Rough Waters....

There's a really cheezy song that says, "Breaking up is hard to do...." and though it's corny, it's very true. This past weekend I had some ups and downs. The subject I will write about today is my drinking goal.

I felt extremely anxious on Friday when I thought about the implications of my attitude on a night without alcohol. I even called my best friend and asked her what it would mean if I had no fun when we went out because I wasn't drinking. Did this mean I had a serious drinking problem? She went on to tell me she thought I was silly to stop drinking and I just needed to learn to moderate my intake. This is easy for someone to say when they do not come from a culture of people with functional alcoholism.

Turns out, I had nothing to worry about. On Friday, I danced the night away and barely noticed a difference in my normal partying routine. I still enjoyed talking to and meeting new people as well as laughing with my best friend, Deep. When I got home, I was still starving and on the positive side instead of eating crappy post-bar food, I ate some grapes! The most annoying part of all this was that I woke up the next day with a headache. I've decided this means that my headaches are not a result of hangovers but of stress. I drank a cup coffee Saturday morning and did my yoga and immediately felt better.

On Saturday night, temptation hit. An old friend of mine was going to be in Philadelphia to visit his brother and since it is only 2 hours away, I decided it would be fun to go party with him that night. I'm pretty sure I haven't touched upon this before but in my hometown it is basically a rite of passage to be a binge drinker. I moved away because I had watched the negative effects of a party life take its' toll on too many people I cared about. My anxiety about this break up became worse when I thought about seeing one of those friends and trying to explain why I was doing it to someone who came from that culture. I thought about not going but then this experiment wouldn't be valid. Could I maintain the same level of fun in a different place with different friends?

Turns out, I was right to worry this night. Though I explained to my friend that I was trying not to drink because it had become an unhealthy habit, he still pressured me to just have one. His good friend that had come with him also drunkenly exclaimed that it just wasn't right to "Cheers" with a diet coke. I did end up having two drinks. I feel slightly guilty about this only because I am attempting this break up. Otherwise, a two drink night is pretty much ok. I made no bad decisions and still had fun. I did have to play babysitter to the other two drunks but that's not so bad because they were pretty funny.

So what does this mean? I'm pretty excited about the fact that I still had so much fun when I didn't drink. This calms some of my worries about my drinking. I'm also excited that I could control the amount of alcohol I had on the second night. My next test will be to attempt to go out on a night after I am extremely stressed out and not have a drink. Let's see how it goes....