Mother, I Sober
A complex relationship with Alcohol
It’s been a few weeks since my last article. I sure missed writing and I hope my readers missed me too! I haven’t written anything because I was processing a lot at once. Anger, Anguish, Attraction, Anticipation, Anxiety and a few more A words sprinkled in there. One A word was certainly more present than others, Alcohol.
Those that know me, know that I am no stranger to the bottle. In fact one of my earliest memories is a very young me, excited as ever to be on the throne itself, my dads lap, and taking a sip of his favourite beer Golden Pilsener. I don’t remember much beyond the action of taking a sip, maybe I was drunk, but I do know that experience was meaningful enough to still be in my head two decades later.
In my early teen years I spent a lot of time alone, particularly weekends. I was never a naughty kid per se, rather I was a nerd. I never broke the rules and my idea of fun was doing homework. Ugh. I cringed writing that. But it was true. So one lonely Saturday, I got a Hunters Dry (cider) from the gardener, who doubled as my guardian when my parents were away. I believe he had a female visitor and didn’t want to be disturbed, therefore he opted to bribe me with alcohol then promptly disappear.
It was cold. I felt a little nervous. I was about to be one of the cool kids. I could already picture a slow walk down the maths corridor like Dom in the Fast and the Furious as I triumphantly declared to my schoolmates that “Hey, I got drunk on Saturday.” A real James Bond. After sufficiently daydreaming, I opened it and took my first sip. Sweet. But Tasty. I finished that bottle in seconds and I immediately felt this warmth from the pit of my stomach. I felt happy, excited, confident and very cool. Like Walker, Texas Ranger cool. I went into the house and threw a one man party complete with loud music and a failed attempt to cook.
At the end of my first year of university, I was thousands of miles from family, in a foreign country and trying desperately to fit in. I had just finished my last assignment, and without wasting time poured out my first drink and with conviction declared, “Cheers to the fucking weekend!” The next thing I knew, I woke up in my pyjamas feeling fresh. My first assumption was my friends went out without me. However, that was quickly disproven by my friends who could barely recount the story of our evening because they were laughing so much. It turned out I did go out, but I was so drunk I literally blacked out. In that time, I fell backwards and hurt my shoulder, I flirted poorly with everyone I saw and tried to invite Campus Police back to my room for shots. At some point I was also kicked out of a frat party for dancing on their expensive furniture. Wild.
One morning, years after university I woke up and completed my morning routine. I headed out to fetch my work mates to begin my day. Unfortunately, I never made it to work. Instead my day turned into a marathon to finish the bottle of whiskey I had in my hand. My brother had died. I was devastated and I was in such a vulnerable place. The only manly way I could receive comfort was from Jack Daniels. My friends didn’t know how to help me. They couldn’t hug me, that would have been “gay”. They didn’t know what to say to me, I mean what do you tell someone whose brother died? They knew what I knew, drink till the pain stops. And that is what I did. For 6 months. Six months of drinking so much that between crying and being drunk I could barely see the road going home on a daily basis.
Which brings me back to the last few weeks. Alcohol became a feature in my life again because of the anniversary of my friend taking his own life. I find myself being revisited by feelings of loneliness and anxiety, and the need to escape my mind before falling into another depression. What’s funny is I have noticed that alcohol has amplified my negative emotions, not reduced them. Particularly when I am not drinking. I am no professional but I think that a long time ago, I ruined my capacity to deal with my problems with a sober mind and instead I instinctively opt for the elixir of emotional numbness because its easy.
I believe I have built a strange relationship with Alcohol. I like it. I like how happy I feel, how I feel on top of the world and that I can literally solve world hunger tomorrow. I like how music sounds better, food tastes better, conversations flow freely, and how I can do things I would have normally been too reserved to do like dance. Like J Hus said, “who said bad man don’t dance.”
But, at the same time I hate it. I hate how I feel after drinking, sick, headache and ready to throw up on a moments notice. I hate how when I am sober, all the things I was shoving down emotionally come back to the surface with more fervour than before. I hate that when I speak “freely” with alcohol it is just me saying the most hurtful things to those I love in the name of being truthful. I hate that when I drink I am always the victim and never the perpetrator. Everything in my life happens to me not because of me.
Therein lies the problem with Alcohol. It makes it okay to divorce responsibility from yourself. Being drunk makes it okay to be the worst version of yourself without guilt. Being drunk requires you to stay drunk because when you stop, you simply overwhelm the underdeveloped part of your brain that was meant to deal with adversity, prompting you to seek out what was meant to be a temporary fix, alcohol and perpetuating the cycle.
I would like to believe that my relationship with alcohol is better than some of the people I know and love. But I am acutely aware of its destructive nature. I have been called unprintable words by my loved ones while they were drunk, with one asking me to “shut up with your stupid American accent” and to kill myself. I too have done things I am not proud of. Perhaps the best way for all of us to kick the bad habit is to find a replacement for the crutch that is alcohol in life. After that, practicing dealing with adversity with a sober mind, reducing the need to turn to the bottle when life gets tough.
I know its the only way to break the shackles of alcohol and alcoholism and as long as I am willing to put in the work, there is no reason the plan will fail. I want my loved ones to put in the work too. We have to find better ways to cope. We have to quit the excuses. We have to face our demons. Sober. We have to kick Alcohol out of our lives.
