32 Weeks of Sobriety

Fear- What I learned from my first sober Christmas Party.

Today, I have been sober for 32 weeks. 224 Days.

Sobriety

Last week I wrote about how the upcoming festive season could challenge my sobriety. Whilst a lot of those fears remain, I feel like I made significant progress this week.

On Saturday I went along to my big family Christmas party. My parents hold it each and every year on the last Saturday of November.

Over the years I have put on some real head-turning performances at this do. I felt I had something of a reputation to uphold. It’s the kind of do that starts, with alcohol, at midday. In the backyard, in the sun, day drinking. It was pretty easy to warm into some really nice form and some years, by early evening, things would start to get messy.

Dad and I at the same do, 8 years and 20+kg ago

I don’t regret any of the nights I’ve had at this party. I might regret a couple of minor things I have done at them, but I certainly don’t regret the drinking. As sad as it is, a lot of my fondest memories come from times when drinking was involved. Alcohol helps me bring my wall down a little. Usually, when I don’t overdo it, it helps me peel back the false layers of my personality that I have put there to protect myself. It helps me tell people what I really think about them. I have said things whilst intoxicated that I wish I had the courage to say sober. Sweet shit, like telling my family that I love them. It’s given me the courage to confess truths that have been eating away at me to people who deserved to know them. All this, fluffy nice shit you see drunk idiots carrying on with.

The problem I have is that I can’t be that kind of drunk without occasionally being the bad drunk. You can’t predict it. You can’t control it. You can’t stop it once it starts. Gradually, the good drunk/bad drunk ratio started to swing more and more in the wrong direction. I started doing dumb shit. Sneaking cocaine bumps off a house key in my parent’s toilet at a fucking family Christmas party before the fucking sun had gone down. “Hiding” my clenched jaw from everyone, talking real fuckin’ fast to my 90-year-old aunty about how much she enjoyed morning tea with her friends yesterday. Just fucking dumb, embarrassing shit. And I was starting to do it more and more.

That is not who I am. I don’t believe any of us are defined by our mental health issues or our actions that are consequences of them. I am not preaching here, just talking truths, I could never bag anyone for drinking, I was fucking legendary at it! But human beings’ bodies are not built to digest alcohol. It is poison. As are most drugs. By design, we are not meant to be inebriated by these substances. That’s why I believe that our habits, coping mechanisms, and mental health conditions do not define who we are as people. I think when we are in a sober state, we are who we are meant to be. It’s our most natural state.

Even though I didn’t know if I was ready, I had to stop being that version of myself. It was getting out of hand. The voice that said not to do the dumb shit was getting weaker and the voice that encouraged me to do the dumb shit was getting stronger. This is probably indicative of the gradual decline in my mental health and the effect of incrementally excusing my own poor decision-making more and more. Each time you do something, it gets easier. It reminds me of this quote that I’ve shared before.

One evening an old Cherokee told his grandson about a battle that goes on inside people.

He said, "My son, the battle is between two "wolves" inside us all.

One is Evil. It is anger, envy, jealousy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.

The other is good. It is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith."

The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: "Which wolf wins?"

The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."

I’d been feeding the wrong fucking wolf. The bad wolf was getting stronger while the good wolf was starving and decaying. It’s pretty simple to me. It’s about habits. Whichever habits you practice the most are the habits you are most likely to fall back on in desperate times. That bad wolf who was getting big and strong was making it far too easy for me to turn into a fucking idiot. It had to stop. No more food for that big fuck.

Anyway, I was quite pleased with the way I handled the party on Saturday. I think writing about my concerns around temptation last week kind of subconsciously prepared me for it. I also wrote about that anxious feeling I would have at events such as this in the past and how I wanted to get over them I think it helped with that too.

It may have had something to do with the fact that I got up at 3 am and ran 60k’s that same morning (more on that later), but I didn’t struggle with cravings or temptations at all. Apart from some mild nerves early in the piece I was barely anxious at all. There could be a few reasons why but I really think the process of writing about it last week helped me place my thoughts on it all where I needed them to be. Journaling has helped me so fucking much and I think anyone struggling with their thoughts should give it a crack. I think subconsciously I had somewhat safeguarded myself against my fears by facing them in my blog earlier that week. I don’t know how or why it worked, I’m not a fucking doctor, but maybe by confronting them I kind of dealt with them before they could become more of an issue.

I used another tool while I was there to try to help me overcome that anxiety of the past as well. I put my phone on “do not disturb”. I was a little bit afraid of doing this, partly because like most people of my generation I have something of an addiction when it comes to my phone, but more so because when you’re anxious in a public setting it’s easy to pretend you’re doing something on your phone as an escape. I guess I was eliminating this as an option and forcing myself to tackle any of these feelings I got, head-on. I’d even uploaded a video of me finishing my 60k run to all socials in a final bid to raise money for Movember, but I thought fuck it, I need to try to force myself to be present. After all, I feel like presence is going to go a long way to help me with the mental health issues I have. I was really surprised at how effective this tactic was. I didn’t even think about my phone. Well, way less than normal. I had far less distraction. I was able to mingle about, ensuring I repeated the same bullshit story to everyone about how life at the coast was, how life as a dad is, etc, and I really enjoyed it. I even got along well with my brother! (he reads this, we’ve had a checkered past at times but I think we’re sweet now, hey mate).

