Third day
This is the first milestone on my new nonalcoholic life because in my former drinking life, I would resume drinking on the third day after two days alcohol free. I believed that I was giving my body a break. So, tonight, I won't drink any alcohol--no wine, no beer, no cocktails, and my body will wonder what is going on. Thoughts and cravings are always there in the background, but I am at the point at which I know there is no solution to this conundrum of drinking but to stop completely.
Last night I started drawing and coloring again for the first time in ages. I have a set of coloring pencils and an adult coloring book. I also have a sketchbook. I put on some Latin jazz and started filling in filigrees and flowers and actually enjoying it. I live alone and alcohol could blunt out the loneliness and uncomfortable feelings and thoughts very easily. I could drink and surf the internet or watch a show on my computer and be on autopilot.
I decided to tear myself away from the computer because it started to get boring. I am not a trained painter or drawer but I like color. Without the veil of alcohol to distract me, I can use my brain and my time, which I have plenty of on evenings these days and for the forseeable future in quarantine.
I did think and bargain in my head about the drinking and while on social media, it's amazing how many ads and postings there are about alcohol. People post their cocktails, their "quarantinis" on social media. Liquor companies buy ads on FB for alcohol delivery. There are inviting photos of tasteful dinner tables with half filled glasses of expensive wines. Friends talk about "mojito day."
It does get the imagination and the cravings going, but I know that it's a dead end to indulge in this. Because I know that as an addictive drinker, I can't stop at one drink. One drink makes me want more and more.
Some say that some obese people don't know when to stop eating because they don't feel a strong sense of satiety or their feeling of fullness takes a lot more food. I feel that way with alcohol. Or perhaps when I feel the pleasant bluntedness of being drunk, I don't want it to go away though I know everything is temporary--being drunk, being sad, being happy, craving alcohol, having fun, working hard, being stressed. Maybe I can use what I have learned from my desire to stay drunk forever to understand that its opposite--feeling bad--doesn't last forever either. If I am using the feeling of being drunk, the elation, the high, to avoid other ways of being but also knowing that this elevated state doesn't last, it can be that the bad states don't last either. I can ride them out. There is a metaphysics to this. How interesting that the lessons of my alcoholism can be used to learn how to live sober...
Tonight I am doing mostly what I did last night. Taking a long walk and getting at least 10,000 steps on my pedometer, eating dinner--salmon and rice and kale, drinking chilled fruit infused sparkling water in a wine glass, and drawing with colored pencils while listening to music. And taking many dance breaks. And then shower and bed. This is middle age and it's not actually that bad!
Last night I started drawing and coloring again for the first time in ages. I have a set of coloring pencils and an adult coloring book. I also have a sketchbook. I put on some Latin jazz and started filling in filigrees and flowers and actually enjoying it. I live alone and alcohol could blunt out the loneliness and uncomfortable feelings and thoughts very easily. I could drink and surf the internet or watch a show on my computer and be on autopilot.
I decided to tear myself away from the computer because it started to get boring. I am not a trained painter or drawer but I like color. Without the veil of alcohol to distract me, I can use my brain and my time, which I have plenty of on evenings these days and for the forseeable future in quarantine.
I did think and bargain in my head about the drinking and while on social media, it's amazing how many ads and postings there are about alcohol. People post their cocktails, their "quarantinis" on social media. Liquor companies buy ads on FB for alcohol delivery. There are inviting photos of tasteful dinner tables with half filled glasses of expensive wines. Friends talk about "mojito day."
It does get the imagination and the cravings going, but I know that it's a dead end to indulge in this. Because I know that as an addictive drinker, I can't stop at one drink. One drink makes me want more and more.
Some say that some obese people don't know when to stop eating because they don't feel a strong sense of satiety or their feeling of fullness takes a lot more food. I feel that way with alcohol. Or perhaps when I feel the pleasant bluntedness of being drunk, I don't want it to go away though I know everything is temporary--being drunk, being sad, being happy, craving alcohol, having fun, working hard, being stressed. Maybe I can use what I have learned from my desire to stay drunk forever to understand that its opposite--feeling bad--doesn't last forever either. If I am using the feeling of being drunk, the elation, the high, to avoid other ways of being but also knowing that this elevated state doesn't last, it can be that the bad states don't last either. I can ride them out. There is a metaphysics to this. How interesting that the lessons of my alcoholism can be used to learn how to live sober...
Tonight I am doing mostly what I did last night. Taking a long walk and getting at least 10,000 steps on my pedometer, eating dinner--salmon and rice and kale, drinking chilled fruit infused sparkling water in a wine glass, and drawing with colored pencils while listening to music. And taking many dance breaks. And then shower and bed. This is middle age and it's not actually that bad!
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