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March 27, 2025 – We all know her. Let’s call her Claire. She appears in many books: a woman in her late 20s or early 30s; sometimes a parent, sometimes not. She’s usually cishet and white, embroiled in a mystery or scandal. And she has a drinking problem. Is she the victim or the perpetrator? We don’t know until the end, thanks to her alcohol use.
It took me years to get sober. After fighting through the initial denial (which took a long time), I still hesitated because, after all, I didn’t look or act like the alcoholics I saw represented in books or on TV. I wasn’t living on the streets. I wasn’t falling apart. I hadn’t alienated everyone and lost my job. In fact, I acted quite a bit like Claire, who blatantly has a drinking problem, but because it’s wine it’s fine. After all, she’s got a job and a boyfriend/husband and she’s solving a mystery, so she doesn’t need sobriety, even with her binge-drinking and the problems it gives her.
