Moved

Hey everyone!

I'm off to Wordpress.com

The new blog is

http://thesoberbalance.wordpress.com/

or

http://thesoberbalance.com

Thanks!

Old Stagnant Friendships

I’ve had this friend for many many years. For the sake of the blog and anonymity I’ll call her Megan. Megan is beautiful. She is stunning and has the most amazing positive energy in the world (aka she loves to party). I met her when we were pledging a sorority in 1992.

Really her beauty deserves some more attention. She’s a crowd stopper. A brunette with a cute petite shape AND big boobs. Long, silky, perfectly straight hair. She doesn’t even have to blow dry it to keep from getting fly aways. I’ve never seen her have a fly away or use product! But of course it’s all about her face. Perfect little ski slope nose, high cheekbones, puffy lips, almond shaped brown eyes. It’s totally nauseating!

When I met her twenty years ago I was (and still am) a full-fledged social misfit. I felt awkward in every situation imaginable unless of course I had a few beers in me. Then all my insecurities slid down my throat to be churned with stomach acid, a fine place for my insecurities to end up.

But Megan didn’t see my awkwardness or ugliness; she saw something else. Maybe it was just a warm body that was up for the same party she was. I don’t know, but she offered multiple times to pick me up in her hot red RX-7 so we could go to a party together. And nothing beat showing up a party with her. Nothing. Ever.

So that’s the foundation of our relationship. Nowhere to go but up. Surely a relationship built on such depth and gratitude would be spiritually fulfilling for years, right? Needless to say, I’ve fought with what she meant to me for a long time.

One year I called her on her birthday—this was after knowing her for eleven years—and after talking to her for twenty minutes she says, “Sara, from Raleigh? Oh!”

Granted at that point in our relationship she was living in NYC, living the Sex and the City life, and I was in Raleigh, married and expecting my first child.  But we had lived together for a year, done many road trips together and even a cruise.  You would think she would know what my voice sounded like on the phone. But in some ways this hints at one of the most basic flaws I find in our relationship. She NEVER asks me about me.

My first child is 11. His name is John. It is not short for anything. She still calls him Jonathan. 

Here comes my alcoholic side, so hold on. I could go on and on for pages about how horribly she has treated me over the years. How I’ve never mattered to her or she’s never called me on my birthday. I could make you hate her with a few cutting, highly descript sentences. But, I’m in recovery.

No seriously, I am in recovery and I have played a part in this relationship too. An equal part. I kept calling her after she didn’t recognize my voice after twenty minutes.

Funny this is the part of the writing process where I just took a three-minute facebook break. Because I don’t want to admit that I’m just as much to blame for this flawed relationship as she is. That yes, she upset me three days ago on the phone, but I’ve got to look at my part of it too. This is the part of recovery that is mandatory.

If I don’t look at my recent resentment of her then I stand a real chance of drinking again. For me, I carry resentments very far. They wear out their welcomes. They grow mold. They decompose in my heart.

Megan and I have had a relationship pattern, a pattern I helped create. We all have patterns in relationships but this metaphor of a pattern has been helpful in describing recovery to people. So Megan and I went like this ABAAAX ABAAAX ABAAAX or whatever.  She would talk, I would try and talk about my life, it got back to her and her problems, I would sympathize, play the part of a friend, then walk off and stew because of her not listening to me. Over and over again for years. This is how it’s gone. Well suddenly something has changed—I am sober and that affects everything. It changes every pattern in my life! 

But just because I am experiencing continental divide and mountain-raising earthquakes in my psyche doesn’t mean everyone else in my life got the memo. So Megan and I talked on Tuesday and it bothered me.

I am mad. I am not okay with how the conversation went. Something must change but I don’t know how to change it or correct it! I’m simply aware of it now. I’m aware of the fact that I am not okay with the relationship, that this is not a friendship!  I’m aware and ready to fight for the injustices that have been done to my former self! This is so NOT okay.

Sound the bull-shit horn someone. Gimme a break. It takes two to tango people.

Since I’m discovering boundaries and realizing how I want to be treated, it’s not really her fault. It’s not her fault at all! This is where the program DEMANDS that I “do the work.” I get it, I totally get it. If I don’t I’ll have that damn resentment.

So now what?

Are there modern guidelines for divorcing friends? I want to do something dramatic! Go out with a bang! But no, I can’t, that’s too alcoholic of me. What if, in a year, I care about her again? What if I want to reach out to her and say, how are you? If I burn that bridge in dramatic fashion by writing a snide email, it won’t happen. Ugh. 

This is so not me! The middle road in my mind hasn’t even been discovered. It’s still an undisturbed forest.

Alright, I wrote an innocuous enough email to her this morning. Told her I couldn’t make it to her 40^th blow out bash she’s planning in Miami because we’re saving for a new house. (We’re not really saving for a new house.) That was it.

I think now I should just let it go.

That’s right. Just let it go.  I don’t need to call her.  I can just LET HER BE.

I can still “like” her photos on facebook and she can continue to not “like” mine because she never notices my facebook presence.

