by Lotta Dann
‘Addictive voice recognition technique’ someone said. What is that? I google it to find out more. Okay, so apparently addictive voice recognition technique (AVRT) is a dissociative technique (that’s psychology talk) whereby you identify the addictive voice inside your mind and then you separate from it. The internet tells me I need to think of my internal addict like a naughty child or a nasty acquaintance, a separate being that lives inside of me. All it wants is for me to drink more, and when I don’t drink it’s goading me on. It wants me all to itself. And ratting on it is a great way to cut some of its power. That’s what I did!
Mrs D Is Going Without (Day 46)
I like this. I feel like I’ve been telling on my addict in this blog which is why I started writing this blog. I’ve written about how my addict drove me to pick up wine bottles even when I was trying to have an alcohol-free day, how my addict would do deals with itself over hangovers (‘I can drink lots tonight and have a hangover tomorrow because I’m not going to the gym, then that hangover will stop me drinking too much tomorrow night which is good because I want to go to the gym the next day after that’), how my addict would appear behind my eyes like a paranoid junkie whenever the wine started to be drunk, checking out how much was left (‘How much are they having? How much is left for me? How much is in the house? How much can I get? I’m your addict and I need lots of wine!!!’) I’m telling tales on my stupid fucking addict to get her out of my head for good (hopefully).
I’m feeling so great that I’ve got this fun, secret, helpful blog vibe happening. It’s out-of-this-world unbelievably cool. I decide I can’t keep it a secret from Corin anymore. I can’t live keeping secrets from Corin (well, clearly I can’t because hiding a bottle of wine from him sent me into a complete tail-spin and sparked a monumental life change). I need to tell him about my blog now; to keep it a secret from him any longer would just be weird and wrong.
I do it at lunchtime on Monday when he’s just home from the TVNZ studios. He’s exhausted, as he always is after presenting on-air for three straight hours, standing in the kitchen making a huge feast to eat before falling into bed for an afternoon nap.
‘Honey,’ I slowly begin, ‘I’ve got something to tell you.’
‘Yes,’ he replies warily, probably mentally preparing himself to hear some sort of dramatic statement from me.
‘Um, well,’ I continue, ‘I actually have this thing going on which I’ve kept a secret till now because I was just really nervous and focused and determined and . . .’ I’m babbling. Corin has stopped making his sandwich and is staring at me.
‘What?’ he says.
‘Um, oh, it’s not bad or anything, it’s just that I started a blog when I stopped drinking.’ I feel a bit stupid now, like it’s not that big a deal. ‘I’ve been writing in it most days, like in the morning mostly, just writing what’s happening for me with the not-drinking and what I’m feeling and stuff. Just writing, you know, to try and, um, help me to not drink ever again.’
‘Oh! Good idea,’ Corin says, taking a big mouthful of his sandwich, probably relieved that I didn’t tell him I was going to start drinking again or run off to India to do a five-week retreat or something.
‘Yeah, but the thing is, now something really cool is happening and some people are actually reading it and . . . I’ve been getting some comments from people. Like, people are helping me now.’
‘Wow,’ says Corin, and he’s obviously impressed at this. ‘Who are they?’
‘I dunno,’ I reply, picking at his food even though I’ve already eaten. ‘Some of them are anonymous, some have their own blogs, some just put a name but you can’t figure out who they are. But they’re all being really nice to me, which is cool.’
‘That’s so great!’ he says. I can tell he’s pleased I’m happy and upbeat for the first time in a long time. And I figure he’s probably relieved to hear I’ve got somewhere to vent other than just talking to him. Poor guy does spend an awful lot of time listening to me blah on about booze and all the endlessly fascinating stuff that I am reading and thinking and discovering (well, at least I think it’s endlessly fascinating). I’m sure he’s pleased I’ve got another outlet for all my brain noise.
He wipes his hands and sits at the computer to take a look around my blog, reading some of the latest posts and seeing how there are a few comments here and there. I hover around behind him, feeling a bit vulnerable, but I think he’s quietly proud of what I’ve gone and set up, and if he finds it weird that I’ve kept it a secret until now he doesn’t let on. ‘Isn’t it great that there are people in similar situations to you around this blogging space?’ he says and gives me a big hug before heading off for a nap.
