My addiction story

My addiction story was originally written as a letter to my Mom on August 3, 2009. I didn't end up sending it.

Dear Mom,

I am an alcoholic.

There. I said it. Exhale.

I have said it silently for a long, long time but never publicly. I have said it in confidence, with an air of foolery, to my best friends but then backpedaled. I didn’t want it to be true and neither did they. I think that’s why they never took me seriously or took up arms to protect me from myself.

It wasn’t their job to protect me. It was mine. It is mine.

Owning this part of myself has been a long time coming. There is part of me that is scared shitless to own it now but Spirit urges me on. I have known for a while that if I don’t own it, if I don’t quit drinking, I will die. I won’t be around for my son.

Is alcohol worth that?

The answer is a flat-out, all caps NO, but still I hesitate, just for a second or two, with the obvious answer, just as I hesitated yesterday when you asked me, “How much do you value your life?”

The question struck me like a lightning bolt as I realized in a flash that I haven’t been valuing my life at all. I have been squandering it. I have been living a slow death. My biggest pastime? Administering the lethal ingestion to speed up the process.

I drink anywhere between two and four drinks per day. When 5 pm rolls around I can’t wait to pour myself a glass of wine. In fact, I won't wait.

How did this happen?

I am not exactly sure...

I didn’t start my cycle of addiction with alcohol; I started with cigarettes. A pack of Parliaments purchased in the dead of night from a lobby vending machine while on a family vacation when I was in high school. Why? I missed my boyfriend, of course! He smoked, so why shouldn’t I? I couldn’t see straight, the head rush so intense and blinding. I didn’t like the feeling one bit but continued to sneak smokes until my body adjusted and got used to the fact that I would continue to treat it badly for years to come. All in all, I smoked from the age of 16 until I was 36. I took several breaks (short one of a few hours and long ones of a few years) but for the most part I was a smoker, tried and true, smoking up to a pack-a-day.

I tried alcohol for the first time the summer between high school and college. I vaguely remember a summer party, under the stars, in a fancy backyard drinking frou frou drinks like Alabama Slammers and Gin Fizzes. That night gave me a taste. Later in the summer, I very much remember waking up one morning to find a huge pile of dried throw-up next to the toilet bowl. I had no recollection of vomiting but I had obviously missed. Apparently, my little brother had found it, informed my mother, and she had left it for me to clean up. She thought it would deter me. It didn't. The appeal of alcohol had already woven its web. I was a nubie but I was hooked. I loved the way it made me feel. My low self-confidence felt bolstered.

I went to college and became a “quasi” party girl. I wasn’t the party girl whose parents had her drug tested each week. My parents had no idea that I was partying like I had never partied before. In high school, I was the good girl, always the good girl who was never in any trouble. When I got to college getting into trouble was fun. I went to blue whale parties, keggers, drunken toga parties and vodka / lemonade General Hospital girl get-togethers every afternoon at 3pm. I had chosen to go to Loyola College in Baltimore, MD because it accepted me and it was five hours from home. It didn't matter that it didn't offer what I wanted to major in; it was far and that was good. I wanted to spread my wings, figure out who I was, fly the coup and get away from my mom, brother and stepfather. I wanted to get as far away as possible.

At Loyola I didn’t learn much in the classroom because I barely went to class. What I did learn was how to chug a funnel, play quarters, and shoot the worm. I learned what the freshmen 20 feels like too. I’ll never forget coming home that first summer and my mom telling me that I looked fat. I then learned how to subsist on one small meal and alcohol alone to lose the 20 and then some. 

After two years, I left Loyola because I could see I wasn’t going anywhere but down. My party girl status had gone from quasi to full-fledged.

I came home and began working at Innotech, my stepfather's company in NYC. John would wake me up every morning, in the dark, by placing a steaming hot cup of coffee on my bedside table. I would then get up, get ready and we would commute into the city together. I am sure everyone on Metro North thought we were boyfriend / girlfriend. He loved it. Older man / young, hot blonde. When I thought about it, it kind of creeped me out but I must admit I didn’t think about it very much. He was my stepdad after all and I loved his attention. He was supposed to be safe. Up until that point I hadn’t had too many safe relationships. I had unresolved abandonment issues with my father and my first stepfather. I’d also been raped in college.

