Drunk Mom: A Memoir

By Jowita Bydlowska

“An intense, complex and disturbing story, bravely and beautifully told. I read Drunk Mom with my jaw on the floor, which doesn’t happen to me that often.” —Lena Dunham

Three years after giving up drinking, Jowita Bydlowska found herself throwing back a glass of champagne like it was ginger ale. It was a special occasion: a party celebrating the birth of her first child. It also marked Bydlowska’s immediate, full-blown return to crippling alcoholism.

In the gritty and sometimes grimly comic tradition of the bestselling memoirs Lit by Mary Karr and Smashed by Koren Zailckas, Drunk Mom is Bydlowska’s account of the ways substance abuse took control of her life—the binges and blackouts, the humiliations, the extraordinary risk-taking—as well as her fight toward recovery as a young mother. This courageous memoir brilliantly shines a light on the twisted logic of an addicted mind and the powerful, transformative love of one’s child. Ultimately it gives hope, especially to those struggling in the same way.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Group
• Release date: May 27, 2014
• ISBN: 9780698156395

Reviews for Drunk Mom

[bookishjojo · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

i stayed up way, way too late last night because i couldn't stop reading this book. it's a tough read at times - which, given the title one must expect, really. but the thing bydlowska does amazingly well is convey the mindset of an addicted/alcoholic person: the frantic, the chaotic, the scheming, the blacked-out, the re-framing. the behaviours she uses in planning to buy her alcohol, drinking her booze, dealing with the empty bottles, lying to her boyfriend, endangering her baby's life - being aware of this, guilty over it yet unable to do differently...well, it's amazing. it's a warty story and while moments are sensational - the opening scene has her finding a baggie of coke in a washroom stall at the ROM (in toronto), which she then proceeds to snort - i never felt like bydlowska was purposefully trying to make anything out to be worse or bigger than it was. her alcoholism was (is) ugly. people around her suffered. this book doesn't ask you to like her or feel empathy for her (though i did. feel empathy, that is.) i think the point of this book is to open the minds of those who don't have addictions/addictive personalities. fwiw, bydlowska is the partner of globe and mail columnist russell smith.

[latorreliliana · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Title says it all. Very revealing raw account of a year of alcoholism as mother struggles to look after new baby.

[froxgirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Every word is drawn from pain. I think this is probably the best book by an alcoholic I've ever read, up to and including "Drinking: A Love Story" by the late genius Caroline Knapp. Because this one has a baby at the heart of it. Or, more accurately, this one has a mom who pumps breast milk, gets shitfaced, and then waits a period of time before nursing again, to make sure the vodka leaves her system. R-I-I-G-H-T. Instead of emphasizing what brought her to her successful abstinence and then unsuccessful relapse, Jowita explains her drinking strategies (mental maps of liquor stores, etc) and her self loathing in depth, and I mean deep depths.But - and this is a truth I have never heard told before - she claims that in order to be sober, the alcoholic must yearn for sobriety as strongly as he/she yearned for alcohol. To replace one irrational desire for another; one harmful for one good. This seems so simple but it came as a revelation to me. And so a blazingly distressing read is redeemed.

[tim.roberson · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

As a recovering alcoholic myself, this was a vivid reminder of drunken nights I don’t recall and all the associated pain and self loathing that came with it. I thank the author for her courage in putting her story front and center and honest. Highly recommended, particularly those who know the struggle.