How to Quit Drinking by John Davis

3 Years Sober: What It’s Like for MePosted on July 1, 2014 by UnPickled

I had lunch with 3 beautiful sober ladies yesterday, new friends whom I met through this blog and the “Booze Free Brigade”. What an incredible joy it is to connect with others who understand the journey. I never imagined I would laugh easily for hours with people I’d only just met, and I certainly never thought my recovery peers would be so very much like me.

I also never guessed that I would still be blogging after three years, still be working to change my life, or still be a work in progress. In all honesty, I thought I would be “done” quitting: recovered, emphasis on the “–ed”.

For the most part, I have nailed the “not drinking” part of this deal. My fridge has a selection of non-alcoholic choices I enjoy, and I breeze through most social situations. I order with confidence in restaurants, decline gracefully when offered booze, and generally speaking living alcohol-free is now second nature to me.

I think something clicked partway through the second year; likely the cumulative effect of repeated experiences. Trial and error of what to say, how to act, situations to either embrace and avoid have all added up to a high level of comfort with my new alcohol-free life.

Two of my new friends at lunch yesterday are in their first year of recovery, and to me they seem yonksahead of where I was at that stage. Ah but we all know better than to compare out insides with someoneelse’s outsides, right?

The “insides” are the focus of my efforts now. Once we tame the behaviour of drinking we turn our attention to understanding the reasons it was ever necessary. It’s not that hard to see, not that difficult tounderstand, how things can go sideways. The tricky bit is learning new ways to act and react so that lifedoesn’t become so painful that we require constant numbing.

This is much more difficult that it might sound. I can intellectualize that I am overly critical on myself; I can understand the root causes of the criticism and identify the patterns of behaviours involved. The real challenge for me is to do things differently moving forward.

It’s not as if I can just say, “I am going to stop being so hard on myself” and BOOM, be gentle. It takes an effort towards awareness.

For instance, last week as I was cleaning my house I could feel my agitation and anxiety rising. The usually euphoric scrub of a toilet was done with resentment; my normally light step was hurried and panic-driven.

In the past, I would have allowed myself to feel righteous anger at everyone else for dirtying the house.This time, however, I was able to realize I was being motivated by a fear of criticism. I was preparing to host a gathering and one of the guests in particular worried me. I was anticipating her critical eye and imagining words she might say if she saw a dusty baseboard or spotted fixture. I was expecting cruelty, bracing for it, resenting it, and allowing myself to feel badly.

On the surface, I was being bitchy about cleaning the house and I was working myself up into a lather. As one of the women said at lunch yesterday, “I just thought that was normal, I thought how I acted was just me. Now I realize I can do something about all that.”

You see, if we just quit drinking and make no other changes, we are stuck with all those old ways of interpreting, internalizing and acting out. This is sometimes called being a “dry drunk”.

If we are going to go to all of the effort of getting and staying sober, we might as well muck through a bit more and change things so that we don’t just end up miserable from some other broken crutch (shopping, gambling, sex, food, and so on).

So while drinking is a long way in the rear-view mirror, I am working on all the other “stuff”, specifically:

Anxiety:

I once would have DIED before admitting I suffered from the A-word. That was for weak people.

Oh that shaking? That’s just nerves. Sweating? I am excited. Chest pains? Yes, I have a really stressful life but look at me handling it! Look at me, look at me – look at all the amazing things I can do while I shake, sweat and ignore the pains in my chest!

Now I can call it what it is: AN-fricking-XI-E-TY and I am learning better ways to identify and handle it.

OCD

I have had (and hidden) a form of OCD called “dermatillomania” since my early adolescence. It is gross and embarrassing and apparently rather COMMON among those susceptible to addiction.

Please read more about it here: http://www.thefix.com/content/pick-me-baby-one-more-time .

I use behaviour modification and relaxation techniques to deal with it and have had great success.

Many readers may identify with this problem. If this describes you, please understand that the condition has a name, there is help available and, as always, you are not alone. Email me at picklednomore@gmail.com if you want to chat about it and are uncomfortable commenting publically.

