Drinkers, after all, find other drinkers. We tend to choose people who speak a certain language: Let’s go get a drink. Let’s have another. Oh, c’mon. Just one more… The chorus plays in the mind, liquid lyrics. The drinker who’s always game for another, who’d rather stay and drink than go out and eat, who encourages the rest of the people at the table to keep drinking, who feels secret relief when the nondrinkers in the group pick up their coats and straggle off—that drinker hears the music. About half the alcohol in the U.S. is consumed by eleven percent of the population: together, we do a lot of singing. – Carolyn Knapp, Drinking: A Love Story

I’ve loved drinking for a long time, and had lots of friends who did too. When I was contemplating quitting drinking, probably the single biggest barrier was the conundrum of what it would do to my friendships. If I couldn’t go out to bars with my friends, would they remain my friends? What on earth would we do together? Would I have to cut off those relationships altogether or risk falling back into alcoholism again? 

In my later drinking days, I met one of those people I was sure I wanted to be friends with. She was new at work, and I’m sure she could have used some new friends. Like a potential suitor, I nervously asked her if she wanted to join a friend and me for a drink. She replied that she didn’t really drink, and immediately, I realized we would not be friends. Without bonding over drinks, I had no idea how to become her friend. If you didn’t drink, I didn’t know what to do with you (the story has a happy ending – after I sobered up, she joined a weekly card game with some mutual friends, and we had a very friendly relationship until COVID sent us all away to work from home. She is as lovely as I thought she would be).   

For many, many addicts, the question is more dire. Literally every friend they have, and often family, are also addicted to heroin, or meth, or alcohol. Getting sober means severing every important tie they have. I am in awe of the courage it takes to quit drugs when it can mean walking away from every friend the addict has in the world. For such people, recovery communities serve an additional function of being a place where they can meet new people to populate their lives, sober friends who can help keep them clean.

I was afraid to lose friends, but what I didn’t anticipate was finding new depths of friendships with people I’d known for a long time. My partner Dan sobered up long before I did, and has been a wise and thoughtful guide on my addiction journey – we are closer than ever with this thing in common. One of my long-time best friends moved across the country, and she got sober too – rediscovering a new kind of friendship with her has been one of the most gratifying experiences of my life. We used to get wasted together, and today we can bond over how much better our lives are now. Most of the people I used to party with have sobered up one way or another – whether they just sort of organically cut down because of kids and career and stuff, or whether they had to give it up, lots of us have sobering up in common. 

Probably the most painful aspect has been the shift in my relationship with my mom. We used to spend hours over drinks, smoking cigarettes on the back porch. Since I quit, we don’t have that time together, and it’s damaged our relationship quite a bit. I still don’t know how to fix it. I try to spend time with her doing other things, like going for walks, but it’s not the same. Maybe it never will be.

After I had some sobriety under my belt, I started wondering how it would be to go to drinking establishments as a sober person. Portland is teeming with beautiful watering holes, from shiny hipster gems to classic, sexy wood-paneled standbys to green vine-lined sunny patios. I didn’t love drinking any more. Could I still love a bar? Could I sit across from friends enjoying their drinks and not feel desperate for my own drink? Could I go to the barber and not get a haircut?

The answer is yes. I can enjoy being in a beautiful establishment nursing a diet Coke while my friends sip champagne and Manhattans. They are as interesting to talk to when I’m sober as they were when I was drinking alongside them. And, bonus: I actually remember the experience the next day. No, the nights are not epic in ways I used to enjoy. But also, my life is not ruined in ways I did not enjoy. 

Do they enjoy spending time with me this way? Well, I think they probably don’t quite as much. I’ve gotten less funny in sobriety – I’m a more serious person now, and I don’t watch TV and cruise Reddit as much as I used to, so I’m less ready with the one-liners. I’m usually only good for a couple of hours of hanging out, so I’m the nondrinker picking up my coat and heading home, giving the drinkers a sigh of relief that they can drink like they want to instead of the restrained, polite drinking you do around people you think might judge you (I remember it well). And of course my mom, who may never love me like she used to. 

I have to admit my friendships with drinking friends are not what they used to be. It’s a sacrifice I’ve had to make. If quitting drinking didn’t come with some serious trade-offs, it would be easy to do, and it is certainly not easy. It was still worth it, 100%.