Day 10
A relationship that turned into a relationshit!
I’m on Day 10. Double digits. Not been here for a while. Terrible night’s sleep - dropping off and then waking up immediately with intrusive thoughts, then a continued cycle of waking, dozing and rumination. Also, in a fair amount of pain from a back problem, which doesn’t help. It’s sh!t, but better without drink.
Today I found this quote from Denzil Washington about his decision to stop drinking:
I made a commitment to completely cut out drinking and anything that might hamper me from getting my mind and body together. And the floodgates of goodness have opened upon me - spiritually and financially.
This is one of my reasons I want to stop. I am coming up on the big 50. I have an acute sense that I have little time left, and I don’t really want to waste another moment. The day I quit was a day wasted because of hangover - I felt desolate, frustrated, and angry. I feel I have given alcohol enough of my life. Lots of it has been fun, and I have loved much of my drinking life. Until recently, drinking gave more than it took away.
But what started out as a fun relationship has grown tired and sour - it’s gone from relationship to relationSHIT! And it’s time to move on. I can’t live the life I want to live; or do the things I want to do if I continue to drink. My life has been on hold for so long, spinning like that little wheel of doom when the computer has a meltdown!
Previous attempts at limiting alcohol have been about removing something negative – i.e. the hangovers, the guilt, the weight gain. This strategy only works for so long because it ignores the function that alcohol plays in my life. I keep drinking because in some strange f@cked up but fundamental sense it is working for me. Removing it leaves a hole that I keep falling into. So, I need a new strategy. I don’t know what that is yet. I need a positive reason not to drink, not simply the absence of negative ones. It’s like exercise. I go to the gym because it makes me feel good in the moment, and takes me further towards goals that are meaningful to me. I need to work out how not drinking does the same.
One of my life-mantras is “don’t expect things of people they don’t have the capacity to give.” I need to apply this to my relationship with booze. It can’t give me what I want, and the more I try to make it work, for example by trying to moderate, the unhappier I will become. I will find what I need from other things - but right now I’m not even sure I know what I need!
I’ve got a challenging time alcohol-wise coming up in the next few days, and it’s weighing on my mind.
But I don’t want to live my life with regret for what might have been.\