Last September, when I got back from New York, I decided to detox a bit after all of the food and alcohol I indulged in on my trip. I went about a month before drinking again, and when I did I definitely binged hard...I felt awful, on so many levels-physically with the hangover, and emotionally with guilt and shame.

These past six months have been incredibly stressful, painful, and overwhelming. It's easy to drink a couple beers, or have a couple glasses of wine at the end of the day coming home from a job I don't love, or to escape the loneliness or heartache that often feels so heavy. I'd open a beer while making dinner, drink another as I actually ate the meal, and one more as I watched a movie or Netflix binge just to stay out of my own mind until bedtime.

It's easy to numb with physical, tangible vices: alcohol, drugs, exercise, sex, social media, moving, running away...We each have tendencies that we fall back on when confronted with the uncomfortable. But that's life, right? Life is uncomfortable most of the time. We're stretched and pushed, uprooted and unsettled. So how to we find the most appropriate and beneficial ways of dealing with the discomfort?

December 2nd I decided to stop drinking for a while again. Half of the motivation came from wanting to cut out the unnecessary calories and cost. The other half came from the feeling that I was getting too comfortable with drinking almost every night of the week.

Looking back just four weeks later, I think in making this decision I was preparing myself to be able to handle the passing of a birthday for one of the kids I nannied that I couldn't be there for; I was preparing myself for the passing of Christmas without seeing them; and apparently for transitioning in to a new year without them in my life.

I don't want to drink to numb or deflect. I don't want to drink to check out. I want to be present. I want to be healthy, in body, mind, heart, and spirit. And for me, at this phase in life, I think that means being sober. I don't have a date attached to staying dry. And I don't really feel the need to. I have several friends who have been sober for years or decades. Some have shared their stories of being out of control with alcohol, others felt like it wasn't necessarily a problem, it just didn't really serve them, and still others because their partners decided not to drink.

What I see everywhere around me though is how much of our social gatherings revolve around alcohol. Throwing a dinner party, having friends over, meeting up for drinks, going wine tasting, whiskey tasting, happy hour...

We're bombarded with images and messages in movies and television, social media, and blogs about coming home from work and winding down with a glass of wine. Recipes for cocktails abound on blogs and Pinterest. And I get it. Alcohol is fun and tastes good. It helps you calm down and relax. But is that the only way to calm nerves and connect? Why is it that alcohol is the first thing we turn to when going out or meeting up with someone. And why do we rarely address the underlining anxiety surrounding it? Or the possibility that not everyone drinks, or that what starts out as casual and manageable turns into something much more addictive?

I want to start having more open conversations about the draw of alcohol-both the good and the bad. I'm starting with myself-being honest with myself and working through my own tendencies. And I'm going to commit to talking with friends and family about it.

We'll see where this goes...

xxo