I am sitting inside my car with my sponsor, several minutes early to our favorite Wednesday night meeting. She’s a woman in her early 60s, full of wit and wisdom, in her final days of life.
I know it, and she knows it.
Several years before, ‘M’, I’ll call her to preserve her anonymity, had been diagnosed with a rare, terminal lung disease, and her timeline is running out.
I start to cry as I take her fragile hand and tell her how selfish I feel, that I am angry. Here she is the model of acceptance of life on life’s terms, and I am a blubbering mess, terrified that my partner on this path of recovery is going to leave me to face sobriety all alone.
“I’m scared I can’t do this without you,” I admit.
“Of course, you can. All of the work you’ve done and the strength you’ve found comes from within you. Besides, when you need me, I’ll come back and visit you as a hummingbird,” M says and smiles as if it was all just that simple.

M died 7 days later.

And so it is decided; I will look for the hummingbirds.

But more than that, my commitment to recovery was ignited. Here was a woman in undeniable pain, days from the end, determined to provide guidance. Even as she had to stop every few minutes to take in oxygen from the tank at her feet. Surely if my sponsor could muster the determination to pass on to me her insights into sobriety as she was dying, I need to believe I can get through anything.

And then came Covid-19—a force, determined to test my resolve. I’ve experienced months and months of deeply uncomfortable feelings of powerlessness, reminiscent of my bleakest days in early sobriety.

Every Mom out there has been pushed so far past our previous threshold of what we once considered difficult. Our reality is made worse still by the narrative that says, “Mommy needs wine” to cope—implying we are not strong enough and therefore we must numb away any dark feelings. This is a dangerous falsehood, one I refuse to believe, promote, or live by—as if it was all just that simple.

During the peak of the pandemic, I received M’s 7-year chip. Something she left for me, believing and trusting that I would earn it. I woke up early one morning at dawn, my only opportunity to take time for myself.

I sat outside looking at the hummingbird feeder my thoughtful husband bought after I told him what M had told me. I held our chip in the palm of my hand and did something I’ve done many times before.

I asked for help.

Sobriety during lockdown felt bigger than me. I knew I was meant to survive this sober, but needed a nudge of strength, as if it were all just that simple. Sure enough, M appeared as she said she would, a beautiful reminder of the courage we are all capable of, if we only have the grace to accept it.

🎙

I never imagined I’d be asked to speak on a podcast about being a sober parent during a pandemic and the dangerous notion currently circulating, that Mom’s need alcohol to cope with the challenges motherhood.

But here I am.

Weathering quarantine as a sober parent in an alcohol-obsessed culture - PeakConnection
Quarantine has become a potential breeding ground for addiction. Mothers already struggle to navigate a culture that's normalized drinking as an appropriate coping mechanism, and the habits we form in the secrecy of isolation can go unnoticed by friends and family. During a global pandemic, who's...

Human Connection - Podcast | PeakConnection
PeakConnection is geared towards helping people better connect as human beings in a disconnected world.

As a writer, I have been intentionally quiet about this subject. Once it’s said, it cannot be unsaid. Once I’m labeled, it cannot be peeled off. It is not the label that bothers me, everyone that knows me, knows I’m a recovering alcoholic. I just celebrated 7 years of sobriety. It’s here, on this platform, I haven’t ever shared before. In this world, there is another shelf for sober mothers, and while that is what I am, it is not all I am. It would be easy to dismiss me now as unrelatable. But I’ve found a window into what will ring true for everyone.

My sister forwarded me a letter a teacher wrote to his students. He said,

“We don’t get to choose when we were born. We don’t choose what natural disasters, epidemiological emergencies, stock market crashes, tyrannical regimes, or wars our generations face. We only get to choose how we react. If you love literature, write. If you are an artist, make art. Make art filled with whatever you have, even if that art comes from anguish.”

I have something I’d like to contribute—because if not now, when?

The experience of early sobriety and sheltering-in-place during a pandemic are so parallel it’s uncanny. The feelings spark something in my brain which says, I have been here before. I’ve sat in this discomfort already. How can I be here again? Like a relapse, except there is no bottle in my hand.

