Real me...

I keep thinking about having a cigarette. I keep thinking I'll text Mr D asking him to bring a packet home with him after work. But then I think about actually having the cigarette and I feel kind of sick. So I don't do anything about it. But I keep thinking about it. I'm very stressed. I have 3 1/2 weeks to go until I get rid of this goddam piece of shit thesis.

I think about drinking in an abstract way like 'I used to have that option' but there are no real cravings there or gritty thought processes which is really interesting and quite heartening actually. 18 months sober and I'm under extreme stress about to deliver my MA and I'm not craving booze. That's good.

I certainly wouldn't win any "Calm Mother of the Year" awards right now though or "Loving Wife" accolades. I'm not a pretty stressed person by any stretch of the imagination. I'm a shouty, teary, unhealthy, tense, locked up stressed person. I think Mr D and the kids will be delighted when the normal me comes back.

But hey, I'm sober so yay for fucking me.

Some great things about being sober...

No hangovers.
No sick guts.
No headaches.
No avoiding things.
No crap sleeps.
No worry about my insides.
No spending lots of money on wine.
No overflowing recycling bin.
No guilt.
No addiction.
No crutch.
No embarrassment.
No worrying.

Some not so great things about being sober.

No avoiding how I feel.
No calming my stress.
No taking the edge off.

Other ways to achieve the above.

Exercise.
Positive thinking.
Trying really hard to do it on my own.

I'm a work in progress. I'm not really managing to do it on my own. Well, yes I am. I am doing it on my own but it involves a lot more outward stress on the people around me and I feel very messy, lurching from one emotional state to another. But maybe I just have to not worry about that and know that for all of us, the collective, me being sober is way better in the long run.  I could be drinking my way through this stress but I'm not. So there's more shouting and tears but hey, at least it's real.

Real. Yes that I am.

Love, Mrs D xxxx

500 days today!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is just a quickie...

I AM 500 DAYS SOBER TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

YEAH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

500 days baby. 500 days.

Might celebrate by going to a nice deli and getting myself some special cheese and bread for lunch. Fresh bread, special cheese, fresh tomatoes and fresh basil. That'll do nicely...

Love, Mrs D xxx

We just have to take it away

I'm getting some lovely (sad, honest, brave) comments from new people who are obviously trawling around the internet desperately seeking answers to their questions about booze, or support for their desire to quit it, or reassurance that life without alcohol is ok, or whatever else they might be seeking.

These comments I find immensely moving and I do honestly feel the pain of these people who are at the point of despair with their drinking. I've been there, and not that long ago (18 mths or so). It's so fucking hard and so fucking unfair that it's so difficult to get this substance out of our lives - those of us who just can't moderate and be normal drinkers.

The other day I was watching Channel E's red carpet coverage of the Golden Globes. Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban were strutting their stuff and I remarked out loud: "He's sober" as I often do when I spot a famous sober person. "Really?" said Mr D. "Yep" I replied. "Some people just have to take it away."

And that's the bottom line I think. For some of us there is no option but to just take it away. Just stop drinking alcohol and accept that you can never drink it ever again. Ok so it's not obviously as simple as that because learning how to live sober takes quite a bit of retraining and effort but it's definitely a journey I would recommend.

The alternative for us hopeless boozers is to keep the alcohol in our lives and spend years angsting about why we can't drink normally, feeling guilty about hardly ever being able to reign ourselves in, trying a variety of techniques to control booze (moderation, abstaining for periods of time, days on, days off etc etc), worrying, feeling like shit, not respecting ourselves and just thinking thinking thinking about alcohol all the time.

Or we could decide just to live as boozers and booze, booze, booze until the day we die. That's the other option.

But for those of us that are sick of the boozing, and sick of the angsting and the guilt (you lovely anonymous people who are commenting and lurking, who feel desperate and miserable) just know that you are not alone. There are many of us in the world who are these people who just have to take it away. We just have to take it away. Keith Urban, Rob Lowe, me!, my gorgeous brave friends whose blogs are in my reading list, countless others around the world. We are all the ones who just have to take it away.

It can be done. And I promise, life without alcohol is ok. Really it is.  Actually it's pretty fucking great.

Love, Mrs D xxx

Romantic pang (just the one)

We are home from our two week summer holiday that included 2 weddings, a New Years Eve party and four days camping with a bunch of friends. I was very happy for most of it being a non-drinker, aside from toward the very end when I got hit with a pang of woe-is-me.

