I looked over at my nightstand and remembered taking my prescription before bed, chasing that prescription with any sleep-inducing drugstore meds I could find in my nightstand. I remembered waking up, thirsty and heavy-feeling, chugging some water, and going back to sleep. And then I opened my blinds and remembered that I’d driven myself home.
But despite that revelation — of another drunken hour-long commute, of another morning spent piecing together conversations, people, and places — I didn’t want to think about what my life would look like without booze. To think about the nightmare of sober Christmas, sober Easter, sober afternoons. To think about not drinking to write, to hang out, to feel better, to arm myself against real vulnerability. I reminded myself that I’d never done anything too bad, that I didn’t get hungover, that I wasn’t doing coke or heroin or taking anything #controversial, and that if I was really an alcoholic, I wouldn’t have been able to drive home at all. I reminded myself of all the movie characters and friends and family members whose alcoholism had been loud and messy and over-the-top, and I soothed myself with the reminder that I wasn’t like them. I lay there trying to convince myself that I was better, that I was stronger, that I was a grown-ass woman making her own grown-ass choices, and that everyone else got drunk, so why couldn’t I? I pushed the nagging feeling down, again, along with the feeling that as much as I told myself I was in control of my drinking, I knew I wasn’t.
If I chose to stop drinking, I’d have to engage and be present and sit there vulnerably without the lubrication of wine and beer and gin. I’d have to confront reality without liquid courage and confidence, without the built-in excuse that I’d had a few too many. When someone offered me a drink, I’d have to say no.
And then I started to cry.
~
The first time I got drunk, I was 15 and with two friends from school; I choked down three beers and a glass of whiskey. I dry-heaved once then made it to the party in time to sit on a senior guy’s lap. I never came close to throwing up again. So, while I was certainly an annoying young drunk, I told myself that I was still pretty good at it.
My dad’s mom drank. I only knew her after she found sobriety, but a lot of my dad’s childhood memories involve domestic disputes fueled by too much drinking. Which is likely why I’ve never seen my dad drunk: for a long time, he avoided drinking altogether. Only a few years ago did he start to have beer, and at the very most he’d doze off after a few of them. And when I drank as a teen, he seemed to either ignore me or fixate on me doing it so young. Compared to his experience, I wasn’t an alcoholic — he’d seen a real drinker, and I didn’t look anything like that.
But the older I got, the more complicated my habit became. I started to drink to fall asleep, to feel confident, to write. I began to drink well — I learned how to make sure nobody ever really knew I’d been drinking at all. I drank to feel included, and I drank if it was offered. I drank to break the ice; I drank to spark real talk. I drank to hit on boys, and I drank to justify kissing them. Drinking could open a strange gateway to vulnerability.
I drank because it gave me the illusion of control. I drank to justify intentional fuckery, knowing I could always circumvent real accountability by blaming it on too much of whatever I’d had the night before. I drank because I could escape from my anxiety and my worries and my hang-ups and everything that held me back.
And I drank because I liked it.
Because that’s the thing: I liked it. Drinking was my favorite pastime and my costume. For a few solid hours, I got to convince myself (and everybody I met) that I was really much better than my actual self — a shiny, full-color version.
Not that Drunk Me was ever actually as charming or as interesting as I convinced myself she was. I knew I was stuck in a persona that annoyed people as often as I entertained them. I’d find myself in the downward spiral of repeating “That’s not what I meant” to irritated looks and eye-rolls. I couldn’t catapult out of the conversation in which I was justifying driving home despite nearly having fallen down on my way to the car. My morning-after routine became wondering what I’d said and in what tone and who I needed to apologize to. But all of that paled in comparison to the idea of something even more daunting: sober reality.
