While I can't improve on Mike's good suggestions, I'd just like to offer a few words of encouragement for you. I can tell from your posts that you're a very thoughtful, bright person and you deserve to be the person that you want to be.

You said something in your last post about finding alternative replacements for drinking that I think lots of us can relate to and it was: "there's nothing that I really love".

I used to have a yellow lab who was passionate about tennis balls and would actually envy him, wishing that I had something in my life that could fill me with the same mad, driven devotion and energy.

Later, a large, gentle, mellow dog came into my life. This guy loves to lie on the deck and stare at the mountains...can do it for hours. Since he's not an antic dog, there's no display of passion as there was with the retriever...no outward signs to tell me that his happiness meter is registering 100%.

This makes me wonder about human beings. Does the marathon runner have something she loves more than the woman who meditates? Do we think the person who's working on a cure for cancer loves what he's doing more than the guy who's tutoring kids in a reading program? Do we make unfair judgments about such things?

So what I'm asking you is this: when you say there's nothing that you really love.... do you really mean that? Or is it that society, or your husband, or all the messages that you've received over the years from family, friends, movies, TV, suggest that you what you love isn't important or significant enough?

I bet if you sat down and made a list of all the things you love, you'd have a long, long list. I'm guessing that you've been underestimating yourself because I sense you're really a powerful human being.

So make that list...after all, it'll keep you busy at 5:00 pm. Your list will start with the usual things, but keep going until you're putting down all kinds things...cantalopes, seashells, zebras. Sit on it for awhile and then when you look it over see what jumps out at you. Maybe it's "zebras". Does your city have a zoo? Did you know that zoos have docents that lead people on tours? If you take the docent training program you'll learn tons about animals and meet other people with the same interests....and so on and so on...and somewhere along the line you'll find yourself saying "I love this".

***
carmen840