Five years of sobriety — a quick review
Today marks the five year anniversary of when I quit drinking, and I wanted to share some of the things I’ve learned so far. Not because it’s a story of unmitigated success (honestly, it’s been absolutely freaking horrendous at times), but because I could never have done it myself without having friends who shared their own stories of how they gave up drinking — and I’m really hoping I can pay it forward!
On April 3rd 2016, I woke up with an indescribable amount of anxiety. I had been partying for 14 days straight, and on this Sunday morning it wasn’t just the hangover that got me — I woke up crying! To this day, I have never felt that bad in my life, and I immediately knew I had to do something. Wary of all the failed Sunday morning attempts I had had in the past (honestly, who hasn’t given up drinking on a Sunday morning only to fail the next Friday?), I decided to hold off of drinking for the next month, or at least until I felt better. That shouldn’t be that hard, especially since I had done it multiple times before. Easy peasy, right? Ehh… wrong!
I never realized how difficult it could be to be alone with your thoughts, without any means of escape. It. Was. Absolutely. Terrifying!
Less than a week into my abstinence, I was struggling! The withdrawal symptoms were very real, and it took all my strength just to get through a Friday night alone at home. Forget a dry month, or even a dry week — I had to focus on staying sober that day! Luckily I lived next to a supermarket, and I did own a PS4, so I got through that first weekend with chocolate and Wolfenstein. I barely slept at all that weekend though and I couldn’t muster up the strength to meet anyone — but I made it through that first full week!
The first few months went by in basically the same way. Irritability, insomnia, stress, anxiety, crying. I couldn’t really deal with that while being around people either, so I chose to isolate myself as much as I could. A few weeks into my sobriety, my days had (d)evolved into a set routine:
- A promise to myself to stay sober that day — anything more than that felt insurmountable
- Power through work if it was a week day, or go hiking if it was a weekend
- Tracking my progress — I used an app called SoberTool, so I could easily see how long I had been sober
- Crying
- Chocolate
- Video games
- Having a breakdown (not every day, but three times a week or so)
Luckily, I did start to see some progress within a few weeks. Slowly but surely my anxiety was starting to decrease, and I felt better. Not good, but better. And I felt healthier. I started shedding some of those extra pounds that I had put on over the years. After having kept the daily promise of sobriety 30 times in a row, I decided to share the post below on Instagram. I was proud of myself, of course, but it also felt important to share because I didn’t want to feel bad for struggling, or feel ashamed of being human.
I’d say it took me about two years to feel good again. To be able to live a normal life, to be around people, to go to bars and actually have fun (pro tip: having a non-alcoholic beer in your hand does wonders — it gives you a sense of belonging, and it keeps people off your back), and to only have a few anxiety attacks per month! It was still a daily struggle though, every single day. In some ways, it still is.
Today, five years in, I can’t say I’ve ever fully recovered. I still need a lot of alone time to get through my days, and anxiety certainly knows how to find me. On the upside though, this experience gave me a lot of practice being alone, which is something I’m very thankful for today after a year working from home. And if I had to go through all of this again I wouldn’t hesitate to do it, because overall — mentally, economically, physically, and socially (believe it or not) — my life is so much better now! That said though, if I did get a do-over, there’s a few things I definitely would do differently. If you are thinking about cutting down on your own drinking, maybe these suggestions can help you as well:
- Don’t quit cold turkey! Believe it or not, but quitting cold turkey can actually kill you! And even if I obviously survived, the withdrawal symptoms I experienced the first month were far from pleasant, neither for me nor the people around me. If I were to do it again, I’d do it in steps. Maybe limit myself to drinking twice a week in the beginning, then once a week, once every two, three, four weeks, and so on until I could quit entirely. It doesn’t SOUND as cool as quitting cold turkey, but the end result — drinking less — is the same. I bet I had felt better doing it as well.
- Decide beforehand what success means to you. From the beginning, I thought success would (and should) be measured in “consecutive days sober”. This is still the easiest way to explain sobriety to someone, but I actually think it adds unnecessary anxiety to the process. You could think about it this way: if in a year from now, I’ve managed to stay sober 365 days, then that would be the ultimate success, right? But what if I stayed sober 364 of those days? Or 350? Or 313? How would you measure that? For me personally, anything above 300 would be wildly successful, and I quickly started chasing the goal “I’m going to stay sober today” instead. Regardless if I failed or succeeded, I could always try to do the same again tomorrow. That took away A LOT of the pressure, and I actually think that was one of the absolute keys to success for me. In the end, every drink that you DON’T drink is a success in itself, and for each and every one of those, your body (and wallet) will thank you.
- Think about your reasons to drink! This is something I realized way too late, and I think it can be helpful to think about beforehand. Before I quit, I always thought that the environment I was in was a huge reason why I drank so often. I mean, every time something social was organized, drinking seemed to play an integral part of it. Hanging out, going to dinners, after work parties, watching sports, playing pool, you name it. Always beer — always! OF COURSE I WAS DRINKING, because I was such a social person! Now in retrospect, though, the question that really messes with my mind is whether I drank because I was such a social person, or if I was a social person just to have an excuse to drink? I still don’t know if I want to know the answer to this.
- Ask for help! There’s nothing heroic or worthwhile with suffering needlessly, that’s just some macho bullshit. I finally shared my struggles with a few friends, and later on Instagram, but it took me long enough. I also went to see a therapist, but not until I was weeks into the process, and only because I couldn’t stop crying. I wish I had gone to see him sooner, because when I did, it helped a lot!
Well, that’s it for now I guess. Thanks for reading! Now I’m going to lean back and celebrate five years on the wagon with an Instagram post — mostly because I want to help others, but I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t proud of myself as well. 🙂
