I turned 58 over the weekend. After a morning walk, I sat with my journal and coffee and thought about my life. Who I am. Who I am becoming. And where I had been.

I grew up in south Louisiana, surrounded by drinking. I had my first beer at a high school party.

But it was at LSU, around 19, that my drinking turned heavy. When I graduated, my drinking graduated right along with me. As I grew up, it grew up too. Cheap beer turned into IPAs and fine wine.

Looking back, I never really got to know who I was without it.

People talk a lot about transformation after you stop drinking. I think my transformation happened when I was younger.

Drinking gave me a way to fit in. When I left Louisiana, it shaped my identity as someone who was fun to have a beer with. It was useful.

But there was a darker side. Drinking turned me down a path of escaping and hiding from things in my life. Hiding from the damage caused by my emotionally abusive mother.

And I learned to sabotage myself. I told myself life was too hard. I told myself I was never going to amount to much.

I’m not sure who I would have been if I hadn’t spent 30 years drinking. But I know it dulled my curiosity. It kept me chasing the wrong things. Status. Money. Being the fun guy. And it kept me from really seeing the people around me.

Now I want something different. I want to do work that helps the people around me. Take the work seriously. Not myself.

Quitting let me meet the guy who was there all along. The one I was never allowed to be.

In some ways I don’t feel 58. I feel 38. Like I have a new view of my life and what’s in front of me.

If you’re a few months in and wondering who’s under there, these are the things I explore with people inside the Walking Sober Club.

Terry