Marian Keyes on staying sober and online scrolling
The Irish author on celebrating 32 years sober and how she starts her day by scrolling through pretty things online.
The Irish author on celebrating 32 years sober and how she starts her day by scrolling through pretty things online.
I’ve recently realised I use my writing to sidestep reality. Especially at the moment. I’m finding the world so frightening – as we all are – that I feel like I have no sense of what’s going to happen and what the outcome will be, and my writing is such a relief.
The people in my books are going through stuff but it’s not the kind of terror that’s happening in the world. I get enormous comfort from stories about people falling in love, or funny situations, or even painful situations. Even if I couldn’t get published any more, I’d still write just for me.
I have just celebrated 32 years sober. Back in my twenties, alcohol was the love of my life and anything that I couldn’t cope with, I drank to make it stop. Obviously, it just made things worse, but at the time it numbed things and was a painkiller for me.
I had very low self-esteem and really felt like I was born lacking. But I don’t believe that any more and I have enormous freedom from alcohol. I will never touch it again. I can be around people who are having a drink but when they start talking nonsense or telling me they love me, I just slip away.
I met my husband Tony [Baines] at his 30th birthday party in October 1992 – he worked with my flatmate. He was so nice but I was still drinking then and ‘nice’ was the most tedious thing; I went after messy relationships that were about somebody endorsing my terrible low self-worth.
Then I went into rehab in January 1994, and when I came out he was there as a friend. I remember one day leaving work in Bedford Square, London, the rain had just stopped and he walked around the corner. There he was, punctual and reliable and kind, and I really saw him. We’ve been together ever since and had our 30th anniversary last month. He has never once tried to dim my light.
"It’s a joy seeing the Walsh Sisters books being made into a TV series – none of my books had made it to TV for 27 years, even though many were optioned, so I stopped believing it would happen. And then, all of a sudden, it did."
The Walsh Sisters is on BBCiPlayer and BBC One on Saturdays at 9pm
We would have loved children, but it didn’t happen and we chose not to do IVF. I’m not sure that there is any sort of formula for surviving something like that, but we communicated all the way through. There’s a deep thing in me – probably my Catholic upbringing – just don’t ask for too much.
I already felt so fortunate that I had met Tony. We’ve constructed a different family and have lots of nieces and nephews and spend lots of time with them. I am a disgrace as an auntie – the young ones can have as many sweets as they want. The older ones are like my best friends.
I suffered a devastating depressive episode for several years in my forties and I’ve developed coping mechanisms. I start every day by looking at beautiful things online – clothes, shoes, nail varnish. I’m very responsive to colour and for about 40 minutes I scroll through pretty things.
(Hero image credit: Shutterstock)
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