Eating behaviours

At different times in my life I have fallen into disordered eating patterns – I think that is the right language these days. This partly stems from perfectionism or fear of criticism, and mostly from a desire to exercise control at times when life has felt unmanageable. I have cycled between binge/purge,

starvation, and obsessive exercising – all behaviours I expect to leave in my past.

Over-achieving

What is the difference between being a high-achiever and an over-achiever? In my experience, it is thatan over-achiever is never satisfied because we are driven by shame and fear. I just never felt good enough and thought I needed to do more than everyone else to be worthy of the same level of acceptance.

Anxiety, OCD, disordered eating behaviours, and an insatiable need for success were just other presentations of the same old problems. I had accepted them as normal, as me. I never expected them tochange because I never knew they were the outcomes of my own misguided efforts to comfort my old wounds.

So when I talk about recovery, I am talking about getting back to the root of our problems – drinking, yes, as well as other things you and I no longer have to accept as “just us”.

We can do better for ourselves, and just knowing that brings a world of relief.

This is where I am at after 3 years, 3 months, and 10 days of living alcohol-free.

Emphasis on the FREE!Posted in Addiction, Alcohol, Getting Sober, Recovery | Tagged addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, anxiety, BFB, bloggers, Booze Free Brigade, drinking, health, Quit Drinking, recovery, sobriety, stigmaof alcoholism, stress, unpickled | 35 CommentsRecovery is LeadershipPosted on June 24, 2014 by UnPickled

recovery leadership banner

I spent years wanting to quit drinking but continued because I was terrified of pinning on the “ALCOHOLIC” badge. When I finally quit, it was without the certainty that I was an alcoholic at all, but rather that I was in desperate need of peace.

Three years later, I am comfortable with the knowledge that I was an active alcoholic, I am a person in recovery, and that recovery is leadership.

Today I made a new label for myself and this blog.

Posted in Addiction, Alcohol, Getting Sober, Recovery | Tagged addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, alternative methods to quit drinking, drinking, Quit Drinking, recovery, Recovery Blogs, stigma of alcoholism, unpickled| 28 Comments

How I Knew It Was Time to Quit DrinkingPosted on June 8, 2014 by UnPickled

If there is one question I am most asked about living alcohol-free, it is “How did you know it was time to quit drinking?”

Only occasionally is this question asked with dancing eyes that reveal a quest for titillation: I want to hear every detail of rock bottom. If I sense that is the motive, I generally let them down easy: I was the most boring alcoholic ever – I have no stories of catastrophe. I just knew I was losing control and needed to take charge.

More often it is asked with genuine interest, either because someone would like to know me better or istrying to understand addiction better for personal reasons. Sincere questions deserve honest answers.

I have been reading about the “transtheoretical model of behaviour change” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transtheoretical_model) and I can easily see how it correlates to my journey. In short, it identifies various stages of decision-making and behaviour changes as such:

Precontemplation (not ready) – in my case, using wine as a daily antidote for stress and anxiety; enjoying the relief it brought; feeling very comfortable with my routine and experiencing no negative thoughts or consequences. Contemplation (getting ready) – I began to feel an acknowledgement and growing discomfort with the reality of my habits. I started to pay attention to the red flags (see below). I began watching Celebrity Rehab with intense focus (while drinking). Preparation (ready) – I got up the courage to assess my drinking patterns online (I used http://rethinkingdrinking.niaaa.nih.gov) and received confirmation that I needed to make changes. I started trying to quit and failed each day. I took no steps to make myself accountable and did not reach out for help, but these initial unsuccessful efforts confirmed my worst fears. Not only could I not quit, but also not moderate or reduce. Throughout this stage, my intake instead steadily escalated and I began to realize where this was headed. Action (initiating change) – for me, this was speaking honestly to a friend, starting this blog, and reaching out to the online community for help and support. I threw myself into the task at hand and little by little made it through each difficult day. Maintenance (supporting the change) – I guess this is where I am at now – you could call this ongoing recovery. This is a great place to be and many recovery advocates say the goal should be to engage in this phase forever. Termination (completion of change) – remembering that the transtheoretical model of behaviour change is not about recovery specifically, there comes an end point where the change is complete and the new behaviours are effortless and normal. There are different schools of thought in the recovery community as to whether or not one can ever end the process. Some pathways teach that if you stop going to meetings and working their program you’ll either start drinking again or fall into the miserablelife of a “dry drunk”. Some pathways encourage striving for a point of supported closure on the change – which does not mean it is possible to start drinking again normally but rather that you can go forward as a “non-drinker” and be done with it. I don’t take a position on this – at this point it doesn’t matter to me because I have a lot of work still to do and see myself in the maintenance phase for many years to come.

