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You know when you sit up late at night and start googling “do I have a drinking problem?” if you’re asking that question, you might already suspect the answer, but you’re not quite ready to label yourself an alcoholic. After all, you don’t really look like an alcoholic. You haven’t hit a rock bottom, you don’t have a DUI, and you haven’t lost your children, your marriage, or your job. In fact, you’re doing it all and knocking it out of the park on most days, except your exhausted, and unfulfilled, and you’re washing your days down with a bottle or two of wine almost every night.
You, my dear, most likely fit the definition of a gray-area drinker. Gray-area drinking is that murky space between social drinker and destructive drinker. And you might think, what’s the big deal? I’m managing things okay. I mean doesn’t everybody do the same thing at the end of the day?
And, things might be okay for you. I’m not really sure. Only you can make that decision. Some people are able to remain in this fuzzy area without experiencing any major drawbacks from their drinking. However, some people aren’t that lucky and their lives and their drinking begin to spiral out of control, to the point where they’re spending a lot of time and energy on managing their drinking.
Jolene Park, health coach and certified functional nutritionist, defines gray area drinking as, “the space between the extremes of rock bottom and every-now-and-again drinking.”
Some other signs that you might be a gray area drinker are (Park, 2018):
You spend a lot of time worrying about your drinking.
You drink between the two extremes of every-now and again; and the end-stage drinker.
You can stop drinking, and you have stopped for a good amount of time (weeks and/or months).
Your drinking doesn’t look like an issue to friends and family.
You bounce back and forth between ignoring that small voice inside your head that’s telling you to stop drinking; and deciding that you’re being overly dramatic about your drinking.
I know this space so well. I was a gray area drinker for decades, slipping every once in a while, into slightly more dangerous territory, but I was always surrounded by someone in my social group whose drinking was worse, so I was able to feel a little better about my habit. I quit drinking, no problem, when I was pregnant with both of my children.
I found myself stuck in a cycle of drinking a bottle (or box) of wine every night, then deciding to quit for a few weeks, and googling to find answers and take quizzes to see whether I had a drinking problem. It was fucking exhausting. So, I know exactly how you’re feeling.
You can’t keep doing the same old thing, and keep dealing with your feelings in the same old way. Numbing those feelings with a bottle of wine and a bag of potato chips, night after night, isn’t going to get you anywhere.
It’s okay to not have everything figured out at the same time. You have to take this journey one step at a time.
You have a choice in this journey and what it looks like. You can either honestly explore your relationship with alcohol, and take a chance to grow and become stronger. Or you can stay stuck and slowly let yourself wither.
I know you deserve better.
If you’re losing yourself in your nightly bottle of wine, let’s talk. We can figure out the next steps together. Book a STRONGER SOBER session.
SOURCES
Park, Jolene (2018) 5 Signs You Might Be a Gray Area Drinker, and What to do About it.
