Emotional Thaw Out

I think I'm suffering with emotional thaw out. I say suffering at this time because it's a very strange and unusual feeling, which I find somewhat disturbing. I've been told that this happens to alcoholics who are young to the program, and I think that it's happening to me now.

I started drinking when I was fifteen years old. I drank for a lot of reasons, I wanted to be fun and relaxed and entertaining, but mostly just so I didn't want to have to be myself. I didn't want to feel the way that I felt inside. I felt abandoned by my parents, because my mother had her own problems and my dad literally abandoned me when I was six until I was fifteen. Also, aside from the fact that I've had issues with depression since a very young age, I was a worrier by nature, so I wasn't very fun or relaxed. I had delusional thoughts that my "friends" didn't really like me, they just let me hang around because they didn't want to hurt my feelings. I was a very unhappy person. Therefore I drank, I drank to be numb.

Since I've stopped drinking less than 90 days ago, I find that I'm not only hypersensitive, but I'm feeling things that I can't identify. Things that I suppose have been suppressed all this time. This has led me to a state of confusion. It's very frustrating to feel something and not know how to respond to it.

I was talking with someone the other day about how I've been feeling like I'm inside my own head. I'm having a hard time dealing with social situations, and forcing myself to be friendly. It's not that I want to be unfriendly, but I just can't find the energy to speak. They said that it sounds like how normal people feel when they're depressed. Whoa! I thought. This isn't like any depression I've ever felt. I'm used to envying the people in the grave yard and stuff. So my immediate response was well, how will I know when I'm happy? Because again my definition of happy consists of me conquering the world. I guess I'll figure it out. Til then I'm learning how to identify and deal, soberly, with these new emotions that have been gone for so long. For the first time in a long time I guess I know what it feels like to be alive. It's not so too bad.