My First (and Last) Dry January
The January has been cold. Probably one of the coldest I have felt in the humid state of Florida for a long while. Cold darkness brings me back to the when I was living in Athens, Georgia, right before the reality of COVID set in and I made the decision to try my first real “dry January.” My relationship with alcohol had been…fraught…since it began, but I always felt sure that I wasn’t a “real” alcoholic. I had made plans and bargains in the past: I will only drink on the weekends (though the weekends would often start on Thursday). I won’t drink more than three drinks in a sitting (but who was measuring the pours). I will only drink vodka sodas (because that is clearly a health drink). Then finally, I decided to try a fully booze-free month, and I found myself sitting in my favorite restaurant in Athens on New Years Eve for a very expensive prix-fixe meal, pouring my wine into my husband’s glass because I couldn’t possibly tell the waitress that I wasn’t drinking.
My dry January did not last long. January of 2020 was tough and it only became more difficult from there, and who can stay sober when the world is crumbling around you? Many people could, of course, but it felt impossible to me at the time. What my first attempt at dry January did, however, was plant the seeds that would later grow into my full blown love affair with sobriety by the time the warmth of spring (and the reality of the pandemic) finally set in. I have been sober for nearly 5 years now.
I fully support any flirtation with sobriety for any reason because, in my biased opinion, a sober life is a better life. But, you can’t know that until you start to uncover the truth behind our culture’s abusive relationship with alcohol. Dry January, Sober October, No Booze November, all these things help us see more clearly the role that alcohol has in our lives and in our ability to cope. My dry January helped me see two things very clearly:
I valued alcohol a great deal. Alcohol was my easy button. It always had been. Sobriety seemed like something that would suck all of the fun from life. I would wake up on Sundays with a hangover that would leave me depleted for days—but I saw that as living a fun and free lifestyle in my early 20’s. When COVID was at its height and every day seemed uncertain, I started to see this pattern as a waste of life. I saw this substance literally killing my clients at an enormous rate. I saw myself unable to reconcile the way I saw alcohol as freedom while I was watching it drain the life out of the people around me. I had to wake up to this reality before I could break the hold that drinking culture had on every aspect of my life.
Addiction is not the only reason to stop. After that New Year’s prix fixe meal, I went on to do my normal run through the bars of Athens, but this time I forced myself to do it sober. I would be lying if I said it was awesome. The people were gross, the band was too loud, everything smelled nasty. I was tired well before midnight. I was forced to really be present in every situation that came up for me. I soberly drove us home, took a shower, and went to bed as soon as I could pull myself away. I woke up the next morning feeling…incredible. My mood was stable, I was not covered in beer and cigarette smoke, I did not have to try to remember the night before (or send any apology texts). I just…..existed. And for the next few weeks, this feeling continued. Eventually, the thought crept back into my mind that I could drink some because I wasn’t actually an “alcoholic” and by that I meant: I did not drink all day every day, I did not have a DUI, I did not get the shakes when I did not drink. So, I happily went back to drinking but I would do so “normally” this time. Except, there is no normal drinking. Marketing, culture, availability, and my personality all worked together to make sure of that. When I finally stopped for good, it was after an unremarkable drinking episode on a pretty remarkable day when the National Guard and the Governor swarmed downtown Athens to break up a peaceful BLM protest. While people were protesting in the streets to fight for their lives and their right to exist— I was drinking a full pitcher of margaritas in my backyard out of a massive Styrofoam cup. I woke up the next morning and said…enough.
Addiction is not the only reason to get sober: getting sober is a gateway to a life worth living, aligned with my values, present with may family, and ready to fight for all that I love.
My sobriety story started with a failed dry January…. what will start yours?
Be well,
Katie Chapin, LCSW