I tidy up the kitchen and think about how lucky I am to have someone like Corin alongside me right now. He’s consistently very calm and stable, which is a godsend at the best of times but particularly lately with me being all over the show emotionally. He just listens and listens and listens and never complains or criticises or judges me for anything. He’s totally engaged in what I’m doing, but in a lovingly detached way, not interfering or dictating how he thinks I should be dealing with stuff. And he’s never once complained about the fact that he’s now married to a non-drinker—he married a boozy party girl, remember?! Luckily (unless he’s hiding it really well) he doesn’t seem to mind that I’m completely changing my ways.
However I am, it must be said, working really hard to make him feel he doesn’t need to change along with me by buying him wine every now and then. My attitude is that this is my problem and my problem alone. I’m the one that can’t control or moderate my booze. Alcohol is going to be all around me for the rest of my life, I might as well get used to having it in the house, too. I just have to focus on fixing me.
Speaking of me (as if I haven’t enough already), I’m actually now starting to lift up again and feel really good about this new non-drinking lifestyle. Great, in fact. So great it’s almost like I’m on some sort of high. I’m positively soaring along. I’d even go so far as to say, I feel elated!
Is it because I’m getting the odd comment here and there on my blog? Is it because my body has adjusted to being a wine-free temple? Is it because my nasty pimple has cleared and the great night’s sleep I’m regularly getting is starting to have an impact? Or is it because since my Oprah revelation I’ve slowly been realising the full impact my steady, heavy wine-drinking was having on my life?
I think it’s all of the above, but mostly I think it’s because of what started dawning on me after the Oprah moment. I’m starting to look at my drinking differently. I’m starting to make sense of the emotional lurching all-over-the-show that I’ve been doing over the past few weeks. Me being overly emotional without the wine is showing me how unemotional I was with it.
Getting angry with Corin the other night wasn’t fun and I felt decidedly uncomfortable about it. But now I’m looking back at that evening and thinking, ‘That was anger, I felt angry.’ Some rough days with the kids have had me stressed and, boy, do I want to drink on those days. But now I’m looking back and thinking, ‘That was stress, I felt stressed.’ Some days I feel inexplicably flat. Just flat and glum. But now I’m looking at those days and thinking, ‘Sadness, is this what sadness feels like?’ I’m just starting to realise that I never really allowed myself the space to feel anything much. Not anger or stress or sadness. I just glug, glug, glugged wine all the time without considering its full impact. Wine levelled me, it smoothed me out.
Now I’ve been sober for a while I can see how my life is going to be different. I’m going to feel more, be far more attuned to my moods. Life without wine is more up and down, and I was avoiding that. My steady, heavy wine-drinking was not just a habit gone too far but a life choice. And now I’m choosing something different. It all seems so much easier to read. This dawning realisation is so amazing I feel uplifted. I feel clearer. Hang on . . . clarity. This is clarity! Holy shit, this is the clarity people tal
k about!
I’m so giddy at my realisation that I start talking more widely with friends about how I’m feeling. Walking the kids home from school one day, I joke with a fellow mum about my newfound clarity. ‘When I used to hear people talk about gaining clarity, I thought it meant that because they weren’t hungover all the time they could open their eyes more widely to see better.’ I’m laughing wildly as I explain to her, ‘I thought “seeing more clearly” meant you could literally see better without your eyes being blurry ha ha ha!’ I am highly amused at my own stupidity. I’m not sure that my friend is matching my amusement levels but she’s listening and being very kind. ‘Now I’m starting to realise that having clarity means you can actually understand yourself and your moods better. Does that make sense?’ I ask her as we cross the road with a gaggle of small children around us but don’t give her a chance to reply. ‘I just feel like I’m starting to get what my drinking was all about, like it wasn’t just that I wanted everything to be fun all the time, it was also that I didn’t want to feel anything slightly negative.’ Oh the joy I feel at relaying this amazing revelation. God knows what my friend must have been thinking.
