Day 19

Some reasons to stay sober:

1. This is, by far, the best reason of all. Reason number one: so you only have to hear your daughter ask you “What’s an alcoholic?” (as you open the fridge for a beer in the middle of the day) ONCE. Of course, I KNEW she had been watching me down a bottle of wine every night for months, but now I also know that she’s thinking about it. Yes, this finally happened. Oh, my god.
2. So you can deal with all of the crap that happens sometimes and leaves you scrambling. Recently, I have learned that my child has learning differences and needs an occupational therapist, an specialist math tutor, and a cognitive behavioral therapist for her anxiety and OCD; that her current school (where she was going to transition to middle school next year) can’t or won’t support her properly so I need to find a new school for middle school; that my mom (who has Alzheimer’s) thinks I’m stealing her social security checks and occasionally wants to send me to jail (and it makes no difference when I bring her regular printouts from the bank); and that a plumbing emergency has flooded the entire downstairs of my mom’s house (and everything has to be torn out and replaced). And I’m dealing with all of that while my partner (and father to our daughter) is having a fairly serious mental health crisis (for months now). Yep, this is all happening at the same time, and alcohol is certainly tempting. I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t help me deal with any of this shit, though.
3. That it feels fucking GREAT to wake up sober in the morning, every morning.
4. That you no longer are waking up at 3 a.m., every night.
5. So you can feel righteous even while eating a big piece of chocolate cake. Every day if you want to.
6. So you know that you aren’t making your pre-existing health issues worse by drinking. Can you imagine how horrible it would be if I needed a bone marrow transplant but couldn’t get one because of the consequences of heavy drinking?
7. So you can finally get serious about doing something adventurous and different with your life before it is too late.

And many more, of course. I have to wrap it up because my daughter is having a meltdown about not having done her homework. Sigh.

xoxo