Better Out Than In

Forewarning: Angry Rant Ahead with Lots of Swear Words.

I’m an irritable fucking mess today. 5 days, 16 hours and 27 minutes since my last drink and I was doing pretty damned good until today. Today I really want a drink. 

No. That’s a lie. I was doing fine for some good parts of the day. Then one little thing happened, the trigger was pulled, and the cravings shot off like fireworks in my brain. And it was over the most ridiculous thing ever:

This comment:

“It’s amazing how articulate you are considering you are newly sober and in rehab. I’ve been in rehab and I spent years working in a rehab and I seldom met a newcomer able to communicate at this level. This leads me to believe that you are either a well established author (I hope so) or you’re not really newly sober and in rehab. Sorry for my skepticism but I have been in recovery for 32 years and something about this just doesn’t seem right. And by the way, personal journals are meant to be private, not public.”

First of all, I should be flattered that the chaos in my head and my heart is somehow finding order on the page and still has some semblance of sanity. But there’s two other parts that really pissed me off (great timing, because I’ve been in a mood all day). “You’re not really newly sober and in rehab” and the final “And by the way, personal journals are meant to be private, not public.”

Like…WTF?

Ok. I’m sure they meant well.

Thankfully, there are no drinks to be had here, because for some reason it’s driving me to want to drink all the drinks.

I write for myself, to get my thoughts out.

Words to me are like wool to a loom.

It’s a craft I adore and I spin sentences in my head just walking down the street (forgetting them instantly, but I love to write as much as I do photography and art.) I’m blessed that there’s so many of you supporting me on this journey and are taking your time to read whatever nonsense spills out of my fingers each day – despite all your own challenges, and you still take the time to encourage me. It says so very much about your character, and I thank you.

Like seriously. You are all amazing.

I think I was just shocked as shit to essentially read someone suggesting I don’t belong here and that the absolute reality of what is happening to me and how I’m feeling is a lie – or doesn’t fit their concept of what an alcoholic is, how they should write, or how I should be acting.

How I wish to fuck it was all a fairy tale.

Why am I even caring about this? Why is it bothering me so much?

Maybe because it took me literally a DECADE to come to a point of honesty where I admitted I need help and had no other options. The final straw. The last chance given, knowing there won’t be anymore. The 9th life long gone.

I don’t know.

But swallowing what little pride I had left and committing to leaving so as to save myself as well as my marriage, my family, my businesses and personal potential was among the hardest things I’ve ever had to do (and I know the hard part hasn’t even started yet.) Admitting I’ve been failing at all of them is a tough to pill to swallow – especially with nothing to wash it down with anymore.

I refuse to apologize for what I write here – or that I’m not moving fast enough or I write with an “emotional fragility” and “pretty words” that are so real to me, still here on the other side, just days into a journey many of you have been working an entire lifetime on.

Of course I’m fucking emotionally fragile right now.

(Aside, again: Thank you more than you’ll ever know to all of you who have made me feel encouraged and not alone, who’ve said you know what I’m talking about and that you’ve been where I’m at…that it gets harder but it’s worth it. You know who you are, and though we haven’t met, I love you all.)

Next – “a journal should be private, not public.”

I call total bullshit on that one.

This is my experience, my journey, and I’ll do with it what I want. I need this to look back on one day. Perhaps it’s generational, and I don’t want to scribe my deep dark secrets into a paper journal that will disappear with age, as though these emotions never happened. Hidden away like the dirty family secret – if no one knows, then it never happened.

Well, fuck that.

It’s time to talk about shit. NOT talking about it is how I got here, and I’m not making that mistake ever again. Maybe one day someone will read this and it’ll inspire them to be honest, too, and start a dialogue that will save their own or someone else’s life. Maybe it won’t. But for right now, it’s the best medicine I’m taking every day.

The problem with this world is that we are told how to feel. We are told not to talk about it. And we are told that we shouldn’t be feeling what we are feeling. That, right there, is the biggest problem I have with organized religion.

I AM a spiritual person. It doesn’t mean I need to go to a church.

Going to church doesn’t make me a Christian. I could sit in a garage all day and it doesn’t make me a car.

I believe in a Higher Power, most definitely – and I call her the universe. I see her in trees and in music and the touching of hands. The exchange of energy and the power within us to change our lives based on our thoughts. But that’s another post for another day. (I actually have the words “Thoughts Become Things” tattooed on my arm, alongside a Dalai Lama quote about gratitude).

Well holy shit, I’m on a rant, and I apologize. This post is turning more and more into a mirror of my brain at the moment.

Better out than in, I suppose.

I’ve been doing great trying to adjust and settle in here, having my little moments of pride every time I check my tracker to see how long I’ve gone without a drink and how much money I’ve saved (unfortunately, it doesn’t track how many people I haven’t hurt or things I’ve screwed up in the meantime) all the while trying to dislodge that stupid butcher knife that is still lodged between my eyes like a never-ending migraine.

One more reason I’m so irritable today.

So it’s water, more water, and eventually a mineral water to give myself some variety (I know, living on the edge over here.) I’m very much looking forward to getting into deeper counselling this week, starting tomorrow, finally.

After re-reading what I just wrote, apparently I need it desperately.

I want to do the work. I can’t WAIT to do the work.

I’m quite certain I’m depressed. Nothing new, really. I was depressed when I left home and I was depressed when I arrived here. Now I’m just depressed, in withdrawal, and lonely – despite having made some great friends already.

I’m going to thank that person who left the comment that I didn’t write enough like an alcoholic – whatever the hell that means. Because without it, I wouldn’t have found the courage inside me right now to sweep all of this clutter out of my brain.

I have a feeling I’m going to sleep much better tonight.