This is my first sober holiday season since I was a child. I don't have the words to express how amazing it is that I am experiencing a Christmas this way with my babies and wife. I won't go into detail about the way it used to be because I want to focus on the positive right now. All I know is that I'm 100% present, engaged and full of appreciation and gratitude. My wife feels it and, even though they're very young, my little girls feel it. There was always love but now there's also peace and serenity in our home.
As I sit here , wishing, I was in your shoes, I put down my glass of wine and weep. Good for you, I don't know you ,but I am PROUD of you, and next year I hope I am posting the same as you! I long for sobriety, I pray for it, I wish for it, but it is so much easier for me to tell my loved ones to go to hell and let me be so I can drink and sleep my life away. I hate myself for this and I don;t deserve nor do I want anyone's love. My heart is broken over my last love of six years who couldn't take my drinking any longer and it has left me angry and mad at the world. I need major help, but yet I don't care if I get it....How sad am I. I feel pathetic. So anyways, good for you , your story made me smile! Take care and stay strong! Kathy
I have struggled for a very long time. I spent so many hours posting here, drunk and depressed. I was so lost and confused that I never thought I could ever have what many of the people here have...peace, serenity, happiness. Deep down inside I hated myself and it caused me to behave in endless self destructive ways. I was a difficult, frustrating person to know both here in this forum and in the real world. If you would have asked anyone about me during those bad times they might very well have told you that I was a lost cause.
After all of these years, after all of the lying and chaos and self loathing I finally opened my eyes and my mind. Even at my lowest I hadn't accepted that I was an alcoholic. I said the words but I didnt honestly understand what it meant to truly and fully come to terms with it. The moment I did that things began to change. I started to go to meetings and to participate. I got a (proper) sponsor who I trusted and became willing to listen to his guidance and suggestions. My mind opened to the possibilities of the promises made in the big book and, more importantly, open to the idea that this simple program could actually work for me if I followed the recipe.
This may sound odd Kathy but you do know me. You, me and every other alcoholic have suffered the same crushing and agonizing guilt, shame and remorse. We've all been there to some degree. Once I began to recover this became really clear to me and I developed an almost inexplicable bond to the other alcoholics in the rooms of AA. As well as so much compassion and empathy for the alcoholic who still suffers.
I didn't have to suffer for decades trying to fight this addiction on my own, and neither do you. You've found AA and they will help you. No matter how stubborn you are, no matter how many times you mess up, no matter how many times you fall, your AA friends will always welcome you and help you back up until you can finally stand on your own two feet. And the greatest thing of all, when you're ready you'll happily do the same thing for someone else.
Today I don't have cravings, urges or desire to drink. I'm really happy. I'm not a special case. It happens in the AA program all the time.
You will be in my thoughts and prayers.
James
-- Edited by The Ghost of Tipsy on Saturday 27th of December 2014 01:54:25 AM
That was the most 'heart-felt' post I remember reading in a long time ... I'm crying tears of joy for answered prayers ... YOU are a 'Miracle In Progress' for sure ...
Kathy, ...
please join us on the road to happy destiny ... the journey is a 'healing' one and brings us back to life like no other can do ... I cannot say it any better than James did already ... here and in the rooms of AA is where we learn to live and to love life ... alcohol had taken my ability to 'love' and 'be loved' away ... AA gave me back a life to truly enjoy ...
Love you guys and God Bless, Pappy
__________________
'Those who leave everything in God's hand will eventually see God's hand in everything.'
As I sit here , wishing, I was in your shoes, I put down my glass of wine and weep. Good for you, I don't know you ,but I am PROUD of you, and next year I hope I am posting the same as you! I long for sobriety, I pray for it, I wish for it, but it is so much easier for me to tell my loved ones to go to hell and let me be so I can drink and sleep my life away. I hate myself for this and I don;t deserve nor do I want anyone's love. My heart is broken over my last love of six years who couldn't take my drinking any longer and it has left me angry and mad at the world. I need major help, but yet I don't care if I get it....How sad am I. I feel pathetic. So anyways, good for you , your story made me smile! Take care and stay strong! Kathy
Hello Kathy:
You likely won't believe me but we pretty well all have been where you are and felt what you feel. You are one of us, no better nor worse.
I strongly suggest that you look in your local telephone book for AA and give them a call. They will help you as they have helped me and millions before me.
You can find your local AA on-line at AA.org as well.
You will be posting the same as James next year if you do what James did .. he called AA and began to listen to what they had to say.
Welcome Kathy M. Very good 1st step...love the honesty so you reveal you still have that tool. 1st step? "Admitted we were powerless over alcohol and that our lives had become unmanageable". You said that as good as I've ever heard it, better than I did ever. I've been in the rooms for a while and was withholding the truth of my powerlessness in the thought that maybe I might be wrong. Oh I stopped drinking and I wasn't really sober. I was dry and incompliance some. Guilt and Shame...didn't feel those two emotions until I was years dry and without alcohol to anesthetize the feelings of nausea I got when the reality hit me. I know I hurt myself and many others during my drinking career however thinking it and feeling it are two different things. I relate to your attitude and didn't get sober until I knew I was wrong. My program and sponsorship told me I would not get truly sober with the same brain I drank with. I had to see the truth as a sober person and not thru the eyes and memories of the drunk. I arrived slowly at the truth that I was a child of God -and- an alcoholic. I was truly a loving person -and- an alcoholic. The " -and- an alcoholic" took me way from saying "but an alcoholic" and by committing to the program as suggested and led thru by the fellowship both statements became true and I can stay sober -and- be a loving, caring, child of God too.
You've knocked on the right door and you got a "white page" suggestion which is what I did. The hotline number in the phone book led me to the rooms when I didn't even know what the hell alcoholism was.
Again welcome...stick with us...listen to the suggestions and follow thru on them and let us love you till you learn to love yourself. Tip can tell you about that part too.
