As time goes by

runnergirl · Senior Member

As time goes by

Mike B. · MIP Old Timer

Runner,
Yes, it's the obsession of alcoholics to be able to one day drink like a normal person. So our diesase sets us up for failure with the illussion that we can drink again. Our drinking doesn't seem to be that bad. Things will be different. This is call insanity for the alcoholic.

For me personally; once things started to get good in the beginning I started to shift my priorities and forgot what got me to that place in the first place. You got it- led me back to the drink. It's easy for us to let the good feelings of sobriety tell us we don't need meetings, to work the steps and call people. This is our diesase talking. It's preparing to hi jack our brain and bring us back to the bottle.

We need to put tools in our life to fend off the hi-jacking and then get to a place were our lifes get so good we don't need to drink to be happy.

The AA program does this for us, but it's a program of action. We need to work at it.

AA for me is: 12 steps, HP, sponsorship, meetings and fellowship.

Since you husband is out of town, wouldn't it be a good time to dive into the program and hit atleast a meeting a day?

runnergirl · Senior Member

Thanks for the reply Mike. Ideally, him being out of town would make things easier except that we have two young kiddos. Our main babysitter is out of town so I'm kinda in a pinch.

So... is your program in that order? 12 steps, HP, sponsorship, meetings and fellowship? Curious what sorts of priorities it takes (within the program).

Mike B. · MIP Old Timer

Runner,
I believe it changes over time. It did for me.

In the beginning- meetings got me to a sponsor- sponsor to the steps- steps to a HP- then fellowship once I was comfortable with me and my life.

Now- HP runs the show- steps practiced to the best of my ability each day-sponsorship- meetings & fellowship. Fellowship is building as time passes.

Tessa · Senior Member

Our disease likes to tell us it wasn't that bad or we can just drink one. etc. It took me a long time in the program to fully admit that I was an alcoholic. Because when others would share I kept looking for the difference...not the similarities. Although I'd been in the program for a little while & was following suggestions. It took me almost 2 years to fully remember my last drunk. When I did things were revealed to me that I had no idea had happened. At first I thought my mind was playing tricks on me. Realized even tho I'd had a blackout I'd started having flashbacks to that last drunk & it definately wasn't the way I remembered it. Much worse. Grateful to be alive today!

StPeteDean · MIP Old Timer

runnergirl wrote:

I'm curious from those of you who have sober for a longer stretch... were you, in the beginning, tempted to think you'd been miraculously cured after being able to stay sober for an extended period of time? I'm now at 3 weeks and the pain of my last drunk is getting more and more blurry. It's good to get this far (my longest stint yet), but it also feels like a tricky/vulnerable place to be.

RG, you kinda answered your own question. But yes going to meetings and seeing beat up newcomers dragging in, gives us a shot of "oh my, I don't want to go back to that", which is gratitude. And Gratitude = Happiness, so going to meetings makes us happy (or allows us to realize our inner contentment). While you're running today, I want you to repeat a few things. "I love myself, I'm valuable, I'm worth taking care of, that's why I'm running and staying sober, I want to live" over and over.

-- Edited by StPeteDean on Thursday 18th of March 2010 03:54:26 PM

Larry_H · MIP Old Timer

The most dangerous time for many Alcoholics is not when things are bad but rather when everything is going good. We tend to have short memories, that is one reason I continue to attend meetings to see the newcomer and to feel for their pain. This instantly brings back a flood of memories of when I was new. I see a new person and I think yes that is exactly how I felt.

Larry,
------------------
Once you are a Pickle You can't go back to being a Cucumber

SoberSteve · MIP Old Timer

I have only been sober 47 days today myself but during this time I find the days I feel "normal" and like I dont need a meeting are the days I make sure to get to a meeting! I wont let the cunning, baffling and powerful snake strike me again!

AGO · MIP Old Timer

runnergirl wrote:

I'm curious from those of you who have sober for a longer stretch... were you, in the beginning, tempted to think you'd been miraculously cured after being able to stay sober for an extended period of time? I'm now at 3 weeks and the pain of my last drunk is getting more and more blurry. It's good to get this far (my longest stint yet), but it also feels like a tricky/vulnerable place to be. It does not help that my husband has been out of town for the last two weeks (almost) so I've only been to one meeting a week. Maybe getting to more meetings would help here...

Thanks and hope you are all doing well! It will be over 60 degrees today and I'm chomping at the bit to go for my run. Want to hold out until it's the warmest it will get... this weather is great!

-- Edited by runnergirl on Thursday 18th of March 2010 01:01:33 PM

Yeah it sounds vaguely familiar

The classification of alcoholics seems most difficult, and in much detail is outside the scope of this book.