~
That morning in May, I accepted I had a drinking problem. And, because movies and TV shows claimed that I couldn’t do it alone, I broke character and reached out, emailing a few friends who had stopped drinking to ask how they’d known it was time to get sober. They were honest and warm and understanding and wonderful, offering me their time and support. And, clearly determined to maintain some sense of control, I told myself that outside of admitting my problem, I didn’t need help; that, unlike everybody else, I could do it alone. As I began explaining to friends that I was going to stop drinking, I peppered my revelation with promises that I’d still be fun and I’d still go to parties and everything was fine because I was fine, really, promise. And under that claim, two days after deciding to get sober, I went to a party where the alcohol was free and flowing, and every drunk person wanted to know in detail why I wasn’t having any. Which is how I learned that the old chestnut about sobriety is true: it really is about taking it one day at a time. Particularly when navigating drunk people who want to know why you aren’t drinking.
My first year sober was slow and tedious and I hated it. I remember counting the days to May 8 (my start date), when I could finally celebrate a full year of sobriety. At first, the idea of going that long without liquor seemed impossible. It felt weird to even use the word “sober,” as though I was infringing on a term reserved for people who really couldn’t handle their drinking. (Unlike me, a person in denial about how much I could handle.) I stumbled to answer questions about why I didn’t drink, why I couldn’t drink, and why I didn’t see myself drinking in the future. I’d get defensive if friends asked if I “still wasn’t drinking,” as though they should understand the severity of my alcoholism despite my never having opened up about it. I’d get nervous the first time anyone had to engage with Sober Anne instead of her wine-wielding counterpart, terrified they’d dislike the person under the mask of too much gin. I’d lead with the acknowledgment that I wasn’t drinking before anybody could notice it. I made jokes that alluded to my problem without committing to having one. I clung to control in any way I knew how.
Those first 365 days, I tried to hide my sobriety, to downplay it, all in an effort to make people around me comfortable. Instead of telling them to shut up and be normal, I made it my problem if they felt self-conscious drinking around me; I’d stay too long at parties or at restaurants to prove just how chill Sober Anne was.
I’d reached out to my sober friends, sure, but I felt defensive when they checked in on me, assuming they thought I couldn’t take care of myself. So I continued to overcompensate. I was fine. I didn’t drink anymore, and it was fine. I announced that my problems had stopped when my drinking had.
But, for the first five months after quitting booze, I still took sleep aids and over-the-counter cold medicine to pass out before bed, until I made myself sick by taking too many. Maybe my addictive tendencies weren’t limited to my zest for things I could drink. Like maybe (I learned while working with my therapist) I had broader issues with control and addiction and using substances to dial down my anxiety. And maybe self-medication is a real dangerous way of trying to quiet the noise of a mental health disorder. And maybe alcoholism also runs in the family.
Okay, fine.
As I began to learn more about myself, as I got older, as I got tired, the less concerned I became with how other people perceived my sobriety. The more comfortable I got with my sober self, the less I felt compelled to make strangers feel comfortable around me. Because my personal decisions aren’t up for public debate. And neither are yours. My sobriety is public knowledge but personal history. I know what brought me to this place, and I’ve made peace with it. I’ve come to
realize I get to decide who I share details with, or whether or not I feel like suffering fools who forget what a sober person might like to drink at a party. Like getting sober to begin with, the choice is mine. If me not drinking makes somebody feel weird or uncomfortable, that’s on them. And if they try to make me feel weird or uncomfortable about it, they can go fuck themself.
~
Lying in my bed that sunny morning years ago, I never thought I’d get to this point. I never thought that without wine or beer or gin, I’d be able to declare that I do not give a fuck. Or that I’d be able to write about the darkest and most embarrassing parts of my life — or anything — without the help of a shitty merlot.
Getting sober was hard. Being sober is hard. I hated being vulnerable and opening myself up to the kindness of people who care about me. (Still hate it, writing this essay was a nightmare.) It took years for me to loosen my grip on the idea that vulnerability meant weakness and accept that it’s an important part of growing and changing and challenging ourselves. And the most sobering part of all of it? Those are things that never actually stop.
