When people talk about time, they often measure it in milestones, birthdays, relationships, jobs, etc. But there is a quieter kind of milestone, one that doesn’t get confetti or congratulations - the moment you realise you’ve now lived as many days sober as you once lived in the noise, chaos and haze of alcohol addiction.
Yes, today is my 50:50 day – 11656:11656. Birth to 5th January 1994 and from then to now.
But being sober for half of my life is not just a numerical split, it’s a division of two selves, two ways of living, and two different understandings of what it means to be alive.
And having lived this way for so long now, the life and achievements that I’ve gone on to accumulate only underline just how good-a-decision I made some 11656 days ago. You see, for many people, sobriety starts as a single, urgent decision, often made following a massive drunken blow out yet for me, I just felt toxic and hated myself. I quit because I wanted to feel ‘alive’ and not waste my time living from one drunken day to another in a bid to survive my depressed and broken world.
The best part is how quickly the sober days accumulate, and then how they seem to multiply. Sobriety was soon a month, then six months, in fact, a year went by very quickly as I remember and those early milestones were monumental.
Sobriety became less something I achieved, and more the way I lived.
Looking back addiction isn’t a moral failing it’s a way of coping when life stops working. And sobriety isn’t perfection; it’s a choice to live differently when things are out of control. Those years spent drinking weren’t wasted, they taught me what it feels like to be lost, and what it takes to become found.
And if I live a further 11,656 of sobriety I’ll be 95, not a bad innings I’d say, and hopefully further adventures and achievements await - something that would never have existed in the haze and daze of my distant past.
Game on.
1,230 Marathons - 290 Ultras - 18 MDS - 10 GWR - 11,656 Days
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