A Note To My Readers
Writing this blog has been cathartic for me.
I certainly didn’t expect catharsis when I started to write. In fact, I started to write without thinking about the horrific memories I’d been carrying around. If I’d given any individual flashback serious consideration, I might have run screaming in a different direction.
Instead, I started writing and kept forging forward, knowing that the end result is that I got sober.
My parents have encouraged me to continue writing, even though they’d probably have preferred to not know so many details. But friends and family alike said, “It’s your story to tell.”
So I’m telling my story. And every time I share a horrific piece, a little bit of the horrific-ness from that time leaves me. It floats off into cyberspace, leaving me feeling just a little less bad than I’ve been feeling for the past 40 years.
I’ve been awestruck by this, and sometimes I wonder what took me so long to tell this tale. It’s been the single most freeing thing I’ve done during three decades of sobriety.
Sometimes I am sure I have the timeline wrong, or I forget important details that I’d like to have remembered, but I do my best to fill in the gaps. I want to be accurate and honest, and sometimes that is impossible to accomplish perfectly, but I keep trying.
For the past couple of months or so, though, I’ve been having trouble writing. I’ve not wanted to sit down at the computer to write the particular life stories stemming from 1987 and beyond.
Instead, I’ve been finding reasons to leave the house, avoiding the blog.
I’ve been reading fiction with a vengeance. I used to read only memoirs, all the time. Now I am avoiding memoirs, even the ones I desperately want to read, because I know that those books will gouge me the way they always do, and make me think about my own life.
Lately I don’t want to think about my own life.
I’ve reached a point in my drunkalogue where it only gets worse; drinking games and fun with friends are in the past.
My pulverized young adulthood in all its alcoholic glory has taken center stage.
The things that catapulted me toward sobriety by causing me unimaginable angst … those are the memories I’m reliving now. And it’s hard to write about those. They are the stories that have lined my intestines for decades, causing nausea every time I dare to remember even a smattering of the detail that is included in my writing.
And I’ve started having nightmares – recurring dreams of being on the wrong bus, so lost, never able to get home. In others, my baby boy is in danger and I can’t save him from whatever threatens his existence. It’s been weeks – maybe months – and I can’t get through a night without waking up in a cold sweat.
Finally, I realized my real-life problem: I’m reliving my misspent youth and I’m – again – unable to save the sweet, caring child I once was – the lost little girl I’ve locked away inside me.
I don’t know if my disease tried to kill her or if, in my zeal to protect her, I shoved her into a broom closet. Even in sobriety, I’ve kept her hidden, afraid of what could happen if I allowed her to walk vulnerably on this earth.
So today, I vow to move forward in telling my story while holding the hand of my inner child. Maybe I won’t become less hardened or brash, but maybe this time, we’ll survive these things together.
