sunrise1

I thought this might be an interesting topic... how we tried to get sober before we found whatever it was that eventually worked for us.

I did lots of the normal stuff:

• Only drinking drinks bought for me
• limiting my consumption to two drinks
• changed to wine instead of liquor
• swore I would leave it alone on a given day only to drink later anyway

What else can you add to the list? I just knew that somehow I could lick this problem myself with the right combination of factors....

CarolD

Hmm....
I never seriously attempted sobreity until depression haunted me.
All my fun vottles were long empty by then...

However....I do remember switching around types of alcohol
to ones I did not like...trying to cut back.
It was a no go.....cause by drink 3 ...I had found a
"new best friend".

findingout

Firm resolutions to not get too drunk this time, and when that didn't work, denial and rationalization.

In 25 years, I never made a serious attempt to stop and never went longer than a week without drinking. Finally, I was offered a choice between unemployment and entering a treatment program. Treatment led me to A.A. and A.A. gave me a solution that has worked for me. I don't know anything much about other methods, but I know that living in recovery is easier and softer than living in active addiction.

Wilde10

- Drinking only Fridays and Saturdays... but surely Sunday is part of the WE too. And obviously we had these guests coming on Tuesday and Wednesday, so what would the guest in question think if I am not drinking too?


- Drinking only if we are going out - But seriously, we never go out because we both work full time and have no family around to look after kids. We feel we use enough external childcare during the week so we never feel like hiring babysitter. So, it should be a perfect solution: we do not go out and we do not drink if we do not go out = complete sobriety. Of course, we cannot do that... life would be too boring!!

-Drink very slowly and always stop after half a bottle of wine... this is the worst type of torture. I hate hard liquors... but I would try to go to the kitchen and sip something of whatever to take the edge off.

Suzie12

I vowed to stop sneaking in a half bottle of vodka to drink upstairs after I had drunk a half bottle of wine with dinner. Did this work oh! no! I would wait for my husband to go up to the loo and then take an enormous slug out of one of the open bottles in the drinks cabinet usually whisky. I also kept a box of wine in the fridge (hard to tell if the level has gone down when it is boxed) and then slug at that when I was washing up. All seemed pretty reasonable at the time, now when I think about all these things I realise how stupid I was.

sleepie

The usual. Switching to beer only. No mixing with pills. Drinking water between drinks. Switching to light beer.

keithj

All the moderation games of drinking only on weekends, only starting after a certain time, beer only, doctors, anti-depressants, willpower, counseling and therapy, outpatient treatment, fear, inpatient rehab, AA with no step work.

I found freedom from alcoholism by a spiritual awakening as the result of AA's 12 Steps.

BullDog777

there was no moderation for me. it was very choatic. i might have tried very early on to control it, but for me personally, it was more like a faucet getting turned on. there was off and there was on. moderation never made any sense to me....control, never made sense to me. my goal was always just short of coma. If any of you ever saw that movie Leaving Las Vegas...I drank like that for a very long time. most days, i can't believe i survived it.

this is the easier softer way.

lildawg

Once I started drinking in earnest, I was like Bulldog. The faucet was on, and the bar was open.

For a lot of years, my nature as an achiever kept me from drinking too much. Sure, I liked drinking. I wanted to achieve worse than I wanted to drink, though. I was always working toward a brass ring, a phenomenal payoff.

Sure, I drank. Sometimes I got drunk. It was never a habit, though. Then, about the time I was approaching 30, my life crashed and burned. Everything I'd worked for wasn't worth a steaming pile of doo doo.

From that day forward, the drinking was on. I wanted to kill myself, but I wanted to have a good time doing it. I used to tell people I had a season ticket on a one way ride. I could finally party like I'd always wanted to. I never again put the breaks on.

Then, one day, I realized how badly I was hurting the people who loved me. The party stopped, suddenly, like when the electricity goes out.

Then it was time for:

Mark75

I never really tried too hard to limit my drinking... What I would do sometimes, is keep the beer warm except for several I planned to drink that day... I learned to drink it warm

JosetteCollins

My way of trying to control drinking has always been to try to limit the drinking to days off. I also tried to measure out the amount I was drinking so I wouldn't drink too much (this didn't work either). I've also tried to compensate with exercise and vitamins (still felt crappy).

I have a question for people. When people on this forum say they drank a bottle of wine, or a half bottle of wine, are they referring to a 1.5 liter bottle (which is equivalent of 10 5oz glasses), or to the small bottle (equivalent of 5 5oz glasses). I never saw the purpose in purchasing the small bottles, and a half of one of those bottles would only be 2 and a half glasses, which is normal drinking.

GettingStronger2

JC, for me, a bottle of wine is the big bottle. If for some reason I bought small ones, it would be 2 or 3. . .probably trying to fool myself that I would limit myself to one of those. . .but that lead to opening at least one more. . .damn y ou Trader Joes and your 2 buck chuck!

I switched to wine a while ago, and I suppose that was my attempt at trying to control my drinking. I pretty much was drinking only beer and wine at the end. And Mark, I could drink beer warm and flat if need be! I just chugged it fast and then drank some water.

Wilde10

JOsette... I am referring to 0.750 ml bottles and half a bottle of this is not normal drinking but almost 5 units. I am a woman and I am not meant to drink more than the equivalent of 2 units a day, i.e. 14 a week.

I rarely did 'only' half a bottle, but even when I did (and felt good about my 'moderation') I was well above the recomended level. I guess I missed all together 1.5 liter bottles.

huntwc

Hi...I mean the smaller bottle. I drank those because I was a wine snob and liked to drink the more expensive chardonnays that only came in the 750's! Drinking the entire thing was not a problem for me so therefore I would have to have a glass from small bottle number 2..ugh

LaFemme

Oh, a bottle of wine was definitely both sizes...LOL...why limit yourself?

I never really tried moderation, although I did try quitting many, many times.

This time is by far the easiest time I have ever had with quitting, it is also the most successful by far!

recycle

Never drink at dusk, because that is when the little green men come out!

shaun00

Maybe it just me but i see doing without booze the "easier softer way".
There was nothing easier and softer about trying to moderate.
or trying to go it alone through gritted teeth..

sure i tried all that stuff.....change drinks.....change days.......change wife......change country......

Alcoholism cornered me everytime.....
Alcohilism cornered me without a drop touching my lips.

Trying to gain power over something i was powerless with, was hell on earth.
and it was a hell on earth my wife would gladly tell you about...bless her for the emotional pain i caused her.

and thank god for the 12 steps, perfect for drunks like me.

Wilde10

Trucker... I think that the inverted commas sunrise used when referring to "easier, softer" are full of cynism

shaun00

you think.

LexieCat

The "easier, softer way" the Big Book is talking about isn't moderation, or struggling to control our drinking, it is attempting to abstain from drinking without working the Twelve Steps. The Book urges us to be "fearless and thorough" in working them. That's where the quote is, in context. From "How it Works": "...then you are ready to take certain steps. At some of these we balked. We thought we could find an easier, softer way. But we could not."

I'm with Trucker, I found attempting to moderate to be exhausting and demoralizing. If I was moderating, I wasn't getting the buzz that I wanted and needed. If I was drinking the way I wanted to drink, I wasn't moderating. I found that surrendering and simply not drinking WAY easier, once I got through the nasty withdrawal.

Quote BB, 1st Edition