Hi folks.

I'm not sure where to start, so I'll just tell you where I'm at right now.  I quit drinking April 10th 2002 (and have not had a drink since) because of a health problem.  Actually that's kind of an understatement... I was hauled off to the hospital and they did that routine with the paddles like on TV.  It wasn't directly caused by my drinking (it had been a couple days since I drank) but the doctors seemed quite convinced the two were related, so I stopped.

It's been hard.

I've been back in the hospital three more times with the same problem, and in January I had a corrective procedure done to stop it from happening again.  The procedure has an 85% success rate.  A lot of people ask me, does this mean I can drink again?

And now we come to the crux of the problem.  I've struggled with drinking on and off for about 20 years.  I've spent seven of those sober (or "dry" if you prefer); 1990-1994 and 2002-2005.  The rest of the time I either managed to drink infrequently (usually if nothing too stressful was going on), frequently but not completely out of control with much effort (late 90s and early 00's were like this), or as a raging self-destructive drunk (not since 89-90 thankfully).

And now I have reached a point where I have realized that I can't do this anymore.  I don't want to wake up hating myself.  I don't want my life to revolve around when I'm going to go out drinking again.  I don't want to look forward to having a drink all day long.  And I am tired of MISSING that, also.  In some ways, that is the worst part.  It is how I know that something is still wrong with me, even though I don't drink.

OK... that's enough for now I think.

 

hi, John R...  welcome to recovery.  You didn't say if you have participated in the AA 12 Step program before,,, and that would be helpful to know.  I would strongly suggest that you find some face 2 face meetings and start attending, while continuing to participate here. When we find a new meeting, it is a good idea to attend it a few times and decide if that group is for us or not,,, and to try a few groups, if that is possible.  Each group has a slightly different personality, some actively working the Steps and sharing good experience, strength and hope than others.

It, hopefully, sounds like you have 'hit your bottom' and on the way up.

Keep coming!

amanda

Hey John R.  Welcome to our site. And youre certainly not alone. I can really identify with you. re: your post--in a lot of ways.

Went to my first AA meeting at age 31. Never wanted to give up the booze-just wanted to make life a bit better. Was in and out of AA for 6 years. Tried every way there was to keep drinking and get things on an even kneel. Didnt work.

Finally it sunk in that no matter what the day brought, I couldnt put my hand on that hot stove. Every time I did I got burnt. And there were a lot of burns.

Its one "H" of an adjustment when one puts the drink down, and tries to live in reality on lifes terms. I missed my best freind for a long time.

I remember all the fear involved--the shame-the guilt. And my biggest question within, was--"How do I live without it?"  I could quit for long periods of time, but I couldnt stay quit.

Well-the old boys kept telling me.

One day at a time--just dont pick up a drink for today. Go to meetings (Went to 365 in the first year) Get a Sponsor. Beleive in yourself, and beleive in a Higher Power greater than yourself. That Higher Power was AA and the fellowship, for a long time. Screw this God stuff.

Didnt think I was insane, but looking back, I was right off my stick.:)

Alcoholism is a disease. Its cunning, baffling and powerful. Ive been in this program for a lotta days, my freind. I still hafta go to meetings on a regular basis, and try to work these 12 steps on a daily basis.

If I dont-I know whats going to happen. The old thinking will set back in, and that monkey on my shoulder will start talkin again. "Maybe you can. Maybe itll be ok this time" Bull crap!!

Been there. Done that. Dont wanna go backwards.

So its pretty simple, if we keep it that way. Then again, Ive never seen to many Alkys that do.hahaha   Ile speak for myself.

Alcoholism is a disease. We arrest it.

I never started having health problems till after I gave up the booze.  The organs were kinda pickled.  Took the booze away, and they all started screaming "We need booze!!"

Got through it all, and even today theres been a few major health problems.  Am grateful that I didnt hafta drink, to get through them.

And yup, its a whole new ball game, my freind. But Ide rather have today, than the way it used to be.