In a way, this kind of reaction is so…. Dull….uninteresting. She doesn’t even know that I’m mad! But that’s the thing, what’s the point of making her aware of it? There is none. I can’t change her. I can only change myself and by me NOT doing anything, I am changing. Today that’s going to have to be enough. 

You don't look like an alcoholic....

God,

The other day someone in a private conversation asked me this, “how do you know you’re an alcoholic because you don’t seem like one?” Fair enough, I thought. You can’t judge a book but it’s cover, right? And I am pretty secretive, especially about my drinking. Well I’m going to try to explain this to my new friends with your guidance of course.

I had my first drink when I was either 11, 12 or 13. Something in that range. That’s early but I didn’t know then I had a problem. In my twenties I started to think, in the background somewhere, maybe, just maybe, I have a problem but not until my late thirties did things finally start to reach a head.

My family was moved to Atlanta in 2008 for my husband’s job. I went screaming and kicking. I was quite settled in Raleigh, NC and didn’t want to go but you gotta follow the gravy train. We set up camp in a nice enough neighborhood and I got to business finding the most serious drinkers I have ever come across in my life. Within six months of moving here, I started my year and a half-long dedication to at least four hangovers a week. That was the period that kind of opened my eyes but I still didn’t do anything about it then.

During this time of hard regular drinking, I was (and still am) a stay-at-home mom. I would wake up and stumble around through the morning routine, hoping the kids didn’t notice that I couldn’t even open my eyes completely. My days were spent telling myself how horrible I was, how much I hated where I lived, saying that I would swear off drinking once and for all, looking for jobs on the Internet, napping and exercising the drink out of my dry pores. My only friends were drinking buddies and believe me they did not have my best intentions at heart. My husband wanted nothing to do with me, and the kids wanted to be where their friends were, where luck would have it, was also where my wine was.

I’m not like a bum drunk who lived on the street, asking for spare change. I never lost my house, my marriage or the kids. I’m still pretty sure not all the neighbors know about my recovery.  But I’m a bonafide drunk, class A alcoholic, obsessed with the drink, can’t say no to one, have to have way too many, gotta make a mess of things, especially myself. I also like pills.

Like I said it wasn’t that research period of a year and a half that got me screaming, “I give, I give.” But what it did do was enable me to reel it in somewhat and make a deal with myself (all alcoholic’s do this wheeling and dealing). It was, if I start counting my hangovers again, then I’ll admit defeat. And that’s what happened. I started counting hangovers again and within a year, I was back up to two to a week. And when I did go all out drinking, the hangovers got worse and worse. They were crippling. I knew my ass was kicked, especially at the family reunion. Of course, right? Gotta go out in style. More on that later.

But, I’m sober now, seven months today a matter of fact, and it ain’t easy. BUT it’s better than that hellacious past I just told you about. That was hell. Thank GOD, HE led me to a special group of people that all are sober. 

Peace out peeps! Until later.

Real quick-- I promise.

Monday my sweet hubby took the day off from work to care for me. That's the way I spin it. Another way to spin it is to say he had to stay home to make sure the two oldest got to school and the baby didn't sit in his crib all day. But, I like to say he did it for ME! It was a sweet gesture though there was nothing he could do to help me. My hair's too short to hold back when I puke and I really didn't need help crawling back to bed.

It's actually beyond a sweet gesture if you knew that three years ago something similar happened, but he almost left me not in the bed to recover, but completely-- as in 'I'm going to a hotel with a suitcase.' I had alcohol poisoning one night and begged him to take me to the hospital, all I needed was an IV and something for the nausea. He reluctantly agreed to take me but first he took the kids to a neighbors and out of spite and his own pain told them where we going and (horribly) WHY we were going there. It was the cinematic equivalent of when the good guy has the bad guy on the floor, on his stomach, beaten, hands tied behind his back, and steps on his face for the hell of it.

Those days I felt his presence like a massive iceberg moving through the house. There was nothing between us and the waters were widening.

But Monday there was just warmth. There was no distance, no divide, no my side, his side. He just wanted to help ME! I wanted to kiss him but obviously he wouldn't let me do that.

We got global warming going on right here! But mine is a miracle, a gift! Oh, and I am so grateful.

Hello you, it's me...

God,

You know how I’ve been struggling with my first blog entry—how do I introduce myself, where do I start, people are going to think I’m nuts, and finally why am I compelled to do this??? And then this last beautiful episode in my life happened. There could be no better story to share with potential friends then this one. It introduces my insanity, my ill concept of priorities and greatest of all it humbles me in front of all.

God, you know this but not everyone out there does, that I’ve always addressed you in journals, letters, and the dialogue in my head. I’m not making this up. I talk to you, a lot. Probably many of us do. Fortunately for me I’ve started hearing your subtle replies to my constant rambling, probably because I’m sober. More on that soon…

So anyway God, I haven’t journaled in a few days because I have been sick. Not just sick but hugging the toilet, buckled over in cramps, sweating and shivering sick. And then when that past I was left with the wooziness, headache, and weak legs trio. It’s been tough. (God, bear with me as I cover ground you’re quite familiar with.)

