Dead Drunk After Three Years

It has been almost three years since I first began writing my account of addiction and about my time spent in Thamkrabok temple detox. So much has happened during that time, and my life has changed in so many ways. For one thing my son came along and that certainly shook my world, but things have been unpredictable in other ways as well. When I first began posting some of my experiences as a blog it was just a way to get things off my chest; there was no way that I could know that this would all lead to an actual published book. Yet here we are; today for the first time I held the finished product 'Dead Drunk' in my hands.

You hear stories about people spending years trying to get their first book published; rejection after rejection but still they soldier on. I have been more or less walked through the process from beginning to end. At every step of the way there were people to help me; individuals who seemed as eager to get my story told as I did. Three years seems like a long time to me, but whenever doubts began to arise there were people to take me on to the next stage. My book Dead Drunk is as much their success as it is mine; just making it to this stage has been a wonderful gift.

On a few occasions this week I have been asked to explain why I wrote this book. After all, aren't there more than enough stories about addiction out there already? Why would anybody be interested in reading a rehash of the same old same old? I always pause when this question is asked and feel a little flustered. Not because I don't have an answer, but because I fear that I'll come across as too full of myself; someone who thinks they are somehow a cut above everyone else. I think that we all have stories that are worth hearing, but mine just really wants to be told - it may sound a bit crazy but that's how it seems.

So to answer the question as to why my story should be read by other people; I can only say that it is other people who have ensured that the story has been published. The people who were interested enough to keep me going and who provided encouragement when it was needed. Maybe these people read something in my story that resonated with their own lives. Dead Drunk is not just about escaping addiction; it is a story about how we all get second chances even after we mess up again and again.

Next week the book will be in the shops and I'll be busy trying to promote it; doing things I never even dreamed of having to do. This means facing my biggest fear; the possibility of rejection. I want more people to like my book and this seems to mean making them like me. It was to escape the possibility of this type of rejection that I ran into addiction in the first place. It is something that I have to do now though, because I really do believe in this book and those people who put so much faith in me deserve my best efforts.

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