Robzoloft

is actually post about the things really going on with me. I would ask for advice on withdrawal and things like that but I never really put things out there....I've decided to do this both on this forum and in the mtgs I'm attending.....Here's a big one....I really struggle with obsessive thoughts...intrusive images and ideas that are quite incapacitating and really hard to deal with....like I'll take an incident that might have occurred....like killing someone while driving drunk...and play the "what if" scenarios over and over and over in my head...it never stops, like a TV always on in the background...imagining the aftermath...the trial....the prison....the destruction of an innocent family as well as my own....the loss....and the thought will get stronger and stronger until I'm actually half convinced it really happened...even though it didn't....it just constantly cycles in my head til the point of physical and emotional exhaustion...even though in reality it DIDN'T HAPPEN......anyone else ever struggle with this kind of repetitive thought cycling? Does it get better in time? My whole thought process/ brain behavior seems like it does what it wants despite my efforts to control it...I just don't understand.......thanks for listening.......ROB

soberat23

LOL. i only laugh cause i did the same things for the first couple months of my sobriety and still do 17 months later. i will be driving down the freeway and start to envision me crashing and being in the hospital and so on, to the point where im not paying attention and am in almost like a deep meditation where i cant move or even see anything in front of me. im glad you shared that, cause i thought i was alone. i think about horrible things alway too, like my gf cheating on me, or actually seeing her with her ex. i wont get into details, but lets just say that they are graphic. the wonderful thing about what you shared, is that those things havent happend and wont happen if you continue to stay sober. they have gotten few and far between since i have ben sober. thanks for that share cause i thought i was alone too. funny how we always think we are different huh?

Astro

I think I have "racing thoughts" like that pretty often, and they're usually morbid or violent. Look, I'm a sick person, I don't claim to be cured

I don't see anything wrong with playing the tape through as a reminder of where the disease can take us. But if it continues you might want to talk to a therapist about it.

tommyk

I do it too... and it always leads down, down, down... to despair.

What if... what if... what if... to doom & gloom.

I've found that when 'it' starts I've got to break the thought pattern and think about something else.

I use music a lot, singing along with the song breaks the thought pattern

I also recite the 12 steps in my mind, and this breaks the thought pattern too.

I have found that once I break the thought pattern I can resist letting it come back again.

My biggest thought 'obsession' cycle involves death and dead people. My mind can run for hours and days if I don't break that thought pattern.

Thanks for your honesty, I know I am not alone.

chrisinaustin

I've always had pretty serious OCD -- emphasis on the O -- since I was a kid. I know it was one of the things I was trying to quell by drinking. I won't lie, after about 90 days sober it spiked a bit, but doing daily meditation (thought comes, thought is acknowledged, let thought go) and some other little tricks, day by day it gets better.

gravity

I read somewhere that everyone gets morbid thoughts (really!) but that obsessing about it could be a sign of depression, anxiety, and/or stress.

I'm seeing a counselor in addition to AA.

Robzoloft

Hey All- Thanks for responding...its good to know I'm not alone. I'm starting to think breaking the sense of uniqueness and isolation will be important to a long term recovery..............ROB