Labels and Learning

I'm learning a lot about myself and it feels really good.  I've also noticed a trend.  I tend to have emotional epiphanies while not drinking and then I go back to wine soothing for a bit before garnering enough strength to try again.  But the trying again is coming more frequent and the feeling of "just giving up" is dissipating.  I really WANT to be alcohol free.

Aside from realizing I can't be, and probably won't ever be, a normal drinker, I really don't want to be.  I no longer think "I can handle this".  What goes through my mind is that I am succumbing to a vice when I drink.  Just like if I eat too much pizza and feel like crap.  Like if I eat that bagel with tons of cream cheese at the office when I was convinced I would eat healthy that day.  It's now just a vice lumped in with others.  There will be times when I succumb to the vice but hopefully more and more times when I don't.

Exercise has really helped.  I'm finally beginning to make it a habit.  I still need accountability to it but I am doing it.  Having a trainer to go to, signing up for classes is helping.  I am finding more and more that I want to do it...….on my own.

Sort of the same with drinking.  I have some accountability built in now with a sober buddy but I am finding more and more that I want to not drink, for my own good.

I hate the label alcoholic.  I don't think I'll go to AA meetings because I just don't think group sessions are my thing.  I went to a divorce therapy session one time and thought I was going to come unglued. I am sort of a "move on, get over it, pull up your big girl panties" kind of girl.  Translate that to not the most empathetic person.  I didn't want to talk about my woes nor hear about others.  I'm sure AA is different than that type of group and people have really wonderful things to say about it.  But I can't get over having to say "Hello, my name is so and so, and I am an alcoholic".

To me, in my mind, I'm not an alcoholic.  Those people miss work, I never have.  Those people look for alcohol in the morning, I never have.  Those people look like alcoholics, I don't think I do.  (Okay, except for wine belly/bloat.)  Those people pass out on the couch at night, I never have.  And etc.

But I am an alcohol abuser.  Hands down, for sure.  While I like to say "I'm addicted", I'm not even sure that's true.  I make a conscious decision to ingest a substance to "relax" in the evening.  After the second glass, I find it hard to stop.  Well, duh, that's the substance altering my brain.   I don't need alcohol to function.  I don't feel bad when I stop, no physical reactions.  In fact, I sleep great, eat better and feel better about myself when I am not drinking.  Every time I don't have alcohol, I have zero withdrawal symptoms other than thinking "oh wouldn't a glass of wine" be nice.  But it rarely is ever one glass.  Especially at home, that appears impossible to me.

Admitting that I am an abuser of a substance sort of brings it home to me.  It makes me feel more powerful, not powerless.  It appears that with AA you have to say you are powerless over the substance and to turn it over to a higher power.  Perhaps I'm missing the boat.  I think different approaches work for all of us.  But as I start another round (pardon the pun) of not drinking, it helps me to ask myself, in the evening, "do you really want to take this substance in, knowing you will abuse it, knowing how you will not sleep, knowing you will not want to exercise the next day, knowing you will eat like crap and knowing that you might even feel down, not to mention what you are doing to your liver?"

I am in charge of this.  What I'm not in charge of is what happens when I slip up at home and think I'm going to "enjoy" some wine.  So still working on other enjoyments.  I know there are those who exercise a ton and still drink.  But since I've never really enjoyed exercise as a part of my life, and now am starting to, I think this will be a great new focus and will hopefully alleviate some of the need to drink.

Onward!
HD