Fighting my demons

“I wish I could see through your eyes so I would know what you like to see. I wish I knew your wishes, so I could give you everything you want. I wish I dreamed the same dreams you do, and together we could make them come true. I wish I knew what makes you happy, so I could make you the happiest person in the whole world. And lastly, I wish I were a cell in your blood, so I would be sure I was somewhere in your heart.” -unknown

so it’s a V day today, valentine’s, vagina, vicious… call it as you want it. I wonder how love can be so different, is it really? Or the difference is actually between love and the lack of it.  My expectations in a relationship are high. Is it a mistake to expect at least as much as you give, from your loved one? Is it naive? I wonder why it takes so little effort for me to make you happy, to do something what you’ll appreciate, something different, something only I can do for you, because only I know you so well. I wouldn’t even call it ‘en effort’, it’s a pleasure. Yet, here you are, with one rose in your hand, bought probably just because some old lady stood with them on the street corner. I am bitching, but I expect nothing less than I give you. I expect some effort, otherwise why should we try, why should we keep holding onto this sparkle, better lets move on. The world is sparkly at night, stars are shining, many stars, I wish to be the brightest one on your sky, I wish you’d make me feel that way, a little bit special. Wishing… & bitching.

“The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be.” – Socrates

So there we go, another “fresh start”, but who would I be if I would not try over and over again. It counts – or at least I let myself to believe so. After 3 weeks of non-drinking existence I once again met with my alcoholic demons. The came around together with the lack of trust to my partner. He made me wonder where the limit of his lies lays. When he drinks he lies. He makes me feel like a brainless child, hoping in his drunk delirium that I do have faith in the creations of his drunken mind. Well, I don’t. I may be naive, but every naivety has got it’s boundaries and sometimes it is existent simply due to purity of the love. My love is dirty now. It whispers trick questions to my jealous ear, it seeks dark corners in my heart and it’s mind-fucking with me. Be who you pretend to be. Give me honesty – I will manage, I do not ask questions that I am not ready to hear the true answers too. I become weak when you force me to believe in unicorns. I feel fragile when I am up against my demons and one that is suppose to be my ally poisons my path. Nevertheless, I’ll raise again, fuck phoenix, I will not turn into ash prior, I won’t let that happen, so beware, because I will turn around and run until i loose my breath if you threaten my integrity once again, my love.

“If we are incapable of finding peace in ourselves, it is pointless to search elsewhere.” Francois de la Rochefoucauld

So I am back at the same place where I was when I started this blog. Enjoying once again my journey towards sobriety. Now not alone though, with my man. As it often happens in relationships, where not one, but two people have problem with alcohol, it started to really get to us that our binge drinking is seriously hurting our relationship. I was disappearing for the whole nights, going clubs, ‘enjoying’ myself with yet another drink in my hand and he became a person that I couldn’t relay on. I started loosing my faith in him, in us.

Now days go slower and are fuller. Perhaps it’s not so emotional anymore (and I love emotional!), but one must remember that there was just a handful of this good emotions and hell of a lot of the bad ones. And the repercussions… Forget hangovers or feeling ill, the moral side of things is unbearable. The pain, the guilt, the sadness, the blaming each other for each other’s mistakes. The confusion to where the relationship going. Me asking “Does he really love me?”. Him thinking “I don’t feel safe with her”.

We are both people with past, we went through our own private hell. We are scared by life, by ourselves. That is why we must focus on finding strength first to love ourselves and then each other. Getting so pissed that you just meet illusion of being a god is nowhere close to finding in own heart the light, to discovering what a miraculous being one is.

I wonder… can we turn around out lives? Our way of being? Can we survive without escaping into the madness of alcoholic paranoia. Fall in love with bluebirds singing, once again…

“If God had wanted me otherwise, He would have created me otherwise”  Johann von Goethe

My dear friend told me today that she is not gay anymore…

My dear friend, whose name is synonymous to believe, has found Christ.

My dear friend, who used to be a happy woman, naughty woman, a lesbian woman. She fucked girls like there is no tomorrow. She gave them pleasure and it gave it to her. She loved women with all her heart and let them love her. She enjoyed saying nasty things in bed and walking around female-only sex shops in search for toys that would rise energy in sexual rituals in the bedrooms. She loves Gay Prides and other happenings, she loved the community. She yearned the vibe.

My dear friend, after a few months, is not gay anymore…

It makes me sad, maybe it shouldn’t… She states that she is happy. Who am I to judge. But wasn’t she happy then? Perhaps it just proves that a human being can find happiness no matter what circumstances. On the other hand, this was a woman over 30 years old, a sergeant in a military, proud of who she is, what she represents. She identified herself as a lesbian since she was a teenager. Yes, it makes me sad. You might say that I am being hypocritical, but isn’t it easier for one to go back into a closet than to come out. It takes guts to come out, to confront your family with revelation that you’re not what they’ve expected. Even though she comes from a very Christian family, she manages to do so. I have always has upmost respect to her for that. And now… I am wondering … sin’t she denying herself, isn’t she denying all what she was fighting for since she could/ wanted to call herself a lesbian.

