tesquizito

Came home from work last night to "friends" (wife smokes pot) smoking pot at house.

Felt uncomfortable and left to run errand. Stopped by bar (big mistake) had 2 drinks) in the interim (had AVRT battle, and lost)

bought alcohol, stashed in car, drank in morning, late to work right now partially inebriated, made excuse to boss (plausible, but questionable)

Now I have work to do.

Great night?!?

sorry, just being honest, need help.

bellakeller

Agh. That sounds awful. And familiar. Sorry you let yourself down. Most of us know how that feels.

Is all the hootch gone? If not, can you dump it out?

langkah

How would you describe the details of the battle you mentioned?

tesquizito

AVRT battle started before I came home, struggled just "get my ass home sober"...I did

Came home to half a dozen people (including my wife) smoking pot, figured I could leave again without anyone knowing. That's when I stopped by the bar and bought the hootch (all gone now.)

I told myself earlier I would thank myself in the morning, if I abstained (and I always thank myself if I do). I've been sober for over 2 months up until last weekend. Very discouraging :-(

The pot issue is a Red Herring (I think), I've been around pot smokers all my life, almost always does not bother me ( I don't smoke pot). I think that was just another stupid excuse.

Ghostlight

Sorry to hear of your slip. I've been down that road many times.

Someone smoking weed is trigger for me, too. I try and avoid it.

You're doing the best you can, given the circumstances, and I understand completely.

Wishing you the best.

instant

I wonder how were you feeling about the pot party at home when you got there?

In any event, what is done is done, time to dust yourself off and regroup

tesquizito

In lieu of previous occurrences....

I'm taking it to another level (a subjective level, at least) I'm opening up to all the close friends (who didn't know) about my problem. Telling them what I'm dealing with, and giving them carte blanche to network with my other friends, follow me, and do whatever they feel is necessary in my best interest. Just had lunch with one old friend who had no idea what I was going through.

So far reception has been positive, embarrassing for me (which I've been avoiding), but necessary.

Sobriety at this point is more important than my pride. I still need to engage more of my friends, plan to continue opening up.

Impurrfect

I often used what others were doing as an excuse to use my OWN DOC (alcohol, then opiates, then crack). I finally realized that what I'd heard here, something like "taking poison hoping it affects the other person" was true. I wasn't doing anything but hurting myself. It had NO effect on anyone but me.

I, personally, had to work on some major codependency issues, remove myself from toxic people before I could really work on my recovery. My biggest trigger was using because of what someone ELSE was doing.

Don't know if that's how it is with you, just some food for thought. FWIW, I live in a house with 3 codies, an addict, and an addict-in-the making. I had to hit my bottom with my XABF#3, really work on my recovery, reach out for support wherever I could find it (SR and some f2f, or at least a phone call away) before I could not let what they did make we want to get numb.

Hugs and prayers,

Amy

tesquizito

I don't think I'm in the same boat, I drink almost exclusively (alone) never with friends.

I think the most toxic person I'm dealing with