Why do I not want it enough???

[briseus]

Why do I not want it enough???

Thank you Kradle and congrats on your 17 days! That is awesome! ) That's the longest sober time I had in the past year. I hope to beat it at some point in the very very near future. But will be taking it one day at a time.

It is almost midnight. The bubble bath was nice, watched my show and will be going to bed sober. I didn't even think of alcohol that much today at all. And there is an entire bottle of wine in the fridge along with a case of beer. Didn't think about it at all though. Weird how some days are easier then others.

Thanks for all the encouraging words.

xoxo

Bri

[TheSunFlower]

Why do I not want it enough???

Congrats

One day is awesome! All I know is that each sober day gets better. Even if I have a crappy day I am able to handle it much better. The sneaky demon gets into my brain...and too many times it won. All the excuses were a waste of time. Now when the voice starts...I just think this is normal for someone like me to have these thoughts.....but, I don't have to answer the door when the enemy is knocking.

[K9Lover]

Why do I not want it enough???

Great job Bri!

I'm glad you enjoyed your sober evening with a bubble bath, tv and a good book! That sounds relaxing. Just think, if you did it once, you can do it again! Keep plugging along and you'll soon be racking up those days, then it will start to get easier!

I'm proud of you!

K9

[briseus]

Why do I not want it enough???

Thanks again, onto day 2. Weekend will be tricky - are supposed to have fantastic weather and friends over for a bbq "bonanza".
I KNOW I can say "NO"...

The voice/beast is very sneaky!! I tried to name it last night but fell asleep before I had a chance to. Lol. I actually thought of giving it the name of a very toxic friend that I had in the past that condoned tunz of drinking and drugs. Needless to say we are no longer friends.

Anyways...
I was reading up on the news and stumbled across disturbing stuff and that voice popped in and said to me "a drink will make you forget about how shitty the real world is".
I think that was my problem. I hate what is going on out there...and alcohol gave me this "dream world" to live in which I realize now is VERY fake. And regardless if I drink or not and it gives me that FALSE sense of safety that real world is still there and still very...real.
Funny how it tries to get you to drink over pretty much anything.

Anyways. Day 2 today.
Hope everyone is doing well.

[K9Lover]

Why do I not want it enough???

You sound good Bri! Wasn't it nice to fall asleep, as opposed to passing out? Now name that Beast! LOL I haven't named mine...I can't name something I'm trying to kill!

I understand what you're saying about escaping from the world....being an animal lover, I could drive myself crazy if I let myself dwell on the plight of animals all over the world. I have to believe in a Higher Power (that I call God) and I'm not trying to get all religious here, but if I didn't believe in that, I would have no hope. All I'm saying is that there are other ways to cope, other than the bottle. All the bottle does is make you see the real world with a crappy hangover!

I hope you have a great day and keep up the great work!

[Supercrew]

Why do I not want it enough???

Great job Bri...Daily positive action!

PS - Quit watching the news and reading the headlines if they depress you, or turn it around and realize how good you have it, or take action to change the things you don't like.

The only thing that will depress me is if you let yourself down.

Good luck!!

[Unwasted]

Why do I not want it enough???

Bri, I have backed way off watching and reading the news. I also know we can control our thoughts. So when I find myself headed toward feeling negatively, I consciously try to switch gears and do something different to change the frame of thought I'm in at that moment. It doesn't work every single time, but the more you catch yourself and reroute your thinking, the better you get at doing it! Small increments of meditation and deep breathing help too.

xx,
UN

[briseus]

Why do I not want it enough???

It's true...if I drank then I would have numbed myself from all the crap I read/watched and I would have had to deal with it the next day. So I am still sober. Onto day 3.

I really am going to avoid the news...it doesn't help either that I am obsessive compulsive and that the intrusive thoughts get to be too much. This is why I self-medicated. To deal with the anxiety and OCD.

Unwasted - how can we control our thoughts? I am trying to look into more books with regards to this for my OCD - and for my cravings for alcohol (funnily enough they sorta tie in together with the intrusive thoughts that I get from OCD and then the intrusive thoughts of drinking).

So the plan is to avoid the news and watching crap.
And K9 - I hear you, I am the biggest animal lover too...if I saw anything remotely depressing that regarded animals I would drink to forget about it.

Funny how you would drink to forget...and you may not necessarily think about it the next day but a few weeks down the road or even months, when you're sobered up for a few days that it pops into your head. I think our AV tries to play tricks on us with things like that too.

Hope everyone is having a lovely night.
I am tackling my iTunes playlist right now - it's in such a mess.

[Unwasted]

Why do I not want it enough???

I am the biggest animal lover too...if I saw anything remotely depressing that regarded animals I would drink to forget about it.

Well, we are kindred spirits to be sure because this was probably my biggest single factor for drinking. But as you say, the drinking doesn't help. In fact, I would see some bad news, drink, become depressed, and drink more. Ironically, the drinking made everything worse -- much worse. I find that I can cope better with everything now.

Regarding controlling my thoughts.........I bought a book on CBT - Cognitive Behavioral Therapy -- that helped a little bit. I don't remember the title but there are lots of them on Amazon. Mostly, though, I force myself to avoid any news or news story that might involve animals. They're so helpless and I don't have to tell you how dire their situation is on all levels. So, when I can, I just send a donation to the charities I have checked out to be good ones, but I don't read ANY stories or listen to any news about them. I turn the channel or the page. I can't avoid everything because there is so much but I can steer clear of a lot.

