Photo: Supplied: Bateman Books
If you're sober but sitting on your hands when someone pops a drink, you're a "dry drunk," and need to tackle the underlying problems that led to the drinking, author Maree MacLean says.
MacLean's first book was about quitting alcohol, her latest, The No Bullshit Guide to Staying Sober, navigates the hurdles of maintaining sobriety.
Her own drinking came to a head after a triple emotional whammy of her father and brother's death, and divorce, she tells RNZ's Nine to Noon.
"It was just like a consolidated grief. And then I just hit the bottle hard and that's when I realised 'shit, I've got a real problem here'."
She got help, and got sober, but realised based on her own experiences and readers of her first book getting in touch, that staying sober required a whole other set of strategies.
"When I talk about dry drunk, what I'm talking about is not addressing the reason that you started to drink in the first place. So, if you're having to sit on your hands, every time someone opens a can of beer or pops a bottle of Lindauer then you've kind of got one foot in sobriety and one foot out.
"You might not technically be drinking, but you for sure as hell aren't happy either."
Road to recovery
If this was the case, it was time for a "deep dive", she said.
"Trauma might not be your fault. Your wife may have gone off to live with your best friend, there might be a justifiable reason that you're hurting right down to the marrow of your bones. It might not be your fault, but it is your responsibility. It is yours to have to manage and handle."
People in recovery sleep a lot, she said, and that's a good thing.
"Sleep is both a great healer, but it's also a great leveller, because you need a break from your own mind.
"So, if the shitty committee is playing ping pong in your head, while you're trying to get sober, you need to have some time where you're not thinking. Aside from the healing and restorative powers of sleep, it's also to turn your mind off for a little while. And I think that that is really key. For a lot of people in early recovery, they sleep a lot, and I think that's fine."
Healthy routines were also a vital part of recovery, she said.
"Take the analogy of train tracks and railway sleepers, you take the railway sleepers and you evenly space those railway sleepers in terms of what time you get up, how many glasses of water you drink a day, when you take your shower, make your bed to do those small, tiny little wins those little achievements."
Laying a solid recovery foundation was key, MacLean said.
"If it takes you two years to lay a foundation, that you can then build the rest of your life on in a way that you want it to go. That's not really a long time."
Being aware of your moments can help avoid relapses, she said. Her own relapse came when she was feeling good about herself.
"It was end of work celebrations before breaking for Christmas, I thought you can drink like a normal person, you've got this managed.
"I was six Aperol spritzers in when my brother arrived to have Christmas lunch and was just like, 'look at the state of you. I thought you weren't drinking, what's going on?'"
Relapses happened, she said, most people in recovery would experience at least one.
"You need to just realise that it's not a one and done, the normal amount of relapses is between two and five," MacLean said.
"If you've relapsed, you're not a failure, you're just textbook. There are people that stop and never drink again. But it's not the norm, it's really not the norm.
"Don't give up if you relapse. Just keep going."
