Moving On...

A few years ago I started questioning lots of different things.  Such as, do I like who I have become, how can I grow, and is there anything impeding my progress?  Certainly these questions bring lots to the table and tons to think about.  I came back continually to how healthy is my relationship with alcohol?  On July 5th of 2019 I decided to take a break from drinking.  What I didn't know, was that this break would turn into something more meaningful and more real that I ever could have imagined. I learned a lot, and realized this could not be about a break, it had to be about recovery.

Here I was, a 38 year old speech pathologist, athlete, and mother.  I'm so much to so many people, but I was crippled by a need to drink.  For me it all started as a preteen who tried Kahlua at parties and snuck vodka when no one was looking. Over the years it turned into frequent partying, poor choices, and occasional black outs.   I often felt bad the next day and could not really remember the night before. As an adult it turned into glasses of wine at dinner, in the evening, and often with friends.  It turned into a habit, one that I was not proud of...  and it took years to come to this choice after being unsuccessful with stopping numerous times.

 I haven't talked a lot about my struggles or my changes, just gone through the motions.  A few friends have helped and listened through my decision to stop drinking and have supported me.  I decided to talk about it with some other friends and I had a whole lot of backlash.  There were the naysayers, "you can't do that - are you crazy? - you love wine."  Or the folks who didn't understand that it had control of me, "you aren't addicted... I know addicts... they aren't (pretty, successful, insert adjective) like you..."  But the hardest people, were the ones who made my struggle about them - which lets be honest, when we can't listen we quit communicating altogether and I still can't talk to those people about it.  What would happen is I would say "it's been 55 days since I last drank," as I am holding back tears and trying for the life of me not to be ashamed - and the response would be "well, I don't drink that much, so it's not a problem for me..." Needless to say it's been really hard.

At this point, I choose not to go into more details of it, because it really doesn't matter anymore.  I used to drink and now I don't.   It's not a secret, it's my story - and I opt to move forward.  I choose happiness over any pain which requires being one-hundred percent present - in my actions, in the moment, and in my life.  I want to train on a different level, as swimming has made a huge comeback in my life. It's not really just a hobby, it's become my thing - and that's important to me.

So on day 113 of sobriety I can openly talk about what is important to me... my children, my husband, my family, and my passions - there's nothing blocking my visions, my dreams, and my life.  It's really the greatest feeling of all!