Red Flags

So what were those red flags for me? It wasn’t any one single “big” thing that led me to change; it was the accumulation of little things. Here are some I recall:

Unable to stop drinking daily Unable to reduce or limit amount Drinking alone Shame about bottles in recycling bin Hiding extra alcohol in cupboard Continual concern about having enough alcohol on hand Obsessive awareness of alcohol at every event – planning when and how to get in the “right” amountto get through the evening while still managing to drive sober to and from events, and appear “normal” to the outside world Becoming very agitated when unplanned changes disrupted my pattern – specifically I recall a frienddropping by and my husband poured her a glass of wine. I began to panic knowing that it meant there would not be enough to get me through the evening. I secretly drank shots of scotch before bed to compensate. I felt guilty about resenting my friend for visiting unannounced. Spending the last hour of work each day deciding if I would stick to my plan of quitting drinking or stop at a liquor store on the way home, all the while knowing I would certainly pick up more wine. Rotating stores because I was embarrassed of buying wine every day, but never buying more too much at once because I was planning to quit “tomorrow”. Finding out that my drinking habits fell into the “high risk” and “heavy drinking” categories. I knew my drinking was only increasing, never declining, and I was running out of categories. Next stop: rock bottom. No thanks.

Now what about you, readers? Do you recognize yourself in the stages of behaviour changes? What were your red flags, and was it many little things or one big incident that initiated your decision to live alcohol-free?Posted in Addiction, Alcohol, Getting Sober, Recovery | Tagged addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, alternative methods to quit drinking, anxiety, change, drinking, guidance, health, incentive, moms who drink, Quit Drinking, recovery, secrets, self-esteem, shame, sober living, sobriety, stigma of alcoholism, stress, unpickled, wine | 106 CommentsNew Level, New DevilPosted on May 14, 2014 by UnPickled

If you are a regular listener to The Bubble Hour podcast, you will have heard me speak many times about the beautiful rituals and routines that support my sobriety: grinding good coffee beans, steaming milk to the perfect froth, using beautiful mugs. You’ll have heard how “Dibbs” ice cream nuggets became my pacifier in early sobriety. You’ll know I order O’Douls in a wineglass at restaurants, and siptonic water with a dash of grapefruit juice at parties.

If you’ve ever ridden in my car or peeked into my (enormous, iphone-swallowing, key-vaporizing) purse, you’ll recognize the smattering of gold-foil balls as the remains of Ferraro Roche chocolates. I buy them in sleeves of three, saving the last one for The Mr. as an act of self-control. The cleaners at our office could tweet scandalous photos of the empty 100-calorie packs of chocolate covered pretzels they remove from my garbage can each week (they don’t, I hope). Occassionally, when I think maybe the chocolate thing has gone too far, I’ll buy a bag of oranges and convince myself that they are yummy treats, too.

Yes friends, I owe my sobriety to coffee, tea with one milk and two sugars, ice cream, chocolate, fizzie

drinks, and citrus fruit. For 3 years and 3 months this perfect magic formula has kept me strong and sober.hotel essentials

My “essentials” for business travel – sweet snacks and evening drinks, coffee with proper milk for morning. (The can opener is for the milk, but I know you noticed the corkscrew! Wino radar!)

I have everything figured out, thank you very much. Don’t drink and work on the shit. No problem. Tickety boo. I even called a counselor to help me start working on the super-tricky shit that I can’t seem to get past on my own. Yep. I am goooood at recovery.

Until….what is this new agonizing pain?

Excuse me? An ulcer? Ohhh-kay. There’s a pill for that, right?

A what? A special diet? A special diet that requires no coffee, caffeinated tea, dairy, chocolate, carbonated beverages, or citrus? You’re kidding, right? RIGHT? You’re KIDDING, RIGHT??!

Oh My Lanta. Kill me now.