Maybe you, yourself are in recovery, have grappled with the idea of quitting, or love someone who is struggling. Those of us lucky enough to survive each day overcoming addiction have tried to explain these feelings to family and friends—but it has fallen short, because there wasn’t anything similar worth comparing. Until now.

These two webs--early sobriety and the pandemic, are so intertwined in fact, they can be read as one.

It came out of nowhere. Except, it didn’t. It had been building all around me, it was just easier to ignore the signs. They were much too terrifying, and now this will change my whole life’s trajectory. The door has been shut and nothing will ever be what it was. There will only ever be a before and after.

In early days there is just so much optimism. I’ve been given the gift of time. A rush of adrenaline.

Ok, this is not so bad. I can totally do this.

The cloud is pink and fluffy like cotton candy—perhaps I can sit atop and float through, unscathed. I say things in this time, that will embarrass me later. I’ve exposed my soft underbelly, too soon in the process. But my defenses were down.

I will go through the motions of perceived thriving, since image is everything at this point.

Look how well I’m doing.

You can look, but you won’t see.

My senses are heightened during the shift. I’m learning to appreciate something I could have easily passed right by. Maybe I could do this, I’m learning more about myself.

The pink cloud lasts as long as it lasts. It doesn’t slowly dissipate, as I’d expect. It leaves and I feel completely ridiculous for believing any of its lies.

There has been a mistake and I have been wronged. I feel like a toddler stomping heavy feet up and down in protest.

I don’t want to!

Don’t make me!

I don’t like being told what to do and I will resent everyone and everything. Every space of my mind I go for an escape, there is none.

Oh, I’ll just.

What about?

But what about?

No.

I want to look for the loopholes. But the answer is always no.

I awake with a feeling of dread. Something dangling just outside my reach. I want to crawl back into bed and sleep until it’s over, but there is no end date. It would be impossible to pinpoint at the moment, but the unidentified object in all its heaviness is helplessness. I want to change this reality, but I cannot. I have nowhere to put this thought, so I immediately shove it aside, but it will rot in a corner of my brain, a forgotten portion of a garden where no one tends. The loneliness is palpable.

I miss the idea of what was. But that reality starts to fracture and I know so many things have to change within.

People are dying and they die from this every day. Shouldn’t death be the ultimate reminder to stick it out? One would think. But we can convince ourselves of anything these days. Continuing on the way that I was is Russian Roulette with my life, or someone else’s life. It couldn’t happen to me. I resent the idea and this space I’m in.

I try and say, “Ha Ha! Make this fun. It shouldn’t be so serious.”

If I don’t laugh, I will scream and cry and cry until it kills me. Gallows humor at its finest. No matter what light trickles in, there is something darker looming in the background. I am constantly reminded of what’s out there, waiting for me.

I am attempting to live in a new reality, where so much is off limits. I need so much help, but no one can do the heavy lifting, it is placed squarely on my shoulders. I contemplate more destructive behaviors to get out of these feelings. They are like wearing the skin of someone else. I’m so uncomfortable it’s almost repulsive.

I am angry now. Yes, rage, this feels productive. Finger pointing, name calling, and blame. Anything, but looking to solve the problem. Loved ones have rallied around me, symbolically of course, because they don’t know, they couldn’t possibly understand this house of madness I live in.

More time passes and this isn’t what I thought it would be. I have experienced so much fear and I don’t like fear as much as I liked anger. Fear doesn’t have a taste, so much as a smell.

I have circled back to helplessness, because it still lingers, like smoke and I’m grabbing and grabbing only to realize its nothingness.

This is what it is. What could that even mean? This thought feels important. But I can’t yet reach it.

Within the fractures, tiny miracles are occurring. Small sprouts along the cracks in sidewalks, so forceful the effort is admirable. Goodness. I’ve missed you.

The wreckage is still there, and the reality is that this is out of my control. I can only do the next right thing. These steps are so small, but monumental in their own right.

I need to place this in hands that are not my own. The weight, is too heavy to carry alone. There is still so much unknown. But I can feel relief in the serenity of turning over control. I have fought against, refused, and blamed—but now I have ceased fighting, everyone and everything.

And this feels like the easier, softer way--to believe in something bigger than myself. I need to accept this. In order to survive this, I need to accept it.

Acceptance. As it turns out, has been the answer all along.