I can’t believe this, but I didn’t realize that I was at exactly 7 months of sobriety until I started typing. I guess that is a good thing, I’m not counting so much anymore. I’m just living life.
But it is not easy. Its pretty boring most of the time. Full time sobriety gives me way too much time to think, be bored, be annoyed, feel trapped, feel sad, feel pointless. I’m not very good at processing all of these emotions yet. I want to run away and hide sometimes but I can’t. I’m a wife and mother. I have responsibilities. I used to have alcohol to escape without actually leaving. Now what?
I am on a bit of an emotional rollercoaster lately. Maybe that’s normal? I am envious of people out here in the sober blogging world that sound so content. Sometimes I feel that way, but a lot of the time I feel restless and irritable. Shouldn’t I feel great after 7 months of sobriety?
I just got home from a party at my sister-in-law and brother-in-law’s house. They are big partiers, and in the past we have always had lots of fun together. I was quiet and awkward, hiding away from meeting new people, avoiding small talk, counting the minutes till we could leave. Alcohol always made situations like that easier. I hate that I can’t just have a few glasses of wine to make a party more fun. It sucks.
I honestly don’t even know who I am anymore. I feel like a shell of my old self. I feel less sparkly, less vibrant, less fun. Now I am just killing time, doing the dishes, doing the laundry, feeling like life is one long repetitive, boring, pointless chore. At least when I had wine, I had something fun to look forward to every night. It just sucks that the aftermath was always so painful for me.
Wahhhh ….. I know this feeling will pass. I know I will feel better soon and will be happy I don’t have a hangover. But right now, I am not in a good place at all.
(Is there) Life After Chardonnay 
I felt the same way at 7 months or thereabouts. Now I’m just over a year and I promise you I feel better at a year than I did at 7 months. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other. Well done! XXXX
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Thank you so much for this comment, Sarah. It really does help. Onward. 🙂
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I just wanted to tell you that I’ve been following your blog and printed many of your posts which help me BELIEVE I can do this too. I’m fairly new to this sobriety e-world, and I haven’t been able to start – for good – my sobriety journey, but you’ve been an inspiration and everytime I read how better you feel since you got sober, I get inspired and closer to attain my goal. I started “Beyond the Influence” and this book is exactly what I needed and will make the difference I know it. Thank you for all your insights. As per Sarah’s comment, I’ve also heard 7 months can be tricky, so I hope you hang in there. I know what’s missing for me is “IRL” support, someone I can see or talk to. For that reason, I am planning on attending AA meetings to get me started on the right track… will see how that goes. Thanks again for your blog and authenticity ! Diane
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I am so happy to hear that things I have written in the past have helped you! Keep believing that you can do it, you absolutely can. Sometimes I am reluctant to put my bad days “out there” because I don’t want to discourage anyone else on this path. But the bad days are reality too.
Don’t worry, I will hang in there. I know I can’t drink anymore. I know where it leads every time. It just gets hard sometimes, living in a world where everything seems to revolve around alcohol and everyone else seems to be having such a good time.
This too shall pass. Thanks so much for your comment and good luck on your path. Most of the time it is SO MUCH BETTER! -Kim
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Thank you kindly Kim! Hope this little cloud over your head quickly disappear and that you feel better soon 🙂
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This will come.
It takes some self awareness and acceptance to move from being self conscious to being comfortable. Comfortable alone with your thoughts.
Yoga has helped me a lot with this. And there are some good guided meditations.
Was it fun? Really? Or just dullness?
I definitely had fun drinking at parties, etc over the years, but I can say I though the drinking at home, alone was fun. And all it left was a headache and more work the next morning.
At 7 months the glow of new sobriety has worn off a bit. This is where step work, therapy, reading take you another step in growth. You can see clearly enough to evaluate your drinking motivations.
I find so much brilliance is the routine life. I take time to notice the small moments. I’m not exactly sure how that happened….but it does.
Congrats on 7 months.
