Tag: alcoholism

sober lifestyle

Thanksgiving

jenwielgusjournalism
Scenes from the past week in my Bucks County, PA neighborhood

I spent about five total hours celebrating Thanksgiving this year — three at the gathering, one in the car each way — but that’s all it took. A short break from routine. A quick scenery change. One step off the beaten path —> a much-needed shift in perspective.

I guess it’s like the iconic Leonard Cohen lyric, about the cracks being where the light gets in? My protective instincts have always worked really hard to seal those cracks, to shut out the unknown/uncontrollable — so, basically the entire outside world — in an attempt to keep me “safe” from pain. If I let them run on autopilot for too long, I can find myself shut away in an airtight vault where sameness passes for certainty, numbness feels like home, and my whole purpose for quitting drinking gets lost in the dark.

Don’t get me wrong; it feels delightful inside the vault; I mean, what sane human really wants to face raw, unadulterated reality — especially (*looks around at America*) right now? Alas, I made the decision to “sign up for life” by saying no to booze, then went and pushed my chips forward into a helping profession, so I’ve got no choice but to snap out of my avoidance utopia if I am going to live/help….and continue to grow.

“Why? I’m so much happier here…” 😵‍💫
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Trouble

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I was desperate to get to my class, but every path I tried was blocked, so I ended up cutting through the pool — as in, a fully-clothed plunge and doggy-paddle — and climbing a steep staircase around the natatorium rafters to a window, where the only option appeared to be wriggling under an open crack. And just as I was about to shove my head between pane and sill, like Wendy Torrance clambering to escape the Overlook Hotel bathroom, a loud voice boomed over the PA system, dripping with contempt:

“JENNIFER WIELGUS, GO IMMEDIATELY TO THE PRINCIPAL’S OFFICE. YOU ARE BEING EXPELLED.”

It was then that I realized…this wasn’t real! I could just open my eyes and be free! 😅 Relief was followed by bewilderment, which quickly turned to frustration.

“Damn! WTF! Why does my brain hate me?!?!”

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Liberation

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L: April 2018 – 40 years old; R: August 2025 – 47.

I’m six years (plus three months) sober, but still a big Avoider, and after experiencing all the ways this personality type can harm a person over the past 40+ years, I think I finally found one way that it helps.

I stopped looking in the mirror.

OK, so it’s kinda hard to make that claim, after I clearly invested time in assembling the attached collage ⬆️. That is me, standing at the mirror in our master bathroom, and the “After” selfie was snapped only a few months ago. I’m not sure it’s the best way to illustrate the point I’m trying to make, nor am I sure exactly how to explain the miraculous transformation that’s happened from L to R.

But I can tell you it has nothing to do with my weight.

You’ll just have to trust me when I say: I’ve adopted an “ignorance is bliss” mentality toward my appearance that’s been a total f^cking game-changer. I feel as “recovered” as one can from a disordered relationship with eating and exercise, and more comfortable in my skin than I ever dreamed possible.

I truly have quit body-checking, beyond a quick last glance on business days before I leave for work. This is really a preemptive courtesy to my clients, given my tendency to “save some for later” when I eat spinach, not to mention my rough touch with the mascara brush….

Can’t hold a safe, therapeutic space for folks to let their guard down when you’re out here looking like Elaine after a 6-hour schvitz!
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Interruption

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I didn’t realize how hard it had been raining until we finished hiking one gorge (Taughannock Falls; pictured above) and got in the car to head to the next (Ithaca Falls; see below). I plopped into the passenger seat, and all at once, I was forced to feel my soggy jacket and leggings clinging to my limbs, my soaked hat/hood weighing heavy on my head, and my tangled hair clumped against my neck.

For the previous two hours, I’d been completely unbothered, my personality split off to its “pleasant” side as my three favorite elements of the universe — my partner, nature and movement — converged in/around one gargantuan hole in the Earth. I found myself feeling grateful for the weather, because despite it being a Saturday morning at a high-traffic tourist attraction, my husband and I barely encountered any other humans on the trails. It was a cleansing rain, from that point of view, washing away both the residue of the week and the weight of the world.

But then, we stopped, and sat stewing in our respective puddles, and I felt my mood instantly turn irritable. Every inch of my body was antsy, to either get where we were going, stat, so I could move again, or get on back to our AirBNB so I could change into cozy pajamas, stuff (burn) my mouth with freshly-baked frozen pizza, and dissociate to Netflix by the fire.

