This is sober me

Here is a fact about me that makes a lot of people uncomfortable, I don't drink anymore. Now before you start thinking this is going to be a blog post about 'my recovery' or 'my journey', I should clear something up. I never really had an issue with drink and by that I mean I wasn't addicted to it, I did however have an issue with hangovers, lucky for me I don't anymore. Aside from the occasional bout of sleep deprivation (which feels quite similar) I am hangover free.

I know I have mentioned this before but let me recap all the same. It was at the tender age of fourteen I first discovered the joys of alcohol and liked the buzz, the feeling of extra confidence and just being part of the crowd. For four blissful years I thought I was immune to hangovers. Once I reached eighteen I realised how foolish I had been to think that. From 18 through most of my twenties (thanks to going to college as a mature student, I continued to party like a much younger woman until I was almost 30) I used to suffer terribly from hangovers. Through the power of hindsight I have come to believe that perhaps alcohol never really suited me. I remember many days where I couldn't even keep water down until late afternoon, the horrible rash I used to get across my forehead and around my eyes from burst blood vessels (from empty retching), thinking that the only cure was McDonalds with Coke and not to mention the horrible flashbacks as the remnants of the night came back to me. The beauty of growing up in Ireland is that drink is so embedded in to our culture that I believed for a a long time that my hangover was no more severe than anyone else's and that I was normal. This was the price you paid for a good night out.

Naturally once I left college and became a fully fledged adult I copped on to myself a bit and calmed down on the volume I was drinking. I came to terms with the fact that I was not in fact in my mid twenties and my liver was very aware of this so even though I drank less frequently my hangovers became more severe. I remember when I was a few years younger and being warned that hangovers get worse as you get older and your metabolism slows down, Such is the arrogance of youth, I didn't take any of it on board until I absolutely had to (many years down the line) and privately admitted to myself that there might have been some truth in this.  As I grew up and started to act my age a bit more, I found my mornings after a night out were marked by mild nausea instead of copious vomiting and when I remembered fragments of the night (if I had indeed forgotten any of it) that I was saying/doing a lot less stupid things. The one thing that continued to get worse was the fear.

In case anyone reading this is not familiar with the fear, it's an Irish term for the depression we encounter in the aftermath of a hangover. It is best characterised by a feeling of intense doom. It's worth noting. before I go on, that I am naturally pre disposed to bouts of anxiety and depression (fortunately not too severe) so perhaps this is why, for me, the fear would last more than a day. I would have several days of feeling depleted and hopeless about the future. I find sometimes when I am feeling down that I tend to spiral a little. It's almost as if I want to make the most of the dark days and instead of snapping out it quickly I find worries to add to the list and occasionally about a stupid thing I did 8 years ago if no worries spring to mind. You get the general idea. I reached the point where the dread of the hangover and prolonged recovery overshadowed the excitement of a night out and a few drinks. I thought to myself that life is too short to feel like this so I took a small break for my mind and my liver. That was a year and a half ago. It wasn't planned to go on this long but at this stage I can't really see myself going back.

Now I am not going to lie and say that my social life is going amazing without alcohol. My social life was hardly hopping to begin with which is probably why it was so easy for me to take a break. It's been hard at times, not to abstain from drink because there's no worries there but just to cope socially without a social lubricant. I am slowly getting better and can probably name more decent nights out I have had out on water in the last 6 months than I would have had in the 6 years previous. I do still find some drawbacks though such as the fact that I get tired early in the night and I often get bored at social occasions. Not to mention the fact that when you are sober, you notice so much more of peoples silly drunken carry on and its less hilarious than people would like to think (the people being silly and drunk that is). My least favourite is when someone tells you the same story  six or seven times using the exact same phrasing and you have to nod a long and look interested/surprised each time. It's a slow process but I am getting there and I think this is who I am now. This is sober me.