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Old 08-20-2018, 01:02 AM
  # 4 (permalink)  
Berrybean
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Join Date: Apr 2014
Location: UK
Posts: 6,902
Welcome back.

I remember feeling just as you do right now. Wanting to get help but being embarrassed, scared, and ashamed to reach out. You dont need to do this on your own - Many of us just cannot do it alone. I was one of them. The relief I felt getting to some AA meetings and finding that there were so many others who felt and thought as I do, and always have done (from before I even found alcohol). The good news is that we don't have to be alone any more.

I remember also that inner battle, of wanting the insanity to stop (and the consequences - definitely the consequences!) But at the same time having another part of me that simply didn't want to quit, because like you,. I loved the feeling of not knowing or caring about what is going on! SAA describe that feeling as being 'in the bubble' (it's worth a Google to read their description of that part of addiction). The thing is, while that was the onky way I'd found for dealing with life (which I found difficult and painfully demanding) and my emotions, it's no wonder I clung to it as if it was my life support, even though in reality it was just dragging me down further into the mire as time went on. Recovery is the key thing here, because it's the recovery work we do that helps us to learn new and better ways of dealing with life and people and emotions. In fact, the AA 12-step recovery program (which is now used for all kinds of other things as well as alcoholism) only even mentions alcohol in the first of the twelve steps. All the others are geared up to self-knowledge, understanding, accpetance and love, and learning how to deal with life differently.

You first came here in 2014. Over four years ago. I'm presuming that things have got stealthily worse since then, just because that's what happens when we self-medicate with alcohol. The good news is that we can change, and there are people here, and where you live, who can help you. Who understand how you feel, and can support you as you learn to navigate sobriety. But that isn't to say there is an easy or painless way to get through the first few months. If there was such a thing then we'd have found it and be shouting it from the rooftops.

I really hope that you will give yourself the gift of sobriety and work on recovery, so that you can find inner peace, and be free from alcohol.

Wishing you all the best for your sobriety and recovery, if that's what you choose at this point.

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