~preface: internet, i cannot let the new year start without starting to get honest with everyone about what’s been going on with me. a lot of you know this story already, but even more of you don’t, and there’s no point to this whole blogging thing if i’m not being honest. i need to share this for myself, and for anyone out there who maybe needs to hear it, too. that thirty day ‘adventure’ i took back in august? well, a more specific name for it would be: REHAB. as in, inpatient rehab. it was quite an experience. there’s no way i can tell this whole story in one sitting, nor the story of everything that’s happened since, so we’ll start small. the following is the ‘good-bye letter’ that my therapist had me write to my ‘drug-of-choice’ while i was there. let’s begin this journey, shall we?~
***
(from august, 2009)
dear smirnoff, absolut, stoli, grey goose, ketel one, ciroc, belvedere–and, yes, in the later days–five o’clock, mohawk, and popov:
you, sirs, are a bunch of a-holes. oh sure, i remember the good times. some of them, anyway. dancing on bars in key west. dancing on bars everywhere, really. drunken family christmas eve parties that lasted til five a.m. (happy birthday, jesus!) working at the bar for twelve years with people who i thought were my best friends. vodka, we wrote fifty page papers together, often times in one sitting. and we always got an ‘A.’ we cried together, and sang together–and, the laughter! oh, how we laughed. about what? i can’t remember.
but, vodka? after a while you became clingy. you started coming with me everywhere i went. people started noticing and began to suggest that maybe i was in an abusive relationship with you, but i didn’t listen. i knew that we were meant to be together forever. and so i turned a deaf ear to my parents and friends for more than three years. as our relationship grew stronger, their voices grew louder, and eventually i took you upstairs to my office where we could be alone together. it was me and you against the world. we wouldn’t answer the phone very often, and we ignored my mother when she would ring the doorbell over and over again for thirty minutes, even though it was obvious that we were home because our car was in the driveway. sometimes john would burst into the room and say things like: “it’s either me, or the vodka.” of course, i didn’t believe him. i knew we needed to talk (john and i, not you and i), but i kept telling myself that i’d fix things tomorrow. kind of like how i kept telling myself i’d go find a new job tomorrow, i’d answer my mom and sister’s phone calls tomorrow, i’d write more tomorrow, i’d clean the bathroom tomorrow. but the tomorrows kept coming and i couldn’t tear myself away from you.
i was giving up everything for you but, vodka?
what have you done for me lately?
vodka, don’t answer that.
i have already prepared a list of some of the things you’ve done for me, and here it is:
1) you have made me spend A LOT of money. seriously, you have made me spend ALL my money. finding a quarter in the couch became a seriously exciting event for a while there. so, thanks for that.
2) you have made all my friends and family absolutely ill with worry. and worse, together we have made them right pissed off. we have lied to them. we have stolen from them. we have ignored them, and then expected them to help us pay our bills and buy us food and not be angry about it. this was all very stupid of us, but what can i say? all’s fair in love and drunkenness, and i was still very much in love with you, even though…
3)you made me vomit more than anyone on the face of the planet has ever vomited before. i wish there was a spot in the guiness book of world records for “person who can puke the most in twenty-four hours;” i would totally win.
4) you made me stop taking showers more than once a week. my hair was always a hot mess, and i’m sure i didn’t smell very nice. i was sure it didn’t matter, at the time. i mean, you don’t have eyes and you don’t have a nose, so i knew you would still ove me even if i was a little smelly, and i was sure that as long as we were together i would be ok. i thought as long as we were together, i could do anything. even though i was doing nothing. well, except for playing scrabble on facebook. we did win a lot of scrabble together.
(hi, harold! you gonna beat me one of these days?)
5) you kept me from properly grieving the death of my father and you did nothing to help me stop thinking it was all my fault that he died. it will have been five years in october, and i STILL think that. a real friend would not let me do that to myself.
6) you have kept me from using my bachelor’s degree, and kept me from finishing my master’s.
7) you tricked me into quitting my job.
8 ) you mad me think i needed you in order to do my writing, and you made me think i needed you in order to be fun.
9) you sent me to the hospital for multiple night stays four times since january. the doctors told me i had to break up with you because you were beating the crap out of my liver, but i stopped and picked you up on the way home from the hospital anyway. when we got home, you continued to beat me up. a lot of people would have shouted: “help! i’m a victim of domestic violence!” but, me? i just cried when you had damaged my body so badly that every time i tried to spend time with you, extremely violent things would happen. namely, violent puking and violent shaking. oh, and violently unrelenting anxiety. the worst was the day that i woke up dizzy and tense and hurty and shaking and already throwing up. i knew that i wouldn’t feel better unless i could spend time with you, but my body kept rejecting you. (my body is smarter than me, apparently) after eight hours of complete misery on the bathroom floor–with you next to me the entire time–you had me throwing up blood and i decided to go to the hospital.
i was there for five nights, and i only remember the first five hours. my heart ached for you so badly, i nearly had a heart attack, with my pulse at over 165 beats a minutes for more than eight hours. i couldn’t pick you up on the way home, because my mom wouldn’t let me drive my car. she didn’t want me to drive because she was afraid that a) i would pick you up on the way home, or b) i was permanently brain damaged by you and the three mg of ativan that the hospital gave me every four hours for two days, in order to keep me from having a heart attack or a seizure.
during that five day stay, my body got over you. i had no physical need to be with you, but emotionally i was not ready to let you go.
i did, in fact, pick you up as soon as i could.
what i didn’t know was that while i was sneaking around so that i could spend time with you, my mom was busy talking to a lady named denise from brighton hospital. my mom told me that if i went there fpr thirty days, i could escape our relationship. she and my uncle then pulled out the “you’ll end up just like your father” card, and i surrendered.
it wasn’t that i didn’t love you anymore, vodka.
it was just that i love my family, too. and i was beginning to understand that they love me far more than you ever have.
it wasn’t easy for me to leave you. it will probably never be easy for me to live without you. but today, i know that i made the right decision. since i’ve come to brighton, i haven’t lied to anyone. i haven’t stolen from anyone. i’ve even washed my hair almost every day.but, most importantly, i’ve realized that you never loved me. you, vodka, are a manipulative self-serving bastard. i fart in your general direction. you are, by far, the worst thing that has ever happened to me, and that is saying a lot.
i know now that i don’t need you to help me write, and know now that i’m WAY more fun and silly and happy when you’re not around. for the first time in months, i’m not wondering if the fuzziness in my head will ever go away. today, my head is clear and it’s full of ideas and love and hope. i can still see the road back to you, but now i can also see another road that will lead me away, and i’m going to take it.
i’m not going to pick you up on the way home from the hospital, this time. in fact, i’m never going to pick you up again. you may not believe me, and that’s ok. a lot of people don’t believe me. but as stevie nicks once said: “i have my own life, and i am stronger than you know.” and, it’s true. i AM stronger than you know. i bet stronger than even i know.
so, vodka? i guess you’re going to have to find someone else’s life to ruin. but, know this: if i ever come across such a person, i will do everything in my power to help that person see your true nature.
the jig is up, vodka.
you’ve always been clear, but now i see through you.
ungratefully,
tiffany
***
coming soon: tales of relapse, responsibility, reinvention, and recovery.
(oh, and really funny quotes from five year olds)
Filed under: ass hats, i'm scared of things. lots of things., in the bar, in which i am an idiot, key west, letters, life, the universe, and everything., that batman guy on December 31st, 2009 | 17 Comments »