The Unexpected Joy of Being Sober

by Catherine Gray

Stigmas grow in the shadowlands.

giving up drinking felt like an enormous loss. A bereavement. I was convinced it brought fun and laughter to my life. I thought, ‘I will never date, dance, party or feel truly relaxed ever again.’

I suffered from Wishful Drinking. Tonight would be the night I cracked it. The night I would have two drinks in the pub, laugh with my friends and go home, rosy-faced and aglow with wine, to make a stir-fry and have an early night.

I go to bed feeling pleased with myself, but I also feel like I’ve been a dullard without the booze.

‘Our brain likes definite decisions,’

Once you make a clear-cut decision, you eliminate the uncertainty, and the multiple outcomes, meaning the limbic system calms down.

I am no longer the Party Girl, and I’m now mourning her death.

They remind me that I’m only the centre of my own night; not everyone else’s.

‘Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.’

Alcohol is the only drug where, the second you stop taking it, you’re seen as being too weak to handle it. It’s truly bizarre.

‘You have your way. I have my way. As for the right way, the correct way and the only way, it does not exist.’