Hi Brooke, watching the call with Nikki today was sort of like unclogging a sink to me – I’ve been wallowing in my most recent setback and it helped me realize that I can make progress if I stick with this. Watching the beginning of her call, she was resonating with me completely but of course I assumed that she is a non drinker and that her issues couldn’t be related to anything “ugly” like overeating or overdrinking. When she talked about how she signed up because of the overdrinking program, it actually made me cry – this is what I did too but I tackled overeating first because I didn’t want anybody in my family to see me working on the overdrinking piece and frankly I thought if I could lose weight I might be happy and not buffer. I have struggled for the last few years with overbuffering as my kids have become independent adults. I have spent the last 22 years pouring my life into raising them.

I recently began working in earnest on the allowed urges, drink plans, and write it down exercises. It’s been extremely difficult but I felt like I was making progress. Overdrinking only became an issue in recent years as I dealt with losing my church foundation, losing my daughter (my perception anyway) to her fiance and his control over her, seeing my kids become independent adults and not need me anymore. I have a peaceful relationship with my two youngest kids but my oldest daughter has always been my most difficult relationship and we have had significant difficulties since she got engaged and then married. They came to our house for the Super Bowl and we put out a big spread of food. I had a plan to only have two glasses of wine but then another contentious and controversial argument began and I started buffering – food AND wine. Big argument finally happened despite my efforts to prevent it, and they stormed out of our home in anger. It was very scary to me as I have always tried to have a warm, loving, non-confrontational home. My daughter called later with her husband next to her and belittled and insulted me to my husband which really angered him. The next day she called and said that on behalf of all the kids they wanted to let us know that they think we have a drinking problem (my husband was drinking beer and grilling meat for everyone during the game). She tends to overshare things with others outside the family as well – feeling compelled to ask for prayer, etc. I now feel like all the work I have done was for nothing because it didn’t prevent this from happening. I am also afraid to go to events now or church, where I don’t know if my personal issues have been discussed with people.

Seeing Nikki talk about this has given me a glimmer of hope but I still am not sure how to move forward with broken relationships with my kids. The good news that I learned from coaching today is that worst case scenario has already happened – I never wanted my kids to see me as a problem drinker (I grew up in a heavy drinking family) and that’s what kept me in check for most of the last 22 years. Now this has happened and I have to figure out where to go from here. As a result of their phone call we have promised we would never have alcohol in the house again to appease the kids, which may be a good thing but it is also magnifying my shame and embarrassment. I haven’t seen or talked to my oldest daughter and her husband since that night, and am having a lot of fear over seeing them again.