Six tidbits from six months sober from the mouth of a reforming pisshead
From the huge mental and physical benefits to rejuvenating Sundays to spurts of anger and frustration to the unbridled joy explosions.
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Six tidbits from six months off da piss from a decorated pisshead
1. Those fears that you are locked into your habits are well founded – but they are there to be challenged
We all have habits – some overwhelmingly productive, others become more demanding and exhausting as we get older, some putting a strain on our health, relationships, our self-esteem. I’ve been a binge drinker since I was 17. I’ve gone too hard on many occasions, I’ve had many incredible nights and experience while drinking, but from about 2022 it stopped being so fun, and the dancing, the karaoke, the silliness ended up becoming isolated to my loungeroom. At first I justified it as a stress reliever, then it became an almost nightly visit to the bottle-o. The habit festered. Challenging the notion I was assumed to be stuck in these habits has given me so much self-belief again.
2. You’ll find joy again
Not enough is made of the pure, adulterated joy of finishing up a day of work, heading to the gym for a spin class followed by a sauna and a spa, then heading home to grab a soda water, chucking on some random 1997 wrestling PPV, snacking on some camembert and writing out a few silly lists that have come flooding into your head knowing you’re not going to be hungover tomorrow. Knowing you don’t actually have to drink. Knowing that you’re at ease. Not anxious. Not depressed. Not lonely because you just organised to catch up with mates for dinner and you’re not forcing yourself to go on Hinge dates simply to justify your mediocre love life. You’re just there living.
3. Booze is incredibly addictive – not just the actual drink itself, but the culture surrounding it
Alcohol is very addictive and it is incredibly insidious. When I started to hide how much I was drinking from friends, family, work colleagues, by slipping in for a couple on my own, by substituting the coffee for a wine, by justifying one more night of drinking, by skipping training, by going as hard as I possibly could at a niece’s first birthday, I knew in my heart of hearts that this was not where I wanted to be. But how do you go sober for a Buck’s Party? Or a wedding? Or a footy function? Or interstate? And the deeper answer reveals itself. It’s not just the booze, it’s the culture that makes it so tough to say no.
4. A good starting point are Reddit pages, or even SMART sessions, and then life will start to open up again.
My friend Charlotte directed me to a Reddit Page (r/stopdrinking) as I started talking about giving up booze for a month. I lasted nine days. But I was miserable. I was sad. I was crying almost every single day or night in the shower. The hangovers would make me feel like I wanted to die. I couldn’t get through a Parkrun because my back seized up but I was so unfit that 5ks had become too much. The Reddit page had many stories similarly, some more intense, others giving hope to make change. The sole SMART meeting I went to in Northcote further filled me with hope. It is bloody hard, but it can be done. And when I started to give up, I also got into spin classes, boxing classes, pilates. My body healed as my anxiety levelled out. I could endure ADHD meds. My life has opened up again. I am no longer trapped in short term thinking.
5. Navigating your emotions is so much easier.
There were tough days, particularly early on, because life doesn’t stop. I got angry for a few days, bitter, sad. I wanted to tear shreds off a couple of mates who I perceived to be unfairly targeting me, I caught up with a former partner and while all appeared pretty good, turned into a conversation that made me feel internally horrible. The deaths of Troy and Adam Selwood nipped at the heels of the questions that bubble away – what is the point? And the point revealed itself when I realised I could navigate between the things I carry with much more sense, with more maturity, without panicking. Add in Vyvanse and the eight plates that I juggle until they get too heavy became lighter, safer and less chaotic. Life still happens, it just gets easier to manage without booze.
6. Sundays.
I’d forgotten what it was like to feel good on a Sunday. The sun peeking through the cracks in the window, the couples walking along the Merri Creek with a coffee in hand and their border collie trudging by, the markets, the long drives to the beach, the catch ups with friends that aren’t so painful, the long, winding conversations with the sober people you hadn’t seen for a while… the absence of shame. I couldn’t tell you the amount of times I have found myself on all fours spewing up into the toilet on a Sunday, promising myself this would be the last time. For me, it does beg the question of why I trashed my body so much – and it’s a much more complicated answer for another time. For these six months, I got my Sundays back. And it was beautiful.
So where to from here? I’ve got to have some time with my thoughts, run a half marathon in the Sunshine Coast, win a premiership with the Mighty Trios, pretend I am going to retire, finish my counselling Masters, find a job whether in Melbourne or otherwise and consider my relationship with booze, but my natural direction appears to be at the very least in the ballpark of sober curiosity. There is a lot of advice, which I’m very thankful for, but after a very long term of teaching, study and placement, a few days to think will do me well.
Here is the final song – a verse from Sam Fender’s duet with Olivia Dean that sums up where the direction may take me if you listen to the lyrics carefully.
I resonate with this a lot, thanks for sharing - all power to you with the next step