I feel like I deserve to put words to where I’m at. Both mentally and physically. This goes far beyond my inability to drink and not have a compulsion to keep drinking. There’s a voice saying here’s a match burn it. Then there’s another voice saying don’t worry I’ll help you rebuild it. It’s not like we haven’t had to before. Which one do you listen to? What it must be like to be normal. Normal brain. Do people really talk to themselves all day every day.  Little conversations throughout the day some make sense, some confirmed the fact that I am insane.

If I told the truth would you stay? There’s 2 of me. A secondary version no one ever sees. Shit maybe even a 3rd version buried deep. I only bring her out to make things get interesting. Listening to the fan spins brings with it a sense of peace. Focus on that and not the fact I can’t sleep. So early on in sobriety words came with such ease. Now full blown sober and words escape me. Like forgotten lyrics to my favorite song. 

That’s where the I’m okay sneaks in. Pretend pretending. Swallow every emotion. Every feeling back into the bottle. No more spilling. No more feeling. I have the emotional stability of a traumatized 6 year old. A 7 year old that learned love is bought. A 9 year old that just lost her best friend. A 10 year old who decided the world was better if she trusted no one. And at 15 she knew she loved her family but it was best for her to leave. So she left one unstable environment for the next. It would repeat itself over and over. Always looking for home. Always searching for love. She found it. I found her. At the bottom of a bottle.

Would one hit really throw sobriety away? Without a single drop from the finest wine? 894 and counting would disappear. Without my hand touching a drink? Obsessing. Its sounds completely insane. My mind needs a place to wander freely. Explore levels. Relax. Meditate. Be one with me.

Snap back. I’m here. 5am. Christmas morning. In a warm bed and my favorite blanket. Quietly listening to the man sleeping next to me. I smile slightly. He’s happiness. I’ll stay sober forever if that means never hurting him again. I’m never as comfortable as when I’m around him. He’s seen just about every single version of me and yet he still stayed. Help rebuild me from all the broken pieces. Sure I did most of the rebuilding. But I never had to guess where his support was. 

That’s what’s wild about all this. I have a happy life. A life I love and yet I can’t seem to not think “You know what this would be good with?”… as I’m stocking a new juice at work. People would say that’s your alcohol talking.  But I wouldn’t drink. I don’t want to drink. But if an opportunity exists, let it find me at my weakest moment. Unable to stand the feeling of my own skin.

I want to stay sober but I don’t want to do the work to make it easier to stay sober. I don’t talk about the past. It’s from a broken place that bandaids couldn’t fix. I’m not talking about the ways I handle life poorly as a child trying to be an adult. I got the blame for that covered. Way before all of that. Before life started and I was just a kid. It’s that version that needs to heal. Needed to heal back then. Before a life spent dealing with it. Just to find new ways of adapting.

To be continued…. Mixed emotions. Moods shift suddenly. Why am I so angry?  Then smile as if happiness is filled up inside me. I laugh and smile. In the moment I am happy. Darkness  creeps with specks of light seeping through like sunlight through a cracked window. I’m cracked. Broken. Stitched into a human being just trying to make it. One more day.  No amount of money in the world can fix me. I’m happy and I’m sad all in the same breath. Slowly I begin to suffocate. As if I’m drowning and cannot reach back up to the surface. 

This used to be my outlet. This used to be my voice. When did I become so hidden with how I truly am feeling? What once came so easily now has become an enormous task. Just putting feelings into words with enough syllables to form proper sentences seem so complicated. I’m fine. I promise. Just a little uneasy. I’ll be fine. Just taking a breather.

I cannot explain what’s wrong. I just feel like I’m again missing a sense of purpose. Like I’m lost in the everyday. In and out happenings of this thing here I call my life. I have a long list of things that I love. An equally long list of things I hate. About me mostly. Like why do I talk about doing so many things. Yet I sit back and don’t do any of them. Why even say anything? I feel stupid. Why do I make plans just to regret it the day of? Socially feeling available and then like a light switch everything changes. I’d rather be left alone. At home. So not really alone. Just a place I am safe. No forced conversations. And I feel the love I cling to.  The love that keeps me sober. Keeps me filled up. I am able to wake up and walk through another day. The hope is that I make it back home. Back to the place with the things that matter the most.

I have to get this out right here before the words escape me and I’m left to obsess. Happiness comes in waves. Navigating a sober life. Thinking thoughts. Sometimes I don’t realize what’s actually screaming at me. A reservation or two I keep returning too. Like a note on the fridge. Save the date. high. Convincing myself it’s enough I’ll still remain sober. One has nothing to do with the other. I’ve always been very self aware. Even in the darkest moments of my drinking. Knowing right from wrong. I just didn’t care. So why care now?

I don’t think I’ve had my last beverage of choice. Yet claim I don’t want to drink. I see the insanity in the thoughts I have that I choose to put onto this page. Tough weeks mentally bring out the worse in me. Adrenaline of the holiday push. Just for it to end abruptly and I’m left feeling a sense of emptiness. Like something was left unfulfilled. Writing everything out. Let it go on and on as long as it helps me to breathe. Removing weight. Look me in my eye and as I try to find the words I’m still unable to form. My head is foggy and I’m complacent. That leaves me feeling….. I’m not mad. I’m exhausted. Wanting to soar. Feel the breeze as it comes through the trees. Up there amongst the birds so I can scream. Quietly I’ll come back down. A better mindset. A better me. 

I justify just about anything. Rationalize it to prove why this or that will indeed be good for me. What self inflicted disaster will it be? Turning inward I’m self reflecting. Self reliant. I miss the person staring back at me. I’m mad at myself still you know? It was my choice to get sober. Subconsciously, I knew I needed to be. A better me. The shell of me still doesn’t want to be. I can’t explain why. It always started with alcohol. I think I knew in the beginning that all of it would have to end.

All of it….

Starts and end within me.