Tag: change

Get Back To Being YOU!

June 4, 2018

 

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This morning I waved my eldest daughter off on her first ever residential school trip.  Her whole class is off the Lake District for five days of canoeing, caving, high ropes, barrel rafting and jetty jumping.  It sounds amazing!! Did I feel emotional when I kissed her goodbye at the coach this morning? yes, but I surprisingly didn’t even cry.  Her excitement for the week ahead was just so contagious I felt more excited than emotional! The whole class was just a bundle of bubbling excitement as they lined up to get on the coach, and I am so excited for her, yes of course I will miss her but she will be  having the time of her life!

I have mentioned in previous posts that since I have stopped drinking I feel as though I am on the same level as my children when it comes to being excited about events and occasions, it’s almost as though I have gone back to being a child again! (hence the picture!)

Jason Vale has a fab section about this in his book ‘Kick The Drink’ , he states:-

“When you stop drinking, you actually return to normal.  We never needed alcohol before we started drinking: the need arose afterwards.  I remember going to parties as a child and I didn’t need alcohol to enjoy myself.  I never feared Christmas or birthdays would be a disaster without alcohol…………. I never thought I would become so lethargic and tired that my main source of pleasure would come from a bottle……. When I was a child I never thought I would end up like the adults I saw.”

When I read his book, this really struck a chord with me, when did we start needing alcohol to have fun?

In the picture above the 7-year-old me is ready for a party, we only took pictures on special occasions like parties or holidays!  Can you remember just being totally excited for what lies ahead, seeing your friends, the games, the food, the party bag, you didn’t need to have a drink to enjoy a party!  Fast forward to my twenties and I wouldn’t have gone to a party if I wasnt drinking, gosh it would have been my idea of total hell, what socialize sober???

Jason Vale believes that alcohol creates the fears that that makes us drink in the first place.  So if you have low confidence, you drink to make you more chatty and relaxed, but it’s not you it’s the alcohol and if anything the next day you feel more withdrawn and anxious than ever.  But once you get into the habit of drinking, you feel as though you need it to have fun and enjoy yourself! I know for a fact that I drank more when I was unhappy with my body and poor fitness level. Drinking made me forget that I wasn’t feeling confident in how I looked, which is crazy because the calories from the drink and food binges that followed the day after, were doing nothing to help my body confidence and in fact making it worse.  It has taken me a long time to break away from this vicious cycle.

When you remove the alcohol you find yourself doing things that you really want to do, just like children do. What do you really enjoy doing? what makes you smile? As a child I was never still, I was always out on my bike, in the garden or on a friends farm and when I stopped drinking I wanted to go on this health kick and try to get in my best possible shape, have more energy so I could be an active mum and have an active life, like I used to have. I feel like I have found my lust for life again.  My next move is a career change and I am hopefully looking  at moving into the fitness industry, its very early stages yet but watch this space!

If you’re looking at stopping drinking or cutting down, firstly think what is making you pick up the glass in the first place?  If it’s to make you feel more confident, then work out why you lack confidence and work on that without the booze because it makes things worse in the long run.  Do you drink to de-stress? What’s making you stressed? Try treating yourself to a massage, reading a book, having a long soak in the bath with your favourite music.  Do you drink to just have fun? then seriously question what you’re doing and who you’re doing it with!! And when it comes to special occasions or holidays, these are fab, happy times anyway, do you really need to drink to enjoy them? If you haven’t tried these events sober, you will never know.  Dig deep and ask yourself, “Why do I need to drink?” “What made me start drinking?”

If you haven’t already read Jason Vales’s book I highly recommend it, it was definitely a game changer for me*, and it makes you see why you actually drink, in a totally different light! (*Along with Clare Pooleys Sober Diaries)

Now the house is very quiet, whilst my eldest is off spreading her wings and loving and living life, truly enjoying the moment! I’m already counting down the days until she returns and to hear about all of the things she got up to!! ( previously I would have used her being away as an excuse to have a drink every night this week, to take my mind off it! But not now, I am going to get through a list of jobs I have been putting off for months  then lose myself in Love Island every night this week!)

Credit to Jason Vale & Kiona LLanos for the quote.

Angie xx

 

My Girls – My Wake Up Call!

May 22, 2018

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Here are three photos, the two on the left were taken a few years ago, the one on the right was in December 2017.  In all three photos I am smiling and happy, of course I am I’ve got the arms of my children around me!  Anyone who knows me knows that my girls are my world and for those who don’t know me, I am hoping you’ve picked that up from my blog and Instagram! Like most of us out there I have always tried to be a good mum, I have tried my best to do the right thing for my girls and that has always been the same, if I was drinking or not.  But there are a lot of ways that I now feel like I am giving my girls the best version of me and the best mum that I can be!

A lot of alcohol free experts state that if you are trying to give up alcohol for someone else then you won’t succeed, and  I’m not sure I fully agree with that?  I know for a fact that my girls are my motivation to stop drinking.  I want to be the best mum that I can be for them, I want to feel good all of the time,be healthy and full of energy for them, especially at the weekends when we have time to spend together.

The main thing for me is that they have my full attention whan they want it, well most of the time anyway!  We’ve all been there, a few glasses of wine down on a Friday evening and your ready to relax, your maybe trying to get the children to bed earlier or rushing their bedtime story to get down stairs to your next glass.   This doesn’t make you a bad parent it just means that you associate your down time and relaxation with a glass of wine, and that is easier to do when the kids are in bed.

It’s exactly the same when friends used to come around, I felt as though I would just go into wine world and leave the kids to it watching a dvd or playing.  This didn’t make me a bad mum,  it’s just that after 2-3 glasses the next glass became my priority.