She was a happy dyke,  a friend that was optimistically twisted and all loved for her for that. What can change one so drastically to deny most of one’s life. As if it was a lie.. Well, it wasn’t.

Did anyone hurt anyone strictly because of being a homosexual. I want to respect religion. But each and everything must deserve and give back the respect…

There is so many beautiful things about human beings that focusing on with which sex one has got sexual relationships becomes really irrelevant when we look on a human being as a whole.

I am lost… why such a beautiful being, created by God – as she believes to be, would deny this creation and try to modify it.

“In every failure one must find at least an ounce of potential for a future victory” Myself

Obviously I did not find a good enough quote for describing my failure… therefore I have created one myself. It ‘ain’t’ half bad, I think.

Anywho…. So I have failed, so I’ve been struggling for – oh bullshit, I haven’t been struggling, I just simply dropped the whole sobering project back in March 2010. And yet, I do live. Although not a sober life.

I am happy. Weirdly enough.

Considering my goals set back in 2010, which were:

1. to be drink free or learn to drink responsively. To install a ‘red light’ & never cross it

2. to find joy in every day’s life & to let it shine over a shadow of everyday worries

3. to see and explore what world and people have to offer

4. to find true friends

5. to fall in love madly & honestly

6. to start the university & even to finish it someday!

7. to loose weight and be happy with my looks

8. to start my own business and be able to base my financial existence on it

9. to write again

The results are:

1. ‘Red light’ has never entered my life

2. Still working on it, visits at psychologist help :)

3. To busy with picking up cats and dogs poo, but its all good for now

4. I hope I did, at least starting to define them

5. DONE!

6. Started…. just had a major hiccup, but hopefully will be back on track soon (got a distinction even!)

7. yeah right :-P, on a diet…..

8. not yet

9. Hey, I am just doing it :-D

Thank you. See you shortly…

“Properly trained, a man can be dog’s best friend” Corey Ford

I know I am suppose to write here about my recovery, but I believe that the part of a successful recovery is getting things of your chest. And, FUCK, am I pissed off! I am furious with people’s ignorance and stupidity, at least here, in England. I am an animal lover, I especially adore dogs.

The fashion for Staffies (Staffordshire Bull Terrier) hit the UK hard. Finally, like every fashion, it wore off, what’s left? Hundreds of thousands of unwanted dogs. The complete ‘moron-ism’ of people comes to the light, when you know how many of them still breed staffs. For what? Well, profit of course.

What makes me furious is not only that most of these dogs will end up in pounds, where they will spend last 7 days of their neglected lives, and after this they will be put to sleep; not only that some of them will live the life of a bait for dog fights, repeatedly bitten & abused, finally dying of physical or mental exhaustion, but most of all, what bothers me, is the ignorance and stupidity of people that keep this murderous circle going.

I know that puppies are cute, but for every puppy born and taken to a loving home, another dog is missing out on this place, another dog, that used to be this cute puppy, just because he didn’t fit in a time frame, WILL DIE.

Breeding certain breeds in killing. Why people do not get it? Should we show them videos of dogs being put to sleep? Or, perhaps, we should take away their beloved staff, kill it and give them another one instead. What’s the difference really? Where does this end…

Approx. 80% to 90% of dogs in pounds are staff related, but hey, go on gumtree, staffs are still pricey, £100 for a staff & this includes one alive and one dead!!! Good deal!

20 dogs a day are put down to sleep in the UK. Think, if every day only two bitches would not have a litter of 10 each, maybe these 20 dogs would still be here. Maybe UK wouldn’t be a graveyard for Staffies.

Once someone said, that we should pay less for every neutered dog, and big bucks for a dog that can breed. I think that’s the only solution, as, in this case, I lost my faith in humanity.

The below I dedicate to all ignorant pricks. With (lack of) love…

***

The river of shit flows from your mouth
Neither sense nor logic one’ll find in it
Painless ignorance is a blessing
For those who have no care
For rude, obnoxious creatures…

crawl back into your greasy cave
Whenever light approaches the shadow
Spit words through your poisonous fangs
They won’t reach my guarded heart

With compassion I think of you
Through pity you make yourself seen
Today, hear me:
You buried yourself

My sight’s drifting away
My understanding, long gone
Not even a whiff of tolerance I’ll leave behind

“Doubt can be a bond as powerful and sustaining as certainty. When you are lost, you are not alone”