It was the end of a long day camping, the kids had finally nodded off in their tents all sandy and sunkissed from a day at the beach. The sun was low in the sky and all the adults were sitting around in deck chairs playing guitars or chatting or reading magazines. I sank into a deck chair to rest and just at that moment a friend came into view and crossed in front of my field of vision holding a glistening bottle of chardonnay.

WHAM! I got hit with a pang. It was a classic moment where the alcohol, all chilled in the bottle, looked so inviting and offered all sorts of mythical enticements and promises. I will relax you, it said, I will reward you, I will comfort you. You deserve me. (Clearly I'm in a waxing lyrical sort of mood).

So there I am sitting in my deck chair feeling all sad and left out that I can't start drinking like the rest of the crew.  So I went there... in my mind...and imagined myself actually pouring a glass and actually drinking it. I totally went there just to see what it felt like allowing myself to fantasize about drinking .. and low and behold! I didn't want to!! That pang was just a blind shot in the dark of my addiction trying to trick me again into thinking I needed to blur my brain. 

I did take myself off to bed earlier than most of our camping crew most evenings but I think that was mostly major MA stress. I have 6 weeks to deliver my thesis and it would be fair to say that stress and I are well acquainted at the moment (Mr D did all the day missions to the beach etc without me and I stayed back at the campsite working on the laptop).

Now I have six weeks to pull my 40,000 word thesis into a shape that will hopefully be passed by my markers. I'm wondering why the hell I ever wanted to do this bloody Masters, but I'm sure when it's done I'll wonder what the hell I'm going to do next. One step at a time I suppose. Oh, and don't drink. That'll help.

Love, Mrs D xxx

Wedding No. 2

I was sitting at a table in the marquee at about 10.30pm chatting with some friends. We were all having a great laugh. The DJ was spinning some 80's tunes (Madonna, Cyndi Lauper etc) and the bride and groom were on the dance floor in a big circle with all their mates (all mid-twenties, sporty types) having a total blast.

There were people dotted all around the huge marquee, at tables with candles lit. Fairy lights were strung around the ceiling and there was a really happy buzz on. I was having a great time - it had been such a perfect, lovely, loving wedding right from the start, a real festival of love - and I suddenly thought, what do these people who are drinking have that I don't right now? And the answer? Nothing! There was nothing that they had that I didn't. What I mean is, I didn't feel left out, or that I was missing out, on anything.

Does this make sense? We were all at the same table at the same wedding having the same fun except they had wine and beer in their bellies and I didn't. And from where I was sitting I couldn't see that I was missing anything. We were all having a great time it was just that I happened to be sober and they weren't.

Daft Punk got us on the dance floor! Had a good boogie for about 5 songs then had lovely goodbye chats with the hosts and the bride and groom etc (everyone tired and a bit blurred and happy) and then it was midnight I drove us all home.  I LOVE DRIVING HOME!!! (almost as much as I love waking up the morning after).

I'm helped now by the fact this is actually the 6th wedding I've done since giving up the booze and I keep getting better and better at it. Every time I do another thing sober, another party or wedding or dinner or function or whatever, it gets easier. So try it once. But don't give up. Try it again. Try it again. And try it again. It starts to get easier and easier and then more fun and more fun. Honest.

Love, Mrs D xxx

Wedding No. 1 & NYE..

First things first. I AM SO FUCKING GLAD THAT I DON'T DRINK ALCOHOL ANY MORE.

We have four weddings to go to this summer and the first of these was on the 30th of December. It was the most warm, lovely, intimate, chatty wedding. The food was unbelievably delicious, the bride looked gorgeous in silver/grey, she and the groom were ultra-chilled out. I just had the best time. I chatted and ate and mingled and felt really calm and happy. There's always a moment early on when the room starts buzzing and I feel a little detached because I'm not drinking but that passes and after that I don't give a toss and nor does anyone else.

Sober me was able to make the effort to talk to people like random sisters-in-law of the bride and groom (2 of them) both of whom were lovely and really interesting. I know I wouldn't have bothered approaching them if I'd been boozing because neither of them were boozing. I would have hung with the boozers. And there were a few of those! I was so pleased not to be one of them. I feel sick in my guts if I imagine filling up with booze again. It's been so long.

Happy me driving home!

