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Class of April 2013 Part 3

Old 05-05-2013, 01:27 PM
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Welcome Daisyboo! Post away!
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Old 05-05-2013, 02:15 PM
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Originally Posted by Goat View Post
Welcome daisyboo!

Hi daisy just wanted to make sure u found this thread, Ok I'm leaving I'm leaving.
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Old 05-05-2013, 02:30 PM
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Hi

Welcome Daisyboo - glad to have you with us

Sorry for your loss scout - glad you're keeping strong though

The amount of time I spend thinking about, drinking/not drinking/regretting drinking/moderating drinking/future drinking temptations, is unbelievable. If I used only a small fraction of that time to pursue worthy goals I could accomplish so much - I will be glad when this drinking monkey is off my back - although I think it may take a while.

Good Luck all

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Old 05-05-2013, 02:40 PM
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Hi Daisyboo, yes you can! I am a wine person myself. I'd be sitting on the back garden of my apartment building sucking down sauvignon blanc, with the other residents right now. I actually ate my dinner out there the other day and all of the wine and beer around me had no effect.
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Old 05-05-2013, 03:01 PM
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Ok it's 11pm and I'm in bed, sober.bit scared of laying here sober to be honest
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Old 05-05-2013, 04:54 PM
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Originally Posted by bookpunk View Post
Mallard and DG re: angry face during recovery:

I sometimes think that what we call "PAWS" is just life. You get sober, you start to have a whole range of emotions including confusion and anger and frustration. Normal people feel those emotions too. As a drunk, I was able to drown these emotions and not really deal with them.

The idea of PAWS is reassuring: That it's just leftovers from being an alcoholic, and this too shall pass. PAWS or not, it WILL pass. That's life.

As St. Johnny Rotten once said, "Anger is an energy."

I am going to have to disagree here. What we experience the first few months isn't the same at all as life as a sober person. Anger is normal... but losing your mind and wanting to murder you roommate because you misplaced your sunglasses isn't. That's overreacting. A typical PAWS symptom is experiencing a normal emotion, but to a much larger degree than is normal for the situation.

Here's a list of PAWS symptoms as described here: Why We Don’t Get Better Immediately: Post-acute Withdrawal Syndrome (PAWS) | What...Me Sober?

Symptoms

PAWS symptoms reach a peak from three to six months after we get clean. Any use of drugs or alcohol, even in small quantities or for a short time, will effectively eliminate any improvement gained over that time, as it will keep the brain from healing. There are a variety of symptoms. Not everyone will experience all of them. Here are some of the main ones.

Inability to solve problems

Inability to solve problems leads to lowered self-esteem. We feel embarrassed, incompetent, and “not okay.” Diminished self-esteem and fear of failure lead to living and working problems. These all add to our stress, and the stress further exaggerates the other problems. Six things contribute to this: trouble thinking clearly, emotional overreaction, memory problems, sleep disturbances, physical coordination problems and difficulty managing stress.

Inability to think clearly

Our brain seems to work properly only part of the time. Sometimes our head just feels fuzzy because of the changes that occurred in our brains while we were using. The changes take time to improve. It is also due to the simple fact that we are trying to process a lot more information than we did before. While using, we mainly thought about getting more, using, and turning off our brains. Now we are considering the myriad things necessary to truly live our lives. To begin with, it can be a bit much.

Inability to concentrate

Abstract reasoning suffers, and we find our minds, like a confused cowboy, jumping on its horse and riding off in all directions. Also related to the reasons above.

Rigid, repetitive thinking

Thoughts go around and around in our heads, and we are unable to put them into useful order. We have not yet developed the ability to channel our thoughts and concentrate on one thing at a time.

Memory problems

We may hear something, understand it, and 20 minutes later…it’s gone! This sort of thing complicates our lives in many ways. It upsets supervisors, annoys significant others, and makes us wonder if we’re losing our minds.

With memory problems it is hard to learn new skills and absorb new information. We learn by building on what we have already learned, and memory difficulties can make it very difficult (if not impossible) to do that. Again, these difficulties add to stress, especially if we do not understand what’s happening to us. We may think, “This sucks! I might as well be high.”

