When your drinking becomes excessive or out of control, it can feel almost like you are in an unhealthy romantic relationship. You may find yourself constantly thinking about alcohol, always wanting to spend time with it, making your plans around it, factoring it into your decisions, spending money on it, only spending time with those who like it, and feeling afraid to be without it.
Alcohol as Emotional Comfort
We often turn to alcohol because we are feeling pain, things are not going well, or it feels like something is missing in our lives. There’s no shame in that. When we’re in pain, it’s human nature to want to find something to make that pain go away. And at first, alcohol may seem to do the trick. But then it turns out that after we drink, the pain or troubles are still there, and sometimes the alcohol has created new problems.
With this kind of emotional drinking, giving up alcohol can almost feel like the breakup of a relationship. It’s as if your ex, alcohol, keeps trying to win you back by reminding your brain how much you miss it, crave it, need it, and how you don’t feel right without it. It keeps trying to pull you back into the relationship.
And when you’ve gotten used to turning to alcohol when things feel bad or even when they feel good, it can be hard to get used to not doing that. Your brain chemistry may have been altered by the steady flow of alcohol. Your thinking patterns may have been wired to signal you to reach for a drink in certain circumstances. Your habits and lifestyle may be centered on your drinking. Changing all this can feel overwhelming.
Letting Go with Compassion
But you can end your attachment to alcohol. The key is to gently let it go using self-compassion. Just like you might do if you were truly getting over the break up of a bad relationship, commit to investing in, loving and caring for yourself. You might task yourself, what behaviors align with the healthy new lifestyle you are embarking on?
Treat yourself like you would a friend or loved one whom you truly care about. How does this beloved person deserve to be treated? Shift your focus from your old, unhealthy relationship with alcohol to your new compassionate one with yourself.
Creating a New Relationship with Yourself
Spend time on activities and behaviors that make you feel good and cared for. Get the comfort, stress relief, or diversion you got from alcohol in new, healthy ways. Try new hobbies, prioritize self-care, spend time with positive, caring people, and seek out interesting new experiences. Learn to get comfortable spending time enjoying your own company. The journaling prompts, hypnotherapy, and movement practices on the Unconscious Moderation app are great supportive resources for this journey of self-compassion.
Rather than viewing your break-up with alcohol as the end of a relationship, you can view it as a new compassionate relationship with yourself, focused on your inner growth.
