Dear Sober Queens, Some time ago a former colleague and I chatted about a conference we attended together some years ago and in an odd kind of way he reminded me of a good moment, one I glossed over at the time, but he was right in his memory recall, it was a triumph just not one I ever gave myself credit for. Because you don’t do you? It is what it is, it’s your thing, it’s a song and dance routine that is wheeled out when necessary and placed back in the box of 'let’s not dwell on that.' Your head screams, it was a good thing, you did a good thing, but alcohol says ‘but if they really knew you, if they could see what you are actually like the verdict would be totally different. He probably wouldn’t remember it the same way because you are not whom they think you are.’ Having a secret and shameful wine habit does that to you. No matter what happens outside of the wine o’clock kitchen hour, it fades into our soul, another blemish, another gold star, all talked about at 33,000 feet above sea level as if it doesn’t matter, didn’t matter in the moment, as if it didn’t affect you, when in fact it really was something and really affected you. But within the wine-shame- guilt-you-don’t-really-know-me-cycle, it dissolves into the depths of glass, another moment in life be that good or bad, which doesn’t matter a shite, but it really does but let’s not go there, let’s not acknowledge it for God’s sake, let’s not draw attention to it, if that makes sense? Daily email
The greyness of kitchen drinking permeates every single fibre of our lives rendering it a colourless anthracite grey bordering on black where everything loses its sparkle as the inner critic shouts the loudest at midnight and triumph, be that private or professional dissolves down the neck of a bottle as we watch our self-respect take flight into another Tesco-long-life-bag set aside for the bottle bank. Alcohol leads to a dark madness where confusion reigns inside our heads and mixed messages abound - we are truly lost because we have spent decades not just drinking but somehow trying to stuff ourselves as round pegs into square holes. Conforming but not conforming at all. Ticking boxes but missing the mark time and time again. Wanting to speak but afraid to speak, wanting to dance but afraid we will be out of time with the crowd around us, feeling all the feelings but not feeling any at all. When drinking we are the walking wounded giggling and smiling at the assembled crowd feeling as disconnected as be damned but staying in the middle leading the charge not knowing where we are going or what we are doing but being afraid to pause, stop, or take a moment because if we stop for even one second we would surely keel over and die from the sheer stress of being in this body with a glass welded to our hands when all we want to do is stop the white noise.
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