Then last night a New Years Eve party. A BBQ. Loads of kids and food and fireworks and fun. Had a lovely time. Had a dance even. Talked to lots of people I hadn't seen for a while and had some great catch-ups. It was a big mix across the spectrum of alcohol consumption and I am fitting comfortably at one end of that.

Had a dance! Then drove the kids home at 10.45 and marvelled at the fact that it took me so long to discover that I don't need alcohol to have fun. Who knew? Happy New Year!!

Love, Mrs D xxx

Yeah!!!! Lovely and calm...

Yaaaaa Hoooooo to all of us who made it through Christmas sober. Yay for us! Yes!  Great job for all of us who said 'no' left, right, and centre to drinks. It's a tough time, for sure, and one so usually associated with drinking and celebrating.

We were at the neighbors yesterday for a few hours in the afternoon and I batted away pims and white wine, opting instead for Sprite (booooring) but who cares that's the way it has to be.  Then today up the road for lunch and I was 'no thanks' to white wine, then red wine, opting instead for water. Zzzzzzzzz. But again, that's the way it just has to be.

Sometimes I can't believe I'm not going to touch alcohol for the rest of my life, but other times I can't possibly imagine going back to drinking it hard out all the time. I think it's just going to get easier and easier and more and more normal and ordinary to be a non-drinker.

And the kids, the kids, it's all about the kids. If I stop being so self-obsessed for a moment and take a second to look around me at the little people who are in the middle of their childhoods, I feel really good. They have no idea how I have changed their early years by kicking their boozy mother to the curb.  Even I don't know what exactly the difference would be to the childhood they're having now vs the childhood they would have had if I'd remained a wine-guzzler.

I do know that sober me was able to stay up late wrapping presents and organizing stockings, stay calm at 10pm when little eyes are still open, not get too grumpy at 3am when excitement breaks through slumber again and be ok with a 6am start to the day.

Sober me was able to take the time to search for the special lego arm that was missing, build the fancy 3-D tank puzzle, drive to a picnic lunch and drive to the beach afterwards, jump on the trampoline late in the evening, snuggle on the sofa watching Back To The Future and have a long chat at bedtime about the merits of Moshi Monsters. Sober me is very locked into my kids and really spending time connected to them. It's a lovely reality of a calm sober life.

That flatness that I often talk about, which is really just a description of my adjusting to being sober all the time.. was actually just a quiet peaceful state of mind that permeated my entire Christmas experience.

So yay for me and yay for you and yay for all of us who take the leap, deal with the downsides but embrace the upsides of living alcohol free. Next, New Years Eve - a party in our home town with a big crowd of old friends. Should be interesting.....

Love, Mrs D xxx

Visualisation...

It's Christmas Eve here right now, 8pm and our kids are bouncing off the walls with excitement. Mr D has had a couple of wines. Me a cranberry and tonic and a soda with lemon. Bit sick of all the mini bottles of fizzy I drink, ginger beer, pink grapefruit etc. I think they're laiden with sugar.

It's definately hard doing the festive season sober... well only from midday onwards when I really feel like drinking is what would normally be going on to celebrate Christmas eve/Christmas day/boxing day/every day. This is only my second sober Christmas and last year was very noisy with us hosting 20+ people and me being all obsessed with and stimulated by my new sober existence. This year it's just the five of us for Christmas and being sober isn't so exciting and new any more. Anyhoo... there's nofuckingway I'm going to drink so... onwards and upwards!

I got into bed the other night with the laptop to watch the Russell Brand doco on addiction on YouTube. It's quite good actually.  Then I did some surfing around YouTube for sober stuff, as I  sometimes do, and ended up watching a BBC doco on Ecstasy, also quite good.

In between these two documentaries I stumbled across all these other bits and bobs about booze and drugs and sobriety. Amongst other things I watched a video from some female addiction counsellor/rehab worker giving tips for going sober. For the life of me I can't find it again now but she was talking about picturing yourself in your mind going up to friends who you'd normally booze with and shaking their hand being all strong and sober. Basically it was visualisation stuff and I think that this has been one of my biggest techniques in staying sober, and I'm still doing it today.

If it's tough going not drinking, and you're feeling low, or flat, or bored or bummed out... visualise yourself climbing into bed sober. Visualise yourself waking up with no hangover. Visualise yourself sober in the future. The immediate future, the medium future and the long-term future. This afternoon I have felt a bit flat I'll be honest. But I keep imagining myself waking up tomorrow morning with the boys all excited about their stockings and it's not normal drinking hours so I won't feel like the only sober loser then. I'll just be happy and hangover free and it'll be Christmas day!

