Mama Bear (without the sore head)

Well here I am again. Back at the beginning, back at Day 1 (well actually it's now day 2 but that doesn't sound so good!). I've just read back over some of my previous blogs, and whilst they have inspired me, they also make me feel a little sad. It was over a year ago that I first recognised the toxicity of alcohol (particularly for me) and embarked on my sobriety journey. It's been, just like my weigh loss journey for the past god knows how many years, a familiar and well trodden path........ Starts off great, making good progress, seeing results. Then the novelty wears off, I think I can "get away" with being a bit more relaxed (one glass of wine won't hurt right?) and then slowly the wheels fall off. It's a familiar pattern, one I have learned to beat myself up about over the years but one that I've never been able to change. I thought it was my destiny. I thought I was one of those "all or nothing" people. So what's different now?...

Today is a mini milestone - I am 2 weeks 100% sober. It feels good. In some ways it's been a lot easier than previous attempts. I don't feel like I'm white knuckling this time. I've had cravings but they've been fleeting. I've craved sugar but no where near like I did last time. I don't feel so deprived.  I guess I know what to expect this time round. On the other hand it's felt like a long 2 weeks. In the UK we are back in our 3rd lockdown, the weather is terrible and it all feels super tough. I'm tired. I know I'm not alone feeling like this and so I'm trying to put things in perspective. It's not helped my rollercoaster of moods though. I say rollercoaster but I'm not sure it's even that. That implies there are highs and lows but actually overall I'm feeling pretty fed up. Within that there is this growing sliver of light which is my sobriety and the strength I'm getting from it. I'm slowly starting to see things in...

There's many things that I've discovered alcohol has robbed from me.....clear memories, countless nights of anxiety free sleep, youthful hair & complexion, not to mention the friends that either got fed up of me or that I pushed away due to my own paranoia/anxiety. One of the most surprising things though was time. As a full time working mum of 2 young boys I never expected to have much time to myself, but over the past few years I've felt like not only do I have no time for myself, but no time just to keep all the household stuff ticking over. Getting bills paid, washing done and put away, house kept clean & tidy all feels like a monumental task. Any then there's the other stuff I want/need to get done - decorating, selling old stuff. It's always felt totally impossible to get anywhere near to ticking off my to-do list. But each time I quit drinking I suddenly find I have more time. Evenings which used to be spent half comatose on the sofa - feeling too tir...

Promises promises...... I seem to recall in my last post I promised to blog more often, well that was back in August 2020 so I think a big sorry is in order! In the spirit of my new approach of self forgiveness I'm not going to beat myself up about it but it's fair to look back on what happened. Quite simply, life happened.  2020 will go down in history as an extraordinary year. The year that the Coronavirus pandemic swept the world and life changed - I expect, in some ways, forever. In all honesty I can't really remember what the various ups and down of the past 5 months have been but it's fair to say I haven't been 100% sober! Far from it over the xmas period for sure. But in a way it's understandable. Sure there's the obvious reasons of trying to juggle work, kids, a global pandemic, Boris cancelling Christmas, cancelled holidays etc etc.....but it was more than that.  Last year when I made the decision to quit alcohol it was because I knew I needed to . ...

  Wow I can't believe it's been nearly 2 months since I last posted. It's been a real rollercoaster time if I'm honest. I can't pin point what it was that made the cart run away, but it really did and I fell off. I fell off the sobriety wagon, my mental health suffered and things started to unravel. There was definitely an element of the pandemic effect that contributed. The non-stop juggle of having 2 young kids at home, plus an au pair and both myself and my husband working from home was starting to take its toll. Add in the on-off dilemma of whether or not we would get a summer holiday and I felt broken. I felt like I really needed a break but even if I took time off it would only be work taken out of the equation - all the other balls would still need to be juggled and I needed more than that. So instead of coming up with a sensible plan I opened a bottle of wine to blot it all out......and then another.....and another..... (with a couple of bottles of whiskey t...

I've been quiet for a while but still sober and still feeling the benefits. I'm actually kind of glad I fell off the wagon at the start of lockdown - it helped me realise how toxic alcohol really was for me and has made it easier to resist the temptations this time round. I'm still kind of scared of the thought of never drinking again. I don't know what there is to be scared of - it just seems like a big leap, but at the same time I don't want to ever feel the negative effects of alcohol again. In some ways lockdown is making sobriety easier. Once I got over the initial hurdle of the first couple of weeks, it's been pretty easy to help myself to an alcohol free drink at home and I'm becoming pretty accustomed to the taste and still get that sense of relief at the end of the day. Interestingly I will often only have 1 or 2 and then move to water or tea (or hot chocolate) whereas I could never stop at 1 or 2 when I was drinking. I do still miss whiskey though....

Back from school Brothers reunited Last year my actual birthday was a bit of a washout. I'd had a party the night before as it was the big 4-0 and so was ridiculously hungover I just lounged on the sofa most the day. I have to confess I don't remember a lot about the party. I'm sure I had a good time but 2 things I do remember were feeling super anxious beforehand and during the party swapping my glass for a bigger one so I didn't have to keep filling it up so many times. Of course there were good memories too but I do remember feeling overwhelmed by anxiety about how I looked, whether everything would go ok etc etc.  This year could not be more different. It's a birthday in lockdown so could easily have been challenging, but I really am having the best of days. It was Harry's first day back at school and it was lovely to walk him to school in the sunshine and enjoy a little 1:1 time with him. Then home for an hours nap as William had decided to elongate my birt...

Just when I thought things were getting easier the past couple of days have been a real struggle. Overall I've been in a good mood - I feel more lighthearted than I have done in years - but the wine and whisky witch have been in full flow. To try to explain how it feels, imagine you are out for a run or a bike ride. You are at the top of the hill, taking in the view and feeling great, then you have the freewheel down the hill which is fun, easy and you feel free. Suddenly you're at the bottom of the valley and its ok but a bit dark and before you know it you've got a massive hill to climb and no energy left to do it. Just like that bike ride, it didn't feel like it was something inside me that changed, but the environment I was in. The evening stress of battling the kids to bed, rushing to get dinner ready, ever worsening hayfever symptoms and tension between me and my husband (kind of inevitable in the lockdown pressure pot) were just too much to cope with. I wanted wi...

If I remember rightly I said in a previous post that I would give a run down of my favourite alcohol free drinks......and there's another upside - I actually remember I said it!  After 2 pregnancies (during which I felt hugely deprived of my favourite tipples) and then 8 weeks of recent sobriety I have tried a few now. It still haunts me today that on finding out I was pregnant with our second child on 1st December my initial thoughts were "Well that's buggered up Christmas - how am I going to get through it without a drink". I cannot believe that alcohol overshadowed what should have been such a happy occasion. Even more so I cannot believe it's taken me another 3 and a half years to finally admit to myself how big a problem alcohol was for me and how it was affecting my life. Anyway, I digress - this is supposed to be a helpful article on the best alcohol free drinks. At this point I should say that there is a school of thought that having alcohol free substitut...