Bad night for me last night. It was like something was set in motion that I had no control over. Went out for dinner with a friend and drank. I'm really working hard at getting step 1 and last night may have been what I needed. Talked to a couple of friends and my sponsor today, feeling pretty crappy about everything, but I guess it's part of the process. I feel like I'm over analyzing everything, that I can "figure" this out. Beginning to see like that isn't possible. Anyway, say a little prayer for me if you get a chance... God knows I'm not doing it.
drinking when i didnt want to is what showed me i was powerless..talking to your sponsor is a great thing..im proud of u that u didnt just give up....thanks for sharing.. (hugs)
I can relate when you talk about over-analyzing everything. I'm guilty of the same. For me I just had to stop fighting and dive into this program. Only now do I feel a part of something wonderful, and not alone anymore with this obsession that guided my every move and thought. I think that was when step 2 kicked in. Being restored to sanity and having something to believe in apart from myself. Keep on posting and have hope because it will get better if you allow it to!
Runnergirl, I think you posted another discussion a day or two ago that suggested the plan was already in motion. I never really had a relapse....just a continuation of my original binge. But once I surrendered & committed to a program of recovery I never had another drink. Surrender: That is key. It was over, done....alcohol had whipped me. I didn't know what would come next, but I was over it. Still, it took every single drink I ever took for me to reach that place, and I am relieved that I don't have to do it anymore. I was in treatment when I had to write my first step. Certainly, I knew that I drank too much, that I got into trouble when I drank, etc. But as I put my history on paper I grew amazed that as my alcoholism progressed my life declined: I was an alcoholic even between drinks. I was losing who I was, and yet there was solace in that. Up until then I saw alcoholism as separate from the mess that was my life. In thinking that was I didn't believe that things could get better by simply removing alcohol from the equation. To find that they were related---and therefore that adressing one would address the other---I had hope. Not a bad point of departure for a recovery program.
Aloha Runner...the bestest thing (conscious or unconscious) that I could have done and then did was to hang constantly with those who had the program down as close to 24/7. I stayed with them...talked with them...listened to them...went to meetings with them...lunched with them and never once drank with them.
Metaphorically if you hang around the barber shop long enough you'll end up getting clipped. (old program metaphor)
yup ,gotta stay outta the environment however you can! Glad your starting again,relapse is not the shame,the shame is not gettin back! I'll keep you in prayer,RUN FAST to meeting,share like your life depends on it(cause it does)and get back on the horse....peace........
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Selfishness-self-centeredness! That, we think, is the root of our troubles.
Hey RG, not too much left to be said, with all the great posters here. All that's left is for you to sort it out and make up your mind. You pretty much know what the deal is, and like my neurotic thread says "you know damn well 2+2=4 but you don't like it". lol The cool thing is that you get to change your mind and decide that it's OK. With my all or nothing mentality, "OK" wasn't where I wanted to be. But being able to move from "Oh **** I'm really screwed" to "I'm Ok today" was huge.
Yep, I've been exactly there. One of the things that I have learned about myself in AA is that Step 1 is just the beginning. I had to admit, and still do, that I have no power to stop drinking myself and that my life was completely unmanageble.
Unfortunately for me in my recovery, I believed some (admittedly very few) well-meaning people who told me that if I kept drinking that that meant that I hadn't really done Step 1 and that I had to go back and do that again. So, for a while there I was always going back to Step 1, lol.
I now realize that that they had a the program all cock-eyed. Step 1 is about self-knowledge. It is the necessary but not sufficient to sobriety: we can't progress in the Steps until we have done Step 1 (just like if you try and skip stairs when you go up them, you'll eventually fall). If people tell you that you are not going to drink anymore b/c you have done Step 1, then in my opinion (and it is simply my opinion) they simply don't understand the program.
As Bill W found and it expressly says in the Big Book, I found that self-knowledge simply isn't enough to stop drinking. We alcoholics have no mental defence against the first drink -- we have an illness that tells us that it will be different this time. Therefore, I needed to work the rest of the 12 step program to stop drinking one day at a time.
And here was the clincher for me: the Big Book says that if I *thoroughly* follow the Steps, then I *never* need to drink.
So, with my early slips, what I eventually did was use those slips to confirm in my own mind Step 1 and instil in me the serious desire to move further through the steps.