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Weirdness

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“What were you just cackling about?” my husband asked as he entered my lair, aka our bedroom, where I was hunkered down behind the blackout blinds at 4PM on a beautiful summer Friday, looking like Charlie in “Always Sunny” writing his Dayman song.

No, I wasn’t in there huffing paint, but I had just popped a melatonin gummy and settled into my usual routine: burrowing into bed, flipping on one of my crimey comfort shows, and scrolling Instagram to numb out after another week white-knuckling it as a mental health professional who’s not exactly, like, the gold standard of mental health herself.

I squinted at his silhouette, backlit by “Law & Order,” as my foggy brain sputtered (*old school computer noises*) to translate silly —> sane. The man I married is a “normie” in every sense of the word, and bless him, after two decades together, he continues to seek logical explanations for inexplicable phenomena — such as, WTF I am doing or saying and why.

“Uhhh…” I stalled, swiping at my screen. I tossed him the phone. “This?” 👀⬇️

😂😂😂😂😂😂
Source: @kindminds_smarthearts
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Art

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A window into the mind of an 80s kid, shaped by Disney, Kenner, MGM and heteronormativity! 🙃 (No idea why poor Toto’s down there looking like Jesse from “Family Guy”…)

On a recent trip back west to visit the parents, my dad went digging in a remote corner of an upstairs closet and produced a bunch of laminated drawings he and Mom had saved from my glory days as a pint-sized art prodigy. 🤣

These prize-winning works are legendary in our family, but not so much for the content as the controversy. Supposedly, the panel of judges at the Morton Grove Library were so enamored with the childish scrawlings I entered in their kiddie art contest every year that they basically rubber-stamped the blue ribbon on everything bearing my name. My dominance so aggrieved some other kid’s mom that she asked them to ban me so her little Picasso would have a chance. 🤷🏼‍♀️

Not to worry, though; my head never gets a chance to swell much before Dad busts out some or other cringey writing project from that era, like my “children’s series” featuring anthropomorphic insects/animals. Somehow, the stories always seemed to cut off before I could come up with an acceptable ending — I apparently was fond of the “it was all a dream” plot device — but each book had a complete “about the author” bio listing all my elementary school accomplishments. 😬

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Love

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People, Places and Things: My best guy (JP) and my sacred nature spot (Tyler State) were huge factors in helping me earn my six-year chip. 😍

My husband and I went on one of our walks Monday morning, getting a later start and moving slower than usual after spending 12+ hours in the car the previous day, and five whole days in the Central time zone prior to that. We’d both taken an additional day off to recover from our annual Midwestern vacation — and to celebrate another recovery milestone.

July 7 was my six-year sober anniversary.

This, naturally, was the topic of discussion as the two of us set off for our local state park, slogging through oppressive heat and soupy humidity, each carrying a hand towel to wipe sweat and shoo bugs.

I admitted to feeling kind of numb, or neutral, about the day, as I typically do about these “big” days. After six years, alcohol-free living is just regular old life. No big deal. But I was curious what he thought, since our lives are intertwined, and of all my loved ones, he’s the one who’s been with me the whole time in the trenches of addiction and recovery. He goes to 12-step meetings and therapy and really “gets” what’s going on.

“It’s impressive to me,” he said, swatting his towel at buzzing sounds in the air around his head, “because I think about how hard it is to do something consistently every day for six years.”

Is it? I’ve always been a determined and disciplined person for whom “hard” things seemed like requirements if they led to my chosen goal. Sadly, in my transition from adolescence to adulthood, the “goal” I chose was, “check out of reality by any means necessary,” and no one can deny I went HAM in chasing that for 20 years! 😳

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Fun

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Snack break between therapy sessions in the Doylestown Cultural District, where it’s possible to imagine for a moment that the world is not completely on fire. 🌿

It’s been about a year since I started working full-time as a therapist. And these days, whether it’s because the mental health field can be incredibly intense and all-consuming, and/or I’m starting to feel my age, and/or the world seems more f*cked-up with each passing minute, my concept of time is really slipping.

I have trouble remembering what day it is, especially during the week; they all blend and blur together as I shift from appointment to appointment, then zone out watching Hulu before falling into bed. I’m able to focus solely on the individual face in front of me, then the next one, and I move through my waking hours with a jumble of clients’ words, gestures, facial expressions, heavy experiences and perplexing questions — not to mention cringey things I said or did in session — endlessly swirling through my head. An occasional “doomscroll” through IG Threads only adds more chaos to the mental clutter.

So, the reason I’m aware of this professional anniversary is that my boss used the final five minutes of our monthly meeting to congratulate me.

She also presented me with a pay raise.

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