This message was sent to subscribers by email october 15th.
day 1 stories:
“all the hateful things i said”
from me: a couple of days ago, i invited you to send me your Day 1 stories. How do you know it was time to quit? What tools do you reach for? What part of Day 1 do you never want to repeat again?
I said I’d choose 4 stories to share, and that each person chosen would get a copy of the first year of the blog collected into one big PDF file (easier than reading it online).
Here’s story #2 (of 4). If this is you, send me an email so i can send you the blog PDF 🙂
A: “my day one was a lot like many other hung-over mornings of my life — i knew my partner and i had fought the previous night. what i couldn’t remember this time was: EVERYTHING else. as he angrily told me all of the resentful, hateful things i had spewed at him in the previous evening’s “brown out,” i could hardly reconcile those statements with the person i know i am at my core. but, the fact remained, i said them. i said them, and our relationship is changed to this day because i said them. i spent the rest of that day in bed, reading every sober success story i could get my hands on. your blog, holly’s work at hip sobriety, and so many others. as my partner ignored me for several days, the only support i had in the world was writings from people like you. we/i made it through, but wow, was it hard.
turning my back on alcohol was initially to save my relationship, to try to regain his trust in me, but it’s only now that i’m seeing what a great gift it was to myself as an individual as well. i have just begun to feel hints of something i thought i wasn’t wired to feel at all: peace. i didn’t think it was possible for someone with anxiety like mine to ever find even a moment when the constant knot in my stomach would loosen, even just a little — so the answer was always to numb myself to such an extreme level that i couldn’t feel it (or anything) anymore. my day 1 was sad, full of shame and regret and humiliation, but it led me to feel this most incredible sensation: the very beginnings of peace. i now dare to wonder what else i might feel that i thought was completely off-limits for me!”
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link to click today: a small audio about feeling irritated, how to shift your thinking > here.
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this exit is loud and clear. can’t miss it. time to get off the booze elevator. HERE.