Tuesday, April 29, 2014

The sober sphere is just like a onesie...

I'm feeling a bit meh.

It's week two of the school holidays and Mr D is out of town for work. Me and my 3 boys are all getting sick of one another. It's raining.

Just made a doctors appointment for the morning to check if my iron is low.

I put my onesie on at 1.30pm today. Instantly felt a bit better…

I bought the boys their own onesies and they've been rocking them all afternoon too. That was fun.

Listened to an amazing talk by the always awesome Tara Brach this afternoon while the boys wrestled each other in the other room.

Took the cap off the bottle of white wine in the fridge and smelled it. That was weird. More out of boredom than anything else (a little bit naughty? It was just a sniff).

Waves of life.. up and down… marvelous and meh … brilliant and boring … stimulating and frustrating …

Reading Ann Dowsett Johnston and getting angry at the alcohol industry for targeting us women and selling us bullshit about how alcohol is going to make our lives better.

Reading other sober bloggers.. brave amazing people who have taken away the booze and are dealing with heavy stuff head on. It's inspiring and humbling to be privy to their journeys. Thank you all of you. Check out Thirsty Still, Sober at Home, Sober Learning .. and please do let me know if you're not on my Blog List so I can follow you too…

Reading emails from people who want to connect .. people who are trying to get sober but friends and family are giving them major shit (any advice for that scenario?).. high achieving people who are secretly desperate about their heavy drinking habits .. people on Day 2, Day 5, Day 8 … lovely people reaching out. I do so love the sober sphere on the internet. It's just like my onesie.. when I climb into it I feel better.

We are not alone.

Love, Mrs D xxx

10 comments:

  1. We are not alone. It can be so easy to forget that. It is my mind's default to see/hear/concentrate on the negatives. I have to work at bringing my head and my focus back to the positive, which is where I can be productive, rather than waste energies on rumination and obsessing.

    Thanks for this reminder and for the fresh post, which is this morning's example of how I am NOT ALONE.

    Good luck with the rainy, single-parenting meh day. I've been there many times. Your "wrestling & onsie" strategy is a good one! Sometimes I like to add in another family, hopefully one with a mom who is a good friend, too.

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  2. Finding a community online populated by friendly, open and often inspirational sober bloggers has really kept me going through these first few weeks of sobriety - in fact, discovering the sobersphere was a big part of my making that commitment to sobriety. Like climbing into a warm cosy onesie - what a comforting thought :) :)

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  3. To the people who are dealing with friends and family giving them shit - Boundaries are so important in sobriety, especially, and sadly so, with family. I am blessed to have my family just give me crap about not going to church anymore.
    They don't have to like what you are doing, and honestly, it doesn't matter if they do. Sobriety comes first and as long as you are happy and not hurting others, that is all that matters.

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  4. We are certainly never alone, Mrs. D. We isolated enough in our doldrums and desperate times. We fended off others to help us or to let them show us the way. We dove for cover of the bottle whenever we had an unpleasant feeling. But now, as we move through this sobriety, we can do it knowing others feel and understand in ways that no others can. That's the wonderment of this community. It's been a huge blessing for me, and am constantly amazed at what I learn and hear out here.

    Thanks for this. (I had a laugh at the oneise..)

    Paul

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  5. Don't be too harsh on the alcohol industry - all consumer industry targets us telling us we are incomplete if we don't have the right car, clothes, tv channel, music, etc.

    Many of them are harmless but some are awful - there is one recently here on the British TV that is advertising a web site that allows you to order a takeaway easily. It is trying to make people think they are stupid for cooking good healthy food. In a country already concerned with obesity and the rise in associated disease like diabetes etc. I find it almost amazing that it is allowed to be shown... but live and let live and all that I suppose. As long as I still cook my own stir fry and curry's rather than clicking on a website to get unhealthy ones delivered I don't need to worry.

    Onesie! Good grief! I don't have a Onesie - have no intention of ever owning one and you can't convince me otherwise... ;-)

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  6. I am humbled :) Thanks for the shout-out and kind words.

    As for the alcohol industry, it makes me angry, too. Our daughters are coming of age with all that crap advertising, and we'd be foolish to think it isn't affecting them. The science of advertising is scary stuff!

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  8. You should so post a picture of you in a onesie!

    As for family who give us shit about not drinking... i fortunately don't have much advice to give as everyone in my circle had been scared to death of my drinking for years. The only thing i would say is that sobriety has to be your number 1 priority for it to work. Personal relationships can be healed much more easily if we're sober!

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  9. Ooops, didn't see you already included the shot of the onesie! My bad!

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  10. It isn't just the alcohol industry that is deceiving us. It is the movies we watch and the music we hear. Everything tells us that alcohol is more that alright, it is cool. The artist community is full of addicted people and we still don' t see and hear how destructive addictions are.

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