I remember after getting sober, how I thought everything would be ok. Well-it wasnt. When I drank, I was an A-hole. When I sobered up, I became a sober A-hole. Lotta changes had to be made. The Answer?  The 12 suggested steps, and meetings, meetings, and more meetings. The old saying. "Work the program till it starts working you" rings so true. And it doesnt all get better over night, but one day at a time, it sure does.

Great bunch on this board John. Great to see you here.  Please share with us often. We care about YOU buddy.

Another day. Another, not picking up a drink.   :)

 

 

 

-- Edited by Phil at 07:50, 2005-02-23

Welcome John

 Phil said it all.

It really dosen't matter why you quit, the point is if you want to say quit and live reasonably happy.  Then you need to work on it. I even question the happy some days. You said I can't do this anymore!!!  When you come to this point your in the right place.  Some people can give the drink up, not go to meetings and be HAPPY. Not ME!!  I'm struggling being happy.  I need my meetings. What is the point to quit  drinking and be miserable??   Phil said, I need to work the 12 steps in my life, so do I. You can stand most anything for one day, thats all you have to do. Don't drink for today!!  Tomorrow will take care of itself. No need to worry I might not even be here tomorrow. This is a lot eaiser said then done, but I'm alot better than I use to be. THANKS TO THE PROGRAM. We all had those rageing destructive days. My worst years were also in the early 80's. DRUGS, BOOZE, LIVE HARD AND FAST AND THE HELL WITH THE REST.  My wife found a paper in a Bible.  RICK'S first AA meeting 1984. To bad I was to young to quit!!  Wasn't Bad enough to quit!! ETC!!! You couldn't get to much worst.  I was admitted to the hospital for Alcohol dehydration, they said I'd have to quit drinking. Ya right!!!  I also spent about 10 of the last 20 years sober. 6 continual with AA and about 4 on and off on my own. I just can't stay stopped without AA. Controlled drinking dosen't work. God knows I've tried. And I bet so has everybody on this board.  Anyway that's about enough. 

Good luck 

Keep coming back

There's good people on here

Best of Luck

Rick

 

-- Edited by Rick at 08:59, 2005-02-23

You know, my biggest fear posting on here is that people wouldn't answer me.  Thank you for showing me that isn't going to happen.

I've never been in the program.  I dated a girl who was (which probably doesn't count huh?) after I'd quit about a year -- that would have been 1991 or so.  I went to some meetings with her and got some idea of what they were about.  I decided at the time that they weren't for me.  At the time, they weren't.  I was put off by a lot of the Jesus stuff.  I was still carrying around a lot of baggage from my childhood and I was angry at God for (in my view) abandoning me and leaving me in a situation that I couldn't handle.

Some days I still find it hard to understand, but I am no longer angry at him.  I have begged for his help to deal with some of the problems he's given me to deal with, and wonder why I seem to have so many.  I think I am ready to ask for his help dealing with one more.  And I think I am ready to admit that I can't deal with it any other way.

As for going back to drinking -- I am not sure that I can and live.  I'm 34 years old and have already had trouble with my liver and my heart.  My stomach is pretty well shot also.  I'd be kidding myself if I thought I could drink and live to be 80.  I've watched relatives (oh yes there are a long line of us) destroy their lives and damage the people around them with drinking.  I've constantly struggled, while I've drank and while I haven't, not to be a destructive jerk.  I have mostly done well with that, but only mostly.

I am afraid a lot of the time.  The heart trouble has aggravated a lot of those issues.  I only sleep four hours at a time with prescription sleep meds.  I have pills for anxiety (which I avoid taking, knowing the danger they pose)... I constantly watch myself and wonder if I will end up in rehab.  My doctor watches me too.  There's no good alternative, in the short term at least, to taking these drugs.  I need them to function.

As for being happy: I am not really sure what that means.  Like a lot of people with trouble with alcohol I grew up in a pretty hellish situation.  I was not a happy kid, I was a miserable and often terrified adolescent and my adulthood has been trial by fire.  I can say that I've done better than I had any right to expect (true), that I've survived so far (true), but I can also say that I've thought of putting a gun in my mouth and pulling the trigger more times than I can count.

