What It’s Like Being a Sober Person in a Drinking World
How do you stay sober when drinking inspires friendships, connections, and even promotions?
“Cheers!” I said, clinking glasses of wine with members of the Communist Party in Vietnam’s National Assembly, the equivalent of the U.S.’s White House. I brought the glass to my mouth and tipped it, as if to drink, stopping just shy of the wine reaching my lips. If anyone noticed the lack of gulping (my acting skills are trash) or the never-empty glass, they made no mention of it. There were more important things to discuss anyway.
I have been clean and sober for seven years. In November, I’ll be 30 years old, followed by my eighth sober birthday in January. I got clean and sober when I was quite young and it was an unexpected turn of events for me at the time. Looking back on my life, however, is like rewatching a TV show or movie again — you see all the clues so clearly, so much so that you think about how blind you must’ve been the first time through. As the old adage goes, hindsight is truly 20/20.
At 21 years old, I went to rehab for bulimia and came out, three months later, still bulimic but freshly sober. It took me eight months to conquer my eating disorder but, other than the lone beer I had post-rehab, my alcoholism has come with fewer…
