Do you smell smoke?

Do you smell smoke?

No one ever wants to be asked that question as they sit in their dining room. The events that happened after my house fire on 10/5/18 are a blur but one thing I can say with complete confidence is that the impact that this event on had on my drinking was in fact monumental.

Later that night I was sitting at a Holiday Inn bar, I had just watched my house burn from a dryer fire and smoke come out of my young children’s bedroom windows (fortunately they had not been home at the time). I remember putting my head down on the bar telling the bartender that my house just had a fire and she empathize with me by giving me endless glasses of white wine, on the house of course. I was now homeless, living at a Holiday Inn and completely unsure of what the future held for me or where my children and I would live. For the next several weeks I found myself sitting at that same bar all hours of the day. It was completely justified in my mind to drink excessively because it was the only thing that I could control at that point in my life. I couldn’t control the Insurance Company . I couldn’t control where I live at the moment. I could only control “numbing out”.

Eventually we moved into a rental and attempted to get settled while I figured out how to rebuild. Rebuilding took three years, five moves and money I didn’t have at the time. Add in a worldwide Covid lockdown, unemployment, building a new home, family health scares and kids mental health decline. So, I drank. By the time we moved back into our new house in July 2021 my drinking had crossed the line of excessive and now I had to hid it.

This was also a time for celebration that we were “finally settled”. And how did I celebrate this “wonderful” news? By drinking, throwing extravagant themed dinners & parties (with the coordinating outfits to match) and ignoring my even more declining mental health. Now I was mentally in a place where I thought I could “buy my way to happiness”. Of course I didn’t actually realize any of this at the time, I just drank to “celebrate”.

My “celebration era” came to a SCREECHING halt on 3/24/22 when one of my family members became critically ill. How did I handle this stress and pressure? I drank and mentally spiraled into a VERY dark hole.

Six months later, my rock bottom hit. My relationship with my kids and my significant other had TANKED and I knew that if I didn’t get my mental health under control there would be devastating consequences. So, on 9/25/22 I had my last sips (more like chugs) of several bottles of Cavit Pino Grigio and committed to improving my mental health.

Getting sober was the single hardest thing I’ve ever had to do. It’s so easy to “numb”, it’s not easy to “feel”. However, what I have learned in the last twenty months of sobriety is that no matter what life throws at me, no matter how difficult of a situation I am in, no matter what comes next in my life…..alcohol is never going to fix it, improve it or make it better.

Now my goal is to stay sober so I can keep reminding myself of this when life throws me the next crisis. In the meantime I am present for and enjoying the new life that I have created for myself.

Good luck with your journey

Donna