tkdan

I went almost a year without drinking then I was stupid enough to think I could drink in moderation. It only took about a month for it to become a problem. So here I am having to face the fact that I still have a problem. The sad thing is I knew when I quit that I could not control my drinking. I can not believe I allowed myself to fall back into this. Now I've let myself down and more importantly I've let my wife down.

TorontoGuy28

Dan.. I am too new to sobriety to offer advice. However, dust yourself off, you had 1 year sober which is a great accomplishment ! It did not go to waste !!!

A good reminder for the rest of us.

dave65

i know how you feel i did the same thing apart from i only lasted 10 months and thought i could drink in moderation, that was a year ago and i've been drinking again since then, but however you look at it a year of the alcohol is a great achievement and if you've stopped once you can do it again which is what i'm going to do again.

CarolD

Take the sober time you had and use it for a strong base
to start again.

As long as you are alive..you have not failed.
Many many of us had false starts!

midgetcop

It took me a couple of tries man.

You had one year, and that is *awesome*. Learn from your mistakes and use them as reminders as you try this again. Whatever you do, don't think of your 1 year sober time as a waste, but look at it as an indicator that you *can* and *will* be able to succeed.

FriendofBill

Sounds like the disease did what it does best...it got you.

Ok, so now that you are aware...whats next?

Stop beating yourself up, start cleaning yourself and relationships us by getting sober again.

Im sure your a special person, but not special enough that alcoholism wasnt gonna wait outside the rooms to kick your ass the first chance it had.

jimhere

Please note-if you are alcoholic, the fact that you drank again has nothing to with intelligence or lack of. It has to with the fact that at certain times there is no effective mental defense against drinking again. It has nothing to do with circumstance, feeling bad or feeling good-a strange mental blank spot occurs when it is least expected, and either all the reasons why you shouldn't drink don't show up, or if they do, they are hazy and warped and easily pushed aside by the idea that "this time will be different."

I would bet that is what happened to you, if you look back honestly. You'll probably see what sort of thinking, or maybe there was no thought at all, that led to you drinking again.

I'm not gonna blow smoke here-if that sort of thinking is established in you, you will most likely drink again at some point without some sort of psychic change. There is no hope in alcoholism and it progresses.
Jim

tkdan

I am trying to focus on the positive. Life was good while I was sober. I got into good physical shape and felt good about myself. Thanks for the words of encouragement.

Slowbriety

Its not the fact of you being stupid, its just your alcoholism got the best of you. That is what happenes when we let up on some sort of a program, or it does for me atleast. Hell, least you made it back.

Kellye C

I also want to say that it is NOT a matter of stupidity. We are not stupid people and in fact most of us are very bright.

My suggestion would be to take a good honest look at what led up to your drinking again. Did you get lax on your program? Did you start thinking you were cured (not uncommon especially around the 1 year mark - I know I really struggled with that one)? What tools did you use when you first got sober and were you using them when you went back out? If not, why not? What changed? Don't do this as a way of beating yourself up or finding fault with yourself but just honestly try to determine what led up to it and then develop "safety nets" to prevent you from going back there again.

That idea of being without an effective defense against the first drink scares the crap out of me. I've been close a couple of times but my HP intervened (it certainly wasn't through anything I did!) and I was spared.

I'm glad you're back, I'm glad you posted and you've helped more people than you realize by sharing your experiences.

Hugs,
Kellye

pbrewster

good job my friend

miss communicat

tkd

thats right! Focus on the positive and you will see more of it!

tkdan

Thanks guys. Kellye D you asked what lead up to my drinking again. It was not anything like a stress or problems. We were going to a social and I stood around with the guys drinking beer thinking after all this time no harm would come from it. I have not quit yet. I have been so busy that there is not time to drink on a regular basis. I know things will slow down eventually and instead of thinking about drinking most of the time I will actually be drinking most of the time. I don't want to be in the same predicament I was before.

zoomer

Hi, I had many years and drank again. It took me a lot of years out there to get back to the program and have two years again. My base was there and I remembered to do all the suggestions that where taught to me. If I can do it so can you. I hope your not in the same predicament,but chances are you'll be in worse if you continue to drink. That is just what alcoholism does: it gets worse as time goes on. You seem pretty smart to me, I do hope you'll come back and not be drinking.

Found

Hi there friends,
I have done this several times.
My sobriety was five years, later one year and four months, later four months, now four months again.
I still benefit from those earlier periods.
I have learned to take things in a more nuanced way when I could get into the states of mind that lead to drinking. If I feel good, always to hold something bad up in front of me. If I feel bad, always to hold up more than one good thing in front of me.
I was one of those people that would drink if it was good weather!

collinsmi

If you're like me, you drank because you're an alcoholic. Intellect doesn't have anything to do with it one way or another. That's what alcoholics do, when we don't get treatment for our disease. THat's what happened to me. Now I do AA, that's my treatment. I look back and wonder what was going on in my head all those years, it seems incomprehensible that I could have put myself through all that misery. Of course, untreated alcoholism was going on in my head, and it can again if I blow off a few simple requirements. It sure is a baffling disease!

collinsmi

Me too. I was kind of like Sam I Am in Green Eggs and Ham. I figured if you had to worry about it, it meant you might have a problem, and I did not want to think about that!

Rusty Zipper

tk sad news tk, now try to get yourselfs back up again...

good wishes tk... xxoo rz