Two Years Sober

December 28, 2015December 27, 2015 Ruby Pipes36 Comments

"Windows Molde Norway abstract" © Les Haines, 2012. CC BY 2.0. — “Windows Molde Norway abstract” © Les Haines, 2012. CC BY 2.0.

Tomorrow will be my second sober anniversary and I am terrified. So terrified I’ve found myself lying on the floor, still in my coat and scarf, kicking the wall, and sobbing. So terrified I drove to my parents’ house after dinner to cry onto my mother’s shoulder. So terrified I’m struggling to find the words to write about it. Terrified.

Because the second year is when I learned that not drinking isn’t the end of the battle. That I’m still sick. I still have bipolar disorder and it’s still something that needs to be managed. The second year is when I learned that there’s a difference between giving your all and giving enough.

The second year is the year I learned that yes, I have PTSD. Yes, some horrible things have happened to me. Yes, I’ve been hurt by people, but they didn’t do this to me. The second year is when I learned that no matter how much other people have done, the fact that I’m sick is nobody’s fault and I have to stop blaming them. That blaming them is just letting them do it again and again.

This year I finally learned that if I’m ever going to get better I have to mourn the loss of normality. I have to let go of the idea that if I can just stay sober everything will be okay. I learned I have to manage my medication, go to therapy, exercise everyday, avoid caffeine, get regular sleep, and write daily. Just like not drinking, these aren’t options for me. They’re not perks. It’s just what I have to do if I want to be okay. And I want to be okay.

If I’m going to do that, some things have to change. I have to admit that I’ve been wallowing in my marriage in order to avoid discovering who I really am without booze. That I’ve let a relationship become my defining attribute, so that I don’t have to figure out what my defining attribute is. What I want it to be. I’m going to have to admit that I’ve been using love and food and video games and sleep to prop me up the way bourbon used to.

I feel like I just barely made it to the finish line this year. I feel like a dry drunk. But I also know that–just like when I quit drinking–realizing what I need to do is half the battle. So in the next year I’m going to give myself the space to figure out who I am as a person. Give myself the space to manage my illness effectively. The space to stop blaming my character flaws on what happened to me in the past. The space to stop confusing character flaws and symptoms.

Because when I hit my third year, I want to know I earned it. I want to know I’m stronger. I want to know I did it different.

Autobiography · Mental Health · Personal Development

Yolk

December 24, 2015December 24, 2015 Ruby Pipes16 Comments

The yolk from the white, I try to separate the logic from the feeling. What I cognitively know from what circles like snakes in my stomach. Only one part is used at a time. The things I know exhaust and go home long before emotions tire, and I’m left sobbing in the shower over things I know aren’t true.

We ache. Our hearts, our spirits are pummeled against the shore for longer than we think they can hold up. At night we wrap up into each other and I whisper, “I don’t know if I can do this forever,” and he responds with, “You don’t have to. Just a little while more.”

I shake. Pull my hair and claw at my skin and gasp into the carpet. Put on my coat and scarf and take a walk. Call my mom. Beg for something to keep me just a little grounded.

It’s that time of year again.

In a bathrobe and slippers, I curl up on the couch and read books. Play video games. Watch Law and Order. Anything to keep me distracted. To keep me from looking into the pit of me and still not having any answers for why life feels like this.

But when I’m running Zedd’s vocalist is singing in my ears again. “Take your dark days and send them to the sun and carry on…” And I hit repeat again and again and again. Again. Again. “Let it go until you let go of all the anger…” And I run. My feet pounding the pavement and my heart leaping out of my chest. Unsure if I even remember what breathing steady is. I gasp for air and my legs scream to stop. No. Again. Again. “It’s easy to hold, but so hard to forgive…” Again. Again. “All the words that made you hurt will burn like paper. Straight into the fire, straight into the fire. Let it go until the smoke is gone forever…” Again. Again.

I separate out the yolk from the white. Knowing full well that each part has its own use and sometimes they are used together. I cling onto the scraps of hope still left in me somewhere. The perfect mixture of logic and feeling. I dig my nails in deep.

Again.

Autobiography · Mental Health

Cheated

December 21, 2015December 13, 2015 Ruby Pipes26 Comments

"Umbrella + Light - 16/365" © [Flávio], 2012. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0. — “Umbrella + Light – 16/365” © Flávio, 2012. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Two cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon. I think that’s how I knew Jon was cheating on me. I’d had my suspicions before, but when I came home that night from my second job and there were two empty cans of PBR on the counter, I knew. He was already in bed. Sound asleep. His twists and turns of slumber disguising anything that had happened there earlier in the evening.

Later Sheldon would send me a text about Jon being out with Stephanie. Would tell me about confronting him at the bar. A lot of people would tell me that. And I asked Jon what he was doing out with her. Asked him if there was anything he needed to tell me. He wouldn’t confirm or deny, just say, “Consider your sources.” As if everyone but him was full of shit. That’s probably why I was so angry with him. Because I asked and he acted like I was the one who needed questioning.

I was giving him an out. He didn’t have to sit me down and tell me that he was sleeping with his coworker. He just had to say, “Yes.” Nod his head. He just had to tell me that all those suspicions were valid. That the smell of perfume in his truck was exactly what I thought it was. That when he said he was working late he wasn’t. It would have been easier, wouldn’t it have? To not have to make anything up. But he didn’t. He just said, “Consider your sources,” and kissed me on the forehead. Like I was the crazy one. Gaslighted before I even knew what the phrase meant.

After finding the beer cans I crawled into bed next to him. Cried quietly into my pillow like I usually did in those months. The next morning I got up, went to school, and signed the papers to drop all my classes. Called my mom. And, with my parents help, packed up all my belongings. Sent a text to Jon that just said, “Moving out.” I didn’t bother telling him that he couldn’t deny it anymore. I figured he’d figured it out by then. And I wanted to kill myself. Not him. That’s the interesting part. I wasn’t angry with him. I was angry with myself. Angry for being the type of person that would be cheated on. As if it had anything to do with me at all. As if it wasn’t just about him.

Months later we’d meet at a bar and he’d ask me to move to Arizona with him. He’d tell me that he wanted me to be his girlfriend again. “Don’t you know I know you were cheating on me the whole time, dude? Why do you think I would run away with you?”

He flinched. Like maybe he thought I hadn’t put it together yet. And then he looked me right in the eyes and asked, “What was I supposed to do? You were crying all the time and cutting yourself and… I need a companion.”

I should have slapped him, but instead I apologized. Apologized like I was something broken that had failed him. And I really thought I did. Thought I did to the point that, to this day, when I catch myself on the floor crying I think my husband should be leaving. That’s depression for you. That’s mental health. That’s low self-esteem. That’s… It.

But I can unlearn it. And he can go to hell.