Almost ten days sober and counting. The previous weekend was my first sober weekend in about a year. I got through it and I won`t lie…it was pretty tough. But I did it and that is a huge step for me personally. But the sober weekend gave room for reflection.
It got me thinking about how I would act and what I would do if I was buying alcohol. Especially in the middle of the week which is highly frowned upon where I live.
If I was buing a six-pack of beers in the middle of the week I would pretend like I was talking to someone on the phone while I was paying, so the cashier would think that I wasn`t buying all that beer for myself but that I had a bunch of people at home watching a football match or something, that I would share it with. A huge deal was also to get the reciept, to give the impression that “all the people waiting for me at home” would split it. That usually also meant buying a bag of chips with the beer to keep the lie intact. The bag of chips ended up being my breakfast the next morning.
I find it rather fascinating how I would contruct this “socially” acceptable impression of myself when buying alcohol so I won`t “arouse suspicion”.
Any experience with this kind of “social justification”?
Definitely. Virtually everyone with a problem does it. At one point I just went “they all know anyways, and I don’t see my life getting worse than this, so screw masking it”.
If you want to laugh about it while relating, you can check out the You Might Be An Addict If thread we have going on. It stings with familiarity and amuses with the absurdity of the lengths we went to.
Once we feel like we need it to survive (emotionally, psychologically, or physically), our brain and body tenses up to protect it, and recruits all the power of “survival mode” to protect our drinking. So we do all sorts of things to make sure nothing threatens getting a hold of that next drink, even if we actually hate the drink. We lie to ourselves, to others, get selfish, go into denial, run from the truth, because there’s that voice telling us our survival depends on it, pushing us to just do it instead of thinking about it and listening to what our rational thoughts say.
Good job surviving the weekend and getting to ten days, by the way. Sounds like progress to me. Keep it going, don’t let it start to slide, but just one day at a time, you can do it. Use whatever tools you can.
I can totally relate it this. I’m keeping a list of all the insane things I used to do as a reminder of the unmanageability of my drinking life and I definitely need to add this. I used to go to a 24/7 supermarket and would buy a bottle along with a wine gift bag and a birthday card to make it look like I was buying a present. I mean WTF is that all about? Who would I be buying vodka for at 6.30 in the morning!!
