Dear Alcohol,
You and I have had quite a wild ride. You have been in my life for more years than not and our relationship has had many different chapters along the way. You have always been there for me when I said I needed you. You were there for celebrations, you were there in my darkest hours, and you were also there to help me just relax and forget about my worries. You always showed up and when I asked you gave me more and more. You did anything and everything I asked of you and did so without ever a discerning look.
You’ve never told me to slow down, you never said “just have one”. You sat seductively in front of me with open arms and a look that said, “Whatever you need, I’m here for you”. All of these things are what we all want in a good friend but it’s not always what we need. While you helped me in any situation I could have ever dreamed you weren’t always the right choice. In fact, most of the time, it was a temporary relief followed by even worse dip. While you are always there, your presence comes at a cost. The medicine you provided cured what ailed me in the moment but left me sick as a dog afterwards. The anxiety, fear, disappointment, and shame all went away only to come back like a vengeance as my brief escape with you left damage and pain in its wake.
What I want isn’t what I always need and unfortunately I want the easy fix. That’s what you provided. A button I could push and make all my troubles go away. What I needed was to learn, develop, and walk through my fears and anxieties so that I could learn to deal with life on life terms without the need for your external stimuli.
I needed a tough love friend who helped me see that it was not the world against me but myself against myself and pointing a big middle finger out at the world. I needed to recognize, once and for all, that my life (that is so damn tough to deal with) is a result of my own actions and twisted ways of thinking. I need a friend who doesn’t enable me to lean on them for everything in some twisted codependent way. Unfortunately, I cannot rely on you anymore for the comfort you bring.
I do not think you are bad for everyone. You are bad for me.
It is not what you did but what I allowed to happen. You became my coping mechanism. You became my solution for my own insecurities and defects of character. As our relationship progressed the cure you were has now became an addiction. A coping mechanism for my existing and newly forming defects of character in life. I started lying, I started stealing, I reshaped my world to fit you into every aspect of it and in the end I didn’t think I could put you down. Countless attempts came and went and each bender, each hangover, each withdrawal getting worse and worse.
At the end, you were my everything. You were my god. You controlled my every move, my every word, my every thought. Either finding more of you or begging you to leave my body so I wouldn’t be in pain. You became my master and I was your slave.
It’s been one year and five months today since we last hung out and the memory of that last meeting is etched into my psyche. I thought I was a goner. I thought I was going to die. Of all the things I wanted in this life the last was to be buried with a belly full of you. And so, now I say goodbye again as a reminder to an old friend who was a part of my first 40 years so I can live the next 40 free from your grip.
Goodbye alcohol.
*** If you or someone you know is struggling with alcohol abuse and is looking for resources please take a look at the resources found in the sidebar of this page. To get to immediate assistance from Alcoholics Anonymous please check out their website and host of resources they have available for anyone who is struggling. Please do not suffer and silence. There is help and a better life around the corner as long as you are willing to go to any lengths to get it. ***
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