I used to keep a bullet on my desk to remind me that no matter how bad my life got, that there was a way out.  I found it comforting.

And maybe that says it all right there.

As for whether I'm ready to start going to meetings: I'm teetering on the edge of it.  I'm still recovering from heart surgery so it won't be for a few more weeks if I do.  But I made some promises to myself and to God when I was going through all that, and if I am going to keep them, I think AA is going to be involved.

Thank you all for listening and for being there.

 

Welcome here John, nothing much to add, it's already been said by other people. Here is a good place with lots of support and good advice from people who know what your going through. Keep on coming back and keep working on the recovery, it is worth it.

Best wishes.

 

Chris.

John

You are writing from your heart. I and, I think the rest of us here have felt much the same. You are not alone. I always said I'd be better off dead. 

 It takes time, but you start to get straightend out. I feel better just posting to you, that's how it works.

As far as GOD, It really turned me off when I first entered AA. He did't provide or do the things RICK thought he should. By the time I came back in, I was more than ready for GOD.  I prayed for him to get me back into AA. 

 Alcoholsim is no joke, it will kill you one way or another.  SLOOOOOWLY OR FAST, BUT FOR SURE OVER TIME. 

 A while back I had an uncle die, his liver went bad.  GUESS THE REST. 

I went to a meeting yesterday, it was a step meeting. If someone is having a problem, it takes priority over the step.  Anyway a women said she wanted to cut her throat. It was a pretty intense meeting. People really shared from there heart. They told of there depressions, attempted sucides, treatments, etc.

 And I walked in thinking I had problems. THEY WERE NOTHING

 I sincerely wish you the best

RICK

I'M THE WORLDS WORST SPELLER, HOPE I DID OK, WE ( I ) NEED A SPELL CHECK

Well I don't want anyone to worry that I'm sitting over here thinking about shooting myself today.  Things have been going fairly well recently.  I've been in and out of therapy to deal with stress, depression, anxiety... many of the things that go hand in hand with alcohol and drug abuse.  I also sometimes have terrible nightmares, and have been diagnosed with PTSD, the disease that a lot of combat vets end up with.  I've never been in the military, but I have been through hell.

And yes, alcohol... I'll use the word: alcoholism is a terrible thing to deal with.  I'm watching it kill my mother.  She's never admitted having a problem.  My father doesn't drink, but it may actually kill him first; he has to live with her.  Well, he chooses to.

If I go back to it, it will kill me too.  But first, it will take away my self-respect and destroy everything I care about.

 

 I have PTSD also..   some of my drinking has been self-medicating that.  PTSD means going through the hell we went through originally again in our memories.  But there is treatment for it. Personally,,,  the 12 Steps have helped me the most with that,,  at first I was angry at God, cuz I thought it was His fault that I went through all that I did, and that He approved. Step 2,,  coming to believe,,,  has been a process of changing my ideas about God. He only allows things because He is going to work them out, if we let Him. Now, when I have a nightmare or flashback, I hold onto God's hand as I work through it,,, and I don't drink,,,  I go to a meeting and share.

keep coming,

amanda

I took a big step tonight and told my wife that I was not going to go back to drinking and that I was thinking of attending meetings.  She was very supportive, and kind of relieved.  She admitted that she worried about me when I was going to bars all the time.  I did enough worrying for the both of us but knowing that it bothered her too makes me more determined not to go back to it.

I'm kind of atypical in that we've had booze in the house for the past three years and I've never been tempted to touch it.  Even when I was drinking often, drinking alone didn't appeal to me.  I very rarely drank in the house even with people over.  Drinking was something I did at a bar; I did not want this to become a part of my daily routine (again).  Because then, I suppose, I'd have to admit I had a problem.

I also had some funny rules which I'm sure other people have had their share of.  I didn't get drunk two nights in a row (although this one got bent a lot).  I didn't drink while it was light out.  (Because I'd keep up until the bars closed and pay for it the next day.)  I generally stuck to beer.  Guinness, mostly.

