Milk, It Does a Body Good

Not gonna lie, I had every intention of drinking tonight. Well, not EVERY intention, but a lot of intentions. I kept telling myself, “If you get to 6:00 and you still want to drink, you can. OK, if you get to 7:00 and you still want to drink, you can. OK if you get 8:00 and you still want to drink, you can.”

8:00 came, and I still wanted to drink, so I marched myself down to the discount grocery store and got some Daily’s pina colada mix (of all things), that I was going to mix with some Grey Goose (of all things). Something a little tropical sounded good. What can I say?

I got home, had a sandwich and somehow, thank the lord, realized I could drink the pina colada mix without vodka … which was disgusting, after I tried it. But I thought adding some milk would be good, and it was. The milk was enough to satiate me and turn me off the booze.

I looked at the clock and even though it was only 8:45, I gave myself permission to go to bed because I was all sorts of tired all of a sudden, no doubt from the tug of war in my brain.

So, here’s where my head’s at. All yesterday and the early part of today, I’ve been worried all the progress I made in the past 3 months is slipping away and would just be gone … and I’m right to a certain degree. It’s going, going, gone if I continue to drink. That’s a fact. Then I’m back to fat, uncomfortable, anxious, sad me.

BUT! If I stay off the sauce, I think I can get back to that good place in pretty short order. Because I do want to be back in that place. That place where I’m excited to wake up, excited to cook dinner, excited to plan for the future, excited to work on projects.

Because shit if I didn’t feel that depression demon hunched on my shoulder in the past 40 hours. I mean, wow. He had flown the coop while I was sober but as soon as I picked up a drink, he was there, breathing his boozy breath down my neck.

Look, I’m not ready to admit any hard truths, or even examine if there are any hard truths around my drinking, OK? I don’t want to know what or if I’m covering anything up. I don’t want to know what or if I’m stuffing anything down. But all I know - which is a lot - is that I felt better when I wasn’t drinking. Then I got drunk. Then I started feeling shitty again.

It’s as simple as that. I feel better when I don’t drink.

I’ve been going back and forth in my head about whether or not I’ll drink when I camp with my gal pals next weekend. I’m making the decision now: No, I am not drinking.

There will also be two pregnant ladies remaining sober, and possibly one friend who is newly-released from rehab. I’ll have plenty of sober company. And I’m going to give myself permission to only go camping for one night, instead of two, if that’s what it takes.

Because I don’t know that I really like the idea of sleeping outside in the woods, and maybe that’s one of the reasons I always thought camping and getting shit-canned went hand in hand.

I am proud of me. I really am. I feel like tonight could have ended up with me flooped out on the couch, potato chip crumbs on my chest, booze on my breath and my head swimmy. And tomorrow I would have woken up feeling like death socked me in the stomach, and I probably would have wasted an entire lovely day just trying to get back to center.

Well, no, fuck you, hangovers. Fuck you very much. I don’t want that anymore. I don’t want the depression. I don’t want to guilt. I don’t want the upset tummy. I don’t want the extra calories. I don’t want the stupid things I say and do.

Alcohol doesn’t work here anymore. I’ll have to come up with some other ways to chill out and unwind.