Feeling great!

Hello all out in Blog Land!  I've been super busy....lots going on. I've been planning and plotting a surprise birthday party for my mom that was supposed to take place yesterday- Mother Nature had other plans. She felt like it was time for some snow. She won that round.

Per LivingSober.org.nz I have been sober now for 53 days!  I've had some periods of temptation but two thoughts have pulled me through:

Primary thought: I don't really want a drink, I just want to feel different. I've read this on several blogs, I think it might have originated in the Bubble Hour? Or maybe that is just where I first heard it, I don't know.

But this I do know: it is really true. As soon I figured out what feeling I wanted to change, the desire for a drink disappeared.

Secondary thought:  Alcohol is a poison.  People who drink moderately might not drink enough to get sick from it, but that doesn't change the alcohol itself.  People survive small doses of toxins, sure. But ultimately? It feels a hell of a lot better once you stop administering poison to yourself on a frequent basis.

 

Here is how those two items have played out recently.

Even though the party was canceled, a small group of people came to my house yesterday and surprised my mom. She was totally shocked and very happy.  A few bottles of wine were consumed with great cheer- not by me, though.  And it's true- there were a few very stressful moments were I did think, I could use a drink!  But then I realized I was just stressed and poof, I was fine again.

My mom and I drove my sister to the train station this morning, and on the way back Mom told me that I really looked much better since I stopped drinking.  She said she never noticed it before but now "You have a glow to you."   I thanked her, and hearing that made me very happy.

 I do feel so much better- I can't even really describe it.  I haven't lost a lot of weight, only a few pounds. My life isn't somehow magic and sparkly. There are a handful of things that I thought would change that haven't. I still procrastinate horribly.  I am still disorganized and forgetful. I still have to watch my temper with my son- maybe even moreso and I thought for SURE that would change for the better.

But inside- I feel wonderful! I really do feel like I was poisoning myself, literally poisoning myself. I always thought people exaggerated, that alcohol poisoning was what happened when someone took way too much...and that you can take way too much of anything and also end up at the ER. I never seriously considered it as inherently bad for you.

I now believe it is inherently bad for you.  Maybe in small doses it's not harmful, but why would you try it? It feels so, so, so much better being sober.

One of the things that gave me a hard push towards sobriety last year was an interview I read in Time Magazine with Hip Hop god Russell Simmons. He said he stopped drinking because it felt better to meditate in the mornings than to drink at night. He talks about here as well:  http://eatocracy.cnn.com/2011/04/12/fame-bites-russell-simmons/

Before then, I never really considered that it might feel better to be sober. I was starting to get tired of feeling like crap after drinking, but I never thought that being sober straight up felt better than being drunk.  That in a head-to-head comparison, being sober would be more enjoyable than being drunk.

I used to love how I felt being drunk.  I used to joke that drinking and NOT getting drunk was alcohol abuse, because you weren't using it to do what it was made to do. Enjoying the drunk feeling was the whole POINT of drinking.

It is shocking to me to find out that actually, I feel miles better sober than I ever felt drunk. I feel better in the mornings- yes, of course. That's a no-brainer: no headaches, no dry mouth, no hangover.

But I also feel so much better at night. My body feels wonderful, healthy, a thousand times better than I did while drunk, even happy drunk. I love snuggling into bed sober, feeling great, looking forward to a terrific night's sleep, looking forward to another beautiful day in the morning.

And- toasting my guests yesterday with my lovely sober drinks yesterday, I am certain that I had just as much fun as the moderates/normies and WAY more fun than the ones who drink like I used to. I didn't have to pace. I didn't need to dutifully drink glasses of water between glasses of my AF specials. I wasn't worried about slurring my speech. I wasn't on high alert, being careful to control myself.

I don't ever want to go back there. In my brief moments of high stress, when I thought "I'd love a wine!!" I realized No. Really truly, No.  I want to be less stressed over the snow situation- I was stressed that our snow blower broke and was worried that people would show up before we had cleared out parking spaces. I didn't want those freaking wild turkeys (the real birds) to jump on our guests's cars like they were doing, I didn't want to feel the anxiety that someone would get hurt or their cars will get scratched.   That's all. Just stess over basic life. Drinking has nothing to do with it. Wine wouldn't improve any of it and I'd feel terrible afterwards. No way.

I love my sober life. It is becoming precious to me.

In other news- I read "Dry" by Augusten Burroughs and adored it.  I related so much to the euphoric feeling of belong that he describes in his first AA meeting- I felt that way when my then-fiance's parents took me to my first Naranon meeting.  And then he hated AA. And then he loved it again.

Based on that book I made sure I got to one meeting last week, on Monday when I was off work.  I got some phone numbers and two emails.  I found out that there is a women's meeting in my area on Tuesdays. I was hoping to go this week and maybe I will, if we are dug out by then (we are supposed to get a few feet of snow between now and Tuesday morning.)

I have more ramblings but it can wait until tomorrow.  Be well!