As the Evangelical preachers say “New level, new devil”. Sometimes when we get strong and become better people, the “devil” will come at us with a vengeance to tempt us back to failure and despair.

That’s how this feels, but I know it isn’t the case. I am not happy, mind you. I feel right rotten and all of my favourite things make me feel even worse. But you know what? I can handle it.

I think this is a little nudge from above, telling me it is time to drop the crutches. An opportunity to become (even) stronger, not an evil curse.

Compared to the heroics involved in setting down the wine glass bottle box, this should be a cinch. I bought a bamboo whisk for my green tea and two peacock mugs from Pier 1. You just friggin watch medrink my tea by the campfire this summer.

We can do hard things. Right?teacups and whisk

It’s all about tools and pretty things. I will survive!Posted in Addiction, Alcohol, Getting Sober, Recovery | Tagged addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, alternative methods to quit drinking, anxiety, change, coffee, drinking, guidance, health, humor, humour, moms who drink, Quit Drinking, recovery, Recovery Blogs, secrets, shame, sober holidays, sober living, sobriety, survival strategies, The Bubble Hour, unpickled, wine | 51 CommentsSeekers WelcomePosted on April 2, 2014 by UnPickled

This morning the Today show aired an interview with Stefanie Wilder-Taylor about moms who use alcohol to cope with stress and anxiety. I had a lump in my throat as I watched the piece, knowing the impact it would have had on me back when I was starting to notice a terrifying momentum in my nightly wine ritual. It was becoming clear to me that I was losing control as one red flag after another waved – rotating stores because I felt ashamed of how much alcohol I bought; uneasiness about the

recycling bin; stashing bottles out of view; cancelling plans so I could spend more time alone (sipping);vowing I’d cut back or quit and failing time after time.

If you are seeking today, I welcome you to this blog and to the online recovery community. My story is one of quitting while I was ahead, before anyone even knew that I had developed an addiction to alcohol. I saw I was losing control and realized that if I continued, things would get worse, then embarrassing, then downright bad. Soon there would be no hiding it. Soon it would not be my choice any more. I had heard that alcoholics have to hit rock bottom before they can get sober, and I did not want to find out what rock bottom might look like for me. Suddenly that whole concept seems utterly ridiculous, like saying “You can’t go on a diet unless you have become morbidly obese.” Screw rock bottom – I just quit, very quietly and very much on my own.

Now, three years later I am still gratefully sober and recovery is still a surprising amount of work. I thought that by now I would be “fixed” and possibly could even start to moderate (that is, drink a little now and then – I don’t, by the way). I originally thought that 12 step programs that say “alcoholism is forever” were playing it a little heavyhandedly but I was way wrong about that. I also thought it would suck and be awfully boring to never drink again but really I feel great and pleased with my life now. Alcohol addiction alters the brain permanently – the neurological changes can’t be reversed so we live with the condition by avoiding alcohol for life. Recovery consists of more than just “not drinking” – it involves a lot of introspection to uncover and change the reasons WHY we drank in the first place. Andnow THAT is a big job, and a worthwhile change to pursue.

If you read through my blog entries, you will learn my story. But that is just the beginning. Please, please read the comments – they are an amazing resource and so insightful (except for the weird guy that recently comment “Bullshit” on a few posts – not sure what his deal was).

Check out the list of sober bloggers and resources on the sidebar, sign up for the Booze Free Brigade on Yahoo, and subscribe to The Bubble Hour podcast for which I am a producer and co-host.

I don’t have all the answers, and don’t pretend to have them. I am a little further on the road, waving you forward and (hopefully!) welcoming you to the start of your journey.

There are many pathways to recovery – many people “self-manage” recovery as I have done, without joining a program or attending meetings. Many go traditional routes with great success, and more an more alternative programs are available. Pick a path, any path, and start walking. If you realize it’s not for you, try a different way. Many of us become accustomed to isolating and hiding while we are drinking, and fear reaching out for help to get sober. I urge you to reach out – start with a comment here or on a discussion board like the BFB (above). Go to a meeting and just observe. Call someone you know is sober and ask if they are glad they quit drinking, if they might share about their journey.