Father Brendan Flynn, Doubt

So here I am. Day 19. Just coming back from what supposed to be a relaxing 3 day break. Oh my poor stressed body and brains. Can’t even be bothered with yearning for a drink. I knew from the beginning that the idea of having romance with a married man wasn’t one of my greatest. I knew that three years ago, but I did not listen to my wise self. Three years ago I rarely listened to anyone. I am still not sure what actually holds this relationship, if I may call it so, together. Well, it use to be our binge nights, getting fucked on booze and coke, getting fucked in bed. Now I am sober. He doesn’t drink when I don’t drink. Sex is barely existent, not that it actually bothers me. I struggle everyday with keeping it straight. No more lies, excuses, no more drink. Trying to make each day as productive as possible. Trying to please his expectations, make it ‘simple’, make it ‘nice’, fucking desperate housewife. The man comes home. Toilet paper folded clockwise instead of counterclockwise, I dared to drink directly from a juice box and his socks ain’t ironed… well, more or less. Tired.com…  Stress-o-holic and Alcoholic on one shaky wagon.

After these 3 relaxing days I am exhausted, I just want to curl in bed and cosy up to my sweet dreams of freedom. The situation that I’m in gets more and more tangled every day. Do I love him? Question is, do I still remember how love should feel? ‘Being’ with someone that makes you want to cry eighty percent of the time, is not the best addition to my attempt on recovery. Oh, blimey. Choices…

Is this what happens when you start seeing your life, not as a blurry alcoholic’s vision? Life is grey, and yet I can see a rainbow hiding behind a mountain. I must cross this mountain, must clear it of all the crap barehanded. My fingernails will get dirty, I’ll tore my skin apart, I’ll tore his heart. The deed must be done. Through the darkness towards light, like an old man with a lantern walking through the 19th century London, lighting up the dark alleys. Step by step. Day by day. I am watching clouds now, they’re passing by, some are interwoven with violets. It’s good to be able to see violets again.

“Never trade what you want the most for what you want at the moment”

Recovery is like trying to close our own Pandora’s alcoholic box. We gently press the cover down each day just a little bit more, each day fewer demons escape and tempt us a little bit less; but will be ever able to shut this box completely? I don’t think so.

Years ago we opened it, maybe when we got drunk one time too many, maybe it happened with our first drink or maybe the urge to let the demons out was deep within us before we even knew the taste of alcohol. How does one define the point in ones life when there is no going back? Is there any sense in doing it? Would it help us to understand the root of this problem or would we just dwell on the past instead of moving forward…

For 15 days now, I am pressing down the cover of my Pandora’s box, everyday new demon escapes, with new arguments why I should let alcohol back into my life. Some are weaker, but some have tremendous strength and great reasoning. I envy them. With these abilities I would be able to overcome every obstacle… But wait, these demons are part of me, their strength lies within me. Although, why is it so hard to gather this strength to embrace positive aspects of life and yet, so easy to use it for self-destruction. It’s all about the rewards and satisfaction. With self-destructive behaviour they come so much quicker. Getting pissed takes few hours, getting a promotion at work, years. You got pissed, you are satisfied, you got a promotion, you already yearning to climb on the higher step of the corporate ladder. We don’t give enough credit to our small successes, instead we focus on chase for more, more and more. Not embracing them enough drives us to wanting the instant satisfaction, the booze. Don’t confuse embracing with celebrating though, oh yes, we do know how to celebrate, even the tinniest success, with booze.

15 days ago, I went to my neighbours party, I drunk so much that I woke up in my bed next day remembering maybe first 30 minutes of it. The embarrassment and fear of what I might have done, was too much (and yet, so well experienced in the past). Until day before yesterday I haven’t spoken to her. I feared the worst. She knocked on my door with a big smile on her face, telling me what great time she’s had and how much fun I am. The demon slipped out of the box, he told me “you see, I was right, you are so much fun when you drink, everybody loves you, the drink makes you funnier, it makes you interesting, it makes you who you are”. I walked with this demon on my shoulder for a day or two, reasoning with it & listening to it’s seductive whispers. He told me everything I wanted to hear, that I can have just a few drinks for a bit of courage, that I am not this awful drunk that does shameful things when under the influence, that I can stop when I choose to do so. Then I thought about the past two weeks and how good it feels to experience the world without regret. How great it is to have your heart free of pain, guilt and shame. How liberating is having control over my own life… and even though I have no doubt that others will come, today, I brushed this demon off my shoulder.

“If we defend our habits, we have no intentions of quitting them”

Oh yes. I love to blame. Most of us love to blame. We don’t blame ourselves of course, that would be almost immoral towards our egos. No, we blame others, the conditions, the past, fortune, god, even the weather.

Why did I start to drink?

