My Share

Yesterday I met someone from the program who recognized the woman I was standing with, as I waited for her to finish her cigarette so we could go into our meeting. After making a bit of small talk, he asked if I would speak at an upcoming meeting. Just to tell my story and if I wanted, to tie that into the step we were working on that day. I am flattered that he asked me to do this but I realize I don’t know how to neatly package “my story.” I love listening to speakers at meetings…They seem to have mastered the ability to organize their thoughts into a flowing, connected series of sentences that make for a captivating story. How I am supposed to do this when my thoughts about my history with drinking are all over the place?

The purpose behind sharing a story is to help another alcoholic, not to win some kind of storytelling contest. But I think it will help to write out my story before I dive into this meeting, so here goes:

I don’t remember a time when I didn’t think and behave alcoholically. I remember getting violently ill after my mom baked fresh cinnamon rolls and left to check on my baby brother. The gooey, steamy rolls were too tempting and I stuffed myself with as many rolls as I could before she came back. In a matter of minutes, I was throwing up, as my mom shook her head and rubbed my back.

For as long as I remember, I’ve struggled with loneliness and low self-esteem. Those feel as inborn to me as my green eyes. I have great memories from childhood–waterparks in the summer, playing Barbies and having sleepovers with friends, getting a puppy–laced with a persistent low feeling that has always hung on my shoulders, reminding me it wouldn’t go away. I have never been able to deal with this dark cloud of sadness, so found other ways to cope. I suspect that even at the ripe old age of six, even choking down cinnamon rolls at record speed had to have something to do with this.

I remember walking to Baskin Robbins with my best friend in middle school. I had a habit of not wearing my glasses when I wasn’t near a chalkboard. Anyway, we saw my English teacher (on whom I harbored a massive-but-then-repressed crush) and another teacher buying ice cream cones. She said “My god, you should take your glasses off more often! You look great!” I remember feeling like I had something to offer–I was beautiful.

I started wearing contact lenses and dieting within weeks after my teacher made this comment. I started to earn the praise of my mother, who historically teased me for having a “bubble butt” and saying “you’re cute” when I asked her if I was pretty. Mom was one of those rare women who forgot to eat and could slip into size 0 pants well into her forties. Every time she would encircle my waist with her hands and marvel at my petiteness, my ego grew all the more.

My school counselor called me into her office to comment on the fact that people had been saying I looked too thin. I felt euphoric. I must have been exceptional to be hand picked by my counselor as a reward for my thinness. I might as well have been crowned Miss America.

What wasn’t so glamorous about this was the secrecy and the sickness behind the facade. I was never a full-fledged anorexic or bulimic, but flirted with all kinds of disordered eating: hiding pizza under a rug when my father unexpectedly walked into the sunroom and would have otherwise caught a binge; eating exclusively Cornflakes and apples; running six miles every day; eating an entire box of Whitman’s Samplers; smoking cigarettes to curb my appetite. I even avoided parties and drinking in high school because I didn’t want to consume the extra calories. Until college came along.

From the very first time I drank in college, I drank to get shitfaced. First I got drunk because, if I was going to waste my day’s calories on alcohol, might as well go all out. But as my eating issues started to subside, my drinking problem got worse. I drank to be someone else. I drank to be charming and witty and funny and cool and sexy. I drank because it increased my sex appeal and men were drawn to me. I was a loser without getting drunk. Since I hit all the right benchmarks (i.e. joining a sorority, having a boyfriend, studying abroad, graduating) I never would have thought there was a problem.

My twenties were all about binge drinking and sleeping around. I had a cluster of friends with whom I liked to…binge drink and rehash hook-up stories from the night before…and basically keep things skin deep. I dated a guy who I cared for deeply, who had his own bucket of issues, and then we split up. One of our issues was my drinking. Because what’s wrong with doing cartwheels with no underwear on in public and crying at his cousin’s wedding because I am not the one who gets to be married?

I slid into a depression some years after that relationship ended. I felt utterly empty and did not know why. It dawned on me when I woke up one morning next to a guy I had been dating that I did not want to date men at all. I really wanted to be with women.

Once I let on that I liked girls, my whole world changed. I felt relief to be true to myself and to know people accepted me. Yet I also drank more than ever. I drank to be comfortable on dates with women. I drank to be physically intimate with women. I drank to get over the shame of being gay. My shame–no one else’s.

A few years into my relationship with my now-wife things with alcohol reached an all-time low. I was blacking out almost every time I drank. I would get lost and try to walk home alone in the dark. I frequently peed myself. I sometimes drank an entire bottle of wine by myself during the week. I got drunk at any function that offered alcohol–even if it was a two-hour get together. I picked fights with my now-wife and screamed at her that I was worthless and horrible (to gain sympathy to distract her from being mad that I got so drunk in the first place). I forgot to call. I forgot to text. I went to work hungover. I stole people’s drinks at dinner. I snuck sips of liquor from our stash while my now-wife went to the bathroom after we had already put away a bottle of wine together.

It had to stop. And no amount of drinking water between drinks, or electing someone to be responsible for cutting me off after three, or just avoiding liquor and drinking beer was going to stop the madness. I had to simply stop drinking.

January 1st, 2014 is my sobriety date and I am grateful to still be sober today.