The relief you feel will blow you away and you will never meet a kinder, less judgmental group than your fellow recoverees.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, alternative methods to quit drinking, BFB, Booze Free Brigade, moms who drink, Quit Drinking, recovery, self improvement, The Bubble Hour, wine | 247 CommentsSunshine Blogger AwardPosted on March 13, 2014 by UnPickled

Image

A big part of my recovery has involved stepping back from my addiction to approval, people pleasing, and generally caring wayyyy too much what others think (see “Backsplash on the Sunshine Whore” ) . Some say that pleasing is simply a form of manipulation, and well THAT’S not flattering, now is it?

So all self-awareness, manipulation, and approval drooling aside, it’s beyond wonderful when someoneunexpectedly dumps a bucket of sunshine my way. I was mucking through a difficult week and as always, the flow of comment notifications on my blog was providing a lifeline; taking me out of myselfto connect with others who understand the journey. Each notification of a comment or new subscriber brightens my day, truly. A comment from Maggie at sobercourage.com was literally full of sunshine: “Hi, I have nominated you for the Sunshine Award!” (Thank you, Maggie – so kind of you.)

As it turns out, The Sunshine Award is all about spreading bloggity goodness – thanking those we appreciate while introducing readers to other great writers and sharing a bit about ourselves in the process. It works like this:

To accept the award, each awardee must do the following:

Display the award on your blog. Announce your win with a post and thank the blogger who nominated you. List 10 interesting things about yourself. Present 10 deserving bloggers “who positively and creatively inspire others in the blogosphere. Link to the awardees and let them know of the nomination.

So…without further adieu…..10 (Interesting?)Things About Me:

I have an amputated finger on my right hand – the result of a childhood accident. I have always been very self-conscious of this and constantly try to keep it discretely out of view. In spite of this, I am righthanded and play guitar. I am ridiculously photogenic but look utterly average in person. I assume people are disappointed to meet me in real life if they’ve seen me first in pictures. I was approached at the age of 12 by a modeling agent and spent a few years as a gangly self-conscious teen model. “You have a photogenic face,” she said and I thought that was a compliment but it’s not really. I hated being on display and never asked my opinion; hated the priority placed on looks over brains. I was called for a shoot with a major skiwear company in 1986 but then they noticed my “handicap” (their actual words), by which they meant my missing finger (see above) , and I was un-selected. That was it for modeling for me but Iam grateful for the poise and polish I gained in the training…and the knowledge that I’d rather be heardthan seen (but preferably both). I am going to become a grandmother this summer – I don’t know if that interests anyone but my husband and I are super excited for our son and his wife. We can’t wait to welcome a new little bebop to the family! My family skis almost every weekend in winter and I must say I am pretty good for an almost-grandma. I love being healthy and active almost as much as I love eating pizza and ice cream. I have been on the cover of Profit magazine in Canada (not as a model but as myself), and have been featured in Chatelaine and Alberta Venture in stories about women in business. I’ve always thought thiswas pretty cool, but now those magazines are in a box in the closet and well, life carries on. (I was on a plane once and the woman next to me was reading a magazine. I looked at the page and saw my own

picture looking back at me. “Excuse me,” I said, “what magazine is that?” She looked up and flashed the cover at me without even realizing that I was the SAME person she was reading about (see item 2 re: photogenic people who look different in real life). I was twitching in my seat with excitement. I knew about the piece but not that they had a photo or were featuring me specifically – to see it in print was a surprise. But I was too shy to tell the woman reading it that she was reading about ME. I quietly bought 2 copies as soon as the plane landed.) One of my first jobs was working for a company called Scheme-A-Dream that sent out costumed actors to events. You could call them for singing telegrams, clowns, gorilla-grams, you name it. I didn’tlast very long at that. Another one of my early jobs was cleaning rental units after the tenants moved out. This was really disgusting, dispiriting work because it made me so sad how people could live in filth and then leave it behind for a teenager (me) to clean up for $7 an hour. I keep my house quite spotless because I would hate to die suddenly and leave a mess for someone else. I peed my pants in sixth grade on a school camping trip because I was too scared of bears to pee in the woods. I thought I might get my first ever period at any moment (I’d just read “Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret” and I was obsessed with menstruation) and I knew that bears like the smell of blood. I have carried the shame of this incident with me for 35 years. Now you may have it for your reading enjoyment. I have a grey dog named Copper. This is confusing for people, especially because I also have a copper-coloured dog named Scout. I don’t have a single tattoo anywhere and I am holding out in the hopes that someday being pale, freckled, and completely un-tatooed will be in vogue.

