As I stirred awake, I knew immediately something was very wrong.

The ground beneath me was cold and hard; my limbs were stiff and my head was pounding.

What had happened to me? 

Slowly, I opened my eyes. Even that hurt. And then, as I looked up at the bright morning sky, felt the cool breeze against my skin and heard the birds singing in the trees, I knew.

I was lying in the front yard of my home. I groaned as patchy memories of the previous evening came screaming back to me.

Drinks, obviously. In a bar with my girlfriends. Shots. Slurred conversations with strangers. A bouncer asking me to leave. How dare he?

A dicey taxi ride home. Misplaced house keys. Fumbling, stumbling, then darkness.

And now this. Waking up on the grass in front of my lovely home, in my affluent neighbourhood, in my designer dress and expensive shoes. 

I grew up in 1980s boozy Britain and both my parents were heavy drinkers. The first time I got drunk at the age of 13, it felt like a 'lightbulb moment', writes Faye Lawrence

I grew up in 1980s boozy Britain and both my parents were heavy drinkers. The first time I got drunk at the age of 13, it felt like a ‘lightbulb moment’, writes Faye Lawrence

My Chloé handbag upturned on the lawn – my keys right there next to it, twinkling in the sunlight.  

Scrambling to my feet, I knew in an hour I’d be behind my desk at my senior corporate job, acting like nothing had happened. 

How on Earth had it come to this?

I grew up in 1980s boozy Britain. My family were all heavy drinkers and alcohol was always a central part of social gatherings. To me, drinking looked like an inevitable – not to mention fun – part of adulthood.

I’d dabbled with drinking from a young age, but when I got blackout drunk for the first time at the age of 13 after stealing gin from my parents’ liquor cabinet, I discovered something else: alcohol gave me peace. 

It was honestly like a lightbulb moment.  

I’d always been an anxious child; my brain felt busy all the time. That first sip of booze turned the volume down, and the gulps that followed shut down the noise entirely until I reached blissful oblivion. 

I was instantly hooked.

I was a party girl but even then I knew I drank differently from other people. I had no off switch

I was a party girl but even then I knew I drank differently from other people. I had no off switch

I'd always be the last one on the dance floor, wanting to kick the party on, even if that meant abandoning my friends and going home with strangers

I’d always be the last one on the dance floor, wanting to kick the party on, even if that meant abandoning my friends and going home with strangers

Throughout my teens and twenties, I became a party girl. I’d have wild nights out with friends where we’d drink, take speed and acid, and go to raves.

Even then, surrounded by others doing the same thing as me, I knew the way I drank was different. 

While I could take or leave the drugs, when it came to booze, I simply did not have an off switch.

I’d always be the last one on the dance floor, wanting to kick the party on, even if that meant abandoning my friends and going home with strangers. 

After leaving school, I got a job on the promotions team of a national tabloid newspaper. The culture there completely enabled my drinking: there were boozy lunches, beers after work – and that’s if you even made it back to the office after the long lunch. 

I’d party in trendy London bars and nightclubs, then head to the office the next morning after two hours’ sleep. I only had to survive until I could get a lunchtime ‘hair of the dog’ inside me, and then off I’d go again.

I was in my early twenties when I travelled to Australia. There, I met my husband; he was just like me and we bonded over partying.

We returned to the UK and quickly had a daughter. Honestly, pregnancy is the only time in my life I can remember not drinking.

Now seven years sober, I can tell you that a glass of wine at the end of the day isn't 'self-care'

Now seven years sober, I can tell you that a glass of wine at the end of the day isn’t ‘self-care’

Even after we had our little girl, my husband and I just changed the way we drank. Instead of going out, we brought the party to us, inviting people over and drinking until the early hours.

Parenting the next day with a hangover was hellish. I’d suffer with crippling anxiety and have panic attacks while trying to do the weekly grocery shop.

But none of that was enough to stop me. 

I had my second baby when I was 25. We decided to return to Australia to give our children a better life, but sadly split soon after arriving back.

Being a single mother of two young girls with no support network was very difficult, and my drinking ramped up.

On the alternate weekends when my now ex-husband had the kids, I’d often have friends over. We’d start drinking on a Friday afternoon, and the session – often fueled by drugs as well as countless bottles of wine – wouldn’t be over until Sunday.

When my children were a bit older, I went back to work. I held a senior position with lots of responsibility but it was never enough to curb my drinking.

As soon as I got home from the long commute and school pick-up, I’d pour my first glass of wine – my reward after a tough day of working and solo parenting.

The rest of the bottle? That was to shut off the noise in my brain and help me go to sleep. That was what everyone did, wasn’t it? 

By then I was almost 30 and after some particularly boozy work drinks at which I embarrassed myself in front of one of the directors, my boss said to me: ‘You’re almost 30 now. Don’t you think it’s time you started to rein it in?’

As much as the words stung, I knew my drinking was out of control. I went to see a doctor and asked for help. I was put on a drug called naltrexone, which reduces alcohol cravings. 

For decades, drinking was a way of switching off my noisy brain

For decades, drinking was a way of switching off my noisy brain

I still drank on the drug – but instead of 20 drinks on a night out, I’d have six. 

As embarrassing as it is to admit now, I saw this as an incredible achievement. 

Feeling brave, I went to see an alcohol counsellor. ‘This isn’t who I want to be,’ I said.

I really felt like I was getting somewhere, but a few sessions in, I was assigned to a different counsellor who told me I didn’t have a drinking problem. To this day, that feels like a sliding-doors moment. 

