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Anyone who is an addict or has known an addict understands that we have some very Big Feelings. In active addiction, these highs and lows are artificially amplified: they climb to the highest peaks and fall to the lowest abysses, and no one is safe from storms we conjure from these winds of chaos. When I was drinking, everything had a deeper narrative, each word contained thousands more, and everything anyone ever said or did was always about me. The sensitivity I’d nurtured since childhood was getting drunk right alongside me, pulling me in with the tide and drowning me before spitting me right back out again.
My life was the grandest of dramas, and I was the main character.
When I first got sober, the confidence and the bravado were squeezed right out of me. I made myself very small and very quiet, subconsciously hoping that would be enough to absolve me of my past sins. For my first nine months, I deluded myself into thinking that alcohol was the source of all my big personality traits, my impulsivity, my sexuality, everything deep, dark, and hungry. I thought I was never going to be a young person again. I thought I’d never make another mistake, take a big fall, choose the wrong man, or take spontaneous drive across the country. I thought I’d never be able to seduce a crowd, say something bold, or do something deliciously daring.
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