(This article was written on 29/12/2025)
The Howl of Abandonment
It started as a courtship. Cannabis moved in daily in 1990 - the live-in partner. Alcohol was the frequent, exciting visitor, only present on nights out. In 1997, they made it official. Alcohol’s weekend binges cemented the union - a deep, chemical marriage was born. For the next 28 years, they ruled my neurology as a co-dependent unit. On September 29, 2025, I filed for divorce. I evicted alcohol. And as I prepared to serve the final papers to cannabis on New Year’s Day, the house wasn’t quiet. It was filled with a singular, piercing sound: the howl of abandonment from a neurochemical widow who knew the end was here.
The First Divorce - Serving Papers
On September 29, 2025, I did the unthinkable: I evicted one of them. I served alcohol with its notice. It fought, it pleaded, it made the first few weeks hell, but eventually, it left. The eviction stuck. For over twelve weeks now, the house has been quieter. But it wasn’t at peace. Because the remaining tenant, cannabis, was now alone. And its solitude wasn’t peaceful; it was a profound, dysregulated panic. I began to feel it in the weeks before my planned quit date: a constant, underlying tension. It wasn’t a craving. It was a howl. The howl of a partner who had just watched their other half be banished, and who knew, deep in its molecular logic, that it was next.
The Neurochemical Widow
This is the dirty secret of poly-substance dependence. You’re not managing two separate habits. You’re managing a relationship. And when you remove one party, you don’t get a happy single substance; you get a neurochemical widow. The howl I feel - this “attack” on my good days - is the sound of that widow’s grief and terror. It’s cannabis, which never learned to regulate my system alone, screaming into the void left by alcohol. The impending quit date isn’t me breaking a bad habit. It’s me finally filing the divorce papers on a 28-year marriage. The howl is the sound of the final decree being read in the court of my own skull.
The Silence After the Decree
I know the howl will change. On January 1st, when I formally dissolve this union, the howl of abandonment will turn into the screams of acute withdrawal. But that’s a different sound. The pre-cessation howl is the sound of impending loss. The withdrawal scream will be the sound of active dying. I can face the latter because I finally understand the former. I’m not fighting a substance anymore; I’m executing a legal separation for the good of the estate (my brain). The tenants are being removed. The property needs refurbishment. The silence that comes after, that’s the sound I’m building for.
Conclusion - The New Landlord
Recovery isn’t about willpower. It’s about property management. It’s about recognising that the substances in your life aren’t squatters; they’re tenants in a complex, toxic relationship with each other, and you’re the landlord who’s been too afraid to collect the rent or change the locks. You have to go through the ugly, loud, legal process of eviction. You have to listen to the howls and the screams. But you do it with the calm certainty of a landlord who finally read the lease agreement and realised it was null and void all along. The house is yours. The marriage is over. The howl is just the sound of the last tenant realising the party’s finally, definitively, over.
This article was written on 29/12/2025