Kia Ora.
I’m 16 days into my new life without the turps. Life hasn’t really changed too much for me apart from the obvious - Not drinking beers on the weekend. I’m actually quite enjoying it, I wish I could say that I have had monumental breakthroughs in the way I look at life. Like how good food tastes on my taste buds, how soothing the sound of my children’s laughter is to my soul or that I've learned to appreciate how spectacularly cerulean blue the sky is. The truth is - The sky is still just fucking blue, food is still just food and usually always tastes good and as for the laughter of my 2 year old daughter - Well, that was an extremely bold statement - If I get to hear that sweet little innocent laugh every day for the rest of my life, I’ll die a happy man. What do I miss? I miss that first beer on a Friday afternoon. Most Friday’s I would look forward to that first sip more than anything else in life, come Friday arvo I felt like I had ‘earned’ that beer and more importantly - I DESERVED it. I had made it through another week and that was my special treat for being such an outstanding human being in both my work and personal life. I mean hell, I had not had a beer since the previous weekend and now it was time to spend some quality time with my pals in both the small brown bottles with the red labels and the big clear bottles with the black label and white letters. They never had plans with anyone else and would always make time for me. I am grateful for the warmth and constancy of their friendship over the past 20 odd years or so. So, it’s difficult for me to see alcohol as an enemy and as something that’s detrimental to me and my life and not as a friend and close companion. After all, it’s been my best friend and been at my side providing amplification, hype and comfort for some of the biggest moments of my life. The biggest of those moments was when I lost my mum to cancer on the 9th December 2010 after a 2 year battle. She was 51. FUCK YOU CANCER. For those of you who have lost a parent at a relatively young age (or any age) you know how heartbreakingly difficult it is to get yourself back on the road that you were on while they were still in your life. The truth of the matter is that you’re no longer on that same road and you’ll never be back on it, no matter how hard you try; that onramp and timeline is closed to you forever. You’re now stuck in the Alternate 1985 timeline that Biff Tannen created when he stole the DeLorean & went back to November 12th 1955 on the day of the ‘Enchantment Under the Sea’ dance and gave himself the ‘Grays Sports Almanac’ book. Everything is pretty shit. You’ve lost one half of the unconditional love that you’re guaranteed when you’re bought into this world. 50% of it - gone, never to return………..The worst thing about it is that it wasn’t your fault. You didn’t have a say in any of it yet it’s you that has to bear the brunt of it and carry that hefty bag of shit and emotions for the rest of your life. There’s not one thing that you could have done differently that would have altered the final outcome of this terrible situation that you’ve found yourself in. They’re gone and will always be gone. Deal with it. I dealt with it by spending a lot more time with my friends (the ones with the different coloured labels I mentioned earlier) and they did help me get by. I guess John Lennon was right, after all. “I get by with a little help from my friends”. I remember saying to my older brother on the day that mum died (while she was desperately trying to cling to the life that was being pulled out of her with every breath) “Don’t let me go too hard on the bottle after she’s gone, bro” To which he replied: “Bro you do whatever you have to do to get through”. Now, I always ALWAYS remembered everything that happened after a night out on the piss. There are maybe 2 times when someone has said to me “Oy. Remember when you did this XXXXXX last night”? That I didn’t remember. I have without a doubt, the best memory of anyone that I know. I have never told anyone this before (not even my wife) But I have no memory of the 2 months that followed my mum’s passing. I remember the 3am trip to Denny's to get a chicken club sandwich and curly fries with my wife and friends the morning after she died. I remember speaking at her funeral and I remember getting told to get out of the spa pool at 2am the night of my mum's wake by my dad and I remember laying in bed one night crying in Nikita’s arms and her cuddling me and rubbing my head and back until I fell asleep. To this day it is the closest I have ever felt to her and was the best cuddle I have ever had in my life. After that - I have nothing…..So from the 9th December 2010 ‘til maybe February 2011 - It’s blank. Nothing, nada, zip. I have my friends with the labels to thank for this. I was so deep in a hole that at any time I could have been given ‘the hose’ and told to ‘rub the lotion on my skin’. I never really understood the term ‘self medicating’ and thought it was a load of bullshit - some people might just drink because they enjoy it and not to repress unresolved trauma. If that’s you - Good on ya! I salute you. I wish I was someone that could ‘take or leave’ the booze and while I wasn’t someone that would drink every day, I was someone that would drink once a week without fail and the amount that I would drink had become more and more scary in recent years. I despise people that boast about how