If you’ve played an RPG before, this is how my health bar looked on Monday. I was operating at about 25% efficiency. In my mind, I incorrectly reasoned that if I stopped drinking by 4pm on Sunday, I’d be fine. I ended up quitting at 6pm which wasn’t horrible, but my nutrition during the day is what made me pay the ultimate price. I ate a Healthy Choice frozen meal at around 11 and then some Ham and Cheese Sliders at 2pm from Misconduct. After trying to find the beer Pliney the Elder, and getting yelled at for talking to some dude’s girl, I went to Fado and caspered out around 6. I drank 1 glass of water for the day and wound up essentially passing out at 6:30 and sleeping until the next day. Productive Sunday.

The previous paragraph is setting up what it takes to recover. On Monday I knew I was hurt. I walked in to Dunkin and the music seemed like it was blaring. I ordered my coffee and felt like an unsure human driving to work. I sat behind my desk and tried to settle in but it was to no avail. I then went to the gym and ran for 30 minutes which was painful but I deemed it necessary. I then ate another small meal and chugged two coco-waters. I had bowling that night and knew that I was in trouble which proved to be the case. The team went 2-2, but I was about 60 pins below my average, which just doesn’t happen if I’m feeling 100%. Another negative side effect is you don’t sleep for more than 2-3 hours. Your body keeps waking you up either to pee or just because. Not fun.

HH – UD Highschool BBall Game

I survived a tough Monday and knew it was only going to get better. Not quite. On Tuesday, I did start to feel like a normal human but there are dehydration symptoms that don’t go away in a 24 hour period. You think all you have to do is drink water but this doesn’t work. Your body can only take so much water so the more water you drink, the more times you pee it out. My mouth stays dry. My brain is still not fully smart. My shits aren’t normal. You belch up acid and pray to god it goes away. I was at least able to eat some food which, when you can’t do, is when you have the ultimate length in recovery time. I went to the gym where I powered through another work out and then went to Upper Dublin basketball game and got through it.  I watched some TV and actually got a full night’s rest.

This brings me to today. I was able to write the trip blog post which I hadn’t been able to do. Frankly, you can’t do anything when you feel like this to its full potential. It’s sort of what it feels like being the slow student in school. You can’t pick up ideas quickly and everything you do is below your ability. This weekend was coming off of my trip and essentially 3 weeks of not doing any think like this to my body. It sort of confirms my thought that these issues stem more from my environment than my personal addiction to drinking. It’s not like I crave a beer. It’s like I drink because I’m at a bar watching a game. I share this info so other people read it and know that you don’t want this. I also probably write it so I know that I don’t want it for myself. It’s not the best way to go through life. This is obviously not the first time I’ve gone through such a process so I’m sort of like an expert on it now so that’s the other reason I post.