THE ART OF LIVING AN ALCOHOL-FREE LIFESTYLE

Tip #14 - You don’t have to have a drinking problem for drinking to cause problems.

THE ART OF LIVING AN ALCOHOL-FREE LIFESTYLE

Part 1: A series of one-off tips served with some straight talk, a bit of sass, and a penchant for not taking oneself or life too seriously.

Part 2: A story of why life may have been “fine,” but quitting was still my best option.

Tip #14 - You don’t have to have a drinking problem for drinking to cause problems.

June 2015 - The last wedding I attended while still drinking. Life looks grand - until you dig deeper.

Part 1

Toni from the Shelf-Help Book Club quoted something I had written years ago as she was introducing me on her podcast last week. And though you may have seen some iteration of this quote made into multiple social media memes, these words have literally been my guiding post for all that I have ever shared about my quit story.

You don’t have to have a drinking problem for drinking to cause problems.

Many of us who were on the spectrum of drinking felt that we didn’t necessarily need to quit because things weren’t that bad. Life was fine or maybe even good. We were successful, had a great social network, good career, family, etc. But then there was this incline nibbling away, that gut feeling and the inner voice whispering quietly - this is not for you; there is another way.

And so maybe we look a little deeper. Maybe we missed a few appointments, shared secrets that didn’t belong to us, got into fights with our close friends or partners, noticed our hangovers were getting longer, anxiety in the middle of the night was a new norm, changes in mood and energy levels, or the glass of wine at dinner that started turning closer to a bottle before bed.

It’s the little things that we notice here and there, the one-offs that we are holding close while pushing down or justifying them all, and yet at the same time, that inner voice continues to get louder.

So whether you don’t want to drink anymore for no real reason or you have a quantifiable reason to stop drinking, please know there are no rules on who should or should not drink. There is no one way to live life, and there certainly are no criteria one must meet in order to make the decision not to drink. Life does not have to go completely off the rails before you make the choice to get yourself back on track.

“You drink a little too much and try a little too hard. And you go home to a cold bed and think, That was fine. And your life is a long line of fine.”

―Gillian Flynn

Part 2

I wouldn’t say my life while I was drinking was bad, but it certainly wasn’t winning any awards for being remarkable. From the outside, it looked to any bystander that I was doing quite well. When I made the decision to really quit, I was 39. I was living in NYC, had a full-time career as an L&D nurse (very romantic on paper, nightmare in reality), was four years into my marriage, had a great group of friends, and for the most part, seemingly very healthy.

My life was fine, a long line of fine.

On the inside, I was a mess. I was questioning everything from my career choice to my marriage, to where I was living and how I was living. I was waking up most days with a wine hangover which was getting harder to ignore. I started my days feeling and looking like shit. At the time, I was working as a night nurse, something I would never do again because it nearly killed me. I am not someone who can function backward and upside down. I know a lot of nurses who thrive on the night shift, but that schedule tore my soul out of my body. That alone would have been enough reason to quit ingesting alcohol, but it was only part of my story.

Physically, I noticed more and more that my body was changing, my metabolism was changing, and my ability to bounce back after a night out was changing. I could no longer push through, and my hangovers, no matter how little I drank, were debilitating at times. Mentally, I was dealing with a lot of emotional turmoil. I was as unhappy as I had ever been. I wasn’t sleeping well at all due to the level of stress and the schedule of my career. I was anxious all the time, and when I would drink to feel better, it only made me feel worse. I would wake up at 2 AM every night, with or without alcohol in my system, to gut-wrenching anxiety. I would then lie awake for hours ruminating over the most ridiculous shit.

My husband and I were having problems as well. During the first decade of our relationship, we rarely, if ever, fought. It wasn’t until I started nursing and working the night shift that things changed for us. My misery was palpable, and it eventually started pushing him away. Then when I would drink, all of my anger and rage was directed towards him. Not a great way to treat a new husband. And mind you, we didn’t fight all the time, and I wasn’t always angry when I drank. But I never knew when it would come out of me. And for the most part, I had a great night every time I went out drinking. Between my husband and I, we had gobs of friends who all loved to go out and have a good time. But that’s the thing about drinking; you never know when it is going to turn bad, once or forever.

Drinking works - until it doesn’t.

As I have spoken about before, our marriage eventually came to a head, and I had to make a decision on how I was going to handle it. I could have gone off the deep end and destroyed everything in my path. However, I had had enough time observing my own drinking that I knew what the common denominator was to everything that was standing in my way. I knew that if I kept doing what I was doing, my life might really turn into something I did not want - like a divorce, leaving my career, moving out of NYC, going broke, and the scariest possibility, physical addiction.

But none of those things happened because I knew my other option clearly. I saw what I had been toying with for years and years and, deep down, knew in my bones that the drinking and the use of it as a coping mechanism had to go. I had to walk away from it once and for all. I knew that no matter what happened if I quit drinking, everything else was going to be ok.

Again, my life wasn’t terrible per se, but it certainly wasn’t great or even good at that time. And had I kept drinking, I know I certainly would not be here writing this to you. Maybe I would still be ok, but maybe not either. And that last “maybe” is enough to keep me humble, grateful, and thriving in this new way of living.