Day 103: Problem Drinker

I just finished reading Sober is the New Black, by Rachel Black.  Really great book!!  It's a quick read- left me wanting more.  Relate so much to the author's language and experiences with boozing/quitting booze.  Very cool woman, insightful, honest.  I loved it and highly recommend to those searching for a positive recovery book that isn't all about the "before"- there is some description here and there of "Then" and "Now", but it is largely a book documenting the first year of this gal's sobriety.  I'm not into the books that revolve around the debauchery of drinking- I want to read about the recovery experience.

While reading, I of course thought about my own habits and experiences.  I remembered other situations in which the event I was a part of revolved around alcohol (whether in my head only or for all involved).  It really makes me sad to think back to so many years of being consumed by wanting to catch a buzz (of some sort).  How did I get like that?  I never could stop.  Never learned how to stop.  Never cared to learn how to say "that's enough for me" or "no thanks".

There is a point in the book that the author talks about considering having a drink ("What's the big deal?") and then thinks about it further and understands that she will never be able to moderate.  That she had tried moderating for years and was unsuccessful, and in fact, got worse.  Why would she be able to take periods off, be able to take it or leave it, after having that one drink?  She would not be able to.  I am exactly the same way.  If I drank now, I see that it would lead to more drinking.  I wouldn't be able to have a drink at dinner tonight, then a drink in a month or 2, then a drink at the holidays, etc.  Why on earth would I think otherwise?  If I have one, I have instantly given myself permission to do it again.  I would be a drinker again.  It wouldn't be casual, even if I managed to convince myself it was.  Even if I literally did follow that "schedule" of a drink now, and then one again in weeks or months' time.  I would be miserable.  I would anxiously await the time I could drink again.  The time between would get shorter and shorter, and I would get more down on myself especially if I was failing at personal "goals", and then I would decide to drown the ole sorrows.  I can see it and it sucks.  I do not want to be that person anymore.

Not sure if this means I am coming closer to admitting I am an alcoholic.  I feel like saying, well what the heck else could I be??  I can't have "just one", I've had to abstain entirely, I blog about my experience GETTING SOBER, I have been to AA....what else is it going to take to admit it??

I think I hold back because I am a mother now.  It's weird logic, I know.  Before I had my son, if I would have gone into this phase of life (sober phase), I think I would be a lot more comfortable saying that I am an alcoholic, using that label, etc.  It affected only me.  But now I have my beautiful little dude, and being his mother, I feel like it makes me sound like less of a mother- maybe not less, but not as "good" of a mother.  It tarnishes it.  I know that's horrible to say, particularly because there are so many awesome moms out there who are self-proclaimed alcoholics or recovered alcoholics or what have you.  It's like you stop drinking and you immediately have a label forever...ALCOHOLIC!  ALCOHOLIC!  It's depressing, no?  I don't want to be 30 years sober and still call myself an alcoholic.  It seems so sad.  It's like, I was an alcoholic when I was drinking!  Now I am NOT one, because I have stopped!  Sigh.  Who knows.  I feel I am content with the label "problem drinker".  Maybe it's a cop out.  I feel like it's admitting I had/have a problem and can't drink like a "normal" person, but still doesn't carry the weight that "alcoholic" does.

Anyhoo- hope all are well :). Much love.