2004-12-13 - 10:41 a.m.

alright. i'm ready to break it down now.

for those who didn't get the last post, on saturday night, i drank. for the first time in over six years of not having even a sip, a puff, or a pill, i drank. and quite a bit if i do say so myself.

it was the second night in a row of extreme torturous thoughts of wanting to try that again. of stubborness to do it my way. i talked it over with lizard first, then cat. both committed to be me watch girls in the way that they will nail me down and have the talk if i start demolishing myself. what really struck me is that i feel for the first time that love isn't conditional. i had this sneeking sensation that i'd be loved only in one tight package. that lizard couldn't be close or love me if i drank. it was good to hear from her that she's my dog on either adventure.

here's how the night played out, then we need to discuss some snags and the master plan.

i went from an opening to don j's friends cocktail party and i just made the decision. i picked up the best bottle of wine at a local market, i went to the party. (don j. only vaguely knows that i'm "not a drinker", so he saw no red flags about me drinking. no one was a spotter at the party, so i was clear to be a human adult making a choice.)

i drank a glass. my nyc friend called. i had another larger glass that don j. gave me, i started to feel so god damn warm. i started to feel *home* again. i'm not going to lie. everything felt as i imagined. copasetic. coagulated. buzzed! that buzzing sensation. that ease. that light, liquad joy oozing all over me. that belonging. that devil-may-care sensation. my threshold was low. i already felt pleasantly removed. i insisted we continue the night.

we drove my car home and don j. and i went to my fav late night bar. i roll up with my glass of wine in hand. hug my door friend and learn some friends are there. hugs, and fantasticness all the way around. i order us two extremely stiff cuba libres. we sit and i talk up the brit next to us and help him to hook up with some girl. i'm making friends all around. i think i'm being louder, looser than usual. not that i'm not gregarious normally. but now it's just purely boundaryless. don j. gets us another hard drink. i'm a bit tanking, chasing that effervescent buzz, trying to insure its staying power. everyone gets kicked out but us for some reason. the staff are hanging. don j. knows one of the bartenders too. we leave. now it's fuzzy. i tell don j. he's not as lit as i, so i ask if i could get him a glass of wine. the same wine which i already swigged right when we got home, just in case. i did feel that need to have it near. to continue. i make him drink. we are playing. i feel that spinning feeling ever so forgotten by time and i get up and make myself half heartedly throw up in the bathroom sink. i get borred with that and go back to bed and this is the only point at which i got loose liped, i started telling don j. that its been six years since i drank. but he didn't ask me anything about it. i don't know why. i wonder what he's thinking about that. maybe he thought i was kidding. but i didn't tell him the bredth of it. the fact that i made it all through thailand with adorable swedes playing vodka games with me and i drank juice.

now that i drank do i regret all the years i fended off? no. it wasn't the right time. i feel like it is now.

the next morning was rough, i battled exhaustion and the hang over to have some friends over to do an amnesty international holiday letter writing brunch.

the next day i didn't feel like i did the last time i did relapse. that time i knew it was totally wreckage, total innihilation of the self. and i felt pounding guilt. i felt lonely and dark.

now that i've made this decision i feel clarity. i feel like this is something i've had to do, i'm not someone who can be spoon fed idea's. and this is what i feel from years of a self help program. i feel like ideas were shoved down my throat in a very "do what ever you want, but....if you do you'll DIE". i feel like this is an adult decision for me to explore this for myself and stop pleasing and appeasing others. i need to know that i can balance my life and stop living under the paradigms made up by others. i balance (imperfectly) food, sex and men. those are also things i can torture myself with, but am learning how to love myself more and make headway on balancing it all.

the important thing for me to feel is that people love me anyway. that they are behind me. i know for a fact i may loose some 'sober' friends that i've had for years and years becuz this will threaten the very foundation their entire life rest upon and if i'm okay and "right" then their whole life might feel slightly wrong. so i have to be bad, dangerous, outcasted for their foundation to stay strong. and that's okay with me. i want truth. i want real friends.

and here's how i know i am being balanced: i'm in it to win it. i have made room for the fact that this *may not* work out. that i may fall into habitual, destructive drinking and that i am at this point entirely willing to back off if that's the case. i'm willing to know that i am just someone who can't drink ever. i don't think i'll get sober ever again in a program. they can be of help, but it's entirely unhealthy for me to be dictated by some group. but i'm willing to hear my inner core (and that does include you), if they tell me that i've changed. that i'm out of control. that i'm disappearing.

otherwise here's the master plan. the imperative.

