Category: tools

Christmas Chaos

~ lorah ~ Leave a comment

Christmas was several weeks back. I have been decompressing. It was a wonderful holiday full of family gatherings, friends, lots of love and laughs.

It started off in early December with the 2 obligatory business parties. I reigned it in this year and chose not to participate in many of the dinners and friend get togethers. I don’t know why, I think I wanted to save myself for the busy two weeks of before Christmas and New Year.

Allie and Pat came home on 12/17 and spent about 2 weeks with us. I loved every minute of it.

A winter storm was brewing a few days before Christmas. Very very cold, lots of wind and some snow and ice. Not ideal timing. Pat’s mom joined us before the storm hit, his sister came the next day in the middle of it all. Luckily Allie, Pat and Kirsten were already home.

We did our annual family braciole making on Thursday night. The weather was warm and a little rainy. Pat’s mom, Geri, got to get an up close and personal look at my crazy family as she joined us this year for the tradition. The kids are all getting older and the process takes a lot less time than it used to. We stayed and played games and just hung out. Of course a lot of drinking too. When we left that night it was cold and snowing hard.

Friday brought the wind and cold with windchill at the -30 mark. Sister, Rhianne joined us. We all hunkered down. We made cookies, played games and watched movies. Again, a lot of drinking was happening …. all day! I was ok.

Geri and Rhianne stayed until Christmas, just a few days and we had a blast.

Christmas Day it was back with my family. More games, more presents and more drinking! It was good family fun and our braciole and meatballs were delicious.

The day after, Steve’s mom and sister came for a visit.

A couple of days before NYE, Kirsten’s 5 besties from college descended on our house. for a couple of days. Allie and Pat were still here. We had 8 extra people at home. Allie and Pat along with dog Stella headed back to Dallas and the next day Kirsten and friends headed to Cincinnati to celebrate the New Year.

It was fun chaos. I didn’t realize how high my guard was up with all the drinking until it was all over. I needed to distance myself from all things alcohol for a bit to regain my footing. During all the holiday chaol, I was able to enjoy, stay in the moment and not stress. All wins for me.

I have had the time to decompress. Now the house is quiet and kind of lonely. I love having my kids home and it is hard to let them leave again. Ollie was depressed for a few days after his buddy Stella left. The let down after the holidays affects everyone – even my pup.

Steve and I have a couple winter trips planned, one hopefully to Dallas with the whole gang (Geri, Rhianne, Kirsten and Steve and I). And they will be back in the late spring. It is all good. It was a great Christmas and I am still sober!

Monday, Day #1

~ lorah ~ Leave a comment

It isn’t exactly a first of the year New Years Resolution ….. but I have been procrastinating for far to long on getting serious about getting healthy and losing some weight. It is not my first attempt at this, but I guess I have to keep trying until something sticks.

I bought a new “The Change Makers Journal … a daily tool for creating change in your life” By Elizabeth Benton. She does a podcast and a whole lot more with her Primal Potential brand. I have done some half assed work with her in the past, one of her workshops and listened to some podcasts. It’s good stuff. I just wasn’t motivated enough or for long enough. This daily journal is about really looking into your life and where you can make changes, what would be impactful, primary focus, and how and what you have achieved each day. For me it is accountability, even if it is just me. You know I love to write and I think keeping track and writing everything down form goals to wins will be helpful. It is only a 3 month journal – so I am hopeful.

It is about more than losing weight and health …. It is about self care and life goals. I would like to keep writing and actually do the online course I signed up for, I need to change up my AA program as I feel I am getting complacent and in a rut. I also want to get on a better schedule with my volunteering. I want to start cooking more and start the noom health program. I don’t work so I feel I should be a lot more productive than I am. Lofty goals, but things I should have been doing all along. I am a great procrastinator, but no more! I will occasionally blog my progress over the next 3 months. It will help me stay accountable.

Whole Food Challenge

~ lorah ~ Leave a comment

Today is day 1 of my whole30 challenge.    It is not a diet of sorts but more of a way to reset your body and mind and along the way hopefully some weight and inches will come off.

30 days ….. No sugar, dairy, grains, legumes, soy, carrageenan, MSG, sulfites or anything like a baked good even with approved ingredients and NO CHAI TEA LATTE (my morning breakfast and drink of choice) Like the title of the diet – only whole foods.    Yikes!   This girl likes to eat and loves her carbs and her sugar-free chai latte with almond milk (no sugar substitutes either).

I am embarking on this journey with Ann, my friend and sponsor.   Hopefully we can support each other through the end of our 30 day commitment.

Day 1 and I am excited and pumped to do this.   I am a little leery that I won’t make it.   I am either all in or all out.  Like most with addiction issues, it is either all or nothing.  Today, I am all in.   I have bought the books and my fridge is stocked with approved foods.   With alcohol and pills and even other food diets, I always tend to relapse if I don’t have my shit together.    So that will be key for the next 30 days.

