putmeontheair

Hey all,

I'm an Alanon, but I was hoping it was OK to post this question here ...

What was your rock bottom? How could you tell it was your rock bottom versus a road to relapse?

Thanks. Just trying to understand it all better. I appreciate it.

TheJungianThing

Kept trying to control my drinking and couldn't. Then wanted to stop entiirely and couldn't. Finally a DUI propelled me into the despair sufficient enough to compel me to ask for help, be willing to take that help, and do what was suggested without too much protest or imposition of my will and opinion.

bellakeller

My husband gave me an ultimatum; rehab or I couldn't go near my children in any meaningful way and I no longer would have a place to live. I had been in complete denial about how bad off I was, though I was physically close to death due to anemia and anorexia. I'd been involved in AA for about 9 months prior to getting into rehab but couldn't stay sober for longer than a handful of days by the end. Despite evidence to the contrary, I was still fixated on the idea that I could beat this addiction by myself. Even when I got out of rehab, I still needed to find a place to live until my husband felt OK with me being with the kids.

"How could you tell it was your rock bottom versus a road to relapse?" I don't really know. All I can tell you is that I woke up to the seriousness of what I was doing and felt that I had just this one last chance to get sobriety right. I ran out of options because I didn't want to live the way I'd been living anymore. I despised the animal I had become.

CarolD

My final go round with alcohol had nothing to do with other people or external circumstances.
My drinking had turned me into a depressed woman I detested. I was edgeing on insanity.

I don't understand what you mean by a road to relapse?
I did return to drinking after I decided to stop...however when I committed myself to God ..AA and the Steps I no longer drank.

Relapse is not part of recovery...it's part of unchecked alcoholism...IMO

BHF

Life just got way out of control. My drinking had serious consequences which I could not control. Legal, emotional, relationship, financial and family problems all crept up at the same time to form the perfect storm. For about the 1st week after this hit, I countinued to sit around and drink to numb myself, but it didn't work. One way or the other, I was going to have to face my consequences and prevent the same thing from happening in the future. There was no sudden epiphany for me, just a slow realization that the way I was living was maddening and destroying myself and anyone who chose to be a part of my life.

putmeontheair

I, not far enough in my Al-Anon program, made the mistake of telling my RAH "rehab or me" without fully considering the consequences. As a result, he wasn't/isn't truly invested in it except for the bare minimum. As such, I consider his a "road to relapse" (although I don't tell him that ... just in my brain) rather than true recovery.

I don't know if that makes sense, and I hope I don't offend anyone by the way I stated that ... that's not my intention. Promise!

Boleo

IMO none of us really know what our rock-bottom is unless it kills us. In my case, I had dozens of what I thought were bottoms only to find out every basement had a trap-door. Looking back at my experience, it was God who decided I had gone low enough, not me.

Antiderivative

I don't have the answer to your question. I have bottomed out so many times, swearing off alcohol forever, but have picked up again. When I honestly think about it, it is truly insane.

Pain is a great motivator, but it won't keep me sober. For someone like me, I can't simply just bottom out. I am a little disturbed by this fact, but it is true.

doggonecarl

No rock bottom for me; I stopped because I saw in utter clarity, for the first time, the direction I was headed with my drinking. So I stopped. Some folks get one chance and don't take it. I didn't want to be that person.

SSIL75

I was just so tired of worrying about my drinking. It was exhausting. I had abstained for a few weeks (deliberately) and while I went right back to drinking I just really enjoyed those weeks. I felt wonderful.

I spent months after that trying to moderate but it didn't work. When I finally accepted that I couldn't moderate then I could quit with a clear conscience.

It was my rock bottom. Just knowing that I'd never be happy as long as I kept drinking. But it wasn't a rock bottom in the 'lose everything' kind of way.

keithj

Hopelessness.

The single biggest event that got me desperate enough to be willing was the realization that no bottom would ever be sufficient. I can't tell you how many I thought to myself, "Oh, now that THIS has happened, I'll never drink again," only to return to drinking after THIS latest calamity had passed.

When I knew in my heart that no consequence was ever going to keep me sober, I became willing to do what others had done to have lasting sobriety. I became willing to give up what I thought was best or what I thought I needed to do.

erikm02

Same here, but I didn't "entirely" want to stop...

nandm

My rock bottom was when I finally came to the realization that my drinking was a slow suicide that not only was killing me but the people in my life that still loved and cared about me. It was only then that I was able to reach out without any reservations to find a way to find a way to live without alcohol or end my life. Fortunately, I was led to AA and found a the solution to my alcoholism there. In 10 years many things both positive and negative have happened in my life, it has been a bed of roses but definitely with the thorns intact. The thing is I have found nothing worth going back to alcohol for, as I know for me that would mean giving up on life and any hope of a future. I do get discouraged at times because of other mental health issues but with AA drinking is not what comes into my head when those times hit.

Reset

I had been thinking about quitting for a while but I guess my "rock bottom" was when, over the holidays, I found myself raiding the in-laws' liquor cabinet after everyone else had gone to bed. They're so nice and wouldn't have cared, but I was essentially stealing from them and it was not cool.

least

I was sick to death of waking up feeling horrible and hating myself. I'd vowed to quit many times, don't know what was different about the last time - it just felt different. I hadn't lost anything material, but had lost the respect of my kids and my self respect and knew I couldn't go on this way any more.

yeahgr8

My rock bottom was when i was absolutely destroyed emotionally and was completely hopeless about my situation and, as a result, absolutely desperate...i thought the only route left to me was to end my life rather than continue in the living hell i had made for myself...

Up till that point i had tried periods of abstinance, counselling, psychotherapy, psychiatry, hypnosis, antabuse, anti-depressants, doctors, group therapy, resonance treatment, rehab and, what i thought at the time, AA...

I had exhausted all options and had drunk again...it took me 20 years to slowly exhaust all those options so the only thing i had left to do was to trust another person to show me how to get sober and live a happy and healthy life...i went to my first AA meeting when i was 18, then 21, then 30, then 33 and thought what a bunch of losers and it wasn't for me...but the rehab i went to was a 12 step one and they showed the value of the steps, as opposed to just sitting round in a group sharing, and they took us to an AA meeting every Saturday where i had met people with decades of sobriety who were happy and laughing about the days when they first came in...

Therefore i knew that AA had the solution but without being hopeless and desperate enough to trust another person i was screwed...so thats the rock bottom i got to and, to the untrained eye, it would have seemed i had plenty of them along the way...

Oh one more important thing, i had cut off my family as they kept bailing me out of trouble and my ex just announced she was seeing someone else so my final enabler wwas gone and for the first time in my life i was alone...that helped a lot to fforce me to trust someone else...

hope that helps:-)

TwelveSteps

You hit your bottom when you decide to stop digging.

GG

wellwisher

After a twenty year slide, I quit when I felt like a walking, living breathing cancer that was no good to anyone.

newwings

Mine was waking up in bed, choking to death on my own vomit after my 'normal' bottle of wine instead of dinner. I was literally seconds from death. Although I knew my drinking and lifestyle was setting me on a path of early disease and death, it seemed too far into the future to really keep me sober. What did keep me sober was realizing I wasn't ready to die, right then and there. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.

NoTears

not there yet, put.

But hope to get on the positive slope soon.

Many of us are also Al-alnon.