The rules never helped much.  I kept a journal on and off, and it would be the same rambling all the time about how this wasn't working or that wasn't working.  Underlying everything was the recognition that I had a problem and the guilt that went along with that... and the inability to really do anything about it.

 

John, You've made that first step,which for me is talking about what's going on.If I hold all that stuff inside it just get's bigger,but if I let it out as soon as it start's to grow,it's gone and doen't get the chance to grow into something I can't handle. Your story sound's alot like mine,I thought about myself more than once while reading your post.The biggest thing for me in the early day's where meeting's.I got the support I needed from guy's/gal's just like me.They had been there done that before I had, and they had the suggestion's I needed to get through it.I also have a very understanding wife which without her I'd be lost.She gives me support at home when I'm away from "my kinda people" Another thing I found worked well for me was helping other's,this got my mind from "my" troubles and helped me see that there's people out there trying to deal with alot more than I have going on.It just makes me feel better helping other's and it takes my mind from "me. I also put alot of faith into my thinking,I have faith that if I work this program, go to meeting, listen to what's suggested and act accordingly.I will be ok.This is a program of action,in order for me to get all I need from it I have to act "now" and everday for the rest of my life.If I try to think myself sober that won't work because I've done the thinking part of it but not the "leg" work part that carries me to the meeting's.I also don't worry about tommorrow cause to me it's nothing more than a vision of something that might come and might not.I wish you luck and KEEP COMING BACK we need you.

Thank you to everyone who replied for your words of support and encouragement.

I read the post tonight on "The Problem of Fear" and that totally has it nailed for me.  It's not so much that I'm ashamed to show up at an AA meeting... but I have been careful to erect barriers in my life especially over the past decade or so between the boozers I dealt with and the "regular people".  This kind of blurs the line; to go to AA meetings regularly is to rub elbows with people with the same problems I have.  I forget who it was that said he didn't want to belong to any club that would have him as a member, but that seems to apply here.

The social phobia thing is a big part of it as well.  I was very into going to bars, but I didn't really want to talk to anybody until I had a couple under my belt.  Walking in the door, I was pretty jumpy.  I'm jumpy any time I walk into a room and there are people I don't know in it.

I need to get over all that.  But I'm confident I will.

 

John ... thanks a lot for writing and contributing. Speaking about the obsession with alcohol in your first message.. that's how it was for me. Externally everything seemed OK, but there was that knowledge in the back of my mind that the drinking and time spent thinking about drinking was just going to go on and on and on.. sometimes more, sometimes less ... but life wasn't going to get any better than it was (and it was pretty bad) and it was likely to get a lot worse. Somehow I finally saw that... and finally saw that it was related to my drinking. My drinking was up, down and all over the place over the years. There was much more of the "high drama" in my earlier years. The last years weren't too exciting and I don't know why I didn't see the way out much earlier. I think I was unconciously afraid that if I gave up drinking I wouldn't have a way of dealing with "life". Alcohol was my ace in the hole. I went to a couple meetings about 5 years before I finally got sober. All I really remember was that it seemed a bit cult like (I'm pretty shy too) and people didn't seem very happy (which is ironic because I was pretty miserable). My mom had gotten sober years earlier and it was working for her and that was great. But AA didn't seem like it was what I needed. I had serious problems that I didn't think others would understand (I didn't go to enough meetings. If you do you'll hear everything.) Also, for me it all smacked a bit of some sort of holy-roller revival meeting. I had a big problem with that. (Now I see that when one's life has been dramatically changed for the better ... there's good reason for having enthusiam). In AA, each one of us is totally free to choose whatever concept we want of a "higher power". John, after 14 years without a drink I can tell you as a fact that your life can change radically for the better. Better than you could ever imagine. Jump in to AA with both feet. Go to meetings and listen carefully. Share your feelings and experiences (we need to hear them.. that's how it works). And don't let anything put you off (personalities, opinions, religion, etc.) This is about saving your life. One more thing (a shameless plug here but it worked for me). When I got sober I got a 2 year subscription to the AA Grapevine magazine (our meeting in print) I figured I was probably going to drink again but if I had this showing up in my mail every month it might serve as a reminder. For the cost of not even a good drunk.. it's sure been worth every cent.