I thank my two-year old for this. I really forgot since my last kiddo went through pre-school what germs they came home with. Those germs are monsters! I swear if I were eighty I’d be six feet under from this! There’s not enough Greek yogurt in the world to keep my digestive track full of “healthy” bacteria to ward off this crap. 

But what’s odd or ironic or coincidental is my most recent obsession before the stomach bug, but first I got sober—aka quit drinking and taking pills—six months ago. It’s been a journey. But lucky for me I was as desperate as only the dying can be and I have been given a life preserver.  Six months ago, I was lucky enough to call on a friend in the ‘hood (Golf course community) I live in.  She’s one hip chick. She’s covered with tats, has the figure of a ballet dancer, has hair like Pink and sings like a white Billie Holiday.  Oh and very into the vintage 50’s vibe, I think it’s called Rock a Billy. She sings with her jazz band, drops the occasional CD and plays gigs from here to Paris. She’s also a devoted wife and the world’s coolest step-mom (she let her step-daughter cut a track on her last CD. She didn’t have to do that, you know?) Anyway, she told me about this anoynomous group she belonged to fifteen years ago that helped her quit “drinking and drugging” she would say, with a raspy voice that has known a smoky bar and a brutal hangover.

Basically two days later, I dragged my drunk, pilled-out ass into a meeting.  Insert big sigh of relief.

So, part of my program and the ladder rung I’m at is practicing handing it over to God. Well, what does that mean? I don’t know, I’m still figuring it out, but I have a hazy idea. First of all, I can be obsessed with anything! If I, dare say, start a shopping cart online at Old Navy, forget about it, I’m updating that bitch two times a day for a week. I may or may not buy anything, that’s not the point. Hell, I don’t know what the point is, or why I do it but I do. Don’t even let me go to Loft.com. I’m trapped in a cycle of sale items for weeks!

I know it’s part of my sickness—anyway… I create a lot of fodder.

So, my obsession is weight! I gained seven or eight pounds during the first few months of sobriety. I have really been taking it easy on myself during recovery. For some reason (and let me just say here that ‘getting sober’ stories are just as varied as ‘giving birth’ stories—no two are alike) I stopped working out. It’s like all this artificial energy left my bones and made me inexplicably tired. I was exhausted. Had to nap two hours a day for months plus I slept like a baby at night for the first time in years or ever. In addition to intense slacking off in all areas of my life in order that I could start recovery I ate however or whatever I wanted to. Who cares! I was sober and that was and is the most important thing. A peace and quiet washed over my house in the first few months of sobriety like a warm wave and I let it envelope me. It took everyone in the house on a vacation too. We were all stunned and sleepy. Mom is sober, say what?

But because I am still an alcoholic or recovering alcoholic or grateful alcoholic or whatever you want to call it, that ol’ sleeping giant called obsession still lingers in my mind. And every now and then it will wake and latch onto something and crush it. Then I got an iPhone and let me tell you why that sucked. There is an app that can count all calories, fat grams, fiber grams, minerals, vitamins, everything you put into your body can all be calculated for you upon tapping in whatever you just inhaled.  Oh and it’s free. “It’s awesome,” says my disease, formerly known as me. I still like it, ok. But one must know balance.

I have no balance.  When I get a box of thin mints, I eat one sleeve, rapidly, in succession. I can’t stop so don’t bother telling me to, I’ll just say something snide and bitchy.

So, I gained the weight, then I started counting calories IN ORDER to cut back, soon I was always counting even after I had exceeded my measly 1300 calories a day. By the way, WTF! That’s an absurd amount of very little calories. Usually I’m done with that by five o’clock, before dinner or the late night cereal binge.

Ok, so then I twisted my ankle in a mature ladies workout class at the Y. We think we’re fly. Don’t tell us otherwise. Our instructor had set up twelve-inch hurdles for us to jump and I didn’t clear one. I went down on the floor and in ego. But after resting for two days I thought well, I gotta start running or something because otherwise this weight is just gonna go up and up and up. Then I got a stomach flu.

In comes the voice of God, “You said you wanted to loose this weight you’ve gained?”

Me, “Yes God, I really do! I really reallllly do! I’ll prove it to you by being obsessed with the idea of it.”

God, “Are you going to cut back on your caloric intake?”

Me, “I’d rather not.”

God, “Ok, let me see what I can do.”

Pause.

Me, “Whoa! I didn’t mean in six hours!”

---

God gave me what I THOUGHT I wanted proving yet again that I do not know what’s best for me.  It’s not best for me to think about weight loss because today I weighed myself at the Y and thought, well actually, I’d like to loose four more pounds.

I gotta give it up. I do not need to obsess about weight. I think that if I ‘tell on myself’ and confide in you what my weaknesses are, maybe they’ll loose power and I’ll wiggle out from under them. If I occupy space in my brain with ‘weight thoughts’ then I’m not being of service to anyone, not even myself.

Peace out new friends and God,
Sara