(journal entry 13 years back).
Today, I woke up hungover again. It’s a Tuesday morning. I tossed and turned all night as thoughts of work, stress and that horrible headache got me out of bed. My wife still asleep next to me. Feeling like shit I walk to the kitchen for a glass of orange juice and aspirin. My dog Dexter looks at me, his ears down with a look of disapproval. I let him out.
I clean up empty wine bottles, cigarette butts and glasses. Trying to hide the evidence that we drank so much. I feel like shit. The word remorseful comes to mind…
My drinking problem is starting to really kick in. I go a couple days without anything to drink then I find a reason as simple as going out to dinner with my wife, to have 3 beers. Then on the way home, stop by the store for some cheap wine to partner with our after dinner smoke. I don’t ever smoke unless I’m drinking. That after dinner smoke turns into 4 or 5 and the bottle of wine is gone. Drive back to store for another bottle of bad wine because we just want one more glass. I feel like shit and my mouth is dry and disgusting with a hint of old cigarettes and wine breath. I look in the mirror and see an aged 35 year old losing his features. Its official I look like shit.
The “I hate me’s” now really set in. I try and go to the computer for some emails but my mind doesn’t really work. It’s foggy, my eyes are blurred and I continue to wonder why I do this to myself. Why do I let myself down like this? I know I have a problem and I need to change. I hate me so much.
I need to change NOW. I need to change my lifestyle, I need to do this for me, I need to do this for my wife, I need to do this so we can create a family, I need to do this because I want to do this. I am ready to grow up. I am ready to be the person I know I can be. I’m ready and hopefully it starts today damn it. Now!
When I’m sober, I enjoy so many things. I enjoy my health, I enjoy working out, I enjoy projects, I enjoy dreaming and going after those dreams. I enjoy my incredible wife and our time together, I enjoy walks with our dog, I enjoy taking on work and challenges of life. I enjoy being sober, I enjoy reading, writing, playing sports, biking. I enjoy fun!
Hungover, I hate me. Hungover, I don’t like work, I don’t like my health, I don’t like my behavior, my head, my thoughts, myself.
It’s that simple. I can change. I will change and it will happen. It will happen NOW! I can do it; I’m up for the challenge. Bring it!
Today I will suffer. Tomorrow I will be amazing. Today I will not drink, tomorrow I will feel great. Today I will make the change, tomorrow will be the beginning. And I look forward to the future. I look forward to my life. I look forward to happiness and look forward to the NOW…
(present time below).
*I did not quit drinking after that journal entry, nor did I quit after many other similar journal self hate / self help words of desperation. I struggled with drinking all through my 30s. You wouldn’t know it from afar. I had a nice life, nice wife. Nice home. A good job. Was sort of healthy, active in skiing, mtn biking, tennis and even a half ironman. I didn’t look like a drunk. Yet this entry illustrates the many days a week I struggled.
It was 8 years after this entry that I finally said enough is enough with alcohol. As depression kicked in hard, life challenges abundant. Years of heartache that brought my marriage to a dark time. I was 30lbs over weight. Feeling like shit, broken and lost as my wife prepared for divorce. My head spun and my heart hurt. Physically and emotionally.
At 42 after a charmed life of success I was desperate. I had lived a pretty fucking rad life. I had chased a dream, became a professional athlete, traveled the world, lived big, had a dope home and successful career. My life was full epic moments.
But now, I was trying to save my marriage and life. So the day before my 42nd Birthday I took my last sip of beer. I had proclaimed this many times as my last drink. But this was different. This was real as i told my wife that I was going to take a year off of booze. She nodded with no sense of confidence in me.
So it began, on my birthday I enjoyed the relief of not having to get wasted. No booze! Day after day I kept going. Diving into books, and the early days of sober podcasts (now there are a ton). It wasn’t easy, but it also wasn’t as hard either. As I learned more about the benefits of being straight edge, the more stoked I got.
After one month sober, I thought maybe I was on the road to bliss…but the journey of living and forgiving past regrets and the future of a raw life was just beginning to start. My wife of 10 years, packed up and left me. I remember her saying after 1 month being sober, “I don’t see any difference”. It’s almost comical now as I look back. Yeah 1 month sans alcohol doesn’t fix 25 years of binge drinking. Needless to say, I was white knuckling this new sober mother fucking lifestyle.
As she left, things got more real man. Yes I had an urge to go get wasted and hook up with some random women. That was my go to in my 20s. However, I had this tiny little base of new life. Sober life. and I’m convinced it was the key to keeping me alive. That and I didn’t want to go be the overly emotional, drunk, divorced guy! I was already emotional enough at 30 days alcohol free. I could only imagine the destruction I would have caused to my life, had I gone out drinking…
So I stuck to it. 1 month became 2 as I embraced the non alcohol world. Speaking of non alcohol, for that first year, my go to in the evening was a non alc beer, and a smoke. I fucking I hate smoking, but I was lost man. I really enjoyed going outside on my deck looking at the amazing view and feeling sorry for myself as puffed down a gross cig. Hey whatever you got a do, I thought. And I still do.
The divorce broke me down hard. I really loved her and I was sad, mad and confused. We had a great marriage. Until it turned. That’s a whole another section of my book one day and hopefully I will lay out a nice finish in my relationship life.
The crazy shit is how rad my life was before all this. A bit wild as you could imagine with someone binge drinking around the world as a professional Xgame athlete. I chased my dreams, i lived them and found amazing success.
But getting sober started to highlight a lot of the regrets in those years. Open up myself to trauma and the created trauma with the continued partying…
The 7 concussions probably didn’t help with trauma and the drinking, drugs, depression and anxiety that would come later in life. 2 concussions stemming from partying…
I even stood on a bridge contemplating. Battling depression, anxiety and random weird phobia’s. I continue to dance with life’s ups and downs. PTSD from a lawsuit. Darkness from divorce, isolation pre pandemic which was amplified during. Its gnarly for sure. But then again, its been full of realness. Hard core, in your face raw realness.
Which is probably exactly what its all about. And what I need. Getting real with myself. healing, forgiving, learning, living, loving. And helping, which is part of why I write this. To help others…
I found this post looking back through past journals. It spoke to me because I remember those days and the heaviness of what I was going through.
I still have heavy days. But there is lightness in being 6 years sober. I actually think it continues to get lighter the longer I am sober… So with that. I continue… Now.