I will blame my conditions, growing up in an alcoholic (my dad), paranoiac (mum) and generally difunctional family. I will blame my choices, (that of course, I was ‘forced’ to make), being a prostitute, not finishing my education, falling in love with the wrong person. But the real question is, why didn’t I stop to drink when I had a choice. We can blame our problems with alcohol on everything else, but at the end, we are the ones to blame. No one and nothing actually forces us to give in to alcohol and it’s vicious ways.

Maybe if my childhood was problem free and maybe if I was surrounded by love, money & stability, I wouldn’t be here. Then again, I look at the fellow alcoholic, that has had everything I’ve ever dreamed of and yet, he is sitting on the same bench as I am. Is the alcohol a patch for whatever is lacking in our lives? Or is it just a cover up for our weakness, that would eventually came to the surface this or some other way. Why some of us are weaker than the others? Are we really weaker or are we just lazy?

Wasn’t is easier at school to blame someone else if you got into fight? Blaming lack of completing your homework on a naughty dog was so much simpler. Not delivering on time at work, it’s a currier’s/printer’s/computer’s fault. Life seems simpler with these little lies. Yearning simple makes us lazy. Lazy craves for simple. Having a problem and not facing it, blaming it on something/ someone else makes the problem simplified and results in us becoming more and more resistant to actually dealing with upcoming misfortunes. I pushed the thought of being addicted to alcohol far, far away. It was easy. If I really got too drunk and was embarrassed about it, I blamed it on not eating properly before, alcohol combined with period, even on possibility of my drink being spiked. I got so good at it, that I started believing, that somehow, miraculously, every time I drink, bad things happen to me because the world is just so unfair. Was it the alcohol tricking me into thinking like this? Maybe. Did I allow it? Yes I did. I allowed myself to find every possible excuse to not disturb my habit. I always had my guard up when someone mentioned my relationship with booze. I even pushed people away just to protect these precious tete-a-tete’s with my greatest companion. I laughed it of “Oh you know, being a child of an alcoholic I have only three choices… be unhappy, get married to an alcoholic or become one… so, Cheers! hahaha”.

I don’t want to be this person anymore. I am tired of pushing fault in all directions but my own. I need to own the shame and learn to deal with it. I need to face my problems, like any other adult that doesn’t have a safety net. So, why did I start to drink? Because I’m weak and I was too lazy to confront my weakness. With every day without alcohol I become stronger. Blood that flows through my veins is clearer. My mind is fog free. I believe in myself. Thank you sobriety.

” I strive for…

the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;
the courage to change the things I can;

and the wisdom to know the difference”

Dear Reader,

it is the 4th day of my sobriety. I don’t want to jump here on a pink cloud, but everything seems a little bit easier. Life seems a little bit better. Smiles, a little bit less forced. I am living my life. And I remember it!

I found a wonderful online forum that truly gave me a great support. No matter how convinced you are that you can manage on your own, or how hesitant to sharing your story with others, somehow reading their thoughts and advices made me stronger. Even though today is not the greatest day (I feel alcohol ‘munchies’ in my belly constantly), each moment I feel weaker, I just visit the forum & find my strength there. I know I will make it through today.

Last night I thought a lot about my friends and people that I associate with. I realised that I don’t have even one non-drinking friend. Furthermore, most of them I met while I was drunk or at least tipsy, which makes me wonder… are any of these people my real friends, or just booze buddies. I always associated socializing with alcohol. I could not imagine meeting someone for a coffee instead of a beer. The big ‘bulb light’ moment – none of my ‘friends’ actually knows the Real Me; therefore none of them can be a true friend. Strangely enough, it doesn’t make me feel very sad, it makes me curious and excited in a way. I am looking forward to making new relationships with people, relationships that are not based on shared percentage, but on sharing a piece me the real me.

For the past few years I felt like I lost myself. Like I wasn’t anymore this intelligent, witty and worthy girl that I used to be. I couldn’t find an explanation, I just accepted that I am worthless & the only time when I felt actually funny & witty was when I drunk. I thought – people like me when I am drunk. I thought that I must get drunk to make new friends. Why otherwise anyone would be interested in me? And even on days when I wasn’t drinking, my mind was so strongly set on “I am worthless without a drink” that I projected this energy all around me. Come to think of it, alcohol is a real vicious bitch! I was trapped in this self-destroying circle for years, convinced, that my occupier is actually my saviour!

With day 4 & with help from SoberRecovery forum came acceptance. It might not be a huge eureka moment of “Hello, my name is Ella & I am an alcoholic” just as yet, but it is moment of “Hello, my name is Ella & I have a serious problem with alcohol”. I know loads of you, would say: just say that you are an alcoholic, but what’s the point in ‘just’ saying that when I am not ready to say it. I don’t think that forcing myself into complete acceptance of my problem, will actually solve it. I choose to take it day by day & be proud that I am, at least, on the road to acceptance.

Thought for the day:      Every day without alcohol tastes better