by Carlina Grillo
This year I turn 21, and I’ve never been drunk in my entire life.
Looking back on that sentence, it seems counterintuitive. Legally I wouldn’t be allowed to drink anyway, so the night’s still young – right? Well, I don’t know, maybe the night is starting to get old.
In March, it will be six years since I was diagnosed with epilepsy. I was a freshman in high school with a couple of alcoholic parents, and I wasn’t interested in drinking anyway. In fact, when the doctors told me I shouldn’t drink because of my epilepsy, I felt relieved to have an excuse not to drink. An excuse other than not wanting to – or because my dad died from alcoholism, that is.
The relief didn’t last though. Throughout highschool, I made friends with the stoners. It was easy because they wouldn’t drink like other teenagers, and I saw myself as a patient using marijuana medicinally – or at least that’s what I told my neurologist. Truth is, I’ve never had a medical problem with smoking weed or the occasional mushroom trip. I was California sober, as they say.
When I moved to Humboldt for college, to no one’s surprise, I kept up with my “medicinal” lifestyle. In high school and throughout college, I’ve stayed close with people who aren’t heavy drinkers. No frat bros and no fake IDs. Just deadheads, med cards and many tours of our local herbal facilities. That’s why I chose Humboldt over other schools. The party scene is mostly BYOBs (bring your own bong) and forest shindigs.
All that being said, it’s impossible to avoid FOMO around alcohol. Whether it’s at parties, concerts, house dinners, first dates… even in pop culture – movies, music, books – it’s everywhere. It’s as if people think college students can’t be alcoholics.
The problem I’ve always had with being California sober is the fact it never felt like I had an option. While everyone was drinking at parties, I needed to feel included in social settings. If I couldn’t pass a bottle at least I could pass a joint. I started smoking weed for fun, I kept smoking weed to feel like a normal college student. I thought because I didn’t drink I was sober, but I wasn’t. I was stuck in an in-between.
I wasn’t consciously choosing to be California sober. I couldn’t drink alcohol because of my epilepsy, and I couldn’t stop smoking weed because of Humboldt’s societal standards. After smoking weed for six years, it only made me anxious. I didn’t enjoy being high anymore, I just liked smoking in a circle with my friends. Smoking weed is a way of socializing. I don’t smoke cigarettes and I don’t vape, so how else was I supposed to fit in?
At the end of last year, I made a choice. I’m already halfway there, why not embrace it? Lean into the discomfort. I guess at parties I’ll have to rely on my natural charm. Feel my emotions, feel the social anxiety, and ride out that feeling. When I’m sober I am in complete control. Epilepsy doesn’t rule me, my surroundings don’t rule me, my inner monologue is under control… like I said, just me and my natural charm.
Now when people offer me drugs, because let’s be honest it oddly happens all the time, I tell them I’m sober. This time I mean it. Nothing to justify, no specifying what sober means, just sober by definition. It’s even got a ring to it.
“Yeah, I’m sober.”
Spending time with friends, laughing until I’m crying, journaling before bed, it’s all got a new ring to it.
I still have my vices though. Ice cream by the quart, getting way too invested in board games, trauma dumping in the newspaper…
You could say it’s a different kind of high, but I’d rather not. I’m sober.
