- I quit drinking before the pandemic started because alcohol gave me anxiety.
- My husband quit shortly after because he didn't have a drinking buddy anymore.
"What are you, 80?" my friend joked in a text. I was explaining to her that my husband and I had just gotten home from our date. It was 4 p.m., and we'd spent the day rock hunting and then sipping espresso at a coffee shop.
I mean, she's not wrong. When we date, it's almost always during the day, and we can be found snowshoeing, hiking, biking, kayaking, or, yes, with our butts in the air searching for rocks.
But we weren't always this kind of couple. In fact, we were the opposite. We were both big binge drinkers — having met in college and being partyers. It wasn't healthy. It wasn't healthy in college, and it certainly wasn't healthy as we began to raise our two children.
First, something happened to me a few months before the pandemic hit. I couldn't handle the anxiety alcohol always gave me. I'd jolt up at 3 a.m. each time I drank, and anxiety would keep me awake worrying about how I'd be a bad mom the following day. Finally, I broke the cycle and stopped. I haven't had a sip of booze in about two and a half years.
My husband followed once the pandemic started because, well, he had no one to drink with anymore. Slowly, he began to feel empowered by sobriety, too. This change eventually led us to move to where we could spend more time outside.
Sobriety connected us
We found that we connected on a deeper level. We talked about things that went beyond the surface — and beyond parenting duties. Together, we grew vulnerable, brave. My husband and I shared our dreams for the future and our regrets about the past. Eventually, the truth came out: We both yearned for more than our suburban life of nine-to-five jobs and taxiing the kids to their activities.
As the pandemic stretched on, our little family of four thrived outside. We connected on the trails and along the shores. So we started to take our dates there, too. After some road trips to national parks in Virginia and North Carolina, we knew we had to listen to our inner voices.
We decided to uproot our family from metro Detroit to northern Michigan, where the forests are deeper, the shores longer, and the nature wilder. My husband quit his finance job to work with his new passion: real estate. I began to listen to my whispers and teach nature writing while working on my book.
Our life is slower because we want it to be
One day prior to our move, my husband and I were hiking along the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore in northwest Michigan. We had just dropped our son off at his first overnight outdoor camp. We came to an overlook of the endless, blue Lake Michigan waters. I looked at my husband, holding our goldendoodle on his leash. He took in a big gulp of air. He had changed.
I held his hand, and he looked at me. "I can't believe we get to live here soon," he said.
"Me too," I said. "And we get to live life, actually live life, right here. Together."
We now embrace the fact that when we go on dates, we often see older couples doing the exact same thing we are.
Sure, some may think it's strange that we're in bed before 10 p.m. every night, or that we have no desire to put on trendy clothes to have a night on the town.
That's just not us anymore. We've embraced our inner peace and feel no reason to let loose. Because for us, that caused only more headaches for tomorrow. Literally and figuratively.
So for now, we'll continue to let the wild calm us. Together.