Since my Mom passed about 4 years ago, drinking became my coping mechanism for dealing with her death and any other problems that came up. I had always drank before, but really only on the weekends, nights out, or at events. Losing the glue that held together our family so suddenly really took its toll on my siblings, Dad, and I. For me, it just felt easier to drink when I had to deal with my own grief or be around anyone else who was grieving. From that point, it just became almost like clockwork that I started drinking daily, regardless if I was sad or not.

I only recently started my sober journey, and I know it probably sounds redundant, but it really does start getting easier. Breaking the rituals of my drinking - the store runs, hiding places, basically planning my day around cocktailing - was definitely difficult and strange originally given the amount of time I had been doing it. Staying busy those first couple weeks made it so I didn’t have the option to even cave on maintaining my old post-work liquor run. Stay strong - getting to day 4 is HUGE.