There you have it. Now, more importantly, here are 10 fabulous bloggers upon whom I now bestow (…in my best Oprah shouty voice…) THE SUNSHINE AWARD:

SoberJulie.com

Byebyebeer.wordpress.com

Mished-Up

Drunkydrunkgirl.wordpress.com

Soberjournalist.wordpress.com

Runningonsober.com

Tellingthewords.wordpress.com/

HeatherKopp

NoMoreSally

NewLifeAfterPosted in Uncategorized | Tagged bloggers, Quit Drinking, Recovery Blogs, Sunshine Award, unpickled, writing | 12 CommentsDeflecting Douchebaggery: Why (Some) Friends React Badly to Our SobrietyPosted on February 16, 2014 by UnPickled

It can be a deflating experience: building up the courage to tell a close friend about the decision to part ways with alcohol, only hear “That’s ridiculous. Don’t be so dramatic.”

Here are some of the more awkward things people have said to me personally:

“Great! Now we’ll always have a designated driver!”

“You can have a drink now and then. It’s not like you’re a raging alcoholic like my brother.”

“It’s okay with me if you don’t drink, but you probably shouldn’t go telling people that.”

“If you were able to just quit, you probably weren’t an alcoholic.”

“I don’t really know if I believe in that.”

Have you seen this too-true video Frankie Norstad a.k.a “Little Miss Addict” made for YouTube called “Sh#t Normies Say to 12 Steppers”?

Anna David wrote a great article for The Fix about how to answer such clunkers. You can read it here: http://www.thefix.com/content/shit-non-addicts-say91717

What’s really behind these questions? What are our friends really trying to say? Why are their words sohurtful?

In early recovery, we are sensitive. We worry so much about what others think, and are coming to termswith our inability to control that very thing. Words do hurt, but compassion lessens the sting.

Here are some common douche-y things normies say and the insights to help you be less affected by them:

Normies say: “Are you going to stop coming out with us now?”

We hear: “You’re ruining our fun.”

It likely meant: “We still want to spend time with you. What’s the best way to do that?”

*

Normies say: “Did I do something to make this happen?”

We hear: “Your recovery is about me.”

It likely meant: “I would never knowingly hurt you” (or…”I feel guilty for something I’ve done.”)

*

Normies say: “Do I have to quit drinking around you?”

We hear: “I don’t want to be with you now.”

It likely meant: “I am not ready to face my own issues around alcohol.”

*

Normies say: “What are we supposed to do after baseball now?”

We hear: “I only want to be your friend if I can drink with you.”

It likely meant: “Is this going to change our relationship? I like things the way they are.”

*

Normies say: “It’s no big deal. I don’t care if you’re drinking or not.”

We hear: “Don’t expect me to do anything differently to accommodate you.”

It likely meant: “I’m acting nonchalant to show you that I’m supportive.”

*

Normies say: “My cousin was in rehab and it made him worse. Stay away from recovery programs.”

We hear: “All alcoholics are the same. I know more about this than you do.”

It likely meant: “I don’t know what to say so I’m relating the only thing I know about recovery.”

Of course, while friends can say stupid things there is also the possibility that this person is, in fact, an asshat. How do we tell the difference between friends and asshats? By forgiving the occasional awkward comment while paying attention to actions. Friends will treat us with respect, enjoy finding new ways to connect and grow the relationship in situations that don’t involve alcohol. They will show interest in our wellness, and they will buffer us in social situations.

Asshats and douchbags will reveal themselves through selfishness, disrespect, and a willingness to endanger our sobriety. Allowing ourselves to remove these types from our lives is an important act of self care.

There’s no need for a dramatic blow up. No “friends off” speech required. Just know that we’ve shown them a better way to be, and that for now the friendship has run its course.Posted in Addiction, Alcohol, Getting Sober, Marriage and Alcohol Recovery, Recovery, Uncategorized

| Tagged addiction, alcohol, alcoholism, change, drinking, guidance, health, humour, Quit