Mrs D Is Going Without (Day 51)
Every morning I wake up feeling clear, and I am starting to relax and accept that this new clear-headedness is with me to stay, I am embracing the new sober me and I like her.
I re-read my old diary this week and it was so sad to read teenage me writing about hating myself, and getting drunk all the time, and hating myself. Miserable teenage me. I want to go back in time and give teenage Mrs D a big hug and whisper in her ear, ‘It’s okay, I’m going to get you through’ . . . because I did get me through and look at me now!
Sorry for this arrogance talking but I’m feeling empowered by my decision to remove alcohol from my life and really happy and proud of myself that I am doing it. I feel like this is my only life, this is it, and I’m living it how I want to. That’s a great feeling and long may it last.
Of course, it doesn’t.
12
Apparently, there’s a name for this elation I’m feeling. My wise wonderful blog readers inform me that this giddy high I am on is actually a known phenomenon in early sobriety and it’s got the delightfully cheerful name of ‘pink cloud’. I’m floating on a pink cloud, baby!
Comment from ‘Derek’
The pink cloud is that wonderful time in early recovery when it all starts clicking and the using days seem far behind and life is just great, great, great . . . it’s a good thing, but also kinda dangerous, cos we start to consider ourselves ten foot tall and bulletproof . . . and start to think we got this clean and sober thing nailed . . . and get a little too big for our britches.
Right, so I have to prepare myself for this feeling to end, but that can happen later . . . for now I just want to enjoy it. Pink clouds rock!
I feel happy and light for the first time in ages. Clever me! I feel empowered by my growing understanding of what my drinking was all about. It sounds cheesy and clichéd to say, but coming to this realisation is totally awesome and utterly unexpected. I’m sure that’s why it’s so powerful, because I’ve come to it myself. I bet that if someone had tried to sit me down six months ago and tell me that my steady wine consumption was me choosing to not properly deal with any emotional shit, I would have laughed at them or gotten really pissed off. Certainly I wouldn’t have heard it properly or believed it. But because the realisation has come to me via me, because it’s me figuring me out, me educating myself, it’s unbelievably powerful—hence the giddy feeling. Woohoo!!!
I’m kind of wide-eyed in amazement. Now I know that taking the booze away isn’t just about me breaking a habit, it’s actually about me having to approach life differently. Without alcohol entering my system all the time, I always have to deal with shit in a raw state, and never reach for my beloved liquid cope-all. It feels amazing to understand this.
But I can also sense why I’m being warned that this pink cloud feeling isn’t going to last—I have to move forward and actually do this. Dealing with shit, raw, all the time, forever. Actually live through every single day feeling every single feeling that comes at me and never drinking to escape. And not just bad shit like anger and stress and sadness. Good shit, too, like elation and triumph and joy. All of it, all the time, raw. No big glasses of red wine to take the edge off a stressful day, no flutes of bubbles to toast in celebration, no cold beer to welcome in summer, no whiskey to loosen tongues on a late-night confessional. Looking ahead into my life and imagining dealing with everything in a raw state is somewhat overwhelming. I can’t bear to look too far ahead so I just lie back and luxuriate on my beautiful pink cloud.
The timing of this pink cloud couldn’t be better, actually—we’re still in the middle of our full-on phase of socialising, starting tonight with a huge black-tie gala dinner that’s being held in honour of Sir Richard Branson. Yes, the Virgin dude is in town. Corin and I usually turn down invites to glitzy functions (we can’t be bothered), but this one we have to go to because Corin’s been asked to interview Sir Richard on stage in front of all the dinner guests. It’s a big honour.
I’m not too nervous as I get ready. In a funny way, knowing ahead of time that I won’t be drinking at the dinner makes me feel more secure in how I’m going to be. I can rest assured that I won’t be chasing the wines all evening like I normally do. I’m careful to make sure my dress (borrowed) isn’t on inside out but sadly I neglect to practise walking in my new high heels. So it’s not until we’re approaching the venue that I realise they’re too big. My heels keep lifting out of the back of them, which is causing me to shuffle awkwardly—this is not classy.
