In a nutshell...

I’ve been thinking lately, which in and of itself is some dangerous shit; but I’ve decided it’s probably time to get a bit more personal with you guys. I don’t mean personal like you can leave your dirty ass socks on my living room floor and I sure as fuck am not about to bring my Sonicare toothbrush to your place, but some folks have said some touching shit to me lately and my charcoal heart has been moved.

Now, I am not the picture of “togetherness” as I sit here looking like somewhat of a Madonna throwback – think Lucky Star days. I’m wearing black leggings, a hideous white lace dress over those leggings and two too many bracelets. I’m a direct assault on the retinas, causing lasting and in some cases permanent damage. The scary part is that I put thought into this outfit today. I threaten my pet guinea pigs with turning them into dinner at least twice a week. I’m always unable to make good on that threat though; recipes for guinea pig are labor intensive and I’m inherently lazy. I swear around my child regularly and have shitty coping skills; I am not the poster child for balanced mental health.

That being said, a few times recently I have been told that I am admired and respected for my strength and courage. It’s not hard being a drunk. It’s hard being sober. It’s even worse getting there. So in a very tiny nutshell, because I’m not even sure you want to hear this shit…here is my story…

I grew up in an alcoholic household. I didn’t know that shit then, but I sure as shit do now. When I look back at how many times I fetched wine and beer for my parents I’m really just pissed I didn’t charge those two trip fess and that I didn’t burn more calories and wasn’t thinner growing up. I was an overweight adolescent and that would shape much of my childhood and honestly still does.

I said I was overweight, thank God I wasn’t ugly too. I was the child that growing up everyone would look at and say “Oh, she has such a pretty face,” like my ass wasn’t standing right there. That’s some shit you say about someone when they’re in the other room comfortably out of earshot. Nope. I was always front and center. I remember always feeling like I needed to appease people – like I needed to be smarter and faster and prettier [at least facially] to make up for what I lacked in other areas. I was always trying to fill this void inside of me. I was a lonely fat kid; a lonely fat kid with drunk parents. My parents loved me though, so put your checkbooks away – this ain’t the Make-A-Wish foundation.

Throughout my young adult life, I would experiment with drugs and alcohol… a lot. I really liked the relief it offered me. It’s easy to forget about how much you hate yourself when you’re fucked up. Your shitty situations and perceived problems are just smoke clouds when you are literally sitting in clouds of smoke. I stayed fucked up as much as I could to make myself tolerable. It was as if I had a record player on repeat in my head and all I could hear were the voices of those people from my childhood and classmates who had ridiculed me. Take all that toxicity and marry it with a troubled home life; because by now both my parents are deeply alcoholic, violent, and going through divorce; and I become a Molotov cocktail.

I’m 20 years old and I’m living with a man I’m 20 years old and living with a boy in San Jose, CA. It isn’t much that we have, but we’re happy. I think we’re happy. We’re happy? This is where the beginning of the end starts for me. We shared this apartment with another dude. He’s really irrelevant to this story except for the fact that he had really great cocaine once. Ok, last time he gets mentioned. Did I mention that I was on disability at the time because I had a cracked tailbone? Yep, I fell down a flight of stairs INSIDE my own apartment drunk one night on too many martinis. I hooked up with my guy because he showed up at my mom’s house to take me to the Oakland A’s game and brought me a seat donut for my broken ass. That’s good shit right there. I don’t care who you are!

It didn’t take long after moving in with this guy for me to start doing shady shit with booze at his place too. They had expensive shit though, so I had to be careful. Hadn’t these assholes every heard of Jose Cuervo or Sauza? How the fuck am I supposed to replace this black label bullshit?? Fuck it, I’ll just drink this clear looking shit. Vodka is always cheap. I’ve never heard of Everclear brand vodka. That was the day that if I could have shit through my eyeballs, I would have – right then. Let’s get this straight: Everclear is NOT vodka. I’m pretty sure I ruined 1/3 of my esophagus that night. I might have done less damage attempting to swallow a flaming sword. It still would not stop me from drinking in the future. That shit hurt crazy bad! I cried privately and crawled back into bed undetected. [If you’re just catching up; I’m sneaking booze]

