One year sober today
It has been one year sober for me. I wanted to share this because this community was instrumental for me since Day 1 and in case my story can be helpful for anyone else out there.
I had my last drink on Feb 19. The decision to stop felt like a combination of several forces coming together. In the 10 years after college, the amount I drank continued to increase. At the same time, I knew I was displaying classic maladaptive behaviors: drinking more than I planned, hiding drinks from those close to you, thinking the only way to unwind was through drinking, missing work due to a hangover, etc. As I got older, my body wasn’t doing me any favors. The elasticity and ability to bounce back easily was gone, the weight was up, and the impact on my mood through irritability was too much. The weekend of Feb 19 last year, my wife and I were on a vacation, and I messed up our whole last day by drinking too much and I had never felt so guilty. On Feb 20 last year, I didn’t know I was going to quit forever, but I joined this community, read the stories of others, and saw that a life without alcohol was maybe possible. In that first week, I read “This Naked Mind” and there was a line about where the author’s father decided to wake up one morning and just quit drinking forever. I can’t say that was the moment when I decided for sure, but I wanted to be like that. I am usually a 0-100 person in most aspects of life, so I figured why not apply that here?
What has the last year looked like? The first few months were absolutely the hardest. It took a lot of unlearning for me to dissociate things that I always did with alcohol- Friday nights, vacation, watching football, dinner with friends, etc. In terms of my relationship, my partner and I had been together for so long, that drinking was ingrained into our routine and weekend activities. Some particularly hard moments were weddings (I am not a super outgoing person) and vacations (had one trip to all-inclusive resort which was not easy). To this day, some family/friends don’t fully “get it” and think this is just a temporary thing I’m doing. As I got past 6 months, it got easier. I used to know which day I was on, but it’s been a while since I thought like that, and this one year date honestly snuck up on me until my wife mentioned it a couple of days ago. Full disclosure- I strongly believe in harm reduction and I have used THC edibles more than before. On this, I must remain careful. While they can offer a stress relief, I don’t want them to become a direct substitute for what alcohol was. Also- non-alcoholic beer (Heineken 0.0) and hot tamales + sour patch kids have become my go to weekend treats.
The good? My mental health- anxiety/depression- have all been better. Working with a therapist over the last year has also been a great thing to do concurrently and I wish everyone had access to that. My relationship with my wife has been much better, much less fighting. I have lost close to 20 lbs (even with eating a lot more candy/sugar).
Finally, I wanted to say thank you to all of you out there. Your stories inspired and continue to motivate me.