Are you RAD?

Dear Healthy Alcoholic, I see you there, sipping your craft beer or bourbon. I see you smiling, enjoying your evening. Tonight perhaps that's your only drink. But tomorrow will come, or a long day, or a setback in life/business. Whenever the feelings begin you will reach for another, and another. Just enough to dampen those feelings, maybe more if you just want to sleep and feel nothing. The hard times call, and damn if there just doesn't always seem to be a hard time. Pour another. You're not addicted or anything. You go days without drinking. Hell, you went 9 months with each kiddo. And what's one or two beers? Sure they are pretty heavy, sure you are a lightweight, but really...what's one or two? That's moderation. You are totally in control. It's not like your weekend binge past times from undergrad and grad school. Football games, nights out, back to the grind and feeling like ass on Monday. No, you don't do that. You have run half-marathons, y

I tend to take long hiatuses in writing. I don't know if it is due to the excessive demands of every day life, or if it is the fear of being as authentic as I want to be. Whatever the reason, I am back for the moment. I have a lot I want to share, and I will get there. For instance, today I am 72 days sober from alcohol. This was a health choice that turned into a HARD lesson on addiction...a subject I know far more about than I should have needed to see it within myself.  A struggle I have encountered before but seemingly ignored due to fear of stigma. I am not afraid anymore. And to prove it I am going to cry and sing in a video dedicated to my big baby pup, Rambo, who we said goodbye to yesterday. This is a raw message. It wasn't intended to be shared publicly. I have intense fear of singing in public. Yet as I find my voice, as I learn to say what needs to be said, I am also learning that fear only holds as much power as I allow it to. My sweet Rambo wasn't afraid o