The next great tool I used is about 60cm long, 60cm wide, chunky as fuck and makes my arm sore from carrying the prick around all day.

Having the big fella with me to take deflect attention onto was great. I think really though, what he did for me was help me realise that these people aren’t judging me. They’re not thinking about that thing I did at the same party years ago. They’re my family. They just want to know that everyone is okay. It’s ridiculous of me to think that anything else is the case. But that’s what the anxious mind can do to someone. It can make you believe that your own family, who love and care for you, are silently sitting there judging the shit out of you. I can find some peace in the fact that it’s not about me anymore. When we walk into a party like this, it’s all about the big fella, and I couldn’t be happier about it.

I think my biggest learning this week is that I was letting fear impact the experience that I had. I was scared of being uncomfortable or anxious. So I would drink. I was scared that maybe I would have to have an awkward conversation with someone, so I would have to pretend to do something on my phone. I think fear is a very important and necessary emotion. I fear drinking again because it could negatively impact both me and the people I care about the most. I fear the ocean because fucking sharks live there. We need fear. But, did you know, 85% of the things we worry about never happen? That article goes on to say;

“Of the 15 percent of worries that came to fruition, 79 percent of the time, people handled those problems better than they thought they would. They even reported learning something valuable from the experience. Do the math, and you find that there was nothing to worry about fully 97 percent of the time.”

This doesn’t mean I should drink again. It doesn’t mean I should swim in shark-infested waters. I think the main takeaway for me here is that when I have an irrational fear and I’m capable of determining it as such, I need to remind myself of these numbers.

I was so fucking scared of going to a family fucking Christmas party without alcohol that I dedicated two whole fucking blogs to it! Surely this is up there as one of the most irrational fears someone can have? Unless your family are all psychos.

The point is, it was fine, It was always going to be fine. I was scared because I made myself scared. I wound myself up. The good thing though is I identified the concerns. Confronted them. Put measures in place to minimise their impacts and had a fucking great day with my family, sober.

The weekend before this was probably the best weekend I have had in a couple of years. Again, sober. My birthday weekend only four weeks ago was a fucking cracker too. Again, sober. I feel like, maybe, just maybe, very, fucking, slowly, I’m starting to learn how to live sober, rather than just exist sober, or fight to be sober. It’s been a lot of hard work psychologically and I’m far from finished, but each and every time I overcome a little hurdle like this, sobriety will get easier. The more I can enjoy life sober, the less inclined I will be to drink.

So, will I have the same concerns before the next Christmas party attend? Of course, I fuckin’ will. But they should be less severe. They should be that tiny bit easier to overcome. I will use what I took out of this weekend gone and take that with me to the next one and get better again.

I’m cautious not to get over-excited here, but I think I’m making consistent progress here. I know life could sling a massive shit at me tomorrow, but I say cautiously that I feel like I’ve built a little momentum, and even if the shit lands square on my forehead, I reckon that momentum might just be enough to help me keep inching forward.

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Movember

The other week I wrote about Why I Committed to a 60k Run on 16 Days’ Notice so I won’t go too deeply into it here.

Movember now offers more ways to raise money for prostate cancer, testicular cancer, and men’s mental health than just growing a mo. I have a double chin, so I ain’t shaving.

60 men die every hour around the world by suicide.

Six Australian men die every day by suicide.

So, last Saturday I got up at 3 am and went and ran 60k I’ll talk more about this later in the week but essentially I did laps of

The R4R Rag

track. It fucking sucked. I fucking struggled, but others are doing it harder than I was at that point in time.

The great thing for you is if you are interested in donating to a very important cause you still can! Click here to do so! Any donation big or small is hugely appreciated and will go towards saving lives. Movember donates all proceeds to charities such as The Prostate Cancer Foundation of Australia, Livestrong, and Beyond Blue who all do amazing work.

Don’t forget to follow me on Instagram and Twitter @sbrngthghts

Guys, please, if anyone is struggling in any way, make someone aware of it. Speak to a friend, family, loved one, stranger, postman, uber eats driver, or me, just talk to someone.

Lifeline Ph: 13 11 14

Alcoholics Anonymous Ph: 1300 222 222

NSW Mental Health Line Ph: 1800 011 511

Suicide Call Back Service Ph: 1300 659 467

Mensline Australia Ph: 1300 78 99 78

Kids Helpline Ph: 1800 55 1800