Alcohol & Our Mental Health

For years, I thought Lexapro and wine were the power combo for my mental health. It turns out that only one of those was a helpful tool, but the way I combined them made both ineffective. It was mental health self-sabotage. Here’s why…

A year or so after my youngest son was born, I found myself in a dark place. For the first time in my life, I was really struggling with my mental health. It was a messy combo of mild depression and anxiety. Not bad enough to be scary, but just bad enough to make things unpleasant. I was full of inexplicable rage, and I couldn’t enjoy being a mom. I felt like I was in a heavy fog, forcing myself to go through the motions each day. As someone who had never experienced this before, it took me a while to acknowledge what I was feeling.

After talking to my doctor and a little trial and error, I ended up with a prescription for Lexapro, and it totally changed my life. Lexapro and I clicked. It was just what I needed. Like with so many other things, it wasn’t a magic solution that made all my issues disappear, but it lifted the fog enough for me to find myself again. It calmed the weird rage I’d been feeling and brought me back to my baseline. Not perfect, but beautifully and acceptably imperfect.

Not everyone wants to go the medication route, and that’s 100% fine. There are lots of approaches to handling mental health, and just like with sobriety, we have to find what works for us. At the time, medication was just what I needed.

For years, Lexapro and I were a match made in heaven. Things were good. Did I drink while I was taking it? Sure…everyone did, right? Even though the bottle clearly tells us NOT to. Wine was another tool in my mental health toolbox, so clearly, it was only a gentle suggestion. I certainly wasn’t going to give up alcohol. That would be absurd.

For a while, there didn’t seem to be any issues. My body let me get away with a lot in my 30s...until it didn't.

I had a glass of wine here and there throughout the week, and then I’d drink on the weekends. I always experienced some pretty intense “downs” after drinking too much, but I just called it a hangover and assumed it was from the messy feelings tied to my drinking – the shame and regret over my blackouts and more broken promises to myself. I'd been dealing with that for years, so it was easy to brush under the rug.

Over time, it became more obvious that these “downs” after drinking were depressive episodes that were getting more extreme. The summer I ultimately quit drinking for good, I finally started to pay attention to the pattern that had emerged…

We would have friends at our lake house for the weekend, and we would drink like we were on vacation because that’s what it felt like. By Monday morning, I would feel the wave of depression rolling in. I was not only hungover, but my mental health was in the gutter. I would feel that way for a few days, and towards the end of the week when I started to feel the fog lifting, we would head back to the lake, and the cycle would start over again. As the summer went on, I could feel it all intensifying – like something big was coming. I just didn’t know what. I wasn’t quite ready for a change, but I was getting closer.

The only question I initially asked was, “Why isn’t my Lexapro working?” In hindsight, I’m astounded by my own ignorance.

Well duh. You’re not supposed to drink while on antidepressants, and it’s not just a gentle suggestion. I was creating a mental health shitstorm for myself. Alcohol itself exacerbates anxiety and depression, and then I was essentially negating the effects of my medication while making my mental state even worse. The Lexapro didn’t have a chance.

When I woke up in the middle of the night on August 6, 2021, with what would be my last hangover, and I felt that wave of depression coming for me, it finally hit me that wine was NOT actually helping me manage my mental health. It was, in fact, making it impossible to manage. The realization washed over me, and I finally acknowledged that I’d lied to myself for years. There are tons of great tools for our mental health, and alcohol is nowhere on the list. NOWHERE.

When I hung up my wine glass for good, I saw almost immediate improvement. Once the alcohol was flushed from my system, I was able to get back to that stable, content, happy place. It felt like I had shed an unnecessary layer of depression, and I was allowing my medicine to do its essential job once again. It was empowering to realize I could pull that lever and make such a positive change for my life and well-being. It was also a little disturbing that I had let things go for as long as I had.

It was also disturbing to look around me and finally recognize all of the erroneous societal messages about the role alcohol should play in managing our stress and challenges. Drinking culture is doing us such a disservice by continually pushing the narrative that alcohol is a useful tool. I hadn’t just made that idea up on my own – it was coming at me from all directions. I had been systematically conditioned to think that way.

While eliminating alcohol is not an immediate cure for our mental health struggles, it can have a tremendous impact. It certainly did for me. I’m not suggesting I’ll never again face issues. Life will not always be sunshine and daisies. That’s unrealistic and naïve. I do feel content and at peace knowing that any future ups and downs that I’ll inevitably face will not be further fueled by booze.

Yes, I still take Lexapro, and I have no desire to change that and mess with a good thing for right now. I’m in a great place, and the medication is only one tool in my new and improved mental health toolbox. That box also contains things like aggressive self-care, boundaries, exercise, therapy (coming soon), time in nature, journaling, alone time, and lots of walks. This toolbox can and should look different for all of us, but the one thing our collective boxes shouldn’t contain is alcohol, which is like gasoline on the mental health fire.

I talk about all of this and more in my book, The Dirty Truth on Social Drinking. If you haven’t read it yet, consider grabbing a copy at https://a.co/d/eRTMDAg

I certainly don’t claim to be an expert on the intersection between alcohol and mental health, so if you would like to read more about the science and research behind it, there is a LOT of great information out there. Just google “alcohol and mental health,” grab a bowl of popcorn, and get cozy.

Finally, if you’re struggling with mental health problems, alcohol use, or both, please ask for help. Don’t wait for things to get worse. If you don’t have someone to turn to, contact SAMHSA’s National Helpline. Visit https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline or call 1-800-662-HELP (4357).