“Why?” I was asked repeatedly. “Why can’t you have Just ONE drink with me?” The Asker, one of my best friends, refuses to try to understand that even if I have only one drink with them to ring in the new year…or to demonstrate my participation in whatever well-wishing, good-lucking celebration happens to be going on at the moment…and even if I have one, and only One Drink, what goes on inside me is unbelievably daunting, chaotic.
I really do believe that if I were to drink just one drink, I would be able to stop with that one drink. But that’s not the point. There’s a price I pay for that one drink, that you, who aren’t alcoholics, cannot understand.
To all you who have alcoholics in your lives, listen-up:
If you have a drink, you are simply having a drink.
If an alcoholic (like me) who has stopped drinking, decides to have a drink, inner chaos and turmoil like you cannot imagine, ensues. The worst hangover you can imagine, does not torment, nor last as long or with such impact, as what happens inside the heart, mind and soul of a stopped-drinking-alkie, like myself.
Even if we only have that One Drink. And don’t have another one for say, 10 years.
Turning down alcoholic beverages and treats is not about you, or us, feeling superior. You cannot imagine how inferior we feel, on a daily basis. It is about maintaining sanity, now that we are able to maintain some sort of self-control.
(Alcoholic Treats & Sweets: no…I did not think it was amusing that a dear friend thought herself cute when tricking me, or trying to, with ‘drunken cherries’…whole, pitted cherries, drowned in bourbon, covered in dark chocolate. She heard about it. And we aren’t friends, any more.)
I can celebrate and revel in festivities just as you can, with water, or any other non-alcoholic beverage.
If you care about the folks like me in your life even just a little, be demonstrative & supportive.
Thanks.
Happy 2013 Everyone.
Man, I know these people. Or rather, I KNEW them. They were the ones trying to derail my sobriety and since I was barely holding myself together from one minute to the next, I didn’t need the pressure and tricks. So, like you and the Chocolate Bourbon Cherry Lady, they became ex-friends (though CBCL does get points for originality).
Happy 2013
Thanks michelle, for your reply. And I concur: CBCL does rather stand out for creativity!