I can still remember my first 30 days of sobriety with a surprising amount of clarity. I never want to go back there. Becoming clean and sober was all-consuming for me, every waking, breathing hour was occupied by avoiding the mental torment of giving into the cravings I had for alcohol. I attended my 12 step program meetings daily, called others in recovery, went to my outpatient classes, and was still at a loss for how to stay sober. I relapsed continually, was given the label: a chronic relapser. I did everything my inpatient counselors, outpatient counselor, sponsor, A.A. oldtimers, and private counselor told me to do. I would piece together a few days, weeks, or even months and I'd once again succumb to my nemesis. Somewhere along my path, with a lot of education, knowledge I learned from my relapses, Alcoholics Anonymous, and experience with a variety of Alcoholics Anonymous alternatives, I've won the battle. Mind you, it's a battle I will have to fight everyday for the rest of my life. I absolutely cannot become complacent. I am still very careful to guard my dormant addiction, it can rear its ugly head at any moment. After all, I have a disease that tries to tell me I don't have a disease.

In treatment I learned you have to work as hard at your recovery as you worked to sustain your addiction. Maintaining an addiction is time-consuming, after all. You must acquire the alcohol. I wasn't necessarily drinking everyday, but each binge required a trip to the store or liquor store. I avoided buying too much all at once, to somehow dissuade myself from drinking consecutive days. But, I had to buy enough, mind you, a sufficient quantity to avoid my biggest fear: running out. Too many of my friends had received D.U.I's and put other people's lives at risk, so I vowed to never drive while under the influence. I had to be prepared for my binge knowing I would be unable to get more. Then, I would spend an extraordinary amount of time actually drinking. For an alcoholic with a high tolerance, this was a few hours of heaving imbibing. And finally came the longest time commitment of all: recovering from the drinking episode. When I first got sober, I told my counselor I felt like getting sober was a full-time job. She said: “Excellent, then you're doing it right.”

I wasn't one of the lucky ones who walked into an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting for the first time, had a miraculous epiphany and never had the urge to drink again. I would go as late as I could, sit in the back, look at NO ONE, and leave as soon as the meeting was over. I would roll my eyes at all the acronyms and slogans flying around the meetings: Live and Let Live, FEAR: Face Everything and Recover or Fu** Everything and Run. H.A.L.T: Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired. God: Group of Drunks, Good Orderly Direction. T.I.M.E.: This I Must Earn. Good Lord, can no one speak in sentences? I got a Big Book, read it. I got a sponsor, worked the steps. I went to meetings everyday. I even began to come a little early, got a service commitment, and horror of all horrors spoke up at the podium a few times. Got the coins, put them in my pocket where they went through the wash. I shut up and listened as I was told to do.

I searched high and low for my triggers. H.A.L.T was supposed to be the big one, so I was always weary if I was falling somewhere into that acronym... I'd go to Big Book studies with my hi-lighter in hand waiting for that special paragraph in The Doctor's Opinion or A Vision for You that would speak directly to me, engulf me in its truth and set me free. It never happened. But, through the Big Book, in particular chapter 3 called “More About Alcoholism”, I came to embrace/wholeheartedly accept that I'm an alcoholic who can never and will never drink like a normal person. And, then I drank.

I returned to outpatient, tail between my legs and fessed up. I would have failed the whiz quiz anyway. See? A.A. doesn't work for me. I told you so! I felt like the biggest loser that night, 3 hours of feeling like a complete failure. It seemed everyone else could stay sober, just not me. With the conviction that I'd already blown it, and threw away all of my sober days, I was off to the races again. I had the bright idea that in order to drink less, I'd start taking Valium, also a central nervous system depressant. Somewhere in my heart I knew this was the end of my addiction, the last time, so I decided to go out with a bang, to rack up enough consequences that my favorite justification would no longer hold water: “I really haven't had any consequences from my drinking, though.” And, frankly, it was true. I managed to keep my addiction a private affair, opting and preferring to drink alone, never drinking and driving, just literally hiding in my house to preserve the perpetuation of my disease. Now, I wanted to “out” myself, to go out in the big world and rack up as many consequences as possible so that I could no longer hide. Crazy, I know. I didn't drink and drive, however. I was not willing to put the lives of others in harm's way. But, I was like Freud's ID gone wild, very impulsive, completely self-absorbed, and on a mission to get and stay drunk. Fortunately, I wasn't able to subsist for long. I was driving home one night, knowing full well I was going to drink that night when a very heavy fog set in on the highway. I was next to impossible to see. I came to the final hill towards home and literally couldn't see five feet in front of me. I felt a great sense of relief, this was my out. I could gun my accelerator, get going as fast as I could and crash into a huge tree around the bend. A tree I'd noticed many times before. No one would think I'd taken my life, they'd blame it on the fog. A sense of peace came over me. I pulled off the road, sat with my high beams on and pondered my own suicide. Were it not for my children, I'm not sure I'd be here today. There was no worse bottom for me.

