Do I hope one day I can drink wine again?

I was asked this question the other day.

“Mrs D, do you NEVER wish that you could have just one glass of an amazing wine, to savour and enjoy with a meal or a friend? Do you really NOT want to taste wine ever again? Did you hope for a while, whilst on your sober journey, that one day you could do this? Or did you, right from the start, accept that was it. Done.”

Here’s my answer.

NO, I never wish that I could have one glass of wine. I don’t think wine is amazing and don’t want to savour it. I just look at that stuff as being a stupid, expensive liquid drug wrapped up in clever sales pitch that had me convinced for too many years that it makes for a better life when it doesn’t.

It’s not amazing to me. I just see it as destructive, expensive and emotion numbing. Over-rated to the max.

The proof I have for this belief is firmly etched in my memory bank. It’s in the many memories I have of me sloppy drunk and disconnected. Numerous instances of me slurring, stumbling, vomiting, miserable. It’s in the countless awful 3am wake-ups where I’d be full of self-loathing and physical illness. Wine did that. Wine stiffled me, bought me to my knees, shut me off from experiencing things to the full, removed me from forming true, deep connections, and utterly ruined my self-conficence and self-belief.

So no, I do not wish I could have that stuff back in my life.

And YES, I did accept this right from the start. While it took some months to truly turn my thinking around, from day 1 I accepted fully that alcohol was a big problem for me, that I couldn’t control the stuff, and that it had to go forever. Period.

Again – I had the proof all there in the many years I’d been imbibing enthusiastically and sloppily and the many months (towards the end) that I actively tried to control my intake. I tried every trick in the book to be a moderate drinker but nothing worked. And it was getting worse, I could clearly see that. As the months went on I needed more and more to feel ‘full’, and new disfuctional behaviours were emerging (like being posessive of what we had in the house, rushing out late at night to buy more because we’d run out, and hiding bottles).

So I resolved to remove it from my life, and to learn how to be happy without it. I didn’t know exactly how I was going to do that but I believed it was possible (and it is!), and I made a firm decision. No more booze for me for the rest of my life.

I have never wavered from that decision and never will.

My advice to people is always first and foremost; be honest with yourself. You know the truth about your alcohol habit and what sort of struggle you have with it. You know if it’s a problem. Don’t hide from the truth and don’t kid yourself that there’s another reality lurking around the corner, one in which you are a happy moderate drinker savouring amazing glasses of wine while being blissfully happy.

If that’s not your reality with alcohol now it never will be.

And my second bit of advice is always BELIEVE. Believe that you can remove alcohol from your life and learn how to live happily without it. Believe that you can beat your addiction, turn things around and get to where you are living happy and free.

And the final bit of advice? Connect. Connect with others who know what you are going through, either in person or online. Connect and share and you will gain immense strength. You are not alone. There are many of us for whom alcohol is a big, destructive problem. And many of us who get sober, happy and free.

You can do it too. And then hopefully you’ll never wish to drink wine again, like me.

Love, Mrs D xxx