While the pink cloud phase feels differs for everyone, common experiences include:

-feelings of elation and euphoria
-commitment to positive lifestyle changes
-confidence about your ability to stay sober
-zen-like feelings of deep calm
-increased emotional and social awareness
-a preoccupation with reading/learning about recovery
-increased desire to improve other aspects of your life: eating well, exercising, meditating etc.
-the idea that you don’t need support

There were many big life events and losses that happened during my 21 year relationship with alcohol that went unprocessed. Drinking became my coping mechanism for any ‘too much’ feeling including sadness and grief. The alcohol effectively froze my grief so I didn’t have to deal with the overwhelming feelings associated with loss. When I stopped drinking and started to learn how to regulate my nervous system, that grief had permission to thaw. To be seen. To be acknowledged. And continues to ask to be processed.

We have this expectation in our society that everything should just be easy. We should stop drinking and magically feel better and all of our problems will disappear. But that kind of instant-gratification thinking is what got us into this mess in the first place. Remember that famous quote by Albert Einstein: ‘You cannot solve a problem with the same thinking we used when we created them.’ Well the same applies here.

Social media is a slippery slope for people who hold hands with addiction. I could get into all of the science about dopamine, but I have nothing to prove here and I know, that you know what I’m saying is true. It’s designed to be addictive. So if you're doomscrolling and finding yourself numbing out - guess what? You're using the app exactly how it's intended to be used. You're not weak and there's nothing wrong with you. For us in the sobriety world, we know that's how alcohol works too. It's an addictive medium...so if you become addicted, well, yeah...you're using it as designed.

Many people have very strong resistance to AA and rehab as the primary forms of recovery. That doesn’t mean either is bad or wrong. It just means that there are not enough options out there for people. And so what do they do? Nothing. They keep drinking.

The lack of knowledge, language + experience-sharing around grey-area drinking keeps people drinking, even if they don’t feel good about their drinking behaviours or their relationship with alcohol.