What I am learning as I go along is that my mood can go from euphoria to the deepest sense of doom and back again very rapidly. This is what I’m like undiluted by Sauvignon Blanc. Just reading a few consecutive blog posts illustrates this clearly – from angry and irritable, I’m on cloud nine just a day or two later. I guess I have to make my peace with these being the cards I was dealt and accept that I am precisely what my mother says I am (and she repeated it once again when she was over to visit just a week ago): “an artist’s soul”. By this she doesn’t mean that I’m a creative genius, but rather, that everything I feel, I feel strongly. Ups, downs, mountain high, valley low and every damn thing in between.
That’s OK. As exhausting as it can be, I figure I’m better off accepting this about myself, as opposed to getting so agitated and confused when every day isn’t rainbows and unicorns. That’s what does seem to be the case, you see. When I get these little blips in my mood and my emotions run haywire, I get all panicked because I think I occasionally lose sight of how life isn’t always a fairytale. This is a remnant of my time spent in active addiction – an unpleasant feeling? Pour wine on it! A tinge of joy? Douse it in ethanol and squeeze it for all it’s worth! Feeling flat? Plunge head long into a sea of glittering white wine spritzer and splash around!
Recovery is doing none of that. Recovery is sitting with whatever it is that I’m feeling and accepting my emotions for what they are. In my case, this can be a very frustrating process because they are so many and so diverse. My emotions are all the world’s cultures, languages, traditions, wars, victories, joys, sorrows and natural disasters crammed into the little space that is my mind – sometimes all at once. My brain’s control panel is forever busy changing its settings to process them all as no two seem to conform to any similarity. I mean, sometimes it takes me a day or two to adjust to speaking Swedish when we go there and then back to English when we get back home, so God knows how tired my brain must get working to decipher all these colourful emotions passing through it.
It’s exhausting, for sure. But hey. This is how it is. I need to be a bit more mindful of it, I think. I mean, it’s as if I forget when I get caught in a dip that this is par for the course of being Anna. Then when I hit the upswing again, I shake it off and push it aside as if it never happened, yet when I’m right in it I feel super hopeless and fed up. Perhaps I need to start meditating? What can I do to become more mindful and aware? The next time I hit a bump in the road, how I can I convincingly show myself that this is just a little Anna-bump? Instead of genuinely believing I’m about to land in the deepest depression and feeling like the world is ending?
Oh well. Just some thoughts that hit me as I read through the last few up-and-down-and-back-up-again blog posts I’ve written. Today? Feeling good and solidly content. Not over the moon, fireworks happy or string quartet, doom-and-gloom sad or angry. Just content. One of those gentle rollers, as one of my favourite bloggers referred to the more balanced life we tend to experience in recovery.
Today I’m not going to drink.
The highs and lows have evened out for me. They will most likely even out for you as well.
Lately, I’ve been doing work to clear past trauma and it has helped enormously. ❤
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In that process, yes…. 😘
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Sadly, it takes practice smoothing out the hills. Lots and lots of practice. I swear, though, if I ever figure out a shortcut, I’ll publish it on my blog… immediately after I cash in on it! LOL!
You’ll get there. 😁
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Please do! I trust you – the gentle rollers certainly materialised! 😘🙌
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😁👍
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It’s an epiphany I’ve had personally, the realisation that I AM what I AM. You often write things that I can identify with, even if our journeys are different.
I’ve had an epiphany of sorts this Christmas. As my mum dipped into a box of chocolates and apologised for the umpteenth time, I realised that I’ve gotten to a place where I no longer feel I have to apologise to anyone else (or to myself) for what I eat or drink. It has always been my choice, good or bad, and is nobody else’s damned business how I feel or don’t about that.
For you, I can tell that your brilliant self analysis will get to this point too. You’re truly an inspiration to me, sweetheart. X
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Likewise. ❤️😘
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I think it’s important to analyze and dwell on those low moods. I would guess they’re so extreme because you have so little experience dealing with them. It was that way for me. Over time, you can prove to yourself that the world won’t end, and your house won’t fall down and you can take the low points with a bit of a grain of salt. The good news is your highs don’t need to come down (but they probably will as you get used to them).
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Excellent advice and also a lightbulb – so little experience dealing with them!!!! You hit the nail on the head so THANK YOU. No wonder. I doused it all in wine. Wow. Thanks for holding up a mirror there, that really did hit home! Awesome. 👌👍👍👍
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When someone says, “I’m happy all the time” – I just cringe. I’ve never been that way. If I am, I know I’m not being honest with myself. I always have some work on myself. Someone reminded me and it just makes sense, “Life is a roller coaster. Whether, the good and/or bad, we learn awareness and take action. If our lives were flat we would be dead.” Today, I acknowledge what’s in front of me right now and do something about it to the best of my ability, even if it’s just accepting it just for right now.
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👍
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I am NOT happy all the time! LOL
But my moods are much more even after 5 years off the sauce!
I have learned that everyone has low moods, and to accept them while working thought them.
xo
Wendy
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I nodded my head in complete agreement whilst reading your comment, Wendy.
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The Untethered Soul by Michael A. Singer.
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I still have highs and lows. I still get stuck…but mostly I have contentment. That is a gift I never want to forget.
Stillness and peace
Anne
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😘👌
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Ah the highs and lows. Dealing with the lows is tough but I know for myself that the lows were much lower when I was drinking. Happy New Year and hers to the highs outweighing the lows. Jim x
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Absolutely true! Happy New Year to you too! 🎉👍
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I always appreciate your warts & all approach Anna. I’m equally up and down. Today I won’t drink either 🙂
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