My Name Is...
It’s not something I keep a secret from people: I am an alcoholic.
I also feel like I have shared my story so many times that it feels like I’m on autopilot anymore when I tell it.
I woke up in the middle of the California desert with no recollection of how I got there in my wife’s car. I was shirtless for some reason. I had so many missed calls and messages on my phone I just deleted them all after listening to the first couple. My wife looking for me. My brother looking for me. My sister looking for me. I started the car and drove home, flashes of my shitty behavior the night before coming back.
My god, I was a shit. To my wife most of all. But to everyone who loved me, really.
I got home and my wife was waiting. Fear giving way to relief, then anger. I had failed and hurt her in ways I would consider unforgivable.
“Fix your shit, or get out.”
And that was day one of my sobriety.
Of course, I am leaving out a lot of the gory details in this re-telling. My wife may read this and she doesn’t need to relive one of the worst nights of our life together. Plus, the shame I still feel is really none of your fucking business. I share those details when it is appropriate at meetings in a church basement in Paris.
—
I had tried sobriety once before. Made it six years and a few months before I duped myself into believing that what was true about me was a lie despite all the evidence.
I can have this glass of wine.
I can have this shot of tequila.
I can have this case of beer in one sitting.
I did rehab the first time I got sober. Against my will, but still, I went and participated. Once I got out I skipped the whole recommended regimen of 90 meetings in 90 days. Fuck the Big Book. Fuck sponsorship. I just need to not drink.
How hard could that really be?
And, being the arrogant prick that I am, I relished my sense of superiority. “Oh my god, *person* is so embarrassing when they drink,” while conveniently forgetting the time I woke up in a mess of myself in my own driveway.
“I don’t do that anymore so, clearly, I am superior to *person*.”
I was what some call a dry drunk.
I did no work on myself. NONE.
My thinking went: if drinking was my problem and I am not drinking, clearly I have eliminated the problem.
But drinking wasn’t the problem. Drinking was a symptom. It took my ass sitting in a psychologist’s office for two years to realize that I was an alcoholic. Of course, by the time I hit the shrink’s chair, I was already drinking again. Can you imagine that?
I was willing to do the work to fix my broken bits, but I also wanted to keep slamming the hammer against my own skull, never thinking that I should stop that.
I can have this glass of wine.
I can have this shot of tequila.
I can have this case of beer in one sitting.
You see, therapy was amazing at forcing me to deal with the damage done to me by outside forces. Nothing could stop the damage done to me by me.
Except for me, of course.
—
So on that first day of my second sobriety I had to choose.
Fix my shit.
Or get the fuck out.
I was in the guestroom for the foreseeable future. So I wrote the things that were in my head, went to meetings, and got to work on doing the work.
I hated meetings at first. Remember what I said about being an arrogant prick? I sat there with these drunks telling their stories still believing that somehow I was better than them.
Then I would come home, go to my room, and write. I would force myself to take the demons out of their box and poke at them. Remember the game Operation? In my mind’s eye that is exactly what it was like. Only, there was no little buzz for hitting an edge. If I hit an edge I could lose myself again to the self-hate, the belief that I was as worthless as drunk me liked to remind me that I am. If I hit an edge I would be reminded of all the fucking horrible shit I did when I was drunk.
For me, the only way it could really work, was to write it down, look at it, acknowledge that yeah, I did this shitty thing to *fill in the blank*. I told my sponsor - an old fucker who fellated his own shotgun once or twice as drunk him reminded him of his own worthlessness before he decided it was time to fix his shit or get the fuck out.
“This is a good exercise, really. But it can’t be all of it because if you’re not careful, if you only focus on the shitty things you did, you’ll spiral into the self-hate that helped get you into this mess in the first place. You are not ONLY the bad things you do when you drink. You have good in you, too. Maybe when you write you can try to remind yourself of something good about yourself. And if that’s too hard, maybe just write something good about your wife or your favorite sports team - just, write something good to hold onto. Eventually, you’ll find it easier to write good, gentle things about yourself.”
So I did.
And all these years later, though I do not journal everyday anymore, it is the first thing I do when I feel myself slipping into those thoughts of self-doubt because those thoughts turn into self-hate really quickly. And like *sponsor* said to, I make it a point to write something good. To remind me.
—
That’s the heart of what this is really about. We don’t stay sober just by not drinking — we stay sober by doing the work, even when it’s messy. Especially when it’s messy.
That’s why I created the 90 Days Strong Journal. It’s not some perfect solution or polished workbook. It’s just a place — a simple structure — for anyone navigating early sobriety to show up every day, face the hard stuff, and still find a way to hold on to something good.
If you’re just starting out, or starting again, or walking with someone who is, this journal might help. That’s all it’s meant to do.
You can check it out here: 90 Days Strong
And soon — very soon — there will be an online web-app to accompany the journal. The web-app will be free, store none of your personal data save for your login.
If you’re trying to get sober I am cheering for you. Give yourself grace. Be patient. If you stumble, get back up, dust yourself off, remember that you are a badass, and get back after it.
If you love someone struggling with getting sober just know you are not alone.