I hope your Christmas was peaceful and loving – it is very likely that it was much quieter than planned, but with love and appreciation for who/what you have in life, and even if you couldn’t physically see and touch your loves, it is still a very special time of year to celebrate the wonders of love and LIFE ❤
I wrote the rest of this blog last year after a brutal brush with COVID, and as I re-read it earlier this month, I realized it is as relevant this year as it was on the day I wrote it……..
Happy Christmas lovely! I can say with the most profound gratitude that my smaller, quieter Christmas was magical ❤
Whilst there are no wrapped presents for me, there was the only gift I wanted, the one I longed for most, and one that I will never tire of receiving, but that’s for a little later in this blog…….
As you may know, I struggled badly with COVID in the run up to Christmas, so all my shopping plans – even online – went out the window as I focused on being able to breathe.
And I wasn’t too bothered. I knew my quarantine ended on 23rd so I could get the basics done, except on the 23rd I still wasn’t well enough to leave the house, and there was no-where to go as I live in Tier 4……Ho Hum…….
So, Christmas morning I exchanged with my son the few gifts I had already bought him, and he, having also been ill, gave me all he had, a Christmas card.
Now I don’t know about you, but I LOVE thoughtful cards, and although I know he felt (temporarily) a bit bad and apologetic, he really didn’t need to because, not only were we both so relieved to be recovering, but even more precious to me were the simple, honest, loving words my Christopher wrote in my card, that bought me to tears again this morning as I hugged it tight.
Here’s what he wrote,
“Happy Christmas to the best mum I could ever want. I know I am the most important person in your world, and you are the most important person in mine. I love you and I am proud of you every day. My super special, mad, lovely MUM”
Can you imagine how I felt to read these words? There is nothing Christopher, or anyone could have given me that means more to me than this.
No physical gift will ever match the gift of this, of his FORGIVENESS of a childhood he should never have experienced due to my drinking, and the FORGIVENESS of me, to me, for the poor, struggling, lost woman I was.
Christopher sees, feels, hears and knows in his soul (as do I), that the woman I was then, was not the ‘real me’, but a lost me, struggling to find a path in life I could walk, but stumbling over the alcohol bottles that I allowed to litter my way, in my beliefs that I was not good enough, in my fears and beliefs around how hard changing my drinking would be and my fears about how I would cope if by some miracle, I could change the way I drank.
My focus was always that I was weak and alcohol was strong. That I was a failure and alcohol was a winner. How wrong I was……….
My son also knows that,
I never meant to hurt or neglect him, he is my heartbeat, and that
I never meant to hurt or neglect me.
I didn’t drink like a woman possessed by any alcohol demon because I didn’t care, because I didn’t love – I, like you, probably love too much.
I drank in a way that hurt us both because I didn’t know how to STOP.
I thought I was battling alcohol, but I wasn’t, I was battling ME, abusing me, threatening me, begging me to change, being disappointed and hating me, not alcohol – it was all my misunderstanding, my confusion, my loss of me, that I tried to comfort with alcohol, and by trying to stay away from, or even change, alcohol, I was denying myself the only ‘comfort’ I had. It is the same for you too.
I know now, with the profound gratitude I lean into every day, so, so differently. I know, accept and embrace who I am and I, again, like you, are always, always enough for me and for those who love me.
The FORGIVENESS and the love in my son’s card, are a reflection of the forgiveness and love I hold for ME, and that FORGIVENESS is the greatest gift, as it powers me forward in life, it releases hurt, lets go of anger and lets in LOVE. I wish the same gift for you too.
So my Christmas has been exactly what I wanted it to be, topped off by Christopher making the most amazing Christmas Dinner all by himself, and we sitting stuffing our faces with Mince Pies laughing at the Vicar of Dibley Christmas special.
This Christmas was special, and every sober day is special too.
Please let 2020 be the very last year you struggle to change your drinking. It is NOT hard, I promise you
Changing your drinking changes every area of your life. It is a miraculous transformation from loss and pain to peace and freedom.
Here’s a message I got just yesterday from a relieved client (there’s more on my Testimonials page).
“This is my FIRST sober Christmas in 15 years….I had 2 glasses of champagne on Christmas Day, and another glass on a family Zoom party, Boxing Day…..my family are so proud of me and I am so proud of me…….this is the life I dreamed of……thank you Sonia”
It doesn’t’ matter where you are now, or how long you have been there, the life you are searching for is within you all the time, you just don’t know how to access it. I do.
If now is your time to change, to put you first, to gift yourself the ease, peace and freedom you deserve, take a look at my completely unique, soul and life expanding 6 week Rapid Alcohol Recovery Method page, and and reach out to me, TODAY.
That first email is the only hard part of change, I PROMISE YOU ❤
Be kind and gentle with yourself
Sonia xx
PS If you would like to understand more about my journey from 28 years of alcoholism, to peaceful freedom, take a look at my internationally acclaimed book, This Isn’t Me (click on the link HERE).I wrote it for my son, as an apology for his younger years, and as an attempt to explain the un-explainable.