It’s Called Fashion, Look It Up
It is a hot day in September, and I am buying a fur coat.
The coat is old, I swear. It’s vintage, it’s on sale, and it smells like the stale cigarette smoke of a powerful lady. And right now, I need to feel powerful. It’s been A Real Time: a series of unfortunate events spurred on by guy stuff and friend stuff and family stuff and exacerbated by my choice to push all of it down instead of asking for help. I try on the coat. I selfie in the coat. And I look at the selfie, and I like the woman who’s staring back at me. She is unfuckwithable and terrifying. She is bold, she is confident, she dares you to ask if the fur is real. I feel exactly like the woman I need to be to make it through the next few months.
Clothes are always my safest way to usher in change. Fashion is one of the first ways you get to assert your independence, to show who you are to the world. In eighth grade, I felt like I’d earned my rightful place in young adulthood when I graduated from kid-friendly fleece to the camouflage tank tops and button-ups I swore I saw on Drew Barrymore in Seventeen. I was sure my limited-edition Hello Kitty glitter gloss would make my crush notice me, or if I bought bright plaid flared pants, I’d look enough like Tamara from Breaker High that a Ryan Gosling look-alike would be totally bewitched by my presence. Of course, my eighth-grade aesthetic was poetic in its tragedy. My favorite outfit was a pair of Adidas pants worn with hiking boots and a Gap bucket hat, and I honestly thought I looked like Kate Winslet in Titanic in my self-described “kinda crochet” graduation dress. If my outfit screamed Rose Dawson to my classmates, too, maybe I could conquer the world (or at least the slow dances at my graduation). I was old enough to recognize the power of celebrity fashion, but still young enough to believe that a garment could convincingly make me look like someone else. Because no matter how many bucket hats I owned, deep down I knew I was still only Anne Donahue.
High school called for a rebrand. I swapped out TGIF chic for pleather, platforms, and bright polyester halters. I used clothing to broadcast who I hung out with, what music I liked, what movies I saw, and the stores I could afford to shop at. I was convinced new clothes would erase any memory my classmates had of how uncool I’d been, would help them see how adult I finally was. But I was more like a kid playing dress-up.
The runways of high school hallways see more fashion turnover than the bargain rack at Forever 21, and my approach was no exception. One month, I pledged aesthetic allegiance to skate and snowboarding brands to convince hip skater boys that I was cool enough to hang around with them. Weeks later, I poured myself into ill-fitting clubwear to dabble in the all-ages nightlife I assumed Carrie Bradshaw had once lived through. I used brands like American Eagle and Abercrombie to make me feel academic despite knowing I was the opposite, and at one semiformal dance, I layered a bikini top under a tank because I thought it made me look like Kate Bosworth in Blue Crush. Shortly after, I dove headfirst into hipsterdom, where I used vintage clothes and novelty accessories as a way of proving how much better I was than everybody. Fashion was the fastest way to pretend I belonged when I was filled with self-doubt. Fashion was the easiest way to hit reboot.
By my late twenties, I’d left behind fashion tribalism, especially as I found myself feeling increasingly anxious, sad, and lost. While I’d technically rebounded after losing control over my job and finances, anxiety was still very much obsessed with me. And, because anxiety is Kathy Bates in Misery, it got even worse as I tried to bury it. So I once again played dress-up to try to create an identity outside of who my inner monologue told me I was. I used clothes to dress up as a woman who had her shit together by layering pieces I hoped would mark my first step into becoming a woman who really did have her shit together. And it worked.
I started with bags. I began scouring for purses that made me feel like a fancy person and then quickly descended into shoes, which I’d previously dismissed during my years of novelty everything. The clothes I’d accumulated over the previous decade — that I’d bought either to hide in or as part of in-your-face “statement” looks — felt uncomfortable and inauthentic, so I began purging my wardrobe. And when I bought new pieces, they had to be things I felt strong in. Pieces I felt could protect me from my self-doubt and imagined worst-case scenarios.