much they drink and who go as far as saying shit like “Last night I had 10 drinks here and then had G&T’s when we got to the bar and then a box of Bourbons at the kick ons” I don’t give a good god damn how much you can drink and i certainly don’t need to hear about it in detail. I am also acutely aware of the irony that it is exactly what I’m about to do now (kind of). The average night on the piss for me would (or could) consist of the following. Fucking heaps! Enough to get 3 or 4 people hammered and keep them hammered for the whole night. Anyway - I Digest…… I was self medicating and had been for quite some time. Alcohol soothed and relaxed me when I needed it to, pumped me up and had me raring to go when I needed it too and helped me cope when I needed it too. “Take 1 box of pre mixes and 1L of Jack Daniels (with Coke) and consume by the can or glass as often as needed. If your symptoms persist, remove the Coke and proceed to consume two fingers over ice or neat depending on your need”. Now there was a prescription I could get behind! Not anymore. Lee Weir M.D has been struck off, never to practice his own rogue methods or malpractice again. Slightly off topic but whoever coined the phrase ”Time Heals All Wounds” needs a swift roundhouse kick to the noggin. Time doesn’t heal shit! It’ll be 14 years this year that Antonia Maria Weir has not been in my life. 14 Birthdays that we’ve been robbed of. 14 Christmases where we’ve not been able to exchange presents. 14 Mother’s Days we've not been able to celebrate and thousands of hugs and kisses that I’ve not been able to give or receive. Don’t tell me that time can heal that, it can’t! I guess the saying “Time heals fuck all, and I guess that over time you just get better at dealing with it” doesn’t really have the same ring to it. Time has zero healing properties. If you take the time right now to think about something or a certain ‘life event’ that has happened and made you incredibly sad - you’ll get sad about it and it will hurt. Something that I have found that helps is what I like to call ‘Micro Grieving’. It takes about 10 - 15 minutes and it will 100% help you. Make sure that you’re by yourself. Put some headphones on and listen to a piece of music that resonates with how you’re feeling or just a sad song that will evoke those emotions from you and just have a good cry. I do this at least once a week (mostly on my way to or home from work in my car). For me it’s a Pearl Jam Song called ‘Come Back’ a Coldplay song called ‘The Scientist’ and as embarrassing as this is for a Rock Radio Announcer to admit - A certain Celine Dion song. I promise you that once you’ve done this, you’ll feel so fucking good. Feeling things is good. Being emotional is good. Crying is good. It lets the ‘Boo Hoo’s out. I wasn’t too sure if I should share this deeply personal and somewhat unorthodox & weird exercise with you or not but hey, it’s out there now and if it works for you - You’re welcome. Back on point - It’s been two (nearly three weeks) since I last had a buzz from alcohol and while the cravings are still present, I know that I have made the right choice. I have made a promise to myself that there’s just no room in my life for alcohol anymore. I think about all the time that I have wasted on being drunk or hungover and how much ‘family time’ has been sacrificed/sabotaged by me and my drinking habits and it makes me sad. Don’t get me wrong, at the time in my mind the decision to drink and not do whatever ‘bullshit family thing’ was being pitched to me was 100% the right call to make. It’s only now when I realise how much my presence was missed that I feel shitty about it. I’m not in any of the cool photos of Nikita and the kids, I wasn’t there for many of the experiences that my children had had and I can’t join in on the ‘Remember when we went to XXXX and saw that cool thing’ etc etc. That’s on me. I fucked up. Bad Lee! YOU NAUGHTY BOY!!! Every time I think about knocking the froth off of a couple dozen golden throat charmers - I now think about my children and how I’m not going to deprive them of doing something (anything) with their dad because he wants to thunder pump some tins. Whether it be jamming a few solo battles on Fortnite & chasing that elusive victory royale with the boy, having a game of Cribbage with the girl or doing the same god damn puzzle with the toddler 10 times; it’s what gets me through my ‘go on bro, have one’ cravings. FYI - That puzzle is currently the absolute bane of my existence. I have had so many people reach out to me to wish me luck, offer advice and say that me publicly addressing the fact that I’ve decided to quit drinking has sparked something within them and that they’re going to join me on this journey. Which is pretty bloody cool. The amount of love and support that I’ve received is incredibly humbling so, thank you to everyone that has reached out to me. I’ll continue to write shit like this as often as I feel led to. Also, I do not think that now that I’ve said ‘see ya’ to the suds that I’m any better than someone who drinks. I’m simply sharing my personal journey and thoughts on the matter in the hopes that someone at the very least, gets a good read out of it. If anything that I have written or said here resonates with you and you want to start making some changes to the habits you have then by all means - Give it a hoon. If not - Don’t. You do you. Until next time ~ Cheers & no beers, Lee.
