Day 6

 It's Friday.

Last Friday I took my last drink.  I drank a bottle of proseco to celebrate my sobriety.  That sounds ridiculous, I know.

Fridays are interesting.  Sober Fridays are interesting.  Normally, on Fridays I would go to Total Wine after work and replenish my wine stash with no less than six bottles of wine.  A combination of reds and whites.  The six bottles were meant to last for two weeks, mostly consumed over the weekend.  Sometimes it worked sometimes it didn't.  Either way I wasn't going back to Total for another two weeks.  That was a rule I had for myself.  That rule, of course, did not stop me from picking up a random bottle at the grocery store before the two weeks was up.  

My sober Friday will look like me going home after work, making a cup of tea, eating dinner and watching television until around 7PM and then mowing the lawn.  

Most people tend to be slow about making changes to their lives because they focus on all the things that they will lose in the process of the change.  The focus is on the negative.  I believe in taking a more positive stance.  In deciding to give up alcohol I am gaining so much more than I am losing:

• Better health - I removed the small bottle of water and Tylenol sitting on my nightstand for hangovers.  No more empty calories.  My liver is no doubt, thanking me as well as my waistline and my skin will not look so dull.
• More money - I spent roughly $1,500 a year on alcohol.  That is a conservative estimate based on my spending history at Total Wine alone.  This does not include what I spent at the grocery store or  the ABC store when I wanted something harder.  I'm taking that extra money and using it to increase my retirement savings.
• Peace of mind - Never again will I have to worry about how much I've had to drink before I get behind the wheel.
• Focus - Alcohol left me numb.  My mind was consistently in a fog.  I'm thinking much clearer even after six days.

This is a good thing for me.  I've been thinking about it for a long time but I honestly never thought that I would ever want to stop drinking.  I really like wine.  Like, a lot -- but just because you like something doesn't mean that it is any good for you.  

While at the gym this morning, I had a thought:  What if there is something that I am supposed to be doing but could never figure that thing out because my mind was always so clouded with booze?  What if now that I'm sober I will see that thing clearly and pursue it and succeed?  Just a thought.  Not an unrealistic thought.  What if God has been trying to tell me something but I couldn't hear Him because of the alcohol?  

Well,  I'm not drinking anymore, Lord.

Speak to me.

I'm listening.

xoxo