On The Wagon... then in 'ere!

How we all coping? @Cuchulain managing to stay sober?

I'd have loved the excuse to sequester myself at home with no one to see what's going on if I'd been drinking. I didn't need the excuse of a pandemic and government enforced lockdown to do just that as it was, but being 'ordered' to sit around by myself drinking would have been a dream come true.

I'm working quite hard to make sure I don't get too isolated by speaking to friends and family on the phone, attending Zoom AA meetings and making sure I get out to exercise daily. Things feel weird, but not lonely and I'm still sober so I must be doing something right!

Stay safe all
 
Hit the one year mark without a drink on May 5th, there have been a few times i've had a real compulsion to drink in the evening with the nice weather but didn't dare, going for a drive on my motorbike, playing some PC games or watching a movie soon helps me forget about it.

I'm at work still so that takes up a fair bit of my time, everyone doing ok during this lockdown?.
 
Nice one khemist & everyone else. I set a goal to have a week off recently as my consumption had been creeping up (instead of buying 4 cans, I was buying now buying 8), it was a lot harder than I thought it would be which I guess says something. I felt so lousy the first few days but by day 4 I felt fantastic, didn't realise it affected my mood so much to be honest. 'Treated' myself to a few drinks the other night and really wish I hadn't bothered.
 
Hit the 500 days mark a couple of days ago. Still in to the non alcoholic beers a fair bit and get the odd twang for a glass of red but this doesn't last long. Good luck to those starting out. It is worth it.
 
During lockdown I've probably been averaging 50 units a week, which is a ridiculous amount, I think I misunderstood how much a unit is when I previously said that 90 units "isn't that much" :o

Need to stop... :(
 
I've still not touched anything since last May and have no plans to have anything for the rest of the year.

My brother is really bad with it though, he had a fit months ago when detoxing in front of his kids and has been in and out of hospital four times since then, he is in there just now after getting admitted last night and that's after being in a rehab place last year so not looking good for him.

I've thought about drinking, as in wanting a drink and even dreamt that i did have a drink and woke up feeling terrible until i realized it was a dream, can't go back to that anymore.

Work, enjoying my motorbike and playing some BF1 is keeping me occupied at the minute, hope you are all doing well.
 
I've stopped as I fell into the trap again and was drinking 20 units a day, I'm only 2 days in and my mood is so low again, when do things get a little easier when you stop drinking? On reflection I think my issue is to do with using alcohol as a coping mechanism, such as feeling low (like now but I know it's a vicious cycle and is probably caused from alcohol) then reaching for a drink to 'cheer up'.

I do start to wonder if it is a bit like smoking, should I ideally be looking at total withdrawal from alcohol or do we have any successful stories of a casual drinker?
 
Bunko said:
I've stopped as I fell into the trap again and was drinking 20 units a day, I'm only 2 days in and my mood is so low again, when do things get a little easier when you stop drinking? On reflection I think my issue is to do with using alcohol as a coping mechanism, such as feeling low (like now but I know it's a vicious cycle and is probably caused from alcohol) then reaching for a drink to 'cheer up'.

I do start to wonder if it is a bit like smoking, should I ideally be looking at total withdrawal from alcohol or do we have any successful stories of a casual drinker?
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If by easier you mean when does the desire to stop drinking lessen then I'd have to say it depends. It was at least 6 months or so before I had the beginnings of the tools and coping strategies to manage my life without automatically feeling the desire to reach for my old crutch of alcohol. Almost 5 years on and there are still times when I have a fleeting craving, but with practice and time I've become more a more capable user of the tools and coping strategies sobriety has taught me and the cravings are both far more fleeting and far easier to deal with.

I must stress though, that in my experience this was an active process; I actively sought to develop the tools I needed to manage my life without alcohol and I actively practised using those tools daily. I still do. It's one of reasons I wasn't able to get sober without AA and it's 12 step programme. I don't suggest AA is the only way to get sober but I strongly suggest that it's so difficult to get sober without that kind of internal work that it might as well be impossible. How you approach the work matters not at all, so long as you do the work and the method of doing it works for you. I'd also suggest that for most people this requires help of some kind so please reach out for whatever will work for you.

I personally believe that if a person is an alcoholic then there is no chance of them "returning" to casual social drinking. For me, the evidence of my own failed attempts at returning to social drinking and the countless variations of those attempts I've heard described at meetings convince me of this. I firmly believe that had it been possible for me to control my drinking I'd have discovered how to do it. I tried enough solutions often enough. If you've tried and failed to control your drinking then you might be in the same position.

I'm aware this all might sound doom and gloom. It certainly wasn't what I wanted to hear when I was stopping drinking so let me finish on a positive. My life is indescribably better today because I don't drink, if that weren't true I'd probably have started drinking again. My mood has improved, I'm healthier, kinder, more productive and get far more variety and enjoyment out of my days. It's been worth it.
 
Appreciate the honesty, glad to hear your life is so much better without alcohol, shows what you can achieve if you do put your mind to it. I don't think I've ever thought of myself as an alcoholic, I don't wake up in the traditional sense of thinking about drinking and then drink all day but I guess it rears its head when you try to give it up for a week and struggle? Compared to 2 days ago though my mood has certainly improved from what it was so I hope that continues especially when I have to deal with something that would usually be a trigger.
 
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