Emotional overreaction or numbness *


People with emotional problems in early sobriety tend to over-react. When this overreaction puts more stress on our nervous systems than we can handle, we react by “shutting down” our emotions. We become emotionally numb, unable to feel anything. We may swing from one mood to another. These mood swings may baffle us, seeming to come without any reason, and may even be misdiagnosed as bipolar disorder. If we have developed insulin resistance or diabetes as a result of our drugs and drinking, this can become extreme. (See H.A.L.T. below)

Sleep disturbances

Disturbed sleep is common in recovery. It may last only a short time, or a lifetime. Often, this depends on what we consider to be a problem. If we are night owls who used alcohol or pills to get to sleep in the daytime, we may discover that the only solution is to make significant changes in our schedule, and perhaps even in our occupations. Sleep deprivation stresses the body, prevents our minds from working well, and generally exaggerates any other difficulties we may be experiencing.

We may experience changes in our sleep patterns, sleeping for long periods at a time, or getting sleepy at different times of the day. Although these may persist, we are usually able to adjust to them. The important thing is to be willing to adjust. We may not be able to keep to our old sleeping habits.

Stress

Difficulty managing stress is the most difficult part of post acute withdrawal, and of early recovery in general. Early on, we may not be able to distinguish between low and high stress situations, because for so many years we managed stress by using mood-altering substances.

Worst of all, the other PAWS symptoms become worse when we are under stress, and this causes the stress to increase! There is a direct relationship between elevated stress and the severity of PAWS. Each amplifies the other.

At times of low stress, the symptoms of post acute withdrawal may lessen or even go away completely. When we are well-rested, relaxed, eating properly and getting along well with others, we seem to be fine. It is easy to see how we can get careless at these times, and many a relapse has occurred when things seemed to be going just fine.
These things are really quite different from what a normal person experiences. I didn't have those things BEFORE I started drinking. But I have faith in others who have quit that it gets better.

It's important to me to be aware of because it lets me handle and manage the stuff when it comes up. I highly recommend reading the whole article quoted here. It goes on to talk about how to stabilize, manage and prevent episodes of PAWS. It's more than a matter of thinking, "with time this will go away". There are plenty of other things we can DO to actually make it go away faster like eating well, exercising, etc.

There's more to being an alcoholic than just the drinking, too. Most of us sacrificed our eating habits, sleep habits, exercise habits, healthy social habits, etc. All of these things also have a huge impact on our emotional and physical health so it stands to reason that once we're quit a while and are able to take better care of ourselves we will become happier and healthier. Of course, we're not going to be smiling ALL the time or anything, but the baseline will be higher and we'll be generally more stable.

Also, here's another good PAWS article from Wikipedia: Post-acute-withdrawal syndrome - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Old 05-05-2013, 05:00 PM
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Originally Posted by Daisyboo View Post
Hi everyone can I please join? Can I post whenever? I'm new!! Xx
You're absolutely welcome here.

I will say though, that since your quit date is in May I think maybe you technically belong over here in the May thread: http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...ay-2013-a.html

You may find more people there that are around Day 1.

Make sure and drink lots of water. It helps, especially during the first few days.
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Old 05-05-2013, 05:03 PM
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Originally Posted by roosta View Post
Tired roosta checking in on the night of day 6.

Passed a big sobriety test tonight...I'm off tomorrow, just got paid and my husband is coming home next week. That's usually the trifecta of doom for me.

I didn't even think about stopping at the store :-) No bargaining, no AV, nothing. Not taking it for granted though. Keeping up my plan.

Goodnight everyone. May you all stay safe and sober tonight. Thank you for being here, every one of you brings something to SR and that's the reason I come here everyday. <3

So sorry about your grandfather, Scout. My thoughts are with you.

roosta
Yesterday was 6 days, so today must be a week for you!! Way to go.

We're glad you're here, too.
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Old 05-05-2013, 05:14 PM
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I'm in New Hampshire for the first of my Boston area meetings... sitting in a Tapas restaurant. Those are hard to find in Ohio

I love how there are (apparently) no fire and building codes here. The buildings are just whatever you can throw together... it's great!

The first step to go up to the upstairs dining is about 18 inches high... the doors are all hung backwards. It's a hoot. This is one of the things I love about travelling. Little consistencies you don't notice until they are completely different somewhere else.
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Old 05-05-2013, 05:16 PM
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27 days for me!!

Today was a smoother day than the last few. Visited with the relatives before they left town this morning, which felt much more comfortable to me over breakfast and coffee.

I spent a few hours playing my drums. I have actually memorized a few pieces, which I am quite pleased about. For the longest time, I couldn't figure out why I couldn't actually learn music, but could sight read just fine. I didn't realize how frustrating that was to me until I quit drinking and am able to actually memorize stuff again. My memory has improved immensely over the last few weeks. Last night my bf had a phone conversation after drinking and this morning, I don't think he remembered it at all until I brought it up and told him what it was about. It made me feel good about myself for being the one that wasn't drinking last night.

