The third reason I decided to take a break from drinking was my energy. I was always tired.
I woke up tired, I was dragging myself through my days, and I couldn’t wait to get back into bed at night. My first thought in the morning was “I can’t wait to go to sleep tonight.”
While I felt grateful for so much in my life, I was so tired all the time that I wasn’t looking forward to, or excited, or even interested, in all of the things I had to do each day. This lack of life satisfaction, while knowing that I hold so much privilege, created a dense shame in me. Who was I to ask for help? Who was I to struggle? What right did I have to be unhappy when I had so much good in my life?
You know that question on the mental health questionnaire? Have you lost interest in things that you used to enjoy? YES YES YES, Yes I had.
I felt like my energy was leaking out all over the place. I couldn’t contain it, no matter how often I worked out, or tried to rest, or tried to organize or simplify, I felt like a wrung out sponge. This was bigger than simply taking a mental health day off from work or adding in more B vitamins.
I realized that I couldn’t change everyone and everything else in my life (don’t worry, I tried) in order to make myself feel better, or to find some peace. This had to be an inside job.
Since I had been sober-curious for a while at this point, I thought taking a long break from alcohol might help. It seemed impossible, undesirable even, but I had exhausted all other options and this was something within my control. Alcohol, we all know, is a depressant after all. Removing it from the mix was something I was willing - remember the power of willingness - to try. If it wasn’t working I could always go back, it wasn’t going anywhere.
I later learned that while alcohol only stays in the bloodstream for 24 hours or so, it actually takes the body a full week to return to baseline. This means, if you are even drinking moderately/ or just on the weekends, you are never actually experiencing yourself without its influence.
The anxiety that many of us use alcohol to quell? The unrest, the inability to find calm? It could very well be a symptom of detoxification from alcohol itself. When we take a long break, we get to rediscover who we are on our own. It feels scary, but the thing I hadn’t anticipated when I started this long break was all of the support that would rush in to help me be successful. We don’t know until we actually do it, what it will be like.