Hi all,
So it is the end of day seven for me. One whole week without booze. I cannot remember when last that happened.
Before I continue with me, I would just like too put a few definitions out there. I know sometimes people are shy or too stubborn to ask. I am putting them down as I will be using them in future posts, and may have used them in earlier posts.
AV - Addicts/Alcohol Voice - the voice in your head that is waiting or actively trying to convince you to have a drink "Go on, just one. One can't hurt"
AF - Alcohol Free - How many AF days have you had?
Those two should suffice for now.
So, I have been AF for seven days now. I am sitting here smoking a cigarette and chomping on an ice cream for a change. I have already eaten my chocolate allowance this evening. Physically, I have a headache. I have cut my water intake down to three liters today. Let's see if my geneticist buddy is talking rubbish. Although my buddy reckons that too much chocolate can also give you a headache - I can already hear the uprising from the feminine quarter. We'll only know tomorrow. I did not have any sweats or shivering. So that seems to be gone. I will not mention it again unless it comes back. The brain mist did come back during the day, but it is ever so slight. I have a slight shaking in my hands. It starts off calm during the morning, but by late afternoon is back. I feel very fatigued almost to the point where I am too tired to sleep. My body feels fine, no physical pain. Muscular control gets better every day. There are still no physical cravings for alcohol. Urine is clear, except for after the vitamins. But all normal.
Mentally, I feel very good. As proof to the people out there who have just started or are wanting to start, that your concentration, brain power, what ever you want to call it does improve - please go read through this thread from post one. I know, I did today. I cannot believe how bad my spelling was or how the sentences are all over the place. Almost slap dash. The further you read the better the spelling gets and the more cohesive the writing gets. Unbelievable what alcohol does to your brain. I shudder when I think of how many reports I have submitted while I was drinking. So there you have it, your brain does get clearer. There is a good thread on this forum titled "Memory", it is so true. Look it up and have a read.
Emotionally, it has been a par for the course day. I alluded to it this morning that your emotional pendulum spends more time in each feeling as we progress through our sobriety. I still believe there is a reason for this and that it is to give us time to savor those feelings that were suppressed by the alcohol. For me it has become more stable. By this I mean I spend longer periods in each feeling as opposed to a few days ago where my emotions were all over the place. My main emotions today were sorrow and relief. The relief I will explain later on, the sorrow is probably for all the things I have missed while being drunk. Arguments instead of good times. We have all been there. I think when we are drinking we deliberately pick fights so that we can have extreme mood changes. It is either unbearably happy or unbearably sad. There is no middle ground when you are drinking. So sad.
I have been reading a lot of posts here on SR on people who had relapses over the weekend, and the standard responses seems to be - so what are you going to change in your plan. I would like to relate an incident that happened to me this evening. First of all, my plan for coping has always been - one day at a time, failing that - one hour at a time and failing that - one minute at a time. As an engineer I would like to share this with you. A plan is the goal. So my plan would be to spend more time with loved ones; go for a run or take a deep breath etc. a plan is not the method. Let me explain. To combat the AV today I plan to spend more time with my loved one. Great, how? So you see, a plan is the goal. The method would be something like - we are going to go spend the day in the park having a picnic.
A plan and method can never be rigid or fixed in stone. If it is, it is bound to fail. I will use my plan with what happened to me tonight to demonstrate. For the first time in a very long time I had to work late. All my old drinking holes are around my office building or in a near proximity. I went down to have a cigarette at about 16H30. This about the time that all these drinking spots start to get going. Of course my AV got onto me. It was very tempting. How nice to go sit on the open deck in the warm sunlight and have an ice cold beer. So I put my plan into action one hour, 30 minutes, one minute. The AV was getting very strong. So the method I tried to employ of making a deal to revisit it in an hour was not working. Revisit was out. 30 minutes, still big temptation. Time to change the method. So I got into my car and into peak hour traffic. There is nowhere you are going to get a beer on the freeway. Within no time in the traffic, the temptation and urge had passed. Anyone who has driven in SA would know why, we drive like idiots here so you are really forced to concentrate on what is happening around you, otherwise you will be in a fender bender.
So my plan of one hour, 30 minutes, one minute is sound. It is the method I choose to employ to combat The AV that makes all the difference between success and failure. If it is rigid, then I am a creature of habit and am doomed from the outset to fail. If it is flexible and I can mould it to the best to suit my predicament, I am unpredictable and therefore not a creature of habit. I therefore have a much better chance of succeeding.
As an aside, I am banning myself from smoking in my house and car from tomorrow. So I will be on the silver cigar (e-cigarette).
Anyway, enough rambling for one evening.
Be safe and be strong
Cheers
ZAB