Dealing with loss! Sober!

This is the hardest article that I’ve written so far, normally I share my articles on social media but this one is going to stay on my website, as it is so personal to me. With most of my thoughts, I offer little tips with what I've found useful, however in this instance, I’m just going to say a little about how things were for me. I hope you find this useful.

I recently lost a good friend. With any loss, it hurt a lot, but I found things even harder due to my sobriety. I first meet this person in my teens, we instantly hit it off. I lived in a village and he the outskirts of the local town. When we were old enough to adventure across the fields, he was the first group of friends that meet outside our village. We grew up together often in different friendship groups but whenever our paths crossed, we had an amazing time.

As I went through my 20s, I would often see this person in the pub. I would never judge another person's relationship with alcohol. However, I think it would be fair to say that we were remarkably similar and often would be the last two stood at the bar. I've had some horrible experiences while drinking, but these were not them, these were fun, and exciting and great friendships were formed.

When I first heard about the death of this person, I felt terrible. I instantly thought back to when was the last time I saw them and realised I had not seen them for 3 to 4 years! I could not believe, it had been that long, and I felt that I was a shit friend, I would never see them again and I did not deserve to. What I did not realise, was that we were both older, we had our own families and we had throughout a global pandemic which meant nobody could see anyone for two of these years.

I wanted to go to the funeral to my goodbye, but I was very scared for several reasons:

1) I’d not seen several people who would be there for several years,

2) Many there, would be friends through relationships around alcohol.

3) The wake would likely be a very heavy drinking event.

I did go to the funeral, and I’m so glad that I did. It helped me to heal. I did not try to speak to everyone there, but I did speak to a handful of friends, I’d not seen for many years. I could not believe how many people felt the same way as me. I offered kindness and understanding to these people and realised that I need to do, the same for myself.

Lots of the friends at the funeral were still drinkers. However, just like I no longer drank alcohol, I quickly realised that no one there was the same person they were 10 years ago, some were married, some had children, some had lost or gained weight and some like me were no longer drinking alcohol. Everyone I spoke to had one thing in common, the sense of loss and the sense of guilt of not seeing the person. I quickly realised that 10 years later we were the same friends, with similar feelings, we had all changed and yet we were also still the same.

I went to the wake, and wow it was busy, there were lots of people drinking. It amazes me now that I'm sober, how much alcohol is ingrained into everything in society. However, this is one of the times, alcohol-free beer has helped me. I bought 2 bottles of Heineken 0% and had them poured into a pint glass, it had to be a pint after all the ones, I had enjoyed with my late friend over the years. I said a toast in my head and thanked him for all the good times that we had shared.

I’m so pleased that I found the courage to go, not only did I get to say goodbye to a loved friend, but I got a chance to learn more about myself. I will treasure the memories that I have but also use my future to make more, continually trying to grow, and trying to stay slightly more connected to others.

I will miss you greatly.........

Ben – It's That Sober Guy

Disclaimer – I'm not a trained addiction or mental health professional, information is based on my own life experiences and shared in good faith to help others.