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Old 06-26-2015, 10:53 AM
  # 59 (permalink)  
EndGameNYC
EndGame
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: New York, NY
Posts: 4,677
Originally Posted by Serenidad View Post
I have no willingness to take action! Have I raised my white flag to this disease? God, I hope not!

I'm so beaten up.
Maybe it's actually time for you to surrender to your condition, to the power that this affliction holds over you? Nothing else you've tried seems to have worked. I am not at all fond of analogies that describe the struggle to get and remain sober in terms of warfare. Attempting to get sober is an incredibly difficult struggle that requires honesty, openness and willingness, not exactly an intimidating arsenal in terms of waging war.

You and I have a history of your openly rejecting my suggestions, and that's okay by me. Apparently I'm not alone in this. I have no personal investment in people doing what worked for me or what I recommend might work for them. None at all. I also have no personal investment in making people feel bad or hurting them in any way. SR is a very small though meaningful part of my life. When people reject my suggestions or attempt to debate me about any particular theme that arises on SR, I go about living the rest of my life with purpose that includes both limited and long-term goals.

So I'll say it again. Given your history of early abuse, it's going to be very difficult for you to feel safe, to care for yourself, to build a meaningful life without getting professional help with someone who has expertise with early trauma (if you haven't already done so). I mean someone who specializes in early trauma. Not all therapists are created equal. Those who specialize in addiction counseling are generally not trained and are therefore ill-equipped to guide people through the healing process that overcoming early trauma requires. Your repetitive relapses hold you prisoner in a life that only has brief periods between each relapse. Your history is written all over you.

You commented at one time that you quit your job in order to focus on your sobriety. You later wrote that you were going to stop attending AA meetings in order to focus on your sobriety. Then you were going to take a break from SR in order to focus on your sobriety, and that you were then going to attend AA again in order to focus on your sobriety. Do you see a pattern emerging?

As long as I chose to remain a victim, I got nowhere. I only became more isolated, more alienated, and developed a talent for rejecting help, and for holding onto the misguided conviction that "I can do this on my own!" with a death grip, despite everything falling down all around me.

I also want to comment on your having had long-term sobriety in the past, and comments around your only needing to do the same thing as you did the first time around.

I was sober/abstinent for twenty five years before my three-year relapse. In truth, the later twelve years or so of that I wasn't taking care of myself, my sobriety, in the ways in which I had earlier. Though I was blessed to be without cravings, I actually picked up the drink about a decade after I'd planted the seeds for my relapse. Because of my situation, I came into contact with other people who'd relapsed after achieving long-term sobriety. We all agreed on at least one thing: The second or third time around was extremely difficult. It didn't have the "glow" of the first time, and something very different needed to be tried. Because I'd relapsed, part of me was convinced that, "Well, that didn't work out. Why should I expect AA to work again?" They couldn't teach me anything I didn't already know. No one could.

I had two choices: Either I die as an active alcoholic, or I do whatever is necessary to achieve sobriety again. The expectation that "what I did the first time should be enough" wasn't, in fact, enough. Nor did clichès such as "redoubling my efforts" or "keeping my resolve," both of which for me were only weak and weakening tributes to will power, provide relief. I got myself into every kind of treatment I could and, despite the fact that I was miserable for the first several months, I got sober again. That's truly the only criterion about "treatment" that has any significance. I also needed to radically change my thinking, the way I engaged the world and other people, and to get honest with myself in ways that often made me extremely uncomfortable. My time with searching for short-cuts and doing things on my own had long since run out.

I truly hope that you find your way through this, but not taking action is not a plan.
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