This may be total self-delusion, but I have told myself that because of all the terrible things going on in life that things just cannot be exactly as they appear -- that these helpless things that suffer are not experiencing exactly what we see on our level (in some parallel universe or something along that line). I'm not religious, but the universe is so amazingly complex, I tell myself that there's more than this.

Anyway, I've rambled. I just hope you can find a little coping mechanism that helps you not drink because there is nothing good that comes from it. It takes a lot of time and figuring out other ways to live life, but I just always hold the thought and fast forward to a hangover............nothing worse than the the drinking roller coaster that was making me so sick.

Have patience and always say no to alcohol unless you want to keep going through the endless cycle that gets you nowhere. And, finally, remember that it gets harder to stop drinking the more you start up again.

xx,
UN :lilheart:

[crazyforwine]

Why do I not want it enough???

Briseus and Unwasted,

I too am an animal lover and have to turn away for sad news stories and one commercial in particular that is for the ASPCA or some such organization. It just kills me.

Just wanted to tell you about one story on the news last night here in NY-the footage was of a young woman who had just returned from a 6 month tour of duty in the army, I believe. It showed her walking into her house where the beagle she had had to leave when he was a puppy was sleeping on his doggie bed. When she walked in, the dog looked up at her-you could see his little doggie brain processing the situation-and then he went completely nuts, jumping all over her, crying, whining, wagging his tail furiously...it was SO CUTE I cried. Reminded me of a time when I was a kid and was separated from my dog for a summer, and was comoletely grief stricken. I got a similar greeting when we were reunited. I loved that dog so much and think of him all the time, 45 years later!

This has little to do with AL but I really wanted to share a happy animal story! I will post more tomorrow when I have officially hit DAY 30! A miracle for sure.

Hugs to all of you and especially the animal lovers!

CW

[K9Lover]

Why do I not want it enough???

Hi Everyone!

Bri - Congrats on day 3! How are you feeling?

CFW - That was a cute story about the beagle...my dogs act like that everyday when I come home. I read somewhere that you shouldn't make such a "big deal" of coming and going to them though. But I just can't help getting excited, so they do too. LOL

UW - You always have the best advice. You're such a good example for us!

[Cinders]

Why do I not want it enough???

This is a great thread and comes at a very good time in my journey.

On May 24th, I woke up drunk, grabbed the bottle of vodka from the side of the bedside, took a swig and felt something in my stomach "pop."

The pain was immediate and I could not get any breaths of air. I called 911.

It took them a while to get me out of the house because my dog was guarding me. I finally crawled out of bed and shoved him through the door and shut it. The EMTs came in through the bedroom window.

After ascertaining that I was drunk and in pain, lots of eye rolling, etc, they took me to the hospital. At the hospital, the ER doctor thought I had fallen and broken a rib. I knew that was not the case, I hadn't been so drunk I blacked out and knew I had not fallen. After much eye rolling and complaining by nursing staff because they could not get an IV into me due to dehydration, a CT Scan was taken of my chest. The doctor realized at that point that there was air in my chest cavity caused by a perforation in my stomach. The "pop" I felt was probably the vodka hitting my stomach and going into my chest. Apparently I had had the perforation for a while, as an operation had to be done to scrap out a large abcess and put tubes and drains into my stomach and chest cavity.

I was then taken by ambulance to a larger city with a hospital that could handle my situation as I am also a gastric bypass patient and the local hospital did not feel they could handle any surgery to repair a damaged GB stomach.

No further surgery was done but I was in the hospital a week on strong drips of antibiotics, a tube in my nose down to my stomach keeping my stomach acid from continuing to damage the stomach and drains to keep the chest cavity clear from fluid due to the infection.

I am back home and slowly convalescing. I am able to eat now and able to get by without pain meds finally.

Like many others, DUIs, loss of work, family relationships ruined, etc, I have had may AHA moments that I ignored because none of them were enough to make me give sobriety 100%.

Now, I am planning on complete abstinence because the memory of the pain that was so intense and the advice of the doctors that any further drinking WILL kill me, period, has made me realize that I have two options. Drink and die a horrible death or quit.

In other words, if I ever pick up a drink again, I will know it is a suicide act.

I have known others who have gone through what I have and gone back to drinking and subsequently died. So, I know that this is not the end of "it" for me. It is the beginning, though.

I never want to look into the face of loved ones so afraid for me, I never want to have medical people look at me with such disgust, and I never want to feel that self-loathing again.

HTH,
Cindi

[RingingCedars]

Why do I not want it enough???

Cinders-that must have been sooo scary. I'm routing for you and need your support too.:l

[Cinders]

Why do I not want it enough???

RC,

You know you have my support in any way I can help.

I am rooting for you, too.

Cindi

[NoraC]

Why do I not want it enough???

Cindi,
Thank you so much for sharing your story. How scary that must have been for you. :l
I have been struggling as of late. Back to day 4 once again. I'm trying to remember all the good things about being AF and remembering the bad things about drinking.
Take care & we're going to do this. :h