Merry Christmas everyone! This isn't quite the joyous post I promised but as always I write just as I feel. And I feel fine. I feel sober. I feel low key.. actually .. it's peaceful. I feel peaceful.

Love, Mrs D xxx

The silly season...

I don't want to get all deep and meaningful and negative on it but I am finding myself driving around the streets at the moment looking at all the houses and thinking about all the stress that is building and all money that is being spent and all the inter-personal angst that is being dreaded and all the booze that will be sunk.

I know there are many many lovely, lucky people who are going to have smooth, trouble-free silly seasons .. but there are so many others that are going to be pushed to the limit by their mum, or get really angry at their brother, or annoyed at their friend, or worried about their sister, or sick of their dad, or so over the whole family vibe...or whatever...and so they'll drink and drink and drink...

Or maybe there'll be people who were a bit like me and drank to chase some sort of fun or happiness that I believed wasn't already in front of me.  Desperately trying to reach some nirvana of joy, believing alcohol was the only thing that has the power to give it...

In the past I've found Christmas tricky, with the crush of family dynamics that comes in.  Hard to step out of my comfort zone, my happy equilibrium that I've found in my own space with my own circle of people and my own routines and my own comforts and no-one around to prick my bubble.

So what did I used to do to chase the fun or ignore the undercurrents? Get boozed!!! Yeahhhhh!!! That'll help!!!!  Woo hoo!!!! Wines!!! Fancy cocktails!!! Bubbles!!!! Beer? Hhhmmm... not really my drink of choice but why not!!!!!

I've got a photo on our piano of me and my Dad on Christmas day about 4 years ago. I'm wearing a pink paper hat that came out of a cracker and a lovely blue dress that cost a lot of money with a pretty broach on it. I'm leaning into my dad and he's got his arm around me. We look very happy.

Except every time I look at it I remember that this was the Christmas that I drank steadily from 8am until 9pm. I didn't fall over or vomit or slur much even (as far as I know). I just steadily drank alcohol all day, starting with champagne breakfast and never stopping.

Oh my god, honestly, thank god I stopped drinking. Really. I had a serious problem. You know, lately I've been having those thoughts 'was I really that bad?' and pangs that I don't get to drink any more... I mentally swat them away swiftly and angrily but they come at me like angry bees.

I've just got to look at that photo of me with my puffy face and remember that I was addicted to alcohol. I was totally and utterly addicted to alcohol. Quiet, steady, heavy, seemingly-functional, middle-class alcoholism. And now all I have to do is not drink and I'm ok. Hallelujah. And Merry Christmas Everyone!

Love, Mrs D xxx

(sorry this is a bit glum now that I read it back. Will write a more upbeat post before the 25th!)

Purgatory...

I don't know who this anonymous person is who just left this comment on my last post but their words are unbelievably inspiring and are worth their very own special post I think.

I just love this. I love the idea it gives me to embrace that flat feeling that I get sometimes and see it as a positive rather than a negative. I love that. It's a practical tangible exercise that I can work on, one that I really think will help me in the weeks ahead of the festive season.

Anonymous is responding to my last two posts and is acknowledging yes, we have left hell, but no, we're not in heaven.....we're somewhere in between...just have a read...

I was thinking purgatory which is much better than hell, but still life with it's ups and downs. Like in purgatory, if it exists, there is a sense of waiting. What are we really here for anyway? There's sense at times of wanting to go back and another sense that is hopefully stronger, of wanting to move forward. I think heaven, and peace is ultimately what we strive for, and our destination.

Becoming sober is one step on that journey. And yes, other Mrs D, I agree that the moments like that when we feel flat, in a sense I too believe it is a glimmer at peace and if we choose to open our arms wide open to it, we can have it more and more and the flatness will seem more positive. It only feels negative because we feel like we are missing, like we are missing an old sense of ourselves. But that's OLD, and not not happy and not where we want to do. Let's make peace and heaven our destination. We don't get there overnight though, so let's allow purgatory to teach us the lessons we need to learn. There is some excitement in that too I reckon. Love and light x

To anonymous I thank you and send back the love and light that you so graciously offered to me.

Love, Mrs D xxx