I'm missing a lot during the pandemic, but I don't miss drinking
Adele Gawley writes about the night she became sober, and the challenge of staying that way during COVID-19
I'm barefoot as I write this. These days, I am barefoot as much as possible. It reminds me of a night I don't ever want to forget.
It was late and hot, and I was, as usual, drunk beyond belief. I was fighting with my on-again-off-again partner, in the middle of an all-too-familiar pattern: Get drunk at home. Take a cab into his neighborhood. Drink more at a nearby bar. And then head to his apartment to try and work it out with him.
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On this night though, I made a decision I had never made before: I let my mother drive me. I'm told that I kept saying I wasn't handling things well, that I wanted my mother to call an ambulance.
When he refused to answer his buzzer, I went to a bar, my mother close by my side. There, I vaguely remember throwing things, though what I was throwing or why, I can't recall.
There is nothing to miss about the disease that led me to drink gallons of mouthwash.- Adele Gawley
And then I took off. I left everything, including my shoes, behind. Intoxicated and wild, I tore back to his apartment, desperately wanting him to talk to me. There is a fine line between addiction and madness, and I was all too close to crossing over it.
Of course, he didn't respond. Eventually, I sank down onto the sidewalk, at once raging and surrendered. I just knew that this was the bottom that would make me stop. Some part of me sagged with relief. At long last, I thought the nightmare was over.
But as it turns out, addiction still had me by the throat, and so I set off down the long driveway in search of more alcohol.
Four police cars met me part way. An officer got out and spoke to me softly. "We're here to help you," he said. "What do you need tonight?"
I opened my mouth, prepared to fight him, teeth bared to the last. But something caved. I had nothing left. I raised my hands over my head and said, "I need help. I need to go to the hospital."
And I did.
Getting sober was the greatest, grandest and grittiest thing I have ever done. There is no climb steeper than the one back up out of a bottle, no battle fiercer than the war against yourself. I had my last drink July 19, 2018.
And then, the pandemic hit.
Like everyone, I have struggled with what COVID-19 has done to my life. I put my work aside the week Ontario declared a state of emergency. Mother to one and stepmother to two, I knew that my job would now be homeschooling my children. But I wonder how long I can survive financially without my business.
I miss hair cuts, dinners out. I miss bringing my laptop to cafés. I miss my infant niece, my best friend, Chapters. Sometimes at night, I lie awake in the silence, this virus-imposed isolation so heavy I can feel its weight.
I can't remember what it feels like not to be worried about my loved ones.
Staying sober is never easy, but it's especially hard during a global pandemic. But like anyone else, I am doing it one day at a time.
I am lucky to be without "euphoric recall," which blurs out the negative and casts the past in a falsely positive light. I don't harbour any nostalgia about my drinking days. There is nothing to miss about the disease that led me to drink gallons of mouthwash.
I stay sober by sticking to a routine. There is a beginning, a middle and an end to my day. I make my bed. I get dressed. I connect daily and without fail to others in recovery.
If there was ever a time to be sober and to be grateful for this second chance at life, it is now.
When I drive by the local LCBO, my heart aches for the huddled masses waiting in long lines. I understand why liquor stores have been declared an essential service. If you abuse alcohol long enough, abruptly stopping is dangerous or even fatal. For many, alcohol is killing them, but they would also die without it.
I worry that people indulging in their "quarantinis" are unknowingly dancing with the devil, believing they can stop when all this is over. Most of them are right. But some of them are terribly wrong and will have another, more private battle when this pandemic ends.
I have learned that sobriety is never impossible. I believe that's true — even now.
There is something deep inside us, always, that can turn toward the sun.