Hi TU,
Awhile back you told me that my "cold duck method" of quitting alcohol was something akin to "shifting".
Here's the way it worked, for those who didn't see what I had said about how I quit. I used to drink a couple of bottles of cold duck every night after work. I'd buy one bottle on the way home with the intent to drink one, then go back out and get the other one with my tail between my legs, when I couldn't stop at the one.
One day, I bought my bottle on the way home, but I'd been trying to quit drinking for years, and I'd especially been thinking about trying to quit again for the prior few days. So when I got home, instead of opening the bottle instantly, I put it in the fridge. I told myself I could have it at any time I pleased. Then I had dinner, and that night I left the bottle alone.
I left the bottle in the fridge where I could see it right away when I opened the door, and every night thereafter I'd look at the bottle and not open it. I'd eat dinner and go back and look at it. Every night, my plan was to drink it after I ate IF I couldn't tolerate not drinking that night, but I promised myself to ask myself if I REALLY wanted it before drinking it. The days wore on, and the bottle stayed put. After a few weeks, the plan to drink after dinner dissolved away. After a few months, I didn't deliberately go look at the bottle continually any more, but I knew it was there.
Sometime after a year of the bottle being in the fridge, it disappeared, but I can't remember who gave it way or threw it away. I couldn't bring myself to pour it out, but I no longer used the excuse of "how can you waste a perfectly good bottle of cold duck" to drink it.
That was over 20 years ago. I've had more recent failings of short duration than the booze (which was 15+ years), and I did not risk this method for my self-recovery from oxycodone. The oxycodone was a bigger hook than alcohol for me, so I set up a 100% no-access situation with it.
I think perhaps now I could put myself in the position of having oxycodone around, but there would be no reason to do that. I am exposed to schedule drugs in my profession, so I suppose I am "practicing" a little in that way, because I never feel the temptation to use in my professional life.
FT