People get sober in all sorts of ways. Sometimes they just quit on their own. Sometimes they go to rehab. They show up in 12-step rooms, ashrams, churches and their parents’ basements. There is no one right way—something we’ve aimed to show in our collection of How I Got Sober stories. Today we’ve got a special addition with regular AfterParty contributor, Paul. This is his story:
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What is your sobriety date?
January 11, 2014
Where did you get sober?
Columbus, Ohio
When did you start drinking?
I had my first drink when I was 15 or 16. It was a Zima. I remember my aunt yammering on about how it was “better than sex,” so I stole one from a family get-together and drank it in my closet. I also had a couple glasses of wine with my family around the holidays, but nothing memorable.
I honestly never had that lightning-bolt moment where I thought: Drinking is the best thing ever! It was just always there in the background and I counted on it. I associated drinking with the warm glow of good times, celebrations and happiness. When I was a junior in college, that’s when I started drinking pretty regularly. I couldn’t imagine a weekend without getting bombed. That’s just what everyone did. It was expected and forgiven. Then when I graduated, I went out a few nights a week with co-workers. In grad school, I went out almost every night. When I was married with kids, I was drinking every day.
How would you describe your life before you quit drinking?
My life was a complete disaster. I still cringe when I think about those last few months leading up to my decision to stop. By that time, my sleep schedule was so fucked up that I’d wake up at 3:30 am, go downstairs to the basement where I’d hidden a case of beer and down at least two cans. There I was in our shitty basement under a single light bulb—not even 4 in the morning—slamming beer alone.
I was drinking everywhere and anywhere. I just think of that time as a series of hellos, goodbyes, lies, half-truths, lies that I’d have to somehow make true, eventual unemployment and a climbing mountain of debt.
One day near the end, I had a full-on panic attack at work. I remember being in this high-rise conference room overlooking the city. I was at the end of a long table. There were about 20 of us in that meeting and I wasn’t hungover or drunk—I was remarkably okay. I was just faking my way through the day (per usual at the time) and someone asked me to take some notes. I said, Sure. Easy enough. Suddenly, I lost the ability to write. I couldn’t write one single letter. My brain couldn’t process how to get a letter down on the page. I’d lost the entire motor function to write. Naturally, like any good alcoholic, I didn’t think alcohol was the problem. I simply thought I was having a stroke. So, I mumbled something to the person next to me and took the elevator downstairs. I walked straight to the security desk and asked them to call 911 for me. I collapsed on a lobby couch. Paramedics arrived, ripped my shirt open, and stuck sensors all over my chest.
My life wasn’t unmanageable—it just wasn’t much of a life. I was existing. I was a human lie. Whatever could get from one point to the next.
What was your childhood like?
Extremely normal. Loving family. Two very kind, hard-working parents and a younger sister. My parents owned the company that made crash-test dummies for auto manufacturers all over the globe, so they were super busy with that. But I was a good kid. I didn’t take advantage of the fact that they were looking the other way a lot. I didn’t give them any grief in my teenage years. I was kind of overweight and really into The X-Files and Star Trek, if that tells you anything. I was very lonely, though. I didn’t have a lot of friends. Ohio is also really gray and cloudy and sometimes kind of bleak which, looking back, is how I think of my teenage years. There was an empty place inside me I was constantly trying to fill.
When did you first think you might have a problem?
I can think of a few distinct moments. Once, in grad school, I gave up drinking for a whole week. I was so goddamn proud of myself. I actually remember saying out loud to someone: “Well, obviously, I don’t have an alcohol problem.” That was clearly a sign that I had an alcohol problem.
I started having to apologize to people. A lot. I had a string of mornings where I’d wake up, cotton-mouthed, and scroll through the previous night’s adventures in my brain. One of my very good friends Matt stopped talking to me for a while—and that hurt. It didn’t slow my drinking down, though. I just found other friends to drink with.
Holidays were getting pretty out of hand. I’d get blackout drunk without even trying because I had a hall pass to drink as much as I wanted to. While nothing terrible ever happened, waking to find myself peeing in the corner of someone’s bedroom wasn’t uncommon.
The DUI should have been a clue, too, but it wasn’t. Living in Northern Ohio, DUIs were something of a rite of passage. At least in my circle of friends. Everyone I knew had one. Also, I was something like 24 or 25 when that happened and I wasn’t ready to stop drinking. I just went through the motions of the alcohol-awareness classes, losing my license for six months and talking the talk.
