Happiness is a new rug

This update was posted by our beloved long-time member @ylang-ylang (over 700 sober days hooray!) in the Members Feed the other day. In it I thought she perfectly summed up how our lives can unfold and settle into a new state of calm and joy after we give up booze. With her permission I am reprinting it here so more can enjoy it. I love her description of ‘Drinkinghangoverland’… 

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@ylang-ylang: Before I moved into my new house, I bought a gorgeous new rug for my new lounge. It stayed rolled up, wrapped in its plastic bag, it’s been leaning against the wall in the lounge. Miss 11 has been very excited to open it. “Not until we’re unpacked” I told her. “It’s the last thing to be unpacked.”

Last night I was sitting on my sofa, with a true ‘happy place’ moment. I looked around to appreciate it. The rug was down (we put it down last night and the Miss 11 and Mr 15 and I rolled around on it for a while with much delight and words like ‘fuzzy’ and ‘soft’ and ‘aaaaaaahhhhh’ and then we lay there in a lovely quiet hug). I had my cute new tea pot and my ‘For the mum with the biggest heart’ mothers day present from Mr 15 when he was Mr 8, filled with yummy herbal tea, feet up on the coffee table (never ever buy a coffee table you can’t put your feet on) watching TV.

The house is unpacked. There is still some sorting in my room to be done and there are a couple of boxes of books yet to be found (in the garage I think, not sure). We’ve been in here less than 3 weeks and it feels very much like home. The kids are happy and we’re settling in beautifully.

I would not be in this happy place if I had still been drinking and I mean that absolutely. I wouldn’t have had the confidence to buy on my own, nor would I have been able to afford to do so if I’d still been drinking.

So, big sober picture: my life is more or less the same since I stopped drinking 703 days ago. I still work in the same place, my ex husband is still a dick, I still eat too much cake and don’t really get enough exercise. I am on a tight budget and live week to week. I have a lot of the same friends, some gone, some new ones. I bought a car, on my own, my first ever really big solo purchase. My car represents my sobriety in as much as I’m driving around in my booze money (car repayments are what I was spending on alcohol – ridiculous I know, but that’s how much I was spending/drinking) and I bought a house! On my own. That was huge for me. It still is huge for me.

When I was living in Drinkinghangoverland there was no way I would have bought a house by myself. I wouldn’t have had the confidence to do it. Also at 51 buying a house by myself was an acceptance that I really am alone and it doesn’t look like I’m going to be sharing my home with anyone other than my kids. That was hard and if I was still drinking I wouldn’t have been able to move forward past that fear/emotion. But I did because I don’t drink.

So last night my new rug went down in my new lounge and my gorgeous kids and I rolled around on it and then lay there quietly, being awesome and happy and together and this all happened because 703 days ago I decided to take my life back.

Being sober, there is absolutely no down side.

@ylang-ylang