One Foot in Front of The Other
This Week on Diary of a Sober Girl
I am so grateful to be sober today. I’m grateful for a weekend full of time with friends, for getting some packing done, for service and for AA. I’m grateful for all of the help I have in my life, for always having a place to go, for growing and for clarity and for learning. I’m grateful to have the means for a new apartment, to be in such a different and better place in my life, for my family and for rest. And also, for coffee.
Goooood morning my friends (: As always, I hope everyone had a nice weekend and that all of you have a short week this week because of the 4th!! I have put this plug in in a while but – holidays can be hard especially drinking holidays like saint patty’s or even the 4th of July.
If you are struggling or are nervous, just remember that it’s just another day. There will still be meetings and people to call, and I promise you are not alone.
On a personal note, I regret to inform you that I’m not feeling much better since last week. Perhaps a little less manic but there is still a rock sitting on my chest and I am going to crash HARD on Saturday when our new apartment is all put together, and I have five minutes where my brain doesn’t find something new to worry about.
I heard a meeting yesterday through, something I’ve yet again heard 1935 times…you do not have to act the way you feel.
What a wonderful saying. I have been acting the way I feel since I was born. All of my emotions are on my sleeve at all times and the people closest to me know exactly how I’m feeling simply by looking at me. How does one NOT act the way they feel? Opposite actions maybe? Right now, I feel so unbelievably anxious, and I can certainly ask HP to lift that but how do I proceed to not act like I’m about to explode?
I’m constantly learning, more about myself and how to navigate the world as a sober woman who doesn’t always behave with grace. A friend last night said that her past 5 years have been a challenge. And I personally really need that honesty. I get so lost sometimes in believing that because I’m sober everything is supposed to be perfect but sometimes shit is hard, and I can preach all day long that that’s okay but actually remembering that for myself. Is hard.
But I’m also really grateful. Grateful to have friends who have shown me over and over that they are not just going to stop being my friends. They don’t expect me to be anything other than myself. And in two years I am just starting to understand that that’s what pretty normal friendships look like.
I am grateful that this anxiety will come to an end, and I have a place to go and people to talk to and I can ask for help even if that help is just asking for people to just be patient with me.
As I grow up in this program and do really grown-up things that sometimes I don’t feel grown up enough to do – every step forward can feel like a shaky one. Every step forward can feel like the ground is going to cave in. But I have to keep going. I have to keep taking those steps forward to see that the ground in fact is not going to cave in, that I have lots of help, that feelings pass and that things will always change and just because they change doesn’t mean I can’t evolve.
I just have to keep trying.
Xx
Jane