All Shiny and New

Since we last spoke I have walked an ultra-marathon (on Saturday) and reached 1000 days sober (on Sunday) – Yeay! Go me! Sounds all pretty positive eh? Well Saturday wasn’t so positive, and the disappointment still lingers, I didn’t finish my ultra-marathon, I had to retire from the event on medical grounds – heat exhaustion.… Read more

Wow hasn’t it been crazy! I’ve literally burnt out from the last 6 weeks of constant 12 hour days. I didn’t have a break over Christmas so have only had a couple of days off in weeks. I work for the NHS so have been busy buying everything to build vaccination clinics from scratch whilst… Read more

I know my blog is normally about sobriety and I’ve not blogged for ages, but wanted to do so today. I’ve been so busy in my role as a Procurement Manager for Northern Care Alliance – (Salford Royal NHS and Pennine Acute NHS Trust). I’m not on the front line, BUT we are business critical… Read more

It’s been a while since I blogged and it’s been absolutely crazy!! A few things I’ve been doing: Work, It’s crazy full stop, I say to Pete every day, wow work was dead manic today. I’ve said this every day for 2 years – so maybe this is my job, crazy manic madness! Run club,… Read more

I’ve said it before that writing this blog is a great way of working through my thoughts and feelings, a type of therapy. This type of working through feelings is still all new to me, I never dealt with the feelings before, I just drank to numb them and block them out. Almost 4 years… Read more

So you thought it was a good idea and thought you’d be fine, but now you might be getting twitchy, anxious, bored and narky. Your mind might be wondering – ‘Could I just have one drink?’ It would take away the boredom right?So, I thought I’d be nice and come up with some suggestions to… Read more

I hope you have had a wonderful festive season and looking forward to whatever normality has in store for you, I’ve spent the whole day in PJ’s eating copious amounts of food after doing 2 park runs this morning! Definitely not normality – but thats OK, my body needed a rest and some food and… Read more

Healthy debate in our house this week! Dry January has been discussed a lot – I personally think that anything that makes people ‘pause’ and evaluate their relationship with alcohol is a massive, positive thing. I get it’s only for a set period BUT what if some of the people who have a 31 day… Read more

The Good Graduation – I earned my degree in Procurement after 7 long years! Most people take 3 years, but I drank all the way through mine and I’m convinced this made me take longer as I failed so many exams. The last exam which I had already failed 3 times, I passed within a… Read more

Well there have been tears of absolute joy this morning, I get so much junk e-mail I was clicking to delete everything and saw an e-mail from Inspire awards 2020 that jumped out. Upon opening it is said I’d been nominated for The 2020 INSPIRE AWARDS in the fitness and well-being category. Now, I’ve only… Read more

So……. Pete stopped drinking with me in October 2018 and didn’t look back. Since we met we had drunk, pretty much the whole time we were together. He drank almost as much as me at home and on nights out he would drink much more than me BUT he always said he could just stop… Read more

My god I needed that weekend; last week was full of busyness and very hectic (but good) stuff and when it came to the weekend I actually had a rest instead of going to Parkrun, my body really needed that little break! So Saturday morning I forced myself to stay in bed watching TV. It… Read more

My old life in daily stages! 1. The Anxiety I’d wake up at 3am with anxiety every single morning (with palpitations and anxiety), ‘Sue what the fuck are you doing with your life? You really need to stop this, you are out of control’. I’d be awake for a couple of hours with this anxiety,… Read more

They are my bloody favourite. The very best thing about sobriety! So….. I love running and I love my friends, so running with friends on a Saturday morning make for Sue being in a great mood all day 🙂 I’ve had quite a stressful week this week, extremely busy at work and then something on… Read more

Doesn’t it make you feel good to make a difference to someone, brighten their day, or give them a boost? What’s not to like about that? Me and Pete were both tagged in a social media post yesterday by a friend who has just smashed ‘Go sober for October’ with her husband. The difference in… Read more

One of the first things that worried me about going sober was what if I miss out, how can I celebrate stuff, am I going to have to miss events and sit at home crying into my Nosecco!?! Am I going to be lonely, what will happen to my friendships, will I lose them? Very… Read more

Yeay! So proud of me! Yes it was me that made the decision and did all the hard work but I had a toolbox that was overflowing to help me to get here. Podcasts…..I didn’t even know what they were (I was probably too drunk to care) but I have listened to Janey Lee Grace… Read more

Over a period of 12 months, I had visited my GP, had Cognitive Behavior Therapy, had talking therapies and eventually attended counselling from an alcohol specialist service. Trish my counsellor asked me what I wanted? I said I wanted to cut down my wine consumption. Each week she would encourage me to cut down and… Read more

What made me want to stop drinking? Nothing actually, there was no ‘wanting’ about it; it was a need more than anything. I needed to stop saying ‘just one or two – which turned into much more’ I needed to stop waking up at 3am worried about what time I went to bed, did I… Read more

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2,000 days since I made the choice to save myself from the dangerous and destructive clutches of alcohol. I know I look like I’ve likely always had my shit together, this isn’t the case anyway 藍 BUT it certainly wasn’t the case 2,000 days ago. My life is unrecognisable now compared to what it was… Read more

This podcast was so very powerful…I’d forgotten how emotional it made me on the day BUT you can certainly hear it in my voice. Especially talking about my Dad. https://open.spotify.com/episode/4fVTaTKZr0E73JzQtnjCzl?si=sPcAF2iXTNusVksZgcsUzQ If it helps to change someone else’s shame, drinking habits or relationship with alcohol. Then recording this podcast was worth it. Give it a listen… Read more

It’s been this last year…. This week marks 8 years since my Dad left us, he did leave such a huge gaping hole in our family. I do wonder if he looks down with pride at his little girl. His little girl who is becoming stronger more resilient and more powerful by the day. (Maybe… Read more