Reaching a Fever Pitch and It’s Bringin’ Me Out the Dark

I don’t feel like an alcoholic all of the time.

                I don’t wake up in the morning with a hefty awareness that I come with a warning label.  The word alcoholic isn’t tattooed anywhere on my tender flesh.  There are no indicative black spots or “marks of the witch” that I hit with color corrector and a good concealer along with the gray bags under my eyes.  I don’t worry that I will forget where I am and introduce myself at a department meeting with, “Hi, I’m Kara.  I’m an alcoholic.” 

                When I’m lecturing, I feel like a lecturer.  When I’m in class, I feel like a student.  When I’m driving, I feel like a tax-paying resident of the State of North Carolina and when I am having a good day, I feel like a survivor, not an alcoholic.  The only time I direct the term alcoholic at myself, its coming fast out of the insult gun that I have pointed at my own head. 

                It’s a dirty word, no doubt.  I know a lot of sober alcoholics with a lot of philosophies, but none of them have turned alcoholic into a characteristic that is brag-about-able.  As far as I can tell, the term will always be a disclaimer, and I won’t be petitioning Merriam-Webster to change the definition.  The problem with words that are used as labels is that they just… sit there.  Inert.  Heavy.  Decomposing but never dying, like swamp dirt.

                The stupidest thought I have ever had came to me sober, and two days ago.  I was sitting with a group of people that I see on most Monday and Wednesday nights.  We don’t know each other well enough to have exchanged deeply personal details, but they know me well enough to feel comfortable asking deeply personal questions.  I wasn’t feeling well—it was apparently, very noticeable.  One of the hot topics of the evening had been the current scourge of flu going around, so when the man behind me said, “Sweetie, you don’t look so good…”

                I vigilantly assured them that I was a bit ill, but that my ailment was not contagious.  I take the blame for stepping in this one, but the follow-up question from two women in at the same time was, “Oh, are you pregnant?”

                My stupid thought came instinctively and then evolved to stupid words, which were, “Absolutely not.  I think I’m disqualified from all of that.” 

                If you are wondering what I think I’m disqualified from all of that means, I am wondering that too, as well, also.  When I said it, I was woozy, had a fever, and (it feels wrong to admit this here, but…) super high on prescribed pain meds.  24 hours later, though, the exchange was still heavy on my mind.  It bugged me.  Disqualified?  From what? And by what? 

                From a normal, happy life.  By a rearview mirror addiction.  Because dirty, dirty alcoholics don’t get to be happy.  Right? Right.

                But sober isn’t a nasty word… and I am that too.  A sober alcoholic.  Alcoholic is a label, but sober is a conviction—a change made in earnest, a commitment constantly practiced.  While being an alcoholic makes me feel “disqualified” (apparently), sober has only ever made me feel capable.  It was an unfortunate road I had to travel to get here, but I did have to travel it.  It made me humble.  It made me patient.  It made me incredibly grateful for what I have.

                Sober is not a label that just sits there and gathers dust and prejudice, it’s a secret weapon—a cheat code to knowing when to embrace a good circumstance and when to remove yourself from a bad circumstance.  We can sniff-out hope and danger like a Blood Hound.  Why would my brain consciously tell me that I am disqualified from a happy life, when I just became qualified?  Making the journey from being a drunk tornado to a reliable adult makes me want to emulate the empathy, support, and understanding that’s been given to me in my relationships, and serve it right back into those relationships.  And carry it into new relationships.  I want to give all of the things that I couldn’t/wouldn’t give three years ago.  No—I don’t just want to, that’s apathetic.  I am ready to do it, enthusiastically. 

  What about that disqualifies me from a normal, happy relationships?  The childlike naiveté? Not gonna be a problem.  I have already lived through the worst relationship I will ever have and I refuse to make the same mistakes.  You think it’s a stretch to compare my relationship with drinking to a relationship with a human?  Bullshit.  Any addict will tell you that their drink of choice, their drug of choice, it was their best friend.  It was their lover, their caretaker, their partner.  Addiction was passionate and it was comfortable and that’s why it was so hard for us to leave him. 

                Substance, human, or animal, I will never be duped again.  I will never get so ingratiated in a toxic relationship that I let it toy with my logic the way addiction did.  The only thought process more stupid than, “I’m disqualified from life,” is one where you go through the rigmarole of escaping addiction and run into the arms of a lover who has all of the components of addiction.  And you fail to see the similarities:

                “I’m not addicted—If I just keep drinking, I’ll be able to control my drinking…”

                “If I push harder, if I concede to their illusions, if I keep compromising my boundaries, if I give more of myself to this bad relationship, then it can still become a good relationship.” 

I was thinking of a man that time but, sir, didn’t you used to come in a bottle?!

Even if I can quickly identify and dodge male partners with addictive qualities, there is another risk that runs alongside any relationship… If I trust myself to only choose good men, then when it doesn’t work out, I’ve lost a good man.  Another good man.  Losing a loser is fine.  Losing someone wonderful, just because the planets didn’t align or the fit wasn’t quite right… I know that hurt.  That’s a drinkin’ hurt. 

Am I qualified to get through that?  No. Nobody is. Don’t be ridiculous. 

Can I get through that sober? Yes. I can.  Because I have to. Because I want to.  Because I’m not disqualified from a happy life but drinking over anything, major or minor, will disqualify me from having the things that currently make my life happy.  Like those good, empathetic, understanding, patient relationships that I have chosen, and have chosen me back.  And my adorable, lovable, giggly, amazing children. 

Ok, they aren’t my children.  I might be disqualified biologically from that.  They may not look like me (fingers crossed for Steele, though) but I love them as if they were all mine.  At least once a day they’ll say something snarky and hilarious and I’ll arrogantly think, “Ah, yes, they get that from me.” I’m qualified to be Kara in whatever role Kara gets the privilege of playing in their lives.  It is a privilege, one that I am unwilling to drink away, no matter how hard a generally happy life can get sometimes.  It really must have been the fever and the drugs, because I can’t be disqualified from a happy life. If I’m already living one.