I manage to walk in okay by clinging onto Corin’s arm, trying very hard not to care about how silly I must look shuffling along. The venue is decorated beautifully and packed to the gunnels with all manner of gorgeous and glamorous people (Rachel Hunter!), the rich and famous, and breakfast TV hosts with their newly sober wives. We find our table at the front and sit down. The room is buzzing and I nervously ask a passing waiter for a non-alcoholic drink. When she returns with it I ask her to snap a photo of Corin and me on my phone, and I send it to Corin’s mum with the accompanying text: ‘Out at a posh dinner!’
I start to relax and, well, I actually start to enjoy myself. There are some nice businessmen at the table with us and they are chatty and low-key. No one is really boozing and it seems irrelevant that my drink is a soft one. The entree comes around and after I’ve gobbled it down (it’s all about the food when I’m not drinking) I shuffle off to the bathroom as fast as I can so I don’t miss Corin’s star turn, which is coming up next. In the ladies’ toilet I encounter a couple of very made-up, glamorous women acting quite aggressively tipsy. I’m quietly pleased to notice that inwardly I’m not envying their booziness at all (although I bet their shoes fit).
I’m so incredibly proud of Corin when he takes to the stage to interview Sir Richard and he does a great job. He comes back to the table happy, we eat the main course and then decide to abandon the glitterati, slip out early and head home. Corin does have an early-morning wake-up ahead of him we tell ourselves, but really we’ve just had enough. And I need to get these shoes off pronto.
Mrs D Is Going Without (Day 53)
Went to a big glitzy function last night, oh so very posh, and had a couple of delicious lemon drinks and an orange juice. No problems! Usually at a function like that I’d be chasing the wines and my regrets the next morning would be ‘Who saw that I was boozing?’ But today, no worries!
It’s interesting looking back on this night because I don’t feel like I was missing out on anything by not-drinking. But then again it wasn’t exactly a warm fun crowd full of friends and family, either. And maybe the pink cloud was buoying me along.
Over the next few days, however, I fear my cloud’s buoyancy is starting to fade and the cold hard reality of trying to never drink again is once more hitting home. I
t’s the bloody Rugby World Cup that’s got me glum again. The All Blacks have made it through to the finals (thankfully, I’m not sure New Zealand would have coped if they hadn’t) and the Biggest Party Ever In The History Of Our Nation is once again being planned for game night. It cannot be ignored so we’ve invited a bunch of friends over to watch it at our house.
While Corin and the boys get busy moving furniture around to create a stadium in our living room, I go to the supermarket for supplies. The place is heaving and there’s a real buzz in the air; everyone’s really excited and nervous about the big game. I grab chips and dip and yeast for the pizza bases and deliberately skirt widely around the booze aisle (Corin has already stocked up in this department). It’s a good thing I don’t need to go down there because it’s like Grand Central Station. It’s packed! Booze, booze, so much booze is being piled into so many trolleys. And this is just in my neighbourhood at this particular time of the day. Around the country all day long this will be going on. I think about all the collective litres of alcohol that are going to be poured down the throats of my countrymen and women tonight and it’s a lot.
But not my delicate sober throat, I think to myself as I grab a couple of energy drinks by the checkout. I won’t lie, I do feel a bit sad about that. I do feel a bit flat. It’s not exactly happy-happy-joy-joy in my head right now. Just a sort of sad determination. I’m adjusting still, I tell myself. I have no choice, I tell myself. This is just the way it has to be, I tell myself.
The evening passes fine, I don’t drink, and thank goodness the All Blacks win.
Mrs D Is Going Without (Day 56)
So life is different without alcohol in it. Not surprising given the amount of hours I devoted to wine (planning, acquiring, drinking, recovering) that are now wine-less hours. But aside from the expected and happy results of living sober—less guilt, fewer headaches and sick guts, more money in the bank—there are other results that I hadn’t expected.