I agree with Steve....except, that you ARE going to drink again if you don't do step 1 right and remind yourself repeatedly of it. I have seen people get sober in other ways than AA. I do think AA is the best way for me (and probably most people but it's not my place to judge). When I look at others who stopped their addictions without a 12 step program, they all basically did a thorough step 1 whether they knew it or not. That one has a lot of power, as do 2 and 3. 4 -12 help to get rid of the crazies that got us this way and the residue left over from years of drinking. It is necessary to progress through all 12 because I am more likely to struggle and vulnerable to drinking if I remain the same person and don't pick up the coping skills offered in the other steps. My grand sponsor states that the steps are a guide to life and any problem you are having at any given time is in those steps and you instinctively know which one the problem falls under and what you need to do to fix it. I had zero idea how these steps worked in the beginning. To a degree...it is true that, if you are active enough in AA, go to enough meetings, and have a sponsor...the steps will start working you and you will absorb them to the point that when you formally do them on paper, it will be much easier.
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
I now realize that that they had a the program all cock-eyed. Step 1 is about self-knowledge. It is the necessary but not sufficient to sobriety: we can't progress in the Steps until we have done Step 1 (just like if you try and skip stairs when you go up them, you'll eventually fall). If people tell you that you are not going to drink anymore b/c you have done Step 1, then in my opinion (and it is simply my opinion) they simply don't understand the program.
As Bill W found and it expressly says in the Big Book, I found that self-knowledge simply isn't enough to stop drinking. We alcoholics have no mental defence against the first drink -- we have an illness that tells us that it will be different this time. Therefore, I needed to work the rest of the 12 step program to stop drinking one day at a time.
Steve, I think you make some very good points. Without realizing it---since I'd never been to a meeting at the time--I had done Step One. I had surrendered, something I think is essential. But I was scared to death: How on earth would I live sober? This kept me in a fetal position for several weeks until I was introduced to AA. The steps are the AA program, a design for life. I'd been through so much therapy by the time I quit, and I knew why I did things. I just didn't know how to make it stop. And I certainly didn't see how my personality structure contributed to my repeated attempts to figure out how to drink. I was eager to embrace steps 2-12; they offered a way out of what had been a quite miserable life. If nothing changes, nothing changes. If I keep doing what I've always done, I'm going to keep doing what I've always done. Therein lies the beauty of the program: Put down the drink and start making changes. The woman I was drank, and she will drink again. Therefore I needed to make changes.
Wow, you guys are great. Thank you so much for the wonderful responses. I'm starting to get it... How it all works. And, Steve, thanks for opening my eyes more to Step 1. It makes sense that it's working ALL the steps that will keep us sober. Just cause I drank doesn't mean I can't do Step 1... for me, it meant more evidence for Step 1. That's not an excuse, but it helping me. I just plain couldn't do it. Anyway, serious thank you's to everyone who responded. I don't feel like quite as big of a piece as I did before...
RG, It took me 2 years of going to meetings to get more than 2 months of sobriety. And I don't recommend that btw, it just takes what it takes. But by the time that 2 years was up, I was "willing to go to any lengths for my sobriety", and I got on with it, made my it my number 1 priority and traded obsessing over booze for obsessing over getting sober. It was a good call and I've lived happily ever after, no exageration.
-- Edited by StPeteDean on Tuesday 16th of February 2010 06:55:14 PM
Hey Runner Girl, glad to hear that you're sticking with us. In the end, all that's worked for me is to keep getting to meetings and working the program. Very, very, very few of us have come into AA and immediately never drunk again. But, what I have seen soooo many people who keep coming back, get it. And all we've got is today -- I'm not going to drink today. If I don't keep working my program and stop getting to meetings, I could be drunk tomorrow. But I'm working my program and getting to meetings, so I won't drink today. And that's really good.
Keep coming back!
Steve
-- Edited by SteveP on Thursday 18th of February 2010 03:27:25 PM
I have not drank since I went to my first meeting. There is a term for that but it usually makes people who relapsed angry and it's an example of not being humble to say "I'm a one white chip wonder!" When I was starting to put some months together, that meant something. Now it means nothing except for 1 thing and the only reason I state it here which is the following: AA has that power if you let it so that you can go and never have to drink again. That is it. (um...except that you have to keep going...a lot...LOL)
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
I have not drank since I went to my first meeting. There is a term for that but it usually makes people who relapsed angry and it's an example of not being humble to say "I'm a one white chip wonder!" When I was starting to put some months together, that meant something. Now it means nothing except for 1 thing and the only reason I state it here which is the following: AA has that power if you let it so that you can go and never have to drink again. That is it. (um...except that you have to keep going...a lot...LOL)
I am also a "one white chip wonder," although I've never heard that term before. In fact, I'd been dry for about five weeks before I ever went to a meeting. I'd never made any prior attempts to get sober....sometimes just tried to moderate or prove I could control it, but you know how that went.
Even so, I believe that I needed every drink I ever took, and by the time I reached AA I had surrendered. That part was over, and I just couldn't do it anymore. To be honest, I'm not sure I could have survived another binge. Really.
