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Old 06-05-2018, 03:05 AM
  # 26 (permalink)  
August252015
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Join Date: Aug 2015
Location: Atlanta
Posts: 8,674
Originally Posted by Justin61571 View Post
Hello all,

Just a little back story to begin. I'm 39 years old and I had been drinking pretty heavy for the last 12 or 13 years. Some days I'd drink 3 or 4 beers some days I'd drink 20. Most days I'd average 10 or 12 beers. I had a Xanax prescription (.5mg a day) for about a year and was able to quit that cold turkey in November. In my younger days I dabbled in cocaine every now and then but luckily never got hooked.

Believe it or not I maintained a pretty active workout routine most of those years while I drank and my job requires me to walk quite a bit. However the last year and a half I had suffered from severe panic attacks (hence the Xanax) which was one of the deciding factors in getting sober. I've had every test you can take under the sun and apparently I'm physically fine. My last round of blood work came back great.

So I'm roughly 70 days sober and I've noticed what I can only imagine is paws. Ears ringing, anxiety, cognitive fog, out of body experiences, sometimes sheer panic bordering on an attack, tight Jaws, muscle aches, racing repetitive thoughts, and impending doom. Heart palpitations... they really ramp up my anxiety. They scare me the most. These symptoms come in waves and last days at a time.

My question is simply this... Is this all normal? Any long term drinkers have any experience with this? It's very scary. I've maintained a pretty vigorous workout routine and proper nutrition. Any advise would be awesome.

Ha also on a lighter note I dream about drinking most nights of the week and my sleep has started to even out. I still feel pretty tired most days though.

Justin
Yep, all normal in my experience. I went through quite extended PAWS- 70 days is awesome but still very early relative to what sounds like a significant drinking career, as I also had.

I had to keep going and not drink and let everything get out of my system.
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