Dry.

Heads up: this is a long one.

On Saturday I did a live about the fact that I am identifying as an alcoholic. Oof. That still packs a punch when I say it but the time has come for me to recognise that my relationship with alcohol is not doing me any good. I mean, when you think about it, no one’s relationship with alcohol does them any good. The best we can hope for is that it does them no harm. And there are loads of people for whom that it true. I’m just not one of them.

There will be some people who don’t agree with me going public about this. There will be some people who believe I shouldn’t break my own anonymity regarding AA but, if you got my last letter (Open.) then you’ll know why I’ve done it.

For a long time, I was really comfortable justifying my drinking as being normal but I wasn’t exactly using healthy parameters as a marker. I was using other people who drank a lot and pointing to them saying, ‘Look I’m only doing what s/he does.’ That doesn’t mean they had a problem because it’s all relative, right? But my own circumstances - my anxiety, my predisposition towards depression, my medication, the history of unhealthy drinking in my family, my own trauma - all of these things meant that it wasn’t really what I was drinking, but why I was drinking that was the real problem.

There’s no doubt however, I was drinking too much. But I’d been drinking too much for a long time. What was it that made me finally decide that it had gone beyond the point of fun? I was drinking every night - at least a bottle of wine - but it was the time and energy I spent thinking about drinking that made me realise this was not a healthy relationship.

I’d wake up and think about the wine I’d had the night before. I wouldn’t be hungover (a bottle of wine didn’t really touch the sides to be honest) but I’d feel sluggish. My skin would look awful, lines would have appeared that weren’t there the day before. My mouth would feel furry. ‘I won’t drink tonight,’ I’d tell myself. ‘I’ll give myself a break.’

But by 12pm I was thinking about that glass of wine I was going to have at 5pm. Or maybe 4pm? I’d obsess about it and tell myself it was a reward for getting through a tough day of juggling all the balls. I’d be impatient and snappy before that glass of wine and as soon as 4pm hit (let’s be honest, 3.30pm) I’d have a glass in my hand. Then, as I started to drink for the evening, I’d spend a lot of time beating myself up about it. It was, quite frankly, exhausting.

It wasn’t just that. The moment I decided to give up was 4am in the morning, at my parents’ house, while I lay awake on their sofa with the most crippling anxiety I’ve ever experienced. I knew it was the alcohol. I knew this wasn’t how it was supposed to be. I’d drank a lot on my own - neither my mum or dad were drinking - and here I was, having a panic attack on my own at 4am in the morning.

Sure, it was a pretty high rock bottom but I’d be lying if I said my drinking hadn’t got me into a number of scrapes that, honestly, should have made me stop well before then. I was sexually assaulted in a blackout, I drove when I was way over the limit, I drank when I was in charge of the kids, I put myself in very dangerous situations late at night on my own in London. It’s only pure luck that meant I didn’t end up seriously harmed or worse.

So I went to an AA meeting. There’s lots said about AA - good and bad - but that’s for another letter. For me, it’s been a life saver. It’s not the only thing I’m doing; I’m also doing therapy, reading lots of books about alcoholism and recovery and listening to podcasts. My friends were incredibly supportive - a few of them are even on a similar journey - and for that I am grateful.

And yes, I identify with the term ‘alcoholic’. I didn’t want to. When I heard the word it conjured up all sorts of stereotypes that I didn’t want to be associated with. But I realised that accepting that word as a descriptor for one part of me, required a necessary humility that was essential for recovery.

So one of the reasons for me writing this letter and doing the Instagram Live on Saturday was part of my Step 1: We admitted we were powerless over alcohol; that our lives had become unmanageable. I am truly powerless over alcohol; that doesn’t mean I’m powerless in general but, when it comes to alcohol, I have never in my life just had one drink and while my life wasn’t unmanageable; alcohol was taking me down a path to where it would have become so. Sure, I could have waited until I hit rock bottom to head into a program and accept there was a problem but, if you graze your knee you don’t then rub broken glass into it until you need surgery. You deal with it, there and then because you know that if you don’t it’ll only get worse.

So, here I am admitting that I am an alcoholic. I’m 53 days sober. I hope that I never drink again but relapse is a thing and while I’m terrified about putting this out there and then relapsing, I know that I have to be accountable.

One thing before I go: I have never met anyone who has given up drinking who said, “My life is shit since I gave up drinking.” Not one person. Every single sober person I know has said their life has improved immeasurably since they stopped drinking.

I’m not a scientist but I keep hold of that when I want to crack open a bottle of wine.

Cat x