There is the type of man who is unwilling to admit that he cannot take a drink. He plans various ways of drinking. He changes his brand or his environment. There is the type who always believes that after being entirely free from alcohol for a period of time he can take a drink without danger.

Then there are types entirely normal in every respect except in the effect alcohol has upon them. They are often able, intelligent, friendly people.

All these, and many others, have one symptom in common: they cannot start drinking without developing the phenomenon of craving.

I would agree with you, this is scary territory, this has all the ingredients for a return to drinking after a VERY brief stint "on the wagon".

Reading your post about thinking about being able to drink after being on the wagon for a few weeks while not attending meetings for some reason totally reminded me of the movie The Matrix. When Neo finds out his entire life is a delusion. I was thinking specifically of the quote "Welcome to the desert of the real" but when I went to look it up, this quote caught my eye.

I changed a few words

M: I imagine that right now, you're feeling a bit like Alice. Hmm? Tumbling down the rabbit hole?
N: You could say that.
M: I see it in your eyes. You have the look of a man who accepts what he sees because he is expecting to wake up. Ironically, that's not far from the truth. Do you believe in fate?
N: No.
M: Why not?
N: Because I don't like the idea that I'm not in control of my life.
M: I know *exactly* what you mean. Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?
N: Untreated Alcoholism?
M: Do you want to know what it is?
N: Yes.
M: Untreated alcoholism is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work... when you go to church... when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth.
N: What truth?
M: That you are a slave. Like everyone else with untreated alcoholism you are stuck in bondage. The Bondage of self. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind.

It's literally that vast. Alcoholic thinking is delusional thinking. Left untreated alcoholic thinking tells me I don't need to go to those meetings, I don't need to work those steps, then it tells me my drinking wasn't that bad. Then it tries various forms to convince me drinking is a good idea, one way by telling me life is good, my drinking wasn't that bad, another is to make my suffering so bad only a drink will make it better, both are delusions.

I had to learn I had a mind that was trying to kill me, a mind I couldn't trust, a mind that came to me like a lover, a mind full of lies.

Trying to address my untreated alcoholism with "Don't drink and go to meetings" was like trying to push a bowling ball up a hill with a limp noodle.

In the meetings they read that "Rarely have we seen a person fail that has thoroughly followed our path", my experience is the inverse is also true, "Rarely have we seen a person succeed that didn't" it's rare anyone ever quit drinking by attending one meeting a week and not working the steps that was an alcoholic so I wish you luck on your present endeavor.

In my area many meetings if not most either have child care or other arrangements to watch children. There is no try, there is only do, or do not.

SUSIE · Senior Member

We have a disease that tells us ....we don't have a disease. That says it all to me. Congrats on the three weeks runnergirl. Im a runner too and hope you get out there and enjoy this beautiful running weather!!! Food for the soul.

Susie

Simple · Senior Member

Cunning, baffling, powerful! I think you answered your own question too. The thing that helped me the most was others instilling in me that AA and my sobriety is my first priority, and making the "work" of AA a habit. I would call people, go to meetings, read, pray, write, regardless of how I felt or what was going on. That way I would do it automatically when I needed it, no question about it. I was told often that it didn't matter what I thought or even how I felt, just do it!

After years of sobriety I now have a 2-year-old and another on the way and now I'm also appreciating how hard it must be to get sober with children (especially women, since the burden often falls on them). My husband is about to start a job in another city and we will move there once we get a house, etc, but in a week he will be there during the week while I'm here, working full time and taking care of my daughter. We have no family here and only one babysitter who isn't available often and I have a number of work events in the evening. Soooo...my point is....I'm feeling for you, girl! But that being said, sometimes there are meetings with babysitters or other drunks who would be happy to watch your kids just to make sure you can get to a meeting (and I know, easier said than done unless you really know the person). But sometimes just the act of willingness, of trying, can keep us sober. It seems like you are also doing all the other suggested stuff so keep it up!

runnergirl · Senior Member

Wow. Thanks for the wonderful replies every one.

AGO, I like your mixture of Neo and Yoda references (that was Return of the Jedi at the end there, right?). Seriously, though, that was a great read. And I guess you could put any of our flaws in there... at least the ones we can work on anyway. I do need to work the steps and I really plan to. My sponsor says she we can't go onto the next steps until I'm positive I have #1 down. How can you be positive when your mind plays that "I'm cured" game? The craving is insane. I think about it all the time. It feels like if I can just wait until that craving goes away I'll be able to drink normally. Ack. Sick thinking, I know.

Simple, congrats on the pregnancy. And holy buckets have you been sober from an early age. I admire your ability to do something so mature at such a young age... this stuff is not easy! I have to figure something out for meetings; hopefully it will get better with my husband back and no plans to travel anytime soon. Thanks for commiserating, it's good to know it's not just me being a wimp!

