I keep starting on day one, and then crashing by 5 (pm, not day 5, which would be a miracle at the moment). Last night, I asked my husband to help me. He does help me, but he is also an enabler, as I have been able to persuade him to let me drink in the past. We had a frank talk. He said that he’s been worried about my drinking for 5 years (is 5 a theme today?). I said that I was worried that I’d be different sober, not myself. ‘But the best you is you!’ he said, ‘not the drinking you. That you is comatosed, not funny, not witty…you’re not who you think you are when you drink.’
So I took my last sip of wine. It tasted bitter, and I thought, ‘I have had enough.’
He wants the best me. I want to be the best me. It starts today, and he is going to help me. And I’m going to help myself by going back to meetings, and listening, and asking for help.
A Dappled Path 
Hi Annie, this is it! You sound different this time, your resolve shines through! Try to get to a meeting everyday, and ask for help. This really helped me. Sending you hope, I promise once you pass the hump, life gets better and better.. Noddy x
Hi Annie, life is better sober and you know that because you have had sober time… keep adding the sober days but most importantly, enjoy them one at a time.
Keep strong x
Annie…it’s both easy and hard at the same time. Withdrawl can be a real bitch and that’s what usually sends us back to the vino after a few hours or days…get whatever support you need to get past the first weeks and months so you can begin to heal. You really can do this.
Jenn
I don’t know if this helps, but looking back at the past 5-10/15 years of my drinking life, but I wasted SO much time thinking, planning, justifying, excusing, getting, and drinking the Drink. That ‘comatose’ your husband describes is so true. Drinking is a constrictive trap… A cocoon… A straightjacket…. It keeps us from participating in our own lives. …. Thinking of you, Annie. … Oh, and one other thing. I was talking to my husband about Richard III (he was acting in a production of it recently), and we were talking about Richard’s line at towards the end of the show – that he doesn’t even have any pity or love for himself. So, if you took that idea to the beginning of the play, because Richard doesn’t love himself, he has nothing to lose. In the conversation, I compared my last year of drinking to Richard. My habits were getting more and more out of control, because I hated myself so much. First, I was punishing myself for drinking in the first place by drinking and then, later drinking even more. Second, I wanted someone to step in and stop my self-destructive drinking, but because no one did, I got more dangerous and my actions became riskier. I was daring someone to say or do something from the outside – just like Richard. However, no one did. Ultimately, it came down to me and my choice and my work towards sobriety. No one else’s. Support, yes, but ultimate choice and actions, no. If I hadn’t stopped when I did, following the course of the play, I would probably be separated from my beautiful family, and/or have lost my job, and/or in jail, and/or dead. When we have no love for ourselves, there is nothing to lose. But the drinking makes us blind. Every day, we lose sight of ourselves more and more, until we become the smallest thing in our lives. The most meaningless. How tragic is that? …. Again, thinking of you, Annie.* -HM.
Make it happen!!!!!!
Annie, I get this so much! I was worried about the same thing, and I had to have the same talk with my husband (many times!) I really thought i would be a lesser person without drinking–dull, not social, uptight, etc–and he was just shocked that I thought any such thing. Since then I have realized that I was not such an interesting drunk person and I really am more myself sober. It’s good to realize this. Don’t worry if you go back and forth on your thinking about this, as long as you just don’t drink! xo