January the 1st

Well, I made it! As the champagne was cracked open, I opened my alcohol-free fizz; as the red wine was glugged, I had my fizzy water. I drank a lot of water. I felt a pang of envy as my husband and friends drank their champagne and wine, but I put the pang aside and tried to be cheerful. I kept thinking that the friends weren’t having a nice time: the other husband (not my other husband – I only have one) seemed to be disappointed when I explained that I wasn’t drinking, and he seemed out of sorts after that. But it may be that I just don’t usually notice stuff when I’m drinking; and NOT drinking, on New Year’s Eve, I was hyper-aware of how everyone was behaving.

Did I feel flat? Not really, and that surprised me. I felt a bit of the usual panic looking ahead and wondering how long I’d be able to sustain this, with holidays on the horizon (holidays have been my downfall every time so far), but I woke up today glad that I’d been sober last night. My husband has a headache today; he claims that he drank more than usual because I wasn’t drinking.  Now, how does that work??

During the evening, I experienced a couple of moments where I felt like drinking. I texted a sober friend (you know who you are!) and her encouraging, warm reply really helped get me through. I also thought of the people who had commented on my blog and who were trying to be sober as well for their New Year’s Eves, and the sense of solidarity was palpable. So thank you to you all, Happy New Year, and I hope I can make it work this time.