My eldest, who was ten when I stopped drinking had definitely started to notice these times, when my attention was focused on the wine.  There are a few occasions that I will never forget and I honestly still feel bad about, when she said I hadn’t tucked her into bed properly or on a camping trip when she had been trying to get to sleep and I was cackling away taking rubbish outside of the tent! OMG cringe!  It was these times, that thankfully were few and far between, that I felt so so bad because I had upset her without realising it at the time.  She was growing up and starting to take notice, and I was noticing that she was noticing!  This definitely made me want to change.

Now I feel fully present for my kids, I am trying to give them the best version of me. We all know that being a parent is bloody hard work, sober or drinking but I definitely find that quitting the booze has helped me a lot.

I feel calmer, with no hangovers or feeling desperate to get a wine down me in the evenings at the weekends, I feel more chilled and patient with them (not all the time obviously!) I have energy to keep up with them and do what they want to do, most importantly I feel on their level of excitement, so for example at Christmas, Birthdays, or holidays, anything really that they are excited about, I am on that level with them.  Children don’t need alcohol to have a good time, they are genuinely excited about what they are doing not where the next drink is coming from.  The beauty of being sober is that I can now relate to that, I am with them on that level of pure joy and excitement for whats ahead!

I read a post on Instagram last week from a sober site that said sober parents are giving their children another option in life, and that is so true.  My girls can see that you don’t have to drink, there is an option to go out, have a life, celebrate Christmas, Birthdays etc and be sober.

So if you have got children just think they may be taking in more than you realise with regards to your drinking patterns, and if you change how you are after a few drinks they will possibly pick up on that.  Both my girls have told me that they prefer me not drinking, they say I am more “mummy like”  at the weekends!  And although I wont be turning into Mary Poppins anytime soon, I am so happy I have made the change when I did, whilst they are still young enough to want the more “mummy like” me tucking them in every night and not rushing downstairs for her next glass of wine!

Angie xx

 

 

A Sliding Doors Weekend…..

May 18, 2018

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This weekend is what I call a ‘Sliding Doors’ weekend!  Does anyone remember the Gwyneth Paltrow, Sliding Doors film from 1998 (yes 1998! couldn’t believe it was that long ago when I googled it, OMG twenty years ago!!!!!)  Anyway the film is a story of the two lives of a girl, one if she missed a train and one if she caught the train.  Just that one small second of the doors closing on the train changed her whole life and you see how her life is so different, its worth a watch if you haven’t seen it!

Ok so your thinking “how is this linked to stopping drinking?” well I use the ‘sliding doors’ phrase a lot since I stopped drinking.  For me its a way of thinking how certain events, weekends, occasions, would pan out differently if I was drinking.  So for example if I have been  on a girls night out, had a fab time, a real laugh, good food, picked everyone up and dropped everyone off, got home safe,  updated my husband on the night, washed my makeup off (I love this part of being sober instead of waking up with it glued on me and my pillow!) I then settle into bed and think how different my night would have been if I had been drinking, that’s my sliding doors moment.

So this weekend is a pretty busy one, the sun is shining and it’s definitely a sliding doors weekend for me!

To start with we are out tonight with the kids, to celebrate my eldest daughter getting through her Year 6 exams this week, she’s been very calm through it all and quietly confident that she’s done well. What more could I ask for! We are planning to go for a nice meal, I will drive so no taxis to pay for or arguing over who’s driving and I’m looking forward to some lovely food and a good catch up with my hubbie and the kids after a hectic week.  Then not too late home because I want to be up early for a run tomorrow.  So if I had been drinking, it would be wine before going out, wine with my meal, I would probably have a huge pig out because my head would be saying – diet starts Monday! Then once the kids are in bed I would stay up later drinking and although I wouldn’t be falling over drunk I would definitely be feeling the effects and also tired, uncomfortably full in a carb coma and annoyed with myself for having no self control!

Saturday we are having people round to watch the Royal Wedding then planning on going to watch the football at the local pub (hubbies suggestion!)  So previously that would be a full day of drinking and “celebrating” into the early evening, with no other option to do anything else once you’ve been drinking most of the day!  But instead I’m still looking forward to a lovely weekend doing those things but I just feel like I can enjoy doing other things too.  So because my day isn’t focused on drinking I can also fit in my exercise, baking with the girls then we are planning a family DVD night later on and a takeaway.

Sunday I’m taking the dog to puppy training class early morning then a family day out somewhere for a walk, weather depending!  I mean can you imagine puppy training with a raging hangover,  no thanks!!  Mixed in with all of this is cooking, homework, feeding and watering people and keeping up with my 100 day challenge. So it’s easy to see how I don’t have time for wine and hangovers!

If I was still drinking I would still do the main things we have planed this weekend but I know I would be feeling rubbish, tired, waiting to have a glass of wine to make me feel better.  When I think of it now it seems crazy but I was stuck in that pattern for a long, long time.  Stopping drinking has made me get so much more out of life, I’ve just got this energy that makes me want to get up every morning and make the most of it – especially at the weekend,  enjoying precious family time that I want to treasure and remember!

So its only Friday afternoon………. if you know you will be spending the majority of this weekend  feeling rubbish after too much alcohol,  or you just know that you wont have the energy to do what you really want to do, just take a minute to think, have a sliding doors moment!  If you don’t drink, how much better will your weekend be? How much more energy will you have? What can you do with that time and energy? How do you really want to spend your weekend? Just think, you can maximise your weekend and better still waking up feeling amazing on Monday morning!

Have a lovely weekend and I hope the sun is shining for you wherever you are 🙂

Angie xx

credit to powerofpositivity.com for the pic x