I took those words and used them to fuel another decade and a half of increasingly dangerous drinking. 

On my 31st birthday, a friend took me for a posh lunch in the city. I was in a new relationship at the time and knew my boyfriend wanted to spend the evening with me – but I’d taken the day off so there was plenty of time for champagne before that.

We ordered a bottle, then another, then a third. By the time my boyfriend called me to say he was on his way to pick me up for a birthday ‘surprise’ we’d just finished our sixth.

Staggering out of the restaurant, I got into my boyfriend’s car. He wasn’t impressed. 

‘You’re wasted!’ he said, as I collapsed into the passenger seat.

‘It’s just a bit of birthday fun,’ I slurred with a dismissive wave of the hand. 

But I was so drunk, I knew there was no coming back from it. As my boyfriend drove to the river and pulled up by a jetty, I was mortified to find he’d booked a romantic boat cruise complete with seafood dinner and champagne – yes, more champagne.

Beyond smashing a bottle of wine before I even got on the boat, I’m ashamed to say I don’t remember a moment of it. But the silent treatment from my boyfriend the next morning told me everything I needed to know.

I’d been an embarrassing drunken mess.

I’d ruined the lovely surprise he’d planned and I’d made both of us look stupid. I was mortified, but would always chalk it up to just having a few too many and promise that I’d start to ‘moderate’ my drinking.

Sometimes this worked for a while, but I’d always end up back to overdoing it.

On another occasion, I was due to pick my boyfriend up from the airport early in the morning after he returned from a business trip. I got so drunk the night before, I had to stop the car several times to vomit on the side of the road on my way to get him.

Standing in arrivals, grey-faced and sweaty, I tried to pretend I wasn’t hungover as he walked through the gate. 

But he took one look at me and his face fell.

He knew after his busy trip and exhausting journey, he was going to be the one driving the car home.

Unsurprisingly, we split soon after. He’d had enough.

I've been sober seven years (Faye is pictured with current partner Gavin)

I’ve been sober seven years (Faye is pictured with current partner Gavin)

I moved out and my drinking spiralled. This was partly because I was now an empty nester, and also because I was living alone for the first time in a long while.

I was working as a freelance consultant from home with no one to keep me in line, so my drinking started earlier and earlier. At first I’d try to wait until lunchtime, but sometimes it was 11am or earlier as I poured the first glass of the day.

I’d drink long into the evening before passing out on the couch or in bed. Then I started polishing off whatever was left in my glass the moment I woke up.

Before I knew it, I was alternating between three different bottle shops because I was so ashamed of the amount of alcohol I was buying.

Still, I was ‘high-functioning’ with very few people realising the extent of my problem behind closed doors. 

I still had the occasional boozy night out with friends, and I’d taken to taping my mobile phone to the inside of my bag because I lost it so frequently. It’s laughable now that this seemed like a better idea than just not getting blind drunk.

But more and more I was drinking at home, drinking alone. Breaking every single promise I made to myself about the ways I would drink less. 

I’d stacked on the weight, I was puffy and sick. I felt like I was hanging by a thread. But I didn’t know who I was without booze, or how to stop it. 

In a last-ditch attempt to pull myself out of this, I started seeing a counsellor again.

After one particularly heavy night of drinking and next to no sleep, I downed a glass of ‘hair-of-the-dog’ wine and stumbled into her office for our session, booze seeping out of my pores.

She took one look at me and said: ‘Faye, I think this is your rock bottom.’

And it was. I’d had enough. If this was living, I didn’t want to be here anymore.

In that moment, my behaviour around my ex on the day of my birthday surprise came flooding back. How could I have done that to him? I now know so many women like me share the same singular, painful memory of disappointing those we love the most.

As my counsellor called me out, I finally felt like I had permission to stop denying this had been a problem for a long time.

I had to make a change – not just for my sake, but for my two daughters. I made a few calls and managed to get booked in for an inpatient detox at a hospital.

I was almost certain I was physically addicted at this stage and going cold turkey at home by myself wasn’t an option. 

After six agonising days of alcohol withdrawals in hospital, I was allowed to go home. And I haven’t had a drink since.

That might sound simple, but of course, it wasn’t. I still had so much hard work to do. I had to learn to sit with uncomfortable feelings and emotions, instead of numbing them with alcohol. 

I worried about my loss of identity as a fun ‘party girl’. But the truth is, I was 44 years old and those days were long behind me. I hadn’t actually enjoyed drinking alcohol for a long time. I simply had no idea how to do life without it.

The more sober days I clocked up, the more I started to find joy in the little things, like a great cup of coffee or a beautiful sunrise. Things I’d never have noticed or cared about before.

I went to therapy, I took good care of myself, I started to like the person I was. It was truly life-changing.

I started an alcohol-free social community called Untoxicated that grew to 10,000 members and eventually retrained as an alcohol and behaviour change counsellor and coach.

So many of my clients are just like I was. Professional women in their thirties, forties and fifties, with families and high-pressure jobs, who have been told a glass at the end of the day is a reward and that several more glasses is just ‘self-care’.

Now, at seven years sober, I can promise you that’s not the case.  

For decades I felt powerless to do things differently. But I wasn’t – and nor are you. 

As told to Polly Taylor 

Faye Lawrence is a therapist, grey area drinking coach and ADHD coach who supports busy, go-getting professionals to navigate challenges with ‘grey-area drinking’, ADHD and trauma and create sustainable behaviour change. 

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