One Year Sober

Hello friends! I've been doing a lot of work lately, in all the ways. Today I am 1 year without a drink! I am so very proud of myself!! And still sometimes shocked. Joe and I were craft beer drinkers and brewers. Drinking beer had become a part of my identity. Drinking beer kept Joe here, I believed. I thought if I quit drinking another piece of him would be gone. I was wrong. I still have all of our wonderful memories and I'm finding it easier to access them. Recovery has brought many changes. The fog is lifting and I can see more clearly. Drinking was a way to drown the trauma and the grief, but only temporarily. In reality, when I stopped drinking all of that was waiting for me. I felt regret and guilt and shame and fear and anger for wasting so much time drinking. Drinking completely altered who I was. It made me into someone else. Someone I didn't like. I'm becoming someone else, in a more intentional way, this time. I'm more awkward than I've ever been, and I've always been awkward. I be awkward, uncomfortable, whatever. I have been getting better at setting boundaries, but it's still difficult for me to say no. I'm unraveling the knots of my childhood and currently loving much of my blood relatives from a distance. I'm working on radical self acceptance and self love. Trying to shut off the negative self talk that I've carried for 52 years. Those voices are not mine that tell me that I'm not good enough or smart enough. I've accepted them as truth because I loved the people who said them. I'm learning to love them but not accept their behavior. I'm finding that I'm actually quite amazing. I've had a difficult life, but I did a lot of things right. I didn't abuse others because I had been abused. I'm not perfect and I don't want to be. It's all the uniqueness that makes us special. I hope today you accept a piece of what makes you awesome! Much love, Ceeeej 

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