Living Sober in a Drunk World
With having a little over 17 months sober my life has changed dramatically. There are a lot of situations that I find myself in that makes me want to try and bargain with myself to just have one drink. I know that one drink would lead to one more drink and then one more drink after that and so on until I am blackout drunk. I was not drinking because I enjoyed the taste of alcohol, I was drinking because I wanted to be the “life of the party” or be able to do things that were not in my character and blame it on the alcohol, as Jamie Foxx would say.
Today, it is so common for people to have a drink when they get off of work or when they go out with friends. Most people are able to consume alcohol socially and not let it affect their life or the decisions that they make. Alcohol is the only drug that people that choose not to use have to explain the reason for their abstinence. When someone offers a drink and it is turned down, the immediate question is “Why not?” When someone does not use other drugs we do not jump to ask them why they do not use them. Why is it standard practice to offer alcoholic beverages first at a party or get-together? Why do we not just point people to the drink area? When I go to events I try to bring my bottle of water so that I do not have to hear the question as to why I am not drinking alcohol.
Since becoming sober, I did not realize that I was missing out on so much in my life. I was missing out on my son growing up because he did not want to be around. I was missing out on getting to genuinely build relationships with people that I met out in public. I was missing out on memories from family events. I was spending so much of my time trying to recover the next day from drinking the night before that I was pretty useless until sometime in the afternoon. That is not a good thing when you have a job that requires you to be able to function at 7 am. Since putting the drink down, I have built my relationship with my son and my family. I am so much more productive with my job during work hours and after work hours as well. My health has done a complete 180. Yes, I had weight loss surgery but most of my weight gain came from making poor food choices because I was drinking and wanted all the greasy food I could get no matter what time it was. I was also drinking a lot of sugary alcoholic drinks, because of this I was borderline diabetic. I can not begin to tell you how much money I spent on food while drunk. There was also a lot of money spent on the alcohol itself. I would have to check my phone to see who I texted or called while under the influence. When my husband and I would go out, I would give my number to all my new “friends” and have text messages from them but not even remember who they are the next day or the next time we go out and run into them. While drinking I was a social butterfly and everyone that I met became my “friend” which led to us having bar tabs of $200+ every time that we went out. I had to buy drinks for all my new “friends” to make sure that the party kept going and to make sure that they liked me. Now my husband and I are able to go to dinner and have a bill that is only $50 compared to $150 because there are not all the drinks during the meal.
