JTBIV

Drinking brings me closer to death everyday, but everyday I drink like I can't wait to die. Why would I ever choose that?

Coldfusion

When I thought my only choices were drinking or dying, I went to the hospital instead of drinking. The hospital helped me find a comfortable, no-cost detox program.

Dee74

I don't why I chose it either but it seemed like the only option for years.

Then I learned about other options

What kind of things have you tried to stop drinking JTBIV?

D

JTBIV

I don't want to die. That's kinda my point. I work at a hospital and I can honestly say 99 percent of my co-workers don't really care if addicts get better. They look at them like they are the scum of the earth and it bugs me. I hear so many times "they did it to themselves." "They are better off dead." "They shouldn't be allowed to be re-admitted again." I just think choice died a long time ago for most of these people and nobody I work with can wrap there head around that. Addiction is stronger than choice. None of them know I drink way too much and can't stop and will probably end up being a patient at the very place I work someday. All of them love me. If only they knew I was just like these "scum" they don't want to care for.

Dee74

I think you're mixing up two different scenarios there though.

I think most of us know people for whom the power of choice is not applicable - the homeless drunks, the wet-brain drunks....

You're not in that category - believe it or not, you do have a say as to how your story plays out.

I don't buy the 'oh well I'm an alcoholic so it's gonna kill me' line - that's just fatalistic BS.

When my drinking really did nearly kill me? I fought like a tiger for life...I bet you would too, JTB

You can make a stand and fight - gather up support,m make changes to your life......or you can get carried along like a leaf in the gutter to the inevitable end.

That's a very real choice, open to you right now..

D

Dee74

oh and I'm not buying into the what other people think argument, man - that makes no difference whether you get into recovery or not

D

JTBIV

I know you're right, Dee. I'm just having a really bad night. We've had so many detox patients lately. Just some really tragic stuff come through and I hate hearing the lack of remorse for them. Mostly I know I'm mad at myself. After this work stretch I had it in my mind I was not drinking again. All it took was a friend sending me a link to a song that had the word "drunk" in the first line to get me to run to the store and buy beer before they closed. I hate this.

Dee74

What other people think of me is none of my business JTB. I know what I am, and I know my strengths and weaknesses better than anyone else.

I'm sure you're the same, man - just a guy trying to make good

D.

afloatsober

Its my view that once we find out that there is a solution and that long term recovery is attainable, we are no longer drinking in ignorance and do have a choice. I have seen homeless and people given the 'last rites' come back and prosper from what seemed a hopeless condition.
Each time that i picked up a drink with knowledge that recovery was possible, i drank because i wanted to, no matter how warped and sick my reasoning.
I was no longer drinking in ignorance.
Yes it's damn hard to stay stopped sometimes, but it's my choice today.
As to what others think.
Hell, they have seen me rolling around in gutters and now they don't.
It's what I think about that that matters.
And i think it's amazing.

Ifnotforgrace

If it's not a choice..then how can you choose recovery?

robgt350

JT
i work at a hospital also, yea i heard the same things you just said and alot more that has words that are banned here. i see these people day in and day out.
but i see drinking is a choice. i mean i am making a choice to be here to help me stop drinking. i am also making a choice to keep sober after 16 months. i love nothing more than to have a nice drink or 3 or 4 and a fine cigar. but i know i will drink there on ever night and ,, yea i might be killing my self too.
so i think it is a choice, well that is my point of view

Notimetoloose

I feel once addiction takes hold it is no longer a choice, it is Addiction..
Different ballgame altogether.

Ifnotforgrace

A difficult choice is still a choice - I can choose to not to smoke, gamble, drink, eat sugar, or consume caffeine etc. Just because that choice will bring about physical withdrawal,,from the substance, it is still a choice I can make. I'm for using every tool in the box to reinforce the choice, but choice it is or NO ONE would ever get sober.

JTBIV

I want to stop. I see end stage liver failure patients laying in bed looking like yellow bloated see hags not resembling even a shell of their former selves. I've had to manage young alcoholics airways as other staff tie them to the bed because they are so out of their mind detoxing they don't know reality from the hallucinations. I see alcoholics die of seizures. I see almost daily the complete mess life as an addict is. Yet I drink, still. I know its probably because I can't admit to anyone else I have a problem. I try to quit alone and it doesn't work. Do I have to wait until I'm on deaths door before I have the courage to admit my problem to the people in my life. Wtf does it take? I know I need a support system to make this work but why can't I tell anyone. Choice is funny.

IWLSAST

When i am active in my addiction it is my choice to buy the first drink of that run. It is after the first drink that i lose my ability to choose.

In recovery mode, I choose on a daily basis to ask for help and freedom from the obsession.

Either way, drinking or not...my choices.

FeenixxRising

Yes, addiction is pernicious. Many of us have wanted to stop drinking or using, but we found it very difficult if not almost impossible. But I believe many of us have the ability to choose to seek help. Certainly anyone who is posting regularly on this site is coherent and cognizant enough to choose to seek help.

Notimetoloose

JTBIV, The despair and tragedy you see unfold before you in your job must have an enormous impact on you.
I am all for a support system and choose them wisely, as you stated from your earlier post some of your work colleagues could do with a lesson in compassion.
I have nothing but admiration and respect for you in the work you do as I find it awfully difficult to distance myself.
Does your job offer some sort of debriefing and support?

caboblanco

If you were offered a thousand dollars each day if you didn't drink..but as soon as you had one drop the deal is off for good...what would you do?

now tell me again if you think it's a choice

Notimetoloose

I want to qualify this....
I feel once in the midst of Addiction to recover is more about a mind set than a choice.
I know that can sound a little like circular reasoning but when we say no more to our addiction we really have to change so much of thinking and lives that its much more than simplifying it down to a choice.

Hawkeye13

I didn't make the choice to stop for thirty years.
I made half-hearted attempts to quit, but relapsed
and blamed it on my genetics (2 alcoholic parents)
my crappy home life (2 divorced still drinking alcoholic parents)
my rough road in life
(had to pay for my own college, couldn't be around toxic family, ACOA issues, etc.)

Then I did make the choice to stop and I stopped. It was very hard at first. Now I love it.

Right now I'm still stopped, and have no desire to drink again.
I suppose I realized watching my mother withdraw from life and essentially die from drinking and smoking alone in her house that I didn't want to die the same way.

I wanted to live, and enjoy my life. Now I do.
I think you have the same choice.