We stop drinking and maybe we start to feel physically better right away. We think it’s going to be easier than we thought perhaps. But reality catches up. Drinking was solving a problem for us and now we have taken away one of our main coping mechanisms. So when we start to feel lonely, bored, stressed, sad, etc., it’s more noticeable because we no longer have our trusted external comfort.
Rachel Hart, the amazing host of the Take a Break podcast, talked about this in a recent episode. She says it’s not that our life has gotten worse, we are just seeing the truth of it. And sometimes that truth isn’t pretty.
You can’t make your life better if you hide from the reality of it. Looking at the truth and making changes instead of escaping takes courage and that feels uncomfortable. But think about what awaits you on the other side.