I have got to do something about my weight and health and hope this will be the beginning of it.

I am guessing if I can give up pills and alcohol I should be able to do this for 30 days.   My hope is at the end of the 30 days when you reintroduce foods back into your diet that I will have reset my eating habits.

I believe eating and my chai became my new addiction, it is now time to reign it in.  Steve and Kirsten will eat the dinners and food I prepare for meals, but they are not all in.   Heaven forbid they quit drinking alcohol for a month.  I will not judge their choices.

Today, I was tired and sluggish in the afternoon.   Missing my caffeine.  Took a nap.   Was hungry so I had  dinner at 5:00 PM.   Hopefully I can get through the remainder of the evening.   There is always fruit to be eaten.

I can do this, right?  Wish me luck!

It’s a God thing

~ lorah ~ Leave a comment

Well I must admit, I have been a little gloomy lately and for no apparent reason or maybe a lot of reasons.  My life is good and for some reason I was getting a bad case of the F-its and that is fuck everything including my recovery.    I was just sick and tired of it all including my AA meetings and the club which I usually love and just bored with my life in general.  So what does one do … I was starting to skimp on my meetings and reaching out.   I preferred to just sit home on my pity pot.  I cancelled my workout trainer, I did not go to volunteer and blew off friends.   To begin to isolate is never a good sign, at least for me.

I spent a Saturday night last week with some (non alcoholic) friends.   We sat at a bar at a wine restaurant for 3 hours, it seemed harmless at the time, but in reality it might have been a trigger for the desire to take a drink and a bout on that pity pot.   Watching the bartender sling drink after drink especially lots of wines was difficult, but at this point in my sobriety should have been harmless as it usually does not bother me.    My state of mind was not spiritually fit at the time and it probably was not a good choice.

Thank God, I have a strong recovery and that I am connected to the program and the club even when I don’t want to be.   It saved me.    It has been a difficult week.   My God always has my back though and is consistently doing for me what I can not do for myself.    I begrudgingly went to a meeting and lo and behold I got a new sponsee.   Just the thing I needed to get out of myself.    Service work always keeps me sober!   Starting to the work the steps from the beginning with a newcomer and getting back into the big book will be good for me.    My other sponsees ….. well lets see;  One is currently out drinking, and one doesn’t go to many meetings,  another has been procrastinating on step 3, and one is working a program.   None call me.    So getting a new girl to start fresh puts some life back into my program.    I will be picking up my meetings again to see her, be accountable and to set a good example to my new sponsee and for my own sanity.   I really do know what I need and what I need to do.

Saturday night this week, I had a group of sober girlfriends over for a game night while my husband was out of town.   At first I was a little put out that I had planned this and just wasn’t feeling it, I just wanted to sit home alone.  But again, it was just what I needed when I needed it.    There were about 10 of us and we laughed until we peed our pants,  ate, drank (no alcohol of course) and were merry.   Hanging with my peeps was just what my soul needed.

I am going to shake this gloominess off and get on with my life and listen to my God’s will for me.   I don’t always know what God’s will is, but I do know it is to be sober, be of service and to be happy, joyous and free!

I thank God for my sobriety and for doing for me what I sometimes can not do for myself.

Accidental Drink

~ lorah ~ Leave a comment

I am coming up on 5 years of continuous sobriety … to be exact, I have 4.94 years, 59.37 months or 1,807 days clean and sober and I got served an alcoholic drink Saturday night at a restaurant.

I was out with my husband and some friends and ordered my usual club soda and cranberry, but ….. it came with vodka (a lot of vodka)  Not knowing this, I took a really big sip of my drink and OMG.  I immediately felt that warm and fuzzy feeling.   That feeling that makes us want to drink more.    It would have been easy to continue to drink it, but my immediate reflex was to recoil from it as if it were a hot flame, like it says in the AA big book.  (Wow is that me, sort of quoting the big book!)

I will not lie, after just taking that one gulp … I have had some obsessive thoughts about drinking.  It is amazing how fast your head can get crazy with just one taste of alcohol.  You see I liked the taste of alcohol,   I liked the way it made me feel. With that one drink, I remembered all the wonderful things about why I liked alcohol and the way it made me feel invincible.    But all I have to do is play that tape all the way through and remember in the end how it really made me feel along with the pills and how it could have destroyed me.   The thing is, a few days later, I can still remember that taste of vodka in my drink with just that one big sip.    But I am in recovery and I have to remember I am in recovery and how good my life is today; mentally, physically and spiritually.  I am grateful that the urge to drink didn’t take over and that I have my tools to get through this.   It is not totally over yet, but I will get through this and in 20 days I will, by the grace of God,  have made it to 5 years!