The same rule applied to makeup — but only after being forced out of my comfort zone. I’d once hidden behind thick black eyeliner and matte red lipstick, but an allergic reaction to old product (gross) forced me to forego my traditional look. So, I started taking new risks, boldly venturing into makeup trends I’d sworn I’d never wear (Black lipstick! No eyeliner at all! Glitter!), and learning that not only was experimentation fun, but it let me express a spectrum of who I was and how I felt. I contained multitudes, and so did my palette. For the first time, I wasn’t using makeup to hide, and I wasn’t using it to try to seem conventionally pretty or even attractive. My face was a canvas on which to paint, illuminating the best parts of myself while uncovering even more things I liked. And as someone who’s always been creative and loud and good at taking risks, I began leaning further into that part of myself, wearing my strengths on my face and daring anyone who had a problem with how I presented myself to say something. Anything.
No one did.
Soon, I began taking the same approach to clothes, using them less as a means of control and more and more as an exploration of who I was and what I was capable of. I finally stopped pushing down my past and resurrected my former selves by amalgamating them through tops, jeans, skirts, and dresses — literally wearing who I was on my sleeves. I mixed and matched vintage, wore platforms, bought silver, gold, and sheer pieces, and picked up what I previously would’ve told myself I’d never get away with. And as I did that, I began to realize that even my most “embarrassing” looks had served as stepping stones to becoming the woman I finally was. (Even if I wasn’t willing to repeat all of them.) I was dressing in a way that appeased my own taste, which I’d finally learned to trust.
By my early thirties, I was dressing like a soldier preparing for battle, and my battle garb could be anything from a cheetah-print jacket to jogging pants. Clothes were a source of reckoning and of comfort, serving as the plus-one for any mood or occasion. Yes, I’d sometimes be stifling a panic attack about where I was going, what I was going to eat when I got there, and what if, what if, what if. But by taking the time to plan my uniform — pieces I felt good and strong in, and makeup that complemented those feelings accordingly — I built that sense of control and sense of self. Even when everything felt bad, this was one thing I already knew felt good. Did I feel like a mess? Sometimes. (We all do sometimes.) But if I looked like a mess, it’s because I wanted to.
~
That same September afternoon, I look at the mom jeans and faded T-shirt I’m wearing under the fur coat and realize that even in moments of feeling less
than battle-ready, I’ve learned to wear exactly what I feel I need to. Recently, I’ve felt as thrown together and tired as that outfit, held together by caffeine and MAC. Before discovering the coat, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and noticed the way I slouched as I rummaged through dress racks. I’d come in to buy clothes I could lose myself in as I figured things out, choosing pieces that would blend into the late summer afternoons and exist just to cover me up while I navigated how I was feeling. I remembered how I’d started the season consciously dressing up, planning outfits instead of slipping into pieces that I could wear easily, and parading each like a personal victory. But over the summer, clothes had become a glorified blanket fort I used to shelter myself while trying to sort out the rest of my life. Then I tried on that coat. And I realized I was ready to morph back into the version of myself who didn’t mind being seen.
It’s easy to believe that changing your clothes will change your life, but no: they simply change the way you navigate it. With a deliberate approach to fashion, we can dress for the selves we need to be. We use what we’ve learned in the past to evolve into our next incarnation. We still carry with us the ghosts of the teen who shrouded herself in camouflage or the twenty-something so proud of her distressed denim skirt. Our reasons for how we dress vary depending on what we’re going through: we dress to hide, to spark change, to stand out, to feel like we’re in control. And all of these reasons are important. But more important still is the sense of power our style choices give us. Because when we wear what we want — casting off the pressure of trends or outside opinions or anything other than our own taste — we curate a collection that reflects who we’ve decided to show the world.
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