Tazman53

Shelia I can see that for some folks, I can also see me telling the whole world to kiss my arse forever if I had been forced into some sort of treatment. When I was drinking if it was not my idea it was to be fought tooth and nail just to prove that I was right and others were wrong. Trying to force me to do anything without hand cuffs when I was drinking was a way of making sure that what ever I was being forced to do I would never do unforced! We are all different, that is just the way I was. This is also one of the reasons AA works for me, it is all suggestions, there are no rules, I can choose to do what ever is suggested of me and stay sober or I can pick and choose from the suggestions and possibly wind up drunk again..... my choice!

SeekingSelf

thanks CarolD for posting a link to my introduction thread.

queenteree

I am not an alcoholic, but my husband is. I watched that show last night and was so very upset by it all. It just really shows how baffling, cunning and POWERFUL this disease can be. And to all of you in recovery, I give you big props cause it appears to be one of the hardest things to ever give up.

queenteree

[QUOTE=tracee1010;1712868] My husband has been to rehab twice, the first time he stayed sober for over 14 years, and during that time he flat out admitted that he was "ready" to stop and work a program. He then relapsed for the past 4 or 5 years (I lose count). This past June he went to rehab again after we all wanted nothing to do with him and he almost died of alcohol poisoning, claiming he was "ready" to stop, that he had to stop or he'd be dead. He remained sober for only 98 days. He has been drinking steadily and heavily ever since, despite liver disease and possibly heart complications, and despite me taking out an order in family court ordering him to court-mandated treatment. Needless to say, I dropped that order cause he promised he'd stick with it on his own (which he didn't). You say if it were your son you would do 100 interventions, cause you never know which one will stick. How much is a person/loved one/family supposed to do??? Sometimes recovery never sticks. I think statistics show that recovery is only an option when the alcoholic/addict is ready, not just to appease his family. They have to want it more than they want that drink. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make them drink. If I am wrong, someone please correct me, but as I stated before, this disease is very powerful.

sugErspun

I was 'forced' in three times. Never stayed sober more than 2 years.

I met hundreds of people when I was a resident - kept in contact 'for a little while'.

I left my last treatment center a little over 2 years ago (drank since), I can count on my fingers how many people I was friends with in treatment that have stayed sober. (purely people I knew from treatment). That is less than ten people from three different facilities. All of them claimed they had really high success rates.

Sad truth - rehab is not really cranking out winners. But it does give you a chance to wake up. Those that have stayed sober are VERY active in recovery programs.

faith08

I tivo Intervention. I like watching it when I'm drinking And I always cry. I'm not sure I understand that whole thing....
Last night watching the show about Lawrence--I knew it was going to say that he passed but when it did....it completely tore me up. I cried so hard I was sobbing. I'm always crying because someone went thru rehab and did good. Of course, I'm toasting them with my beer (pathetic) I'm literally sitting here saying " Good for you " and wishing them well. But for some reason it just really got to me that he died.

I was doing pretty good at the beginning of the year--I didn't drink from before Christmas until late January. I don't remember why I started back again. But here in the past few months I have had some pretty good (bad) binges. One day/night I drank a 12 pack and have been drinking beer pretty much every day. This past week I drank almost a whole box of cheap wine. And tonight I'm drinking the end of a 12 pack/on the 5th and last beer. If I had more I would drink more. And the bad thing is I still have a couple of glasses of the wine left. Alcoholics have every bit of alcohol counted out in their head you know. I was really strong at the beginning of the year, I don't know where that was coming from (I know a little bit from coming here). I've been having a rough transition into another job since the end of January....maybe that is what happened ? I don't know. Right now I'm not sure I have any strength but I worry about myself all the time--I live by myself. My routine is to start drinking as soon as I get home from work while watching tv or playing games on the computer.
Anyway....I guess I went off on a rant..... just really wanted to comment on the Intervention episode. It was heartbreaking to me.

Tazman53

Tracee I am an alcoholic, I drank for 40 years, my family and the court systems could have forced me to go into 1,000 rehabs and detoxes and if I was not ready, I was not going to stay sober. I got sober when I had enough to drink, forced rehabs in this recovered alcoholics experience only keep an alcoholic from reaching thier bottom allowing them to drink even longer.

The best thing family and friends can do for an alcoholic is to stop any form of enabling and let them know that the ONLY thing they will do for them is take them to detox.

I know hundreds of recovering alcoholics, except for one person who I already mentioned, every one of them got sober when they were ready to get sober and not when family or the courts tried to force them to get sober.

Do not get me wrong, I think interventions are great for helping the families feel they are doing something, in some cases an intervention works, but very few of them.

barb dwyer

I can't watch shows like that.

I just can't watch it.
Too close to home.
TOo many trips to the rodeo for this old woman.

I have to be able to act IN recovery.
Not watch.
I'm no longer viewing life.
I'm a participant.

Marius

When I watched the show I had feeling Lawrence was going to die, and he did in the end. The amount of alcohol her drank and his denial was most surprising to me. I was also shocked how fast he met his demise, he was in great shape before he started to drink heavily, I think his death also had something to do with the cancer he had, which he was in deanial about that too, probably because of the booze.