I went back to my outpatient counselor, bawling crocodile tears, having left a path of destruction behind me and begged to be put out of my misery. Within a few days I was in a treatment center detoxing and being told I was lucky to be alive from the Valium and alcohol mix. I spent a few weeks there as an inpatient, then stayed in a residential program for individuals who are “relapse-prone”.

Before my relapse, I was onto something... In my first few months of sobriety, I had to work as hard at getting sober as I worked at getting and staying drunk. There's no magic wand here, no great epiphany to be had, it takes dedication. Coming out of rehab, I felt like a newborn fawn, unsteady on my legs, scared to leave the safety of my support system, back to my old environment, triggers, the same old, same old. Everything around me felt like a trigger. I began to learn that my triggers weren't necessarily the ones I'd learned about in A.A. or treatment. In fact, my biggest trigger was a simply beautiful day. A day I was feeling good and wanted to enhance how I felt with the use of chemicals. That was, indeed my biggest trigger. Not loneliness, anger, or unmet physical needs. Just a damn beautiful day. I knew if I was to stay sober, many things had to change. I decided to do everything, well, just a little different. I created reminders around my environment to symbolize this change, some were big, some small. I moved my watch from my left wrist to my right. Every time I looked at the time and date, I was reminded that my life had changed. I started getting dressed in a new way, left foot into the pants first, instead of my right. Weird, I know, but somehow these little things were what provided the constant reminder that I was on a new life path. A friend of mine had written me a message that simply said: “Drinking is not an option.” I put that on my fridge, I saw it everyday, and it began to ring true for me.

Yes, I went to meetings everyday. I got a sponsor, reworked the steps, studied the Big Book. Even though I still found myself rolling my eyes occasionally, sitting in those meetings was a guaranteed hour a day I was not going to drink. I found that very comforting. I hung out in Starbucks A LOT with friends in recovery. Again, a guaranteed net number of hours per week I would not be drinking.

I started exercising again. I found getting in shape helped further reduce my cravings, not only did I get my little runner's high, but conditioning the body and drinking are incompatible. Similarly, I was very careful about what I ate.

At some point I'd have to return home. Home for me was like my own little bar, however. They say to avoid old drinking establishments, so I was clearly at a disadvantage since mine was my own house. This is where my use of rational recovery methods came into play. As I stated before, I have a disease that tells me I don't have a disease or a problem. I had to envision this dominant inner voice as being a completely different entity from me: my nemesis. Rational recovery calls it your BEAST. It will attempt to get me to drink by tricking me into believing any number of lies. My BEAST likes to tell me: “I deserve a drink after this long, hard week.” Or, “You've been so good for so long, you are entitled to drink.” Or, “No one will know!” Or: “You're not really an alcoholic, you just love to drink and need to try to control it a little better.” I've fallen into the trap of that BEAST many, many times.

I've learned from my relapses what this inner voice says to me and how it influences me. I know that when I'm actively using, it has completely taken over my thinking and I'm stripped of all choice. I have no superego anymore, it's all this Id-ish beast stripping me of who I really am. I've chosen to see it as a separate being from myself, one that lies in waiting to take me down. I drew a picture of how I imagined it to look and kept that with me in the early days. Anytime drinking crossed my mind, I had that picture to pull out and remind myself this wasn't really what I wanted.

This was difficult in the beginning since so many of my thoughts came from this beastly, irrational part of my brain that had been a dominant force in my life. I wasn't quite able to identify this voice. I was sure it was just part of my naughty character, ingrained in me and a component of who I really was. With practice, I was able to separate out this voice from my rational voice. My plight was often: “I really want to drink!” and “I really don't want to drink!” It was as simple as that. Then the BEAST would enter, begin shooting off all kinds of rationalizations and justifications, and I'd come close. I'd call someone, I'd be reminded that I really don't WANT to drink and suddenly I'd get that voice of malice under control. It took a lot of practice, but over time all I had to say to it was: “SHUT UP!”

This may sound a little odd (but so be it, you already know I'm not normal), but there was a part of me that was reluctant to give up being, well a little naughty sometimes. Part of my personality, and I'd venture to say many other addicts' personalities, is an impulsive streak. It can get me in trouble, but when kept in check it's one of my favorite parts of my personality. I didn't want that to disappear. I've come up with healthy ways of keeping that part of me alive. My best friend calls me very spontaneous. She calls me on my impulsivity, too and I listen. I'm all or nothing, she says. Today, I look for the middle ground more often. But, I still maintain that wacky side of me I'm not willing to part with. But, it's all about balance.

For a new friend. And for the scores of us still battling addiction... My worst day sober is miles and miles better than my best day drunk.