Happy New Year!
I wish that I could say that I missed Hogmonay's posting because I was too busy party planning or that I thought it made more sense to do it today, to wish you all the best for 2009 but that's just not true.
What do I do with my days?????
It's eleven-ish and I'm procrastinating about having my shower by browsing online!! I fall by the wayside when the kids are on holiday because they all stay up late and get up late (they haven't appeared this morning yet) and I lie in and sit around and do very little!
In my defense, I did write in my business-plan that I would take all of the kids school holidays off! So I'm really on my holidrums-right!?
We had a lovely New years, with movie-watching and game-playing and grandads steak pie!! Who needs drink, eh? I will have been sober for 3 years, come April and although I sometimes think that I'd like that "lighten-up, Linsey" feeling, I know that I'm not brave enough to have a glass of vino yet!
Will I ever be??? I really don't know. All I know is that I don't seem to have an "off-switch" when it comes to alcohol. One sip and I'm onto that second bottle! When I gave up, I was drinking a bottle pretty much every night of the week (and more!) and I when I was given three signs to give up drinking, in the same week, it finally sunk in!
Sign number one-A wee man giving out flyers "Do you know someone with a drink or drug problem?" I pinned it on our notice board with a giggle!
Sign number two-Whilst looking for some books for the Drop-in centre, Allan Carr's book, "No more hangovers" fell off the shelf, right in front of me and I felt that I should buy and read it to see if I couldn't cut down a little bit on my wine consumption. The secret of that books success is that it lulls you into it with a promise of helping you to decrease your alcohol intake but midway through the thing, you realise that he's telling you to totally give it up! Sneaky!!!!!
Sign three-I watched the movie "When a man loves a woman" with Meg Ryan playing the part of an alcoholic mother and it rang some truly loud bells!!
Now, I'm not saying that I'm an alcoholic (I think that it would have been harder to give up, if I was?) but I do think that I have an addictive personality. Alcohol made it easier to banish any feelings that I didn't want to feel and it also made it easier for me to pretend to be someone who I was not! At the time of giving up, though, I simply felt that it was a habit that I loved the taste of but that was growing too big in size!
I used to make dates for friends to come visit, midweek, just so that I'd have an excuse to have a bottle of wine. Not that I didn't want to see my friends but I realise now that the alcohol played a big part in some of my friendships and interestingly, those friendships have become distant since the wine-bottle sharing stopped.
Friendships do change but I have kept the same core-base of friends for most of my adult life. They are the people who are supporting me along this road we're travelling together and who have never once asked me to "just have a drink, Linsey". The drunken nights at my house till the early hours of the morning have been replaced by sober girls nights where people can drop-in or drop-out. They can have some food or watch a movie. They can also have a glass or two of wine if they want to. They're based around friendship and not alcohol and it suits me to offer myself in this way.
I've not changed, really. It was never me who was on show before-not the real me! My friends and I must share a subconscious wavelength because although they are only now learning who I really am-I think that they've always known and that is why we were drawn together in the first place!
So, for this 2009, if you think that you may be drinking too much-as is our culture, unfortunately!.......
........get hold of a copy of the movie or the book mentioned above and see if they make any sense! Don't beat yourself up if you don't think you can give up or cut down. I debated for months about my need to cut down and always came up with excuses to not. You have to decide that the time is right to do something for you. When the time is right you'll do it!!!!
And on a footnote and not a "touting for business" note-the Bach Flower Remedies and Reiki can be very supportive in helping you do whatever it is that you want to do. (And I also have to say that I had a course of Shiatsu, right around the time I stopped drinking. A coincidence?????????????)
Off for my shower, now!
Lxxxxxx
Posted on Fri, January 2, 2009
by Linsey Denham