keithj

Carl,

Great! You're ahead of the game. A little resting on the laurels maybe. Happens to all of us from time to time. I tend to get feeling uncomfortable, unmotivated, and just plain blah. Oftentimes, I'll notice it in how I treat other people before I notice it in how I feel.

Still powerless? You drank when you didn't want to? OK. Still have something you believe in? Can you still pray to something? OK again. Moving on.

Have you given over your life? How would you know? I can always tell this because I get fearful. The areas in my life that I have not put under the care and direction of a higher power are the same areas where I have fear. Sure, God, take over my alcoholism for me, cuz I'm screwing that up big time, but I can handle the rest.

I'm just guessing here, Carl, throwing out ideas about unhapiness in sobriety. The most common areas of life where I try to retain control are my job, my finances, my family, and my sexual relations. I can get over things not going my way in other, ordinary, small ways because I am simply not that important. The world doesn't care if I have to wait in line, or get stuck in traffic, or get cheated out of a few dollars.

But the things that I really care about, like family, sex, and money, I really want to have control over. And that futile attempt to control what I can not control makes me miserable. So I do that exercise of naming my fears in those areas where I still try to control. As in, I'm afraid she won't love me. Then I ask, what would God have me be? And I write that down and carry it with me for a couple of weeks. Sounds silly, I know. When that fear (or discomfort) comes up, I pull out that card, look up the fear about her not loving me, and follow the directions for what God would have me be. Loving, kind, and patient. Then I act loving, kind, and patient.

I'm just spitballing, Carl. I've been doing this for years when things seem sucky in sobriety. Because things aren't really sucky, I am. Things are exactly as things are.

carl11

thank you, I appreciate your thoughts keith.......I hear you. I am not in the emotional or physical or state to answer fully......

Dee74

Hi Carl
I'm sorry to hear you're struggling but its good to see you again.

I hope you find some stuff in this thread that helps you get back to where you want to be, mate

D

keithj

OK, a bit much at the moment. How about instead of trying to live life on life's terms, try living life on God's terms.

carl11

I am trying Keith....I have always had a spiritual side and didn’t have any issues with it in AA.

sfgirl

This is a brilliant statement by Wolfchild. His whole post was awesome.

If I ever used happiness as a measure if I should continue on in sobriety I wouldn't have made it past day one. I certainly wouldn't have made it past last week. I felt yucky last week. But you know what? Yesterday I started feeling good again. This is what I have been learning as part of sobriety— how to deal with all my feelings, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Before I just chased the good and ignored the bad. If you go into sobriety with that same mindset, very much the addict mindset, that sobriety=happiness so let me get sober because alcohol doesn't work at making me happy anymore well it is difficult to keep it going. Feelings are fleeting; they pass. As Wolfchild says you need a different motivation for staying sober.

The other thing is that my own personal experience with happiness in sobriety is that my mood my first six months pretty much sucked. I was feeling introverted and extremely tired. A whole lot of emotional and physical change was going on. I was learning so much. And for the first time I was confronting all that I had drank over for my whole life. Guess what? I didn't need to confront a whole lot of pleasant issues, they were mostly unpleasant and things there was a reason I had avoided. But you have to have faith. And at around 7 months things started shifting. I can't believe how far I have come. But again am I happy all the time? No. Certainly not. Last week=bad week. But I ride it out kind of like a craving. And I am riding out this first year working hard at recovery knowing that it only gets better and easier.

Relapse isn't all that bad. I did it too in the first month. You just got to get back on the horse. It helps you reexamine issues that needed attention. I don't do AA, but other people here had some good suggestions regarding that stuff. Good luck!

joedris

Ok, I usually let Keith do all the responding as he is most excellent at it. But I have to jump in here. You relapsed after several months of sobriety. Now I don't want to bust your bubble here, but you're not unique in having done this. I've lost track of the number of times I relapsed after months of sobriety (9 mos was my big hurdle). The thing to consider here is picking up the drink is the last step in relapsing. We always set ourselves up long before, most often by our alcoholic thinking. The relapse process was set in motion long before the drink.

So get back up, brush yourself off, and get back into the program. Work with your sponsor to try and figured out what happened. Learn from it. And please stop beating yourself up. AA is a simple program, but it's also a difficult one as you're finding out. Revisit the steps you've done so far. Take it one day at a time. You'll find that the day will arrive where you don't want to drink more than you want to. It'll come, just keep with the program.

spiker

Maybe you can find a reason to be sober? Something that makes you happy, and that only sobriety can bring you?
I also plan ahead on danger zone nights. What I mean by that is, I know that friday night after work has been my big drinking night. So, I have made plans ahead of time in order to have something else to do. Tomorrow, I am going to deliver a computer I fixed for a friend and then we will go to the movies.
Otherwise I would be heading to the pub.
I am not preaching, I still struggle with drinking. I have been drunk once this week and called in sick to work with a hangover. So, I understand.
I also understand it is pathetic for a 37 year old man such as myself unable to hold a relationship and a man who calls in sick to work from a hangover. So shaming.

spiker

"I had to find my soul's purpose in order to stay sober. I had been going through life, ignoring the little voice inside me, and heading off in whatever direction struck me at the time. I had to slow down, be quiet and listen."

I am curious as to what the voice told you?

carl11

Well, I have just made an appt. with a therapist. After thinking it all through, speaking to my sponsor and my grand daddy sponsor, they both felt that nothing could hurt and realize that the program cannot help deep seated issues that may drive one to drink the way I do, 4 mo.s stop then start, then a year clean then again after 6 months.

No father around, my grandmother died when I was 8 ( my only other sppt.), my mother dieing a year and a half later, ( I found her, stroked out on the couch) and then being packed off to a boys school, well, my issues may be beyond cleaning house etc. My sponsor was concerned when he didn’t see any abandonment or such issues like that in my inventory/resentments, I basically responded well, its hard to make amends/close off feelings with a person who died, it was beyond anyone’s control.