Also a thought occurred to me once I was in bed about being out last night. I was SO GLAD when my food came. I can tell that I'm healthier because that was what I really wanted. It used to be that I didn't really care about the food as long as I had a drink and I'd get that same sort of thankful feeling toward my drink instead.

My boyfriend went out a while, so I get a few hours of quiet to relax and be calm.
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Old 05-05-2013, 05:28 PM
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Originally Posted by Goat View Post
I'm in New Hampshire for the first of my Boston area meetings... sitting in a Tapas restaurant. Those are hard to find in Ohio

I love how there are (apparently) no fire and building codes here. The buildings are just whatever you can throw together... it's great!

The first step to go up to the upstairs dining is about 18 inches high... the doors are all hung backwards. It's a hoot. This is one of the things I love about travelling. Little consistencies you don't notice until they are completely different somewhere else.
I didn't know what a Tapas restaurant was for like the first 20 years of my life. I guess they're hard to find in my state too.

And I just have to agree that those unique things you find along the way are one of the great things about traveling. It's interesting how we get so used to our own world sometimes. Come to think about it, even though I travel a lot, sometimes, it's like the moment I get home I start forgetting that there's other stuff outside my front door.
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Old 05-05-2013, 06:00 PM
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Ugh.... just binged on FOOD. I won't even tell you what I ate, because it's so embarrassing. Guess I listened to the AV after all...

Hope I don't feel horrible tomorrow and my pancreas doesn't crap out.

Anyway... hope everyone had a good weekend. Going to hit the sack early before I eat anything else, and read instead.
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Old 05-06-2013, 12:57 AM
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Hey!
Day 17 here. Yay me I did it, another week-end without booze.

Johnny, I would absolutely love to read your story. If you start a blog I'm definitely gonna check it out! My drinking has a lot to do with me being a punk-rock- metalhead-goth chick. Gonna post about that in my blog later or tomorrow, but I know it's related (or I make it related, but I want to keep the metal/punk/goth part and remove the drug/booze part).

Anyway, I had this huge party on Fri. night and I did it. All my friends drink a lot, and I think that most of them do have a problem with alcohol (they would drink 20 or more beers at each party, and nothing in between, but sometimes parties are once a week) but they don't get really drunk.
One girl got really drunk and was annoying and the rest (including my husband) was drinking but still very interesting to talk to. So I had lots of fun, people were still able to have a good conversation on politics at 4 am (yes we French people just love arguing about politics). I went to bet after 6AM, totally wired on caffeine. I had to take some Xanax to be able to sleep which is not good but still better than drinking (I'm very careful with the benzodiazepines I don't want to trade one addiction for another, and I am very good at doing that).

Did I have cravings? yes, definitely.
When we arrived about 4 PM the girls were already having beer in the garden. I looked longingly at the six packs on the table and asked for a glass and drank my first bottle of Fanta Zero quite quickly. I actually had waaaay too much soda, during the night. I realized that all the soda I had would have been beer on an afternoon + night like that, but I had like 6 liters of soda. I guess it's not very good (aspartame, caffeine) but for the moment I don't care. Then I had several cravings after that (one at each new alcohol, actually: they had very good whisky, mead, and wine, each time a new bottle appeared, I had a small craving, and I was just asking myself: why would I drink? What would I gain from drinking? am I having fun? yes. Am I enjoying everybody's company? yes. So I don't need a drink. And the craving went away and disappeared).
Oh and I vaped a lot my e cig, too.
But I had a great night.
Saturday was even easier, I was tired and beer was more expensive than OJ anyway at the festival, and I was driving (on Friday I was supposed to, but finally we stayed for the night at my friends place).
Today the weather is awesome. Gonna exercise on my elliptical now and I'm gonna go and enjoy my garden after that.

Hope everyone's having (or is going to have) a great sober day soon!
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Old 05-06-2013, 01:39 AM
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Hello Class.

Firstly: Thank you all very much for your thoughts. I cannot convey how much they mean, even if we are perfect strangers that share a common site, and goal of sobriety.

While not a total shock, Grandpa's passing was tougher than I imagined. I lost my dad while I was in my second year of undergrad, and this is just another link to Dad that's gone now. It's hard being so far away. Our family is about as scattered internationally as we can be, so there will be some that go home, and others that do not. We're staying home. It's a real mess around here. What with Mom being on island...and bringing some of dads ashes with her, as dad never made it to Hawaii. He grew up, lived near, and worked on the water. He actually forged his dads signature so he could head for the Coast Guards boot camp the day after he graduated. Tuesday we will let a part of him into the blue waters of the Pacific. Going to be a **** all week, I can say that much.