*i don't want anything about my life to change, except to continue to expand. i want to still have a sterling spiritual connection. i want the inner quiet. i want to see that spirit in life the way i do becuz i have clarity. i don't want it to muddy my sight.

*i want to stay balanced with yoga, work, politics, writing, creating, exanding my career. expanding my lessons about loving myself and learning that i'm worth good things, inccluding great work that financially supports me, and having a great expansive adult partner. not settling with someone safe that just takes care of me.

*i want to keep growing in therapy and thristing for those inner challenges.

* i don't want to allow myself destructive behaviors to slip in because i feel like i opened the gate with this. i don't want to view this as a slip or an opening of pandoras evil box. i don't want to see this as a self destruction, because it doesn't have to be. it can be like anything i enjoy in moderation and turn back to what is important to me. work during the day, don't drink when iwant to get up early. keep my commmittments.

* i want to keep it mostly non drinking. i want to have the ease of having 80-90% of my week not drinking like i used to. i don't want to do any drugs. i am still as always open to mushrooms in a very specific, safe way that is planned for a purpose. i don't want to use this all to escape and hide.

i'm not going to pretend that i won't get drunk sometimes. so does everyone. that's okay to me. i also want to just not drink more than i actually do. i don't want to trash myself or this gentle opportunities.

i have to say, there is some bad idea inside of me, i think aa put it there by brash repetition for those who really did need it to stay sober. the idea is that since i did this, i don't deserve all the good things i have in my life. like, i'll be punished, ei. my creative contract i received will be taken away. people will be taken. opportunities will be taken.

here's another very big issue. my family. and all of the sober people who will judge this like custards last stance. i can't tell you. this isn't actually just in my head. when someone who has many many years and is very known in the community drinks, it's BIG NEWS. and it spreads like mold on french cheese. i feel comfortable with this tho, and i don't really feel ilke i have to defend it. i feel like my actions will speak louder than words.

but my family. fuck. you have *NO* IDEA. at this point, my dad's been dry for years not drinking (on the path with me), my brother abhors my thought on drinking and says i'm an alcoholic and should never touch it and he'd fly out immediate and take action on me. i was supposed to call him first. my mom has openly threated to throw me back in rehab if i "slip".

now i'm scaring you aren't i?

it's not that bad. it was. certainly. and fuck all. at the time *i* was really in a bad place. with *everything*. not just booze. with bulemia, with sex, with self. i bled everywhere, in all ways possible. and i am different today and not perfect, but i'm balancing everything else i've had to.

my two favorite aunts are both hard core judgementally sober. let's just say, this will inevitably shake the family in a profound and erruptive way and i'm not quite sure how to roll it out. i might wait till after the holidays. i'm pissed that my mom thinks she can control me. this is not her life or her decision and none of us know just yet. i need to find my way with this. but i'm acutely aware and sad about how disappointed my family will be. my grandma and pa were so proud of me. this part is tough, but i also know that this is couragous for me to find my truth and no longer be fed. i need to dive in and do this for me, and if people can't understand that, then i understand actually. i know its just because they love me so much and are afraid of loosing me. i get it. and yes there is a special place inside of me that always wants to get lost. but i'm much less in touch with that, then with this brilliant, alive part of me that wants to thrive and that loves life and growth and all that's come to me. i just don't want to loose confidence, or self.

like a dream i feel like i have to record thoughts here now, for fear that my original intentions will disipate with the tarnishing momentum of time, and the weathering of booze. i don't want to change. i don't want to stray from my committment.

and i know we are merely readers, peering in. i know that many of you have "read" me for *years*. and once in a while i will get checked online by someone. like when i was fooling myself with ben the brit. i do appreciate that.

i'll admit to you right now. i am scared. this has a lot of heat, and i also think it doesn't have to. but it also feels really freeing for the first time in a while.