At Innotech, I flourished. I loved my job. I loved the responsibility. I loved being in Manhattan. I loved making money. I bought a car and paid it off in just one year. I loved my relationship with my stepfather too. We were comrades. I could share my problems with mom and my annoyance at having a nosey little brother and feel that he understood. I could open up about my insecurities and confidence issues and feel safe in doing so. All the while, Innotech was party central. Definitely before the dotcom boom but just as indulgent. We drank at lunch and smoked cigarettes in the bathroom.

After a year at Innotech, I was let go and ordered to go back to school which is how I ended up at Iona College in New Rochelle, NY. A Loyola friend had something to do with it too. She had transferred there and introduced me to everyone. Before I ever applied, I already felt like I belonged. 

The summer I turned 21, my mom, brother and I went to California for vacation. We landed in L.A. and drove up the coast to San Francisco. This is when I fell in love with San Francisco. After a week, they drove up to Sacramento to see my aunt and uncle and I flew home. John picked me up from the airport and took me to dinner. That night, I shared my rape. I'm still not sure why I felt compelled to do so that evening but I am sure several vodka grapefruits had something to do with it.

When we got home, he propositioned me. He told me that he was sad I had had such a horrible experience and said he wanted to show me what making love could be like, could feel like. I was sobered instantly asking incredulously, “What about Mom?”

Beat.

“What about her?” he countered.

I said NO and went upstairs to my room. I went out on the balcony to have a cigarette. He was in the backyard sitting in the grass. He didn’t look at me or say a word but in the morning he scolded me for smoking. Are you kidding me? Last night you wanted to fuck me and now you want to be my father? Screw you!

My confidence was decimated again.

Alcohol numbed the pain. So did cigarettes. 

For several years, I was lost and sad. I tried to find myself and failed miserably. I waitressed and felt sorry for myself.

One night at the restaurant, I kept pouring wine into a paper cup and sipping it down throughout my shift. As I drove home drunk, I took stock. This is not the life I wanted to live. I knew I was on a perilous path and decided to quit. 

I was alcohol-free for almost four years. These were the years I first lived in Colorado. I loved the clarity but instead of indulging it, I chose to transfer my addiction and continue to hide. I chose pot this time. I chose it often. To be frank, it never had much pull for me as it tended to make me paranoid but it was now easily accessible and fun...at least for a while. In the end, the pesky paranoia took over but it didn't matter. It allowed me to hide. I needed to hide.

When I moved to San Francisco in 2000 I swore off pot, but on a awkward first date I said yes when I should have said no to sharing cold Sake. I thought to myself, "I can handle this again. I can keep it under control." I couldn’t.

I tried but I couldn’t.

San Francisco is the city where I danced, and sang, and came into myself more than ever before. It is also where I crossed the line from being a drinker to becoming an alcoholic.

Drinking was never as all-consuming as it has become. It is an overwhelming urge to lean over the bar and pour it myself because the bartender can’t come fast enough. It is an overwhelming ache for that first sip of the day. It is an overwhelming thought that I can’t be and don't want to be "present" to a conversation or situation, a.k.a., life, without a drink-in-hand.

Drinking is an elaborate game of hide and seek. A game I've gotten quite good at. I hide it (at all cost) from those I love so (1) they don’t worry, and (2) they don’t take it away from me. I drink mostly alone or out at a party with other drunks.

Drinking has brought with it an agonizing, all-encompassing self-hatred. I hate myself when I am drunk. I hate myself when I am sober. I hate that I am hiding. I hate that I am terrified. I hate that I am out-of-control. I hate that I could do something about it but haven't. I hate that I got lost. I hate that it is my fault. The agony of being me is muted when alcohol is running full steam through my veins. The alcohol has become my elixir, it keeps me down and yet buoyant at the same time.