Stuff starting getting annoying in that relationship, which translates to: he was beginning to see that I had a problem so I left him. There were other issues but this story isn’t about him. It’s about me being a big old fuck up and how I got better but am still way fucked up. I bounced in and out of several relationships for the next few years. I have what I like to call a 2-yr attention span. Basically what that means is that after 2 years, usually guys are smart enough to see what I’m really about. They’re finally able to see just how neurotic and jacked up I am. It takes them a while in most cases. I like to give myself credit for picking them smart enough to still entertain me while we’re together, but just dumb enough to not catch on. It’s not as if I’m good at hiding shit…especially when I’m drinking. I remember falling into the closet doors more than once and blaming it on the laundry pile on the floor. It was the whole ‘Dog ate my homework’ routine. That shit worked too – sad.

I finally landed Prince Charming after the separation from my husband in 2009. By this time, I was hiding bottles under my son’s mattress and taking sips when I would tuck him in at night. I don’t really want to get into my ex-husband because as far as I’m concerned he is a good father and deserves respect. I also believe that he is the Lord of the Underworld and if he finds out I’ve said anything negative about him; I will pay. So – moving on. Prince Charming and I met on New Year’s Eve at my roommate’s apartment over…you guessed it – cocktails!! Looking back on it soberly, he was an ugly son of a bitch. If I never see another fucking fedora it will be too goddamn soon. This relationship would literally -- and in some cases figuratively, bring me to my knees.

I did some geographics [hastily moving around, for my normie friends] after losing custody of my son during this relationship. I would LOVE to point fingers and blame [and still do on some days] at this man for the shitty circumstances under which Curran was taken from me. This man was selfish and upset with me about something then and was a child about it. I get that today; but the truth is I am an alcoholic and what happened that day still happened alcoholically. Regardless of where his feelings were directed, my actions were firmly planted in alcoholism. I would lose Curran and stay with that ass-wipe off and on for another year and a half. Why? Because he let me drink. He liked me drunk. I was pliable that way. Turns out I was easy to beat up too; until one day I wasn’t.

In February of 2011 I was beaten physically, emotionally and spiritually. I had no one in my life left that I didn’t owe money to, hadn’t offended, or even trusted. My soul ached. I hated women because they were all competition. I think at some level I was still trying to find the next man that was going to take care of everything for me; I didn’t want to compete with another woman because if you’ll recall, I’m a fat teenager. Men at this point are a means to an end and have left a very sour taste in my mouth. I miss my son. I don’t even recognize the woman looking back at me in the mirror. I can’t not drink. I can’t live like this. I move in with my father and the healing began.

Levity. I am 32? That was too hard. I actually just did the math there, folks. Yes, I was 32 years old and I moved back in with my father. On the very first night I had my first seizure too! Yay! I just remember being relieved that I wasn’t naked. At least, he told me I wasn’t naked. Dear God, please tell me I wasn’t naked. What a great Christmas card that would have made though. Just a picture of me sitting on the toilet. According to Dad, I had gone into the bathroom and sat down on the toilet seat with the lid down, fully clothed, like maybe I was going to do some deep thinking. We could caption the picture of me drooling “Look who’s home for the Holidays!”

I don’t want to bore you with talk of all the rest of what it has taken me to stay sober and I have spared you the really gritty shit of what it was like actually being drunk, but if any of you ever want to know, feel free to ask me privately. When women that I respect and admire tell me that they admire my courage, I feel like maybe I have something worth sharing. I guess you never know who you might help. Some of the shit that I’ve omitted is really, really fucking funny too – I just don’t have the time for it all.

Sufficed to say that after arriving at my father’s place, shit changed. Not because I really wanted it to; I’d be lying if I fed you that shit. It changed because it had to. I wish that I could tell you that the love of my son was enough to make me want to get and stay sober; it wasn’t. In fairness – it still isn’t. I have to want to be sober for myself. I have to want this life that I have. As fucked up and flawed and neurotic as I can be, I have to love myself enough to choose me. If I don’t, all of this means zilch. If I don’t respect myself, then the choices that I make today bear no weight. If I am not in a relationship with self, then I am not able to be useful to anyone else. That just too heavy for? Here…try this one for size