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Thank you so much Anne, I really appreciate your insight and support. You are truly an amazing light on my dark days.
I have been doing a lot of hiking and a pretty intense cardio and weight workout twice a week. This has been great, but has taken me away from yoga. Thanks for that reminder. I probably need to add yoga to back into my routine. For some reason, I have a really hard time incorporating meditation. I have been to workshops and retreats, have piles of books and still … just getting started is nearly impossible. I have some internal resistance I need to break through. Thanks for the little push forward – I will make that a priority.
Okay, I am going to find some brilliance in that messy kitchen out there. 😉
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Thanks for your honesty. It’s refreshing. This is how I feel every time I try on a few days sober and I hate it. Irritable, annoyed, still obsessed with alcoholic thoughts, more obsessed even ’cause there’s no escape. My last sober stint ended pretty soon after my husband looked at me and said “what’s your problem!?” – he’s never said that to me before. I must have really pushed him to his limits. Everyone tells me the irritability, bad moods, etc. is withdrawal but that’s always seemed a little convenient and brainwashy and here you are as evidence – at 7 months, it can’t still be withdrawal. I’m encouraged by people who say they don’t think about alcohol much anymore from 6 most to 1 year. But I do question whether they are just happier people. I’ve always been moody and depressed, even before i was a drinker. Your continuity in the face of all these doubts gives me strength though. And of course we can’t just continue on like before.
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Oh do I feel your pain! I will say, most of the time it is SO MUCH BETTER not drinking. After the initial withdrawal, my health is better, my relationships are better, and on and on. But simply not drinking doesn’t make other underlying issues go away. Instead it lays them bare. Now there is nowhere to hide.
I know I can’t go back to drinking, so now I have to work through these feelings and try to get beyond them. The good news is, without alcohol we can finally start moving forward. Many people find they had underlying depression. In my case, I learned that I have Adult ADD. (I plan to write more about that soon.) Now I am trying different medications and behavioral modifications to manage my ADD, instead of drinking to numb my scattered, overactive brain. When I was still drinking, I thought the only problem was that I was hungover all the time. Now I realize there was much more going on and I have been self medicating all this time.
I want to encourage you to push through the hard stuff. It really does get better, even though there are still hard days. I will take the occasional bad moods over daily hangovers, self loathing and shame all day long. In the end it is much, much better, I promise!
I guess that is one of the things I am learning … bad moods are just bad moods. They pass, just like the weather. We don’t have to run away from every bad mood. Riding them out makes us stronger, and we don’t have that sickness and remorse in the morning.
Good luck to you on your sober journey!!
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Thank you! You are right – bad moods are just bad moods. I recently stopped my addiction to chardonnay – love the stuff! I hadn’t even planned on stopping but, after a night of watching all my girlfriends and myself drink and an ensuing fight – I woke up the next day and said “thats it” I am done. I was in another 12 step program so I got myself to AA right away. I feel like i have been lifted out of one world and plopped in another – its all strange and new. I am optimistic and am taking it 1 day at a time!
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Whilst I’ll never be the gregarious party host I can now attend those things, be ok, have a good time generally and not worry about it. This too shall pass in time. In my early years I had a cycle of about 3 months – going up slowly, feeling better and better then for some little or even an inexplicable reason a sudden feeling of “What’s the point? I’m far worse off like this as a person. No-one will ever like me if I’m lost and miserable like this”… etc. etc. But slowly those dips evened out and now I rarely get them and normally I can see the cause of this depression behind them if I look frankly and openly enough. Then I do something, either directly on the issue or if it is one of the many things in the world I can’t actually change I have to practice the mantra of accepting it and focus on doing something else good for me to get my focus back on track.
Keep on the journey – your experience is not unlike mine and the path did for me level out in time I trust it will for you if you work on it
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Thanks to all of you for your candor and sharing your experiences, thoughts, feelings, this helps so much! I just love that we have this forum to support one another.
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