“On a medical form I would confidently check off “social drinker” without a second thought.  Slowly, almost imperceptibly, that changed.

I wasn’t just drinking socially.  I was drinking alone. I wasn’t just have a glass or two with dinner, I was sitting on the couch finishing a bottle and replacing it with another bottle of the same wine so no one would notice.

I started taking “those quizzes”…”Are you a problem drinker?”  Quiz after quiz would yield the answer that I knew was already there.  

Okay then, I’ll fix this.  I will handle it the same way I would handle an extra few pounds on the scale.  As a personal trainer, this plan made perfect sense. I knew how to change behavior to yield different results.

I did a Whole30, a crazy elimination diet.  I was, and still am, against those, but I wanted to see what my clients experienced when THEY did one.  I wanted to support my friend who was doing it AND, AND, AND I wanted to see if I could NOT DRINK for 30 days.  If I were to be honest with myself, THAT was the real reason. I thought if I could “wrap” not drinking inside “not eating a lot of other stuff”, it would be easier. 

The short story is this:  I sort of did it. I drank twice during the month.  One night was at about 2 weeks and one night was toward the end of the month.  When I WASN’T drinking, the difference was AMAZING. I felt sooooo incredibly good.  Clear-headed, no night sweats, didn’t wake up at exactly 3:12 every night and stay awake for 2 hours.  I finished that month thinking that I could DEFINITELY “moderate” my drinking.  

That’s when I set up “The Rules”.

• Only on the weekend.  Nope. Didn’t work.  

• Only one night during the week and one night on the weekend.  Uh-uh.

• Only 2 glasses in an evening.  Didn’t happen.  

• Only tequila, so I drink LESS.  Drank more.

I’m sure there were more...One by one I knocked my rules down.  FAILURE, that’s how I saw it:

Why I can’t I “drink like a normal person”?  

Why does it feel like my “off switch” is just BROKEN??

I don’t regret all those times drinking.  They were fun…Until they weren’t. Then they really weren’t fun.  I looked back at a journal I kept during that time. I wrote, “I look like shit.  I feel like shit.” I described how many times I had tried moderation and asked of myself, “How’s that working for you??”

While never physically addicted, I was emotionally and mentally addicted to alcohol.  I used it – I thought – to ease anxiety, to numb pain, to celebrate and to mourn.

Quitting was the hardest thing I’ve ever done.  Few people in my life know that, and that’s of my own making.  I think that’s why I’m writing this. So that they (and others feeling the same as I) know how hard it was and how worth it.  I want to say that again. I want others to know how hard it was AND how worth it.

I quit by “playing forward” that first drink in my head.  You may have one tonight, but that will ultimately turn into 2 tomorrow and more the next night.  I watched moderation NOT work.

The other strategy I used was “working backward”….I hated “the next day”:  headache, nausea, how I looked, how exhausted I was, how cranky. I hated how I blacked out for parts of the evening.,,not remembering things my daughters had told me.  I hated knowing that a third drink was inevitable after the second. I realized that the ONLY part that I REALLY enjoyed was the first SIP. That was it. I realized that allllll the rest of it was NOT worth ONE SIP. 

And so I quit.

Carolyn is a personal trainer and nutrition coach who uses her experience to better coach her clients.  While a “sober coach” she doesn’t “coach sobriety”.”