Waterlines: You wrote, "Yeah I'm not expecting this to be easy, as soon as I start to get over my hangover, I'm already thinking about rewarding myself with a drink. Or thinking I could just have a couple of glasses of wine..but that rarely works out. Thanks so much for your support and I think I'll definitely be posting a lot on here to try and stay strong!"
Good to hear that! You asked about AVRT or what is called the Rational Recovery Program. For that I suggest you check out the "Secular Connections" forum on this SR Website. When you say you're "already thinking" about having one or two glasses of wine (maybe as a supposed "reward" for your wonderful start on sobriety (some reward! No way is it a "reward"). this seems to illustrate one of the things they seem to emphasize in AVRT, which is that these messages to take a drink or two are likely coming from the more primitive part of your brain, which is trying everything it can to resume the flow of alcohol (since your chemistry and physiology have changed to become alcohol dependent; that is you're addicted). So the primitive part of the brain starts sending these messages up to the more rational part (which has been numbed by alcohol) and it's what they call a "set up". Your brain is actually trying to set you up to resume your drinking. "I'll have just one!" "I need just one to settle down", etc. etc. The tough part is developing the skills to recognize these signals for what they are and treating them just like you'd treat the screaming demands of a small baby. Easier said than done. AVRT tells you how. But don't give up on Alcoholics Anonymous without giving it a good try. I have a bunch of issues with it but it saved my life.
As far as the mental issues go, the best way, maybe the only way, to give the psychiatric medications a chance is to quit drinking. I'm not a doctor but I seriously doubt if the medications are at all effective in an alcohol environment. As to panic attacks, I may have mentioned that I used to have them at 3 or 4 in the morning. One of the most unpleasant things that have ever happened to me. I haven't had any now in 25 years. I feel no cravings at all to drink. I don't miss my drinking "friends". Many of them are now dead.
W.