Blue Dog and I are on the back patio. Listening to the rain, and enjoying a cigar. Well, I am. He is gathering toys and piling them at my feet wanting a little night fetch session.

With everything going on, sobriety is the last thing on my mind. Not in the sense that I don't care, or am giving up...I'm just not thinking about either. Drinking, or not. Or maybe I am and just don't realize it. A death in the family used to be pretty much license for a lot to drink. Neither thought has really occurred to me.

I'm just sad. Which is ok. I'm not despondent or inconsolable. Just sad.
I need to get a lot of work done tomorrow...but sitting out here right now feels kind of nice. My pencils are just over there on my desk...I'm hoping for a bit of inspiration to strike between now and morning tea...as those pencils don't seem to be drawing anything for me. Jerks.

I think my love of cartoons probably started with Dad. When I was very small, he worked nights, and would wake me up on Saturday mornings--I'd watch cartoons, and he'd doze and mumble incoherent dad things while I lie on his chest. Wile E. Coyote was his favorite. He always cheered for Wile because he never quit.
There have been days in the last month that I really feel like I've been blown up with my own ACME rocket...and in a lot of ways...it's true since I, and I alone did the drinking.

But...
I'm never going to quit.
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Old 05-06-2013, 04:07 AM
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Originally Posted by ScoutBall View Post
Hello Class.

Firstly: Thank you all very much for your thoughts. I cannot convey how much they mean, even if we are perfect strangers that share a common site, and goal of sobriety.

While not a total shock, Grandpa's passing was tougher than I imagined. I lost my dad while I was in my second year of undergrad, and this is just another link to Dad that's gone now. It's hard being so far away. Our family is about as scattered internationally as we can be, so there will be some that go home, and others that do not. We're staying home. It's a real mess around here. What with Mom being on island...and bringing some of dads ashes with her, as dad never made it to Hawaii. He grew up, lived near, and worked on the water. He actually forged his dads signature so he could head for the Coast Guards boot camp the day after he graduated. Tuesday we will let a part of him into the blue waters of the Pacific. Going to be a **** all week, I can say that much.

Blue Dog and I are on the back patio. Listening to the rain, and enjoying a cigar. Well, I am. He is gathering toys and piling them at my feet wanting a little night fetch session.

With everything going on, sobriety is the last thing on my mind. Not in the sense that I don't care, or am giving up...I'm just not thinking about either. Drinking, or not. Or maybe I am and just don't realize it. A death in the family used to be pretty much license for a lot to drink. Neither thought has really occurred to me.

I'm just sad. Which is ok. I'm not despondent or inconsolable. Just sad.
I need to get a lot of work done tomorrow...but sitting out here right now feels kind of nice. My pencils are just over there on my desk...I'm hoping for a bit of inspiration to strike between now and morning tea...as those pencils don't seem to be drawing anything for me. Jerks.

I think my love of cartoons probably started with Dad. When I was very small, he worked nights, and would wake me up on Saturday mornings--I'd watch cartoons, and he'd doze and mumble incoherent dad things while I lie on his chest. Wile E. Coyote was his favorite. He always cheered for Wile because he never quit.
There have been days in the last month that I really feel like I've been blown up with my own ACME rocket...and in a lot of ways...it's true since I, and I alone did the drinking.

But...
I'm never going to quit.
my friend it's getting through these hard times that gives us the belief we don't have to drink. Yes I am struggling but when through a lot of sh,t the other week and came through with out a drink,
Makes me feel more confident I don't need it.
Sorry for your loss
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Old 05-06-2013, 04:16 AM
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30 days today at 10:45 PM, the time I sat down my last (of about 12 that day) cocktail. So far so good. Lots of desire to drink but that has passed.

On to 60 days!
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Old 05-06-2013, 04:19 AM
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Snapp 30 days here to well done lets hope it gets easier here on
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Old 05-06-2013, 05:13 AM
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Congratulations Drake and Mallard

It's perfectly natural and ok to be sad, but stay in touch Scout
D
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Old 05-06-2013, 05:53 AM
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Drake and Mallard, way to go on 30 days guys!! That is super awesome!!



I'd find those smilies with party hats and balloons and all, but my tablet won't let me access the 'more smilies' so the one will have to suffice but just know you deserve the balloons.
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Old 05-06-2013, 05:58 AM
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4 weeks for me!!!

Well, today is day 28 for me no alcohol.

I woke up in a good mood. I am going to make it a productive and good day.
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