more I focus on not obsessing over how great wine would be, the more I focus on, well, how great wine would be?

(Don’t worry, I’m not planning on drinking. Just thinking out loud… Though, I did get a lot done, and some pretty fantastic things happened today, so…what the fuck am I whining about?)

101 days and counting.

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, anxiety, b, binge drinking, boredom, brain damage, cravings, cravings won't go away, depression, drinking, goals, psychology, recovery, sober, sobriety, wine, women

Comments 5 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Anxiety, Binge drinking, Boredom, Cravings, Depression, Goals, Neuroscience, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety

Bored with sobriety

15 Jun

6:02 pm

I’ve got 90 days coming up tomorrow, and honestly, ehhhhhhh. (I care, but not that much; and, hopefully I’ll be in a better mood, and better able to exist in the certain type of denial that sobriety takes; to enjoy, congratulate, relish. We’ll see.)

Right now, sobriety feels endless. Boring. I have a bunch to do, but don’t want to do any of it. It’ll be there tomorrow, unfortunately, just like my sobriety. Sure, there are few cravings; however, no number of chunks of time or chips from meetings will change that it seems to be an endless stream of…boring. I mean, it’s the same thing, day in and night out. I’ve gotten USED to feeling good, albeit, I’ve never been this chunky around my waist. Somehow, all that wine kept me thin.

I’m bored with sobriety, and I can’t deny it! Would drinking spice things up? I guess I could try to go out and socialize sober, but I really don’t have it in me. In an all-caps kind of way. I miss the escape; I want it. I NEED it.

So, it’s another Saturday night, and I’m on. On all the time. And it’s tiring. All the “Oh, this feels GREAT to be walking home sober”‘s never quite make up for the energy expended just getting through the situation, making myself believe–whispering it over and over and over again in my ear–that it’s better this way and I don’t need to drink and if I did, shit would go down… It’s mentally exhausting because I know it’s not true. Drinking WOULD make it better, at least temporarily. Drinking WOULD give me something to anticipate after a long list of things to do, most of which involve cerebral pursuits; as it stands, it’s all willpower, passing my days reading and writing and then–nothing to take the edge off. There is still more thinking, or not thinking; I’m still aware of it all. And, it never adds up. There is still a hole in the sky called the sun, the passing of time, my own sense of base purposelessness as a human being. Of course, I do have purpose, but I guess I don’t have faith that it’ll carry me through to…what? The other side? An arrival, a final Ahh, now this is IT, it ALL makes sense?

And, I can’t pretend that NEVER going out, and hitting the sack after SNL (I NEVER watched SNL on a Saturday night; the last time I watched SNL was in high school, when I didn’t drink!) isn’t simply getting old! Haha. I mean, I know it’s my fault, but this is how my sobriety has panned out–I can’t imagine it’s that much different for others. Anyway, old. Boring old. Old boring. And, worse is that there’s something much bigger (worse?) about it, I can’t seem to articulate: perhaps it’s the sense that after all the thinking and probing and clearing out, this IS all there is. This is it. Is it?

In fact, it beats me down thinking that I have to be this way–on and present–for the rest of my life. I give up to being on and present! Yet napping and working and reading and EVERYTHING else I do to get through the days is, I know, just a cover. All the tiny gifts and pep talks are just…workarounds. Something deeper–and sad to the point of being neutral, like a huge ocean that is both wonderful and jarringly impersonal–lurks; I cannot deny this.

So, here I sit, wondering what to do with my night. Options galore, but none really matter, at the very end of the day, now do they? I know they don’t, but I have to keep telling myself that they do. I know I want to drink, but I have to keep telling myself that I don’t.

One day at a time (echo echo echo)…

Tags: alcoholic, alcoholism, binge drinking, boredom, boring, depression, drinking, psychology, recovery, sense of purpose, sober, sobriety, wine, women

Comments 4 Comments
Categories Addiction, Alcoholism, Binge drinking, Depression, Disease, Life, Psychology, Recovery, Sobriety

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Drunky Drunk Girl

Recovery is as competitive as Alcoholism; don’t play into it

Now I chase the reprieve, not the buzz

Anger, Buddhism, and the 12 steps, oh my!

Binge drinker, or alcoholic?

I have power over my cravings…

And yet…

Bored with sobriety

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