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I have chosen to give up drinking. And no. It’s not a poxy new years resolution or anything like that. But because I want to. I’ve had a good run on the ‘golden throat charmers’ and now the sun is finally setting on our near 30-year relationship. Don’t get me wrong - we’ve had a great relationship and alcohol will forever and always occupy an incredibly special piece of my heart but it’s just time to call it a day. To quote the great philosopher Craig David - “I’m walking away”. Every relationship has its ups and downs and my relationship with alcohol was just that. Picking one up and drinking it down. Then another, then another. It was great. I bloody loved it. I was good at it. I never used alcohol to fit in though. I have never thought of myself as being better when I’ve had a few. A little louder, yes. But do I need alcohol to ‘be accepted’?, no. No, I do not. I am just as much fun without the booze. I was also never an aggressive person or a dickhead while I was on it either. I’ve also never wet or shit the bed while drunk. That’s a win any way you look at it. I did however schedule every social thing that I’d do around the availability of alcohol. Everything I did socially was done around the fact that I would be able to punch a few whilst doing it. Sport games, picnics, beach days, dinner with friends, Barbecues and fuck, even kids’ birthday parties these days seem to have an alcohol station at them for the parents right next to the fairy bread and sausage rolls. I’ll miss that. Drinking has been a large part of who I am for as long as I can remember. I’d wear the “Lee can handle his piss” comments like a badge of honour and took immense pride that while most people were on their third or fourth beer – I was happily chopping my way through my eighth or ninth. Let’s just say that if we were to go halves on a 15 box – You were getting 7. That precious 8th beer was all mine and often chopped right at the opening of the box, I’d neck the first one in a couple of gulps, then open my second one while you were half way through your first so casually that you wouldn’t even realise that I’d had one more than you until we were reaching for the last two beers in the box and think “15 isn’t an even number, where did that 15th beer go”? Not my first rodeo, mate. I’m a pro. You’re smashing suds with the best of ‘em, pal. I wouldn’t drink every day. Hell, I’d say that drinking one night out of the week was totally fine, wouldn’t you? I would say that it was a minority of the time, not a majority of the time that I would punch beers. But I would punch beers. One night a week (usually on the weekend without fail) I would punch beers. Drinking every weekend (or every second weekend if I absolutely have to push it out that far) is something I have done since I was around 14/15 years old. It’s a routine, that’s all. A routine that needs to be changed. I have done it in other areas of my life, so I can do it this area too, surely? I have seen great results and changes in my health since making small sustainable changes in both what I eat and the quantity in which I eat. I have lost close to 13 kilos in the last 4/5 months and have noticed that clothes that didn’t fit me prior to making these changes are now fitting my rig just fine. So, this change in my alcohol consumption will surely prove to be beneficial to both my health and my wardrobe. I have a heart condition called Atrial Fibrillation. It is an irregular and elevated heartbeat. I never know when it’s going to come on and it’s a real pain in the ass. It’s quite palpitatey when it happens and is very uncomfortable. The episodes can last anywhere from 10 minutes – multiple hours. As a result of this I am on several different medications to help me keep my heart in check & rhythm.
I am also a type 2 diabetic and take Galvumet to help with that. Currently my diabetes is in check – my hba1c count is back down to nearer the pre diabetic range (a result of the changes that I have made in my diet that I mentioned earlier). Kicking goals, there. Happy with that. Back to the atrial fibrillation – This is an old peoples disease. My cardiologist told me that the main cause for someone my age getting this condition is alcohol consumption. She asked me 2 years ago during our first consult if I drank. The conversation went like this. “Lee this is an old people’s condition. Young people don’t usually suffer from this. The main cause for someone my age getting this condition is alcohol consumption. Do you drink”? “Yes I do”. “How much”? “No, no. That’s what I do. Some people play golf, others read books. I drink”. “do you drink every day”? “God no. I’m not an alcoholic. I do drink to excess every weekend though”. “How many Drinks do you have in one sitting”? “Depends. I could drink anywhere from XXXXXXX or XXXXXXX and XXXXXXXX in one session”. “O.K, well that’s not good. You should stop drinking altogether. That’s my professional recommendation.” “For how long”? “Until further notice”. “Fuck.” So, I stopped drinking for a few weeks and then slowly slid back into my old habits. Recently I have felt that my relationship with the booze is coming to an end. I’ve felt this way for a while now. So, it’s time to act. Time to say goodbye. It will be hard. It will suck at times but ultimately it will be for the best. No longer will I have to hear about people saying things about me to my family like “I’m worried about Lee. He drinks too much. I’m going to say something to him” While I am sure that the above comes from a good place being the last person to know that people are talking about you, sucks. No matter what the subject matter is or how good their intentions are. I’ve chosen to Break up with it. No trial separation, no marriage counselling. No late night ‘you up’? texts. I’m talking about a complete severance, and you know what, the divorce settlement will be win-win for me. I get the kids, the dog, the house, the DVD collection, the long happy life and alcohol gets nothing. Nothing except the odd desperate and awkward glances from me when I’m in a ‘drinking scenario’ at least for the first wee while. Don’t stop inviting me out. Don’t carefully open beers around me adjust your drinking habits to suit me. I’ll be fine. Onwards and upwards… L |
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AuthorLee Weir - Radio Announcer, Marriage Celebrant and Guinness World Record Holder. Archives
January 2024
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