My Sobriety Story With Kristen Blanton Crocker

sobriety offers us everything alcohol promised—we’re setting up a very different narrative.

The only way not to know was to get wasted and stay that way, so she started drinking heavily during her honeymoon. The drunker she became, the more distance she felt from the dragon inside her. After a while, the booze and drugs became her problem, which was convenient because she didn’t have to deal with her real problem anymore.

“The goal here is to create a situation you no longer have to escape, or a life you don’t have to numb. The achievement of sobriety is not the point; it’s a by-product of the work. The work is the point. Addiction is the hook that gets you in the door, and quitting is the catalyst to heal deeper wounds.”

I read the book and had my first drink in weeks—a farewell, if you will—but the alcohol hit different, felt joyless, almost like keeping a doctor’s appointment. I looked at my wine and said, “I don’t want to believe in you anymore. I want to believe in something else.” And even if I continued to drink, even if the books weren’t enough and I had to

An alcoholic who is in the throes of addiction believes