AGO · MIP Old Timer

runnergirl wrote:

Wow. Thanks for the wonderful replies every one.

AGO, I like your mixture of Neo and Yoda references (that was Return of the Jedi at the end there, right?). Seriously, though, that was a great read. And I guess you could put any of our flaws in there... at least the ones we can work on anyway. I do need to work the steps and I really plan to. My sponsor says she we can't go onto the next steps until I'm positive I have #1 down. How can you be positive when your mind plays that "I'm cured" game? The craving is insane. I think about it all the time. It feels like if I can just wait until that craving goes away I'll be able to drink normally. Ack. Sick thinking, I know.

Simple, congrats on the pregnancy. And holy buckets have you been sober from an early age. I admire your ability to do something so mature at such a young age... this stuff is not easy! I have to figure something out for meetings; hopefully it will get better with my husband back and no plans to travel anytime soon. Thanks for commiserating, it's good to know it's not just me being a wimp!

Empire Strikes Back, great catch

Dumbledore, and Gandalf also appear frequently in my writings hee hee

Ummm......uuuhhh....isn't your sponsor going to like...ummm....work the first step with you? Like read the first 60 pages together, going through the Doctors opinion, Bills Story, More about Alcoholism, etc. with you????

You supposed to learn about alcoholism by osmosis?

Read this thread with Electric Twist, read my responses and questions to her, that is like 10% of what a sponsor doing a first step with a sponsee looks like

http://aa.activeboard.com/forum.spark?aBID=42735&p=3&topicID=34663003

Even the Dr.s Opinion here, here is how a friend of mine does it (thx BBalldad I'm lifting this to help another alcoholic, please forgive me) Now I think BBalldad is a bit over the top, and it's not quite how I do it, I am illustrating what working just one part of the first step might look like with a thorough sponsor.

my present step sponsor gave me a few directions on the Dr`s Opinion

first,he took me to page 55 and showed me where to find the Great Reality,deep down inside,and we took several minutes of silence to try and make contact with that Great Reality together,and I was to do that before I prayed....and then he had me pray this prayer
(he was preparing me to do the work)

God,please have me do this work the way you want me to do it,and show me the truth about myself,Thank you!

He stressed the nessacity to bring God in on this to help show us what "He" wanted..
I was also instructed to pray this prayer before I read or wrote anything
we met weekly during this time

get a composition notebook

read the whole chapter,the Dr`s Opinion
write out in the composition notebook and look up the definitions in a dictionary of every word I did not know and also the ones I thought I knew...you will be surprised at what you don`t know by doing that...and I was to go over that with him

read the whole chapter again
highlight or underline
in different colors
1-the problem
2-the directions
3-the solution
as I do,in the margin ,put a "p" for problem beside the text,or "d" for directions etc
and I was to go over that with him

read the whole chapter again
in the margin of the book,he had me write a " w " for when there is a warning,a " P " for a promise and go over that with him

read the whole chapter again
write down anything that I have questions about
and I was to go over that with him

we met weekly during this time and we would read the whole chapter again,page by page,taking turns and he would stop me when he wanted to make a strong point

he wanted to make sure I knew excally what it meant and to show me how sick I was,but also how we can get well

also during this time he stressed for me to "be of service"
I found in the Dr`s Opinion there is quite a bit of text referring to our "being or service to others"

hope this helps...

here is how another does it (Thx Jen I'll beg for forgiveness at Facebook)

When I take someone through the Dr's Opinion (or review it with them, or read it over, discuss it, or however you'd like to phrase the act) I AM taking them through the first part of the first step. The directions are in the book. The Dr's Opinion conveys powerlessness in relation to Step 1. The phenomena of craving + the mental obsession = powerless.

No offense, but I think it's pretty darn important that they understand why they call themselves an alcoholic.

I hear people in meetings say things like, "Well I'm powerless over everything!" I'm not trying to refute that, but it has nothing to do with powerlessness in regards to step 1, which is specifically about being powerless over alcohol, and has one very specific qualification: the phenomena of craving. You ask half of them what it means to be powerless over alcohol and they give you a deer in the headlights look. Here they are, calling themselves alcoholics, and they don't even know WHY.

To draw reasonable and accurate conclusions, one must first understand the facts.

Before you can admit what it is you are powerless over it helps if you know what that is. If you have any questions, PM me, because there are 2 ways to work a 1st step, one is with a sponsor, the other is drink until you want to commit suicide, I am not sure which one she is asking you to do here.

-- Edited by AGO on Friday 19th of March 2010 11:20:54 PM