A wee trip away...

I've been practicing my talks for next week. I'm going down to the South Island to talk to a couple of women's Dinner Clubs about my recovery. Really looking forward to it. I do have a tendency to hide behind my computer for much of my recovery work (blogging, writing or being interviewed for articles, communicating with people on Living Sober). I have a few local sober friends that I connect with in person, but it will be really good for me to go and meet a bunch of new people face-to-face.

There may be people in the crowd who are secretly worried about their own drinking, or maybe not! There may be people in the crowd who are worried about a loved ones drinking. Or maybe the crowd will just be full of people who are interested in hearing stories of others lives.

Any or all of that is fine by me. I just want to go and be honest about my drinking and my journey in sobriety. I want to be honest about how low my self-worth & self-respect was when I was drinking, and how improved it is now. I want to explain how being trapped inside my drinkers brain had me feeling miserable, confused, and very alone. And I want to explain how all of those negative feelings slowly turned around when I took the booze away.

I just want to lay it all out. No lies. No embellishments. Just the raw honest truth. And, knowing me, the odd swearword!

The wonderful Jean from Unpicked Blog posted this video on her Facebook page the other day. It's a man called Bill White who is an addiction expert in the states. In this video he talks about the need to break down the stigmas and stereotypes surrounding addicts and people who are in recovery. He is calling for a "vanguard of people in who are recovery to step forward. People who are temperamentally suited for that role, and whose personal and family circumstances allow them to take on part of that public role, to simply step forward and put a face and voice on recovery. And as soon as we begin to get this vanguard to step forward those stereotypes can't be sustained any longer."

I liked this a whole lot! It made me feel a little more brave and a little more proud about putting myself forward as a visible person in recovery.

And it's always nice to get a wee break away from my domestic routine....

Love, Mrs D xxx