F-E-A-R has two meanings. “Forget Everything And Run” or “Face Everything And Rise.”

-Zig Zigler

I have in the back of my head that I would try sobriety when I was finished with my birthday present, which was my favorite whiskey: Dirty Monkey Banana Peanut Butter Whiskey. I love the taste, and it is so smooth going down. Tonight I finished up the bottle. So tomorrow I walk into my parade of sobriety. I imagine a parade, because I need to make it a big deal, if only in my own mind, and I need to feel that my family and friends are cheering me on.

Natasha Tracy has a section in her book Lost Marbles, that is entitled “Being Hard on Myself Gets Stuff Done.” She states that she has always had high expectations of herself and has always been a perfectionist and being hard on herself combats the lack of motivation that comes with her bipolar. I understand this feeling, and experienced it today.

I didn’t want to crawl out of bed and take a shower, and I sure as hell didn’t want to go grocery shopping. But those were things I needed to do to get on with my day, so I gave myself a little kick in the pants and got myself up, feeling heavy and overwhelmed, and even asking my husband if I could shop tomorrow. I know I had all the time in the world to go grocery shopping, so I kicked myself in the pants, just a little, saying I could take a shower and see how I felt after that. I was still just going through the motions so I whispered to myself “Keep going,” and while I didn’t feel it, I took just one step at a time until I was out there with my grocery list, at the grocery store, picking things off the shelves to put in my grocery cart. I did it. I made myself do it. Congratulations were in order. Sometimes I have to be my own cheering section, because how ridiculous is it that I need congrats for what seems like easy tasks? That’s just life with bipolar, and I have found my coping mechanisms.

So tomorrow is a new day, a new life. Without alcohol. And I can do it. I just have to turn to that part of my brain that helps me overcome the obstacles, the side that cheers me on when choosing the more difficult path. It has to be a joyous journey, a celebration of the healthy new me whose medicines will be at peak performance because of the decision I have made. A celebration of a new way of living, reaching for the best in me, ready to face everything and rise.