The Dating Game

Blog post by: Alumni Relations Specialist

There’s a rumor going around saying we shouldn’t date in our first year of sobriety. I say ‘rumor,’ because I didn’t want to believe it. Please don’t take away alcohol and drugs and then tell me I can’t engage in playful flirting and looking for the man of my dreams in the rooms of AA! So I ignored the suggestion and started scanning the rooms for my next victim. I found one and began a four-year battle of staying sober and learning how to grow up, pay my bills, get the trust back from my kids and find time for someone who was almost as immature in sobriety as I was. I kept thinking, no matter what happens, I won’t drink over a man. No matter what. We had our ups and downs and at first we kept the relationship a secret, which fed my addiction for manipulation and lying. Then it got real, and believe it or not, the man of my dreams had faults, and lots of them. I started to build resentments against him and we would break up, only to find our way back together again because I thrive on chaos. It’s all I’ve known. Finally, after four years he just decided not to call again and left me for someone else. Ouch! Not so great for the little self esteem I had managed to pull together by working a program. I immediately set out to sooth the pain with, you guessed it, another man in the rooms of AA. This time I went for longevity. This man had years of sobriety. Surely he would be the one! He wasn’t. As far as I know, none of us drank over the heartbreak, blow to our ego, twisted thing we call a “relationship.” Would I do it all over again? Not if I wanted to focus more on finding out who I am and learning to be ok with myself. Today I leave the men in the rooms alone. When I go to a meeting, I actually listen to “How it works” and remember that I am there to stay sober.