When I got sober I put all kinds of stuff on credit. A car, furniture, clothes. You name it I got it. Over here (in NZ) we call 'getting credit' 'Hire Purchase' as in HP. I remember a guy at an AA mtg saying to me the only HP he needed in his life was his HP. It made me laugh but it was true at the time. I was in debt up to my eye balls and had barely been sober a year.
But personally I don't think us alkies are very different to the rest of the world when it comes to filling the void with other stuff. I.e. plasma TV, new boyfriend or chocolate cake. So I wouldn't give yourself to harder time.
And a few years ago, a friend of mine in the program had a book he wrote published. It took him years to write and he got quite a lot of publicity in the media but after it all died down he found himself going into bookshops and keeping a running score (in his head) on how many copies were selling because of course the should of been selling by the hundreds!!! And he could not be happy/content until it happened. Lol. He told me this story though to illustrate that there will always be 'another thing', that our minds say we need to make us happier, feel better, look better, make doing something easier etc...
The good thing about recovery is we learn to be happy with what we have rather than getting what we want because when we're happy with what we've got and we get what we want, it is 10x sweeter.