When I met my ex, I met my alcoholic match. We only had a few things in common and drinking was #1. I settled for him because I needed an enabler and I wanted a baby. I believe he settled for me for the exact same reasons. I think our son's spirit whispered us together. He wanted to come in to this world and he wanted to be our kid. He wanted us as much as we wanted him. 

I quit smoking the night our relationship began and I quit drinking the moment I found out I was pregnant. No hesitation, no problem. My baby was more important than wine.

Nine months later our son was born. Five-plus months after that I had my first sip of wine. I had an impossibly difficult time breastfeeding. My milk never fully flowed. I felt like a failure weaning him but it gave me the go ahead to drink again. As I became more and more unhappy with myself, with my choices and with my ex, I drank more and more.

He didn’t care except when I would get bitchy. He drank with me for the most part in separate rooms, watching separate TV shows. We were both extremely depressed and drowning.

Present day: August 3, 2009

Our son is now two-and-a-half. We are no longer in San Francisco. We moved to Colorado just over two months ago.

I am drinking a bottle of pinot grigio a night. I sit on the couch and drink it like water and veg out to TV.  In San Francisco, I rarely went over three drinks, and now, I am consistently at four.

Next step...five or six or more?

I am already popping 3-4 Advil each and every night because I can’t be hung over, not with a toddler. I refuse to let my daytime duties be hampered by my nighttime excess but 3-4 Advil per night can’t be good for my body either.

All this said, the morale of the story?

I need to quit cold turkey and I need to stop forever. I don’t want to do it with AA. I want to do it on my own with the love and support of my mom. You can hold the space and hold my hand and I can do it.

If I don’t, I won’t live. If I don’t, I will die. I do not accept that. I value my life too much. I value my kid too much.

Mom, will you help me heal? I need your help.

I love you,

Kim

Present Day: Today

On November 11, 2009 I quit drinking. The night before I drank an entire bottle of "Mommy's Time Out" pinot grigio. I have been sober ever since.

On March 23, 2010 I left my ex. I told him I was done the night before but didn't have the courage to walk out the door until the next morning, kid in tow. I have never looked back.

The seven years since have been a day-by-day adventure. Musings for another day...

Weird and refreshing

I've had two conversations in two days about addiction. I find that both weird and refreshing. Weird because talk of addiction is typically taboo and hush hush. Refreshing because both women revealed themselves with grace and raw vulnerability.

One conversation involved a woman's husband who landed himself in a forced treatment facility due to a hit and run where no one was hurt (thank goodness) and the other where the woman detoxed herself from pain killers after becoming addicted due to a chronic medical condition. Both conversations began innocently enough--the first talking about the dog that had become a lifeline of unconditional love for the now sober husband, and the second about ramping up to quit sugar and how that might bolster her fragile constitution.

These interactions have me thinking about my own addiction story. I wrote it once…in the ramp up to quitting alcohol, in an attempt to get it on paper while I still remembered it, in homage to the lost girl I was and the clarity I wanted so badly. I wrote it for me, not for public consumption. 

I don't often volunteer my "sober status" unless the situation warrants it. I tell people easily that I don't drink but I rarely tell them why. It took me over a month to tell my boyfriend why I don't drink, and when I did, I only scratched the surface telling him what pushed me over the edge towards sobriety and not the "nitty gritty" of what led me there in the first place. 

There two brave women gave me the courage to find my addiction story again. It was filed under "drafts" among a massive amount of musings I have already written and not ever shared.

It’s time to share.

I endeavor to muse

I have started and stopped a smattering of blogs over the last 10 years. Each begun in an attempt to explore my voice, each giving that voice an outlet, and each abandoned once laziness, neglect and / or other priorities took precedence.

It's hard to call yourself a writer if you don't write regularly. In that vein, with the intention of publishing weekly posts, I endeavor to muse in an attempt to write the future I have always seen for myself.