Hotel mini bars...

So our three sons went to my sisters for the weekend and Mr D and I went to a HOTEL for TWO NIGHTS with NO KIDS!!!!!!

It was awesome. It was low-key and relaxing and treaty and peaceful and lovely. We just hung out happily in each others company doing not much but reading books and surfing the net and watching tele and I did a face pack and painted my nails and we went out for brunch twice and dinner once and to a couple of movies.

If I was the old me - the boozy me - I would have seen this weekend as the perfect excuse to drink more than usual. Fun treaty weekend! Time for bubbles! Bloody Mary for brunch! Lets have cocktails before dinner! A nightcap before bed! Glug glug glug.

I would have boozed throughout, slept like crap, dragged my sorry hungover body around during the day.. I would have just been that boozy version of me that I was for so long. I've written about this before here.

And the hotel had made it easy for me to do that… I'm telling you, the mini-bar was stocked to the gunnels with booze. There was sooooo much grog in that tiny fridge I'm surprised there was room for anything else. It'd be hard if you were still being tempted by booze if you had that little fridge in your face. I'd call ahead and have it emptied if I was in early sobriety I think.

But I'm not tempted by that shit any more or swayed by their fancy labels. Their labels might as well read 'EVIL DRUG THAT WILL MESS WITH YOUR LIFE'.. coz that's how I see the stuff now. No offense to clever beer brewers or talented wine makers. I respect your craft. But for me - quite simply - your product is an evil drug that will mess with my life.

I took half of it out to make room for the deli foods I'd bought along… and had a ginger beer on Friday night in a martini glass, and on Saturday night I had an iced tea with an ice cube in it in a martini glass. The rest of the time I drank herbal tea or coffee.

It didn't matter one bit. Booze couldn't have added anything to this weekend. It would have taken away. I did lush out a bit on pate and tasty cheeses and ginger crunch and stuff. But those things don't dull my senses or affect my sleep or fuck with my addicted brain.

I got interviewed this afternoon for a parenting magazine about my drinking and sobriety and the blog/book/new website. It was fun - the journalist was lovely. At one point she asked me "do you feel sad thinking that you won't be able to drink ever again?"

I answered her from the deep down honest bottom of my soul.

No. I do not feel sad that I will never drink alcohol ever again.

Love, Mrs D xxx