As most of you know from my posts, I am in therapy and substance abuse counseling for sexual abuse and alcoholism. I also just began AA which has been amazing. My therapist suggested that I write a goodbye note to alcohol. I wanted to share that letter with you all today. Writing this was extremely therapeutic, and honestly, for anyone who is in the beginning stages of sobriety, I highly recommend writing your own goodbye letter. I am planning on reading it at Monday's meeting, and was hoping I'd get some feedback from you guys.

November 1^st, 2017

To the poison that took away half of my life,

          You came into my life sixteen years ago when I was just a child. I did not ask for you. I did not want you. You were given to me by adults that should have protected me. Instead, you were a gift that was used to groom me. You deceived me and made me think that I was an adult. Suddenly, I thought that all of the bad things that were happening to me were okay. You were not in my life much back then, but you were there enough to make an impact for the years to come. By the time I got into high school, I barely saw you. I was adjusting to life in a new environment and that brought chaos. Eventually, I got involved in a rough crowd and you were back in my life. I’d sneak out of my house late at night to sit in a park with untrustworthy people and drink you. You made me feel alive, mature and happy and you brought me the one thing I craved; friendship. That soon changed once you were in my life for a while. My trauma came back, and I started to realize that I had buried a lot of painful memories. Drinking you brought them up, and I didn’t know how to handle it. Wine coolers and beer just wasn’t cutting it, so I persuaded an older boy who liked me to buy me something harder. That was when everything changed. Suddenly, I was sitting in my dim-lighted room, drinking you, those hideous and painful memories raping my mind. Drunk with eyes drowned in tears, I picked up a razor and pressed it to my skin, and as the blood started to drip, the pain began to fade. I had finally found a way to cope. Throughout my teenage years, you were there. Anytime I felt pain or couldn’t deal with my life, I drank you. After I had you, you seduced me to hurt myself in order to eliminate that pain. This was temporary, though. As the years rolled by, I did what I could to fix my life, but you were always there. I kept you close by in case I needed courage or I needed to forget. Suddenly you became the number one thing in my life. I drank you for everything; social gatherings, holidays, good weather, bad weather, when I was depressed, angry, sad, rejected, even happy. You were the one thing I could count on to be there. You were there for everything, but what I didn’t realize was that you were the most deceiving friend. Not only were you poisoning my body and soul, but you were destroying my life. You made me feel ugly and worthless and not good enough. You made it hard for me to look in the mirror. You made me believe that no one would ever love me. You convinced me that hurting myself would make the pain go away. When the pain remained, you suggested that I kill myself. I tried. After I survived, I went on to live my life in the riskiest way possible. I figured that if I lived on the edge, eventually I would fall off. Once I hit rock bottom, I had to make a choice between laying there and waiting for death or finding the strength I had inside to get sober. After hurting the ones who truly loved me, I banished you from my life. I was no longer yours.

I loved you for sixteen years. You were there for me during the worst of times and the best of times. It took me sixteen years, six months before my 30^th birthday to realize that you never loved me back. You masked your true intentions by manipulating my mind and ruining my life. I will never forgive you, and I will never love you again. You took away what should have been the best years of my life. You ripped my childhood away from me and prevented me from truly living. I hate you. I hate what you’ve done to me. These scars will never fade, but I promise that my connection to you will. I will do whatever I can to rid you from my life forever. You are the worst thing that has ever happened to me.

We’ve been apart for only a month, but I can already feel my life coming back to me. It feels like I am looking at life through a new set of eyes. I feel empowered, strong, motivated and happy. I have forgiven myself and my past and look forward to creating the life I’ve always dreamt of. Being without you has given me my life back. It has opened up so many doors in such a short period of time, I am ecstatic to see what this new life has in store for me. I will never forget you. You will forever be a constant reminder of the life I left behind, the life I no longer live, the life I will never live again. This is my final goodbye, my infinite farewell, to the villainous foe, my false friend, the one who will never have me again, alcohol.

-C