Laura Mckowen - We Are the Luckiest: The Surprising Magic of a Sober Life

Advance Praise for We Are the Luckiest

We Are the Luckiest is a masterpiece. Its the truest, most generous, honest, and helpful sobriety memoir Ive read. Its going to save lives.

Glennon Doyle, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Love Warrior

Laura McKowens fearless, eloquent, powerful story is an ode to living an awakened life. Yes, this is a book about getting (and staying) sober, but its so much more than that. Its about embracing the beautiful messiness of being human. Readers of We Are the Luckiest are lucky indeed.

Dani Shapiro, New York Times bestselling author of Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love

Heartbreakingly candid and brave, Laura McKowen takes us on an unflinching journey of what it means to get sober. We Are the Luckiest explores what it means to reclaim ones life and more. An unforgettable, soulful read.

Ann Dowsett Johnston, author of Drink: The Intimate Relationship Between Women and Alcohol

Vulnerability sounds great in theory and is hard as hell in practice. Laura McKowen writes with grace and wisdom but also with huge vulnerability. By telling her story with raw, unflinching honesty, she invites us to look at our own stories with new compassion.

Claire Dederer, bestselling author of Poser: My Life in Twenty-Three Yoga Poses and Love and Trouble: A Midlife Reckoning

Laura speaks to that place within us where what breaks our heart becomes our highest learning and our most invaluable currency.

Elena Brower, bestselling author of Practice You

Laura McKowen is a stunning writer, and this book is a gift for everyone: the newly sober, those with longtime sobriety, those for whom the sands are beginning to shift, and those who simply arent sure where they stand. This is beautiful, revelatory writing filled with grace and awareness about what it means to be a complicated human being living in a complicated world, and not only surviving, but thriving. It will be a blessing for everyone who reads it.

Elissa Altman, author of Motherland: A Memoir of Love, Loathing, and Longing

In a voice both direct and kind, Laura McKowen shines a shame-erasing light on her history of addiction and illuminates the lucky life she found in its wake. Through personal stories and practical advice, she offers readers a path to the other side of their own struggles and more importantly, she illustrates with eloquence and vividness why that path is more than worth the effort. As a person in long-term sobriety, even I found inspiration and useful tips in this warm, compassionate book.

Kristi Coulter, author of Nothing Good Can Come from This

We Are the Luckiest is a hope-inducing dose of narrative medicine for those who fear that life ends after drinking does. Like a long, honest conversation with a very good friend, Lauras story is a gift to anyone starting out on that scary, lucky path.

Melissa Febos, author of Whip Smart and Abandon Me

We Are the Luckiest is ultimately about the wild and holy effort of trying to face this great big unsayable love inside us without numbing ourselves from its blazing truth or distancing ourselves from the fact that its here with us, whether we ever believe were worthy of it or not. Laura McKowens words are drenched with proof of the existence of this unsayable love, and with hope that its never too late for any of us to begin to say yes to a life thats courageously present to it.

Meggan Watterson, Wall Street Journal bestselling author of Mary Magdalene Revealed

Copyright 2020 by Laura McKowen

All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic, mechanical, or other without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

Permission acknowledgments on page 231 are an extension of the copyright page.

The material in this book is intended for education. It is not meant to take the place of diagnosis and treatment by a qualified medical practitioner or therapist. No expressed or implied guarantee of the effects of the use of the recommendations can be given or liability taken.

Some names and identifying characteristics have been changed.

Text design by Tona Pearce Myers

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: McKowen, Laura, date, author.

Title: We are the luckiest : the surprising magic of a sober life / Laura McKowen.

Description: Novato, California : New World Library, [2020] | Summary: A memoir of alcohol addiction and recovery, written by a successful career woman who describes the joys and challenges of staying sober in a culture permeated by drinking. --Provided by publisher.

Identifiers: LCCN 2019042319 (print) | LCCN 2019042320 (ebook) | ISBN 9781608686544 (hardback) | ISBN 9781608686551 (epub)

Subjects: LCSH: McKowen, Laura, date- | Recovering alcoholics--United States--Biography. | Alcoholics--Rehabilitation--United States.

Classification: LCC HV5293.M35 A3 2020 (print) | LCC HV5293.M35 (ebook) | DDC 362.292092 [B]--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019042319

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019042320

First printing, January 2020

ISBN 978-1-60868-654-4

Ebook ISBN 978-1-60868-655-1

Printed in Canada on 100% postconsumer-waste recycled paper

10987654321

For Alma

1. It is not your fault.

2. It is your responsibility.

3. It is unfair that this is your thing.

4. This is your thing.

5. This will never stop being your thing until you face it.

6. You cannot do it alone.

7. Only you can do it.

8. I love you.

9. I will never stop reminding you of these things.

Contents

How did you go bankrupt? Bill asked.

Two ways, Mike said. Gradually and then suddenly.

ERNEST HEMINGWAY, The Sun Also Rises

O n July 13, 2013, the night of my brothers wedding, I left my four-year-old daughter alone in a hotel room overnight because I was blackout drunk. It shouldnt have been a surprise, but it was to me, to my family, to my friends who found out later. I had a twenty-year history with alcohol and sometimes it looked problematic, but mostly except for the last couple of years, and even then only if you got