Later, I started hiding my drinking. I put vodka in water bottles. I hid six-packs of beer in the gas grill. I’d buy “stunt doubles” of wine bottles—duplicates of the wine we’d enjoy, so that way, I could enjoy twice as much and my wife wouldn’t notice. It just looked like the same bottle. I also found myself going to different liquor stores all around town, no matter the distance, so no one recognized me.
How did you rationalize your drinking?
I just kept telling myself that I could stop and that it would all go back to normal. I just had to get past whatever it was that I was going through at the moment. Once I did, it’d be fine. Until then, I needed this pint of vodka, dammit. And I drank over everything: new jobs, lost jobs, bad days at work, celebrations, because it was Tuesday.
What do you consider your bottom?
I’d have to say in my worst moment I was unemployed, about two weeks out of rehab and I’d just relapsed. I dropped the kids off at school and started hitting the bottle hard that morning. I woke up to several missed calls, voicemails and texts. My neighbor was pounding on the door. I’d forgotten to pick my son up at kindergarten. I raced to school, and I think seeing him there in the principal’s office was the moment I decided to get my shit together.
Did you go to rehab?
At the end of 2013, I went to a treatment center called The Woods at Parkside. I spent about a week there and promptly started drinking again a couple of weeks later (not the rehab’s fault). I ended up getting sober on my own, several months later, at home. We simply couldn’t afford to put me through treatment twice. I had to come down all over again, without any meds or assistance.
Did anything significant happen during treatment?
Two things. One, I met someone about 15 years younger than me and he’d been in treatment 14 times. This time around, though, it seemed to be clicking for him. So I paid attention to what he was doing and saying. We’re still very close. Second, rehab planted a bunch of seeds in me: what it means to be an alcoholic, what it means to live a sober life, what it means to be honest. The last one was especially foreign to me.
Did you go to AA?
I’d gone to one AA meeting before rehab, which was just me trying to figure out if I was an alcoholic (someone told me that people don’t go to PTA meetings to find out if they’re parents). I thought just showing up would win me karma points. When I decided to get sober for real, I returned to that meeting and I kept going back. I can’t imagine getting sober without AA. In fact, it’s as impossible for me to conceive a life without AA as it was impossible for me to conceive being sober when I was drunk all the time. I’ve sought AA meetings all over Columbus, but I mostly keep returning to that first meeting. If I don’t go to a meeting for a couple of weeks, I start feeling cold inside. I feel “off.” AA really centers me.
What do you hate about being an alcoholic?
That I’ll never be cured. To my knowledge, there is no magic pill, fix or shortcut. It’s something I have to live with—and legitimately work at. No matter how much time and energy I put into my sobriety, I can feel it inside me, curling around my thoughts. I’m confident in my sobriety but I’m very well aware that it’s fragile.
What do you love about being an alcoholic?
I genuinely love the connections I’ve made in recovery. They’re among some of the deepest relationships I have in my life. Beyond that, I love being able to channel my obsessive thinking about alcohol into more creative things—and actually finish them.
What are the best tools you have acquired to stay sober and happy?
- I’ve stopped having expectations in life.
- I’ve become rigorously honest.
- When other people talk, I actually listen now.
Do you have a sobriety mantra?
“Life on life’s terms.”
What is the most valuable thing that has happened to you in recovery?
Getting a sponsor. I’m not particularly spiritual, but I do believe he arrived at the exact moment I needed him. I’d gone to about two months’ worth of meetings and decided I didn’t need a sponsor. I’m positive that if I hadn’t met him, I’d probably have attended two more weeks of AA meetings and then gone back out drinking. He approached me after a meeting, saying that I’d reminded him of something he’d forgotten. We got to talking and before I knew it, I had a sponsor. I’m incredibly fortunate, too. He just gets me.
If you could offer a newcomer or someone thinking about getting sober any advice, what would it be?
- Sobriety is messy and imperfect. Don’t give up if you can’t get sober right off the bat. It’s also not the same for everyone. What worked for me might not work for you.
- I’d ask why you want to be sober in the first place. What got you to this point? How bad has it gotten? Deep down, just like losing weight, you need to want to be sober.
- If AA seems like too much too soon, there are some truly amazing websites, Facebook groups, resources, and online communities out there. Podcasts were a huge help to me. Anna David’s AfterPartyPod singlehandedly got me through early sobriety.
- My life is amazing right now. I’m so incredibly fortunate to have a healthy, happy family and all the opportunities I do. I owe that all to my sobriety.
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