That's an excellent suggestion.  I'm trying to reinforce my decision before I even take action on it by telling people I'm going to do this.  One of my personality traits (which is sometimes a flaw) is that once I make up my mind to do something I am incredibly stubborn about it.

Quit smoking?  No problem.  No junk food?  I can do that.  Not drink?  Yeah, I can even do that -- but it feels like a trick, like holding my breath.  I don't think normal people feel that way.  In fact I'm sure they don't.

My life is already better than it used to be.  If you listen to me talk and think this is my low point... no.  My low point was at 18-19 years old.  There are entire months of 1990 that I have no memory of due to drinking.  The parts I do remember are like pieces of a nightmare.  I was banned from going places and threatened with arrest.  I was charged with trespassing.  I was put on probation for threatening to break someone's legs.  I knocked up my girlfriend, paid for her abortion, and she left me.  My father disowned me.  I was thrown out of college after getting top grades all through school.

I dragged myself back out of the gutter and unlearned some of what I'd learned growing up in my house.  Not all of it, I'm not sure anyone can do that, but a lot of it.  Therapists have been amazed at what I've done and how well I function considering what I started with.  But it's still not good enough.  I think of becoming a parent, and I think of passing along my problems -- the ones I still have -- to my kids, and it scares me.  My fear, my anger... they don't need it.

Eventually I made peace with my parents again.  It took years.  The girlfriend never spoke to me again.  And like the Steely Dan song, I never went back to my old school.

 

John ... when I started going to AA and heard the term hitting bottom I thought "I've certainly hit bottom many times over the years". Most dramatically when I woke up in St. Mary's Hospital, Long Beach CA in 1980 with my stomach being pumped .. then in short order having a bit of a nervous breakdown, quitting my job, abandoning my apartment and belongings and driving back east across the country (21 years old). Or maybe the bottom was lower 2 years earlier when I was left by my girlfriend in Israel and I scaled the outside of a 5 story building (drunk of course) and had to be talked down by a kindly old Palestinian gent. .. then was quietly asked to leave the country. In fact I could think of a lot of "bottoms" that seemed much worse than when I finally got sober. I think what finally nailed it for me was when (31 years old) everything (externally) was pretty damn good. I'd bought a house, had a wonderful new loving relationship with someone, my job was pretty good (no one there would have suspected my mental struggles). Good physical shape, jogging, lifting weights. What was wrong? Somehow it became clear to me that the problem was the booze. But when I tried to control my drinking the obsession just got worse and worse... not the drinking necessarily but the obsession. That's what was killing me. That and knowing where it would eventually end up. So I tried reading all the books I could find in the library about alcoholism but usually ended up getting cross-eyed drunk while reading them. Now I know the problem was I was trying to do it myself. In a sense, I'd already taken the 1st Step at least a year or so before I finally got sober. I mean, I certainly knew that I was powerless over alcohol and I was fighting valiantly trying to get control of things, sort it all out, make things better for those I loved and cared about... but as I said.. the more I fought the worse it got. The change finally came (and the obsession magically disappeared) when I admitted that I could not do it myself ... I needed help (the 2nd Step). That came when I picked up the phone and dialed a number I'd gotten from late night TV... when all us drunks are sitting up trying to drink ourselves into oblivion. The 2nd Step for me at that time was simply asking for help .. believing that a power greater than myself could help. That power was a doctor (psychiatrist) who later lead me to AA. I believed what he told me about going to AA meetings because I did not want that horrible obsession to return. In fact, at that point I probably would have paraded down Main St. in a gorilla suit if they'd asked me to. Of course, I didn't know that I was working the 1st and 2nd Steps at the time. The Steps continue to grow in meaning to me as I stay sober and try to work them as best I honestly can. As I said, those external "bottoms" seemed a lot worse (or dramatic) in my earlier days.. but in the end it was the emotional and spiritual bottom that got me.