Sober Roots: The BreakUp
The hardest thing about change is accepting that what you’ve been doing isn’t working.
We are wired to seek the path of least resistance.
But even when that path is leading us down a dark road, we fear letting go of our comfort, habit, vice, addiction…
Today marks 23 days sober.
My relationship with alcohol is riddled with pain - physical and soul-withering. But it served as medicine.
It was something I looked forward to joyfully and a relief from life — this nebulous existence (or what it can feel like), heavy with self-loathing, uncertainty, and echoes from an unhealed past.
Alcohol became my escape. A friend. A way to feel alive and dead at the same time.
After 20 years of time spent with it, I finally came to realize how much of a crutch and abusive lover it’s been.
I’ve made many attempts to “manage” my drinking. I even abstained for 3 months a couple of years ago. But I gave in, of course, thinking I could maintain being a “social drinker” at a family dinner. This quickly devolved to strategically “drinking in moderation,” which failed most of the time. Throughout my life, I blacked out many times and made many bad choices. As I got older, less of the former happened, but I drank similarly to the people around me (maybe one more than they), but I started to feel the time it takes to get back to fully functioning (mind, soul, and body) after drinking, which really took its toll on me. It wasn’t just the hangover; it was the bitter shame of going too far, even though from the outside looking in, everything seemed fine. In the end, it made me feel like I couldn’t trust myself.
That’s the tricky thing about alcohol (ie, ethanol) - it’s insidious. We see everyone else imbibing and assume that, as long as we are matching their behavior, we are “doing it right.”
But what if we are matching behavior, but still feel like shit? Missing stretches of time or conversations? Embarrassment? Arguments? Regret? Needing stimulants to regulate? Waking up to a horrendous hangover? Or not having any of the above but operating in daily life as apathetic, anxious, or irritable as can be?
Do I have a problem? I’ll have one less than last time. It’s fine, it’s part of the drinking deal.
I just need to have more self-control.
But what if there is no controlling it? What if we’re playing with fire and burning ourselves, not because we lack self-control, but because that’s simply the nature of it? What if we are unwilling to let it go because it gives us just enough of a good time that we accept all the blowback?
It’s incredible to me that ethanol is the socially acceptable, permitted drug that slyly robs us of our time, presence, health, and authenticity.
It serves us a lie that we can’t life without it. It gaslights, telling us we need it to feel good and free, only to leave us insecure and empty. It chips at our self-worth. It steals our essence and, at the same time, tells us “this is who you are.”
The truth is, alcohol doesn’t reveal our true nature. Rather, it exploits our affinities and shortcomings. It makes us unstable, unreliable, and vulnerable —and, for many, complacent. It’s a quick dopamine hit and hijacks our ability to experience dopamine in daily life.
If you stayed with me to this point, I thank you for hearing me out.
If you are someone who is struggling with the “moderation” game, know you don’t have to play. It’s ok to outgrow alcohol. And you don’t have to wait for “rock bottom” or for something to happen to prove it’s a problem in your life to let it go.
I didn’t lose everything or hit rock bottom when I decided to start my sober journey. But the price I was paying was too much. Nothing is free (alcohol is also sooo expensive). Every choice to do something means rejecting other plans. I wondered, “Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be joyful without it?”
This thought I held onto, and am still holding onto, with all my heart. How can I be that person I think I feel like when I am drinking, in my everyday life?
Ultimately, I broke up with alcohol after a gazillion cuts of fuckery and bullshit. Alcohol is not my friend. I cannot change it. I can’t control it. I accept its true colors, and I can’t go back to playing its game, no matter how hard I try to convince myself it’ll be different this time.
Since committing to this breakup, I have invested so much energy in my own physical healing, in my family, and in embodying the person I want to be now and in the future. Energy that would be wasted if it were given to alcohol. I get excited about staying home, getting up early, setting up my toddler’s activities for the day, to get to write, to find genuine joy in consistency, in the mundane, and to BE — to be with my family, to be present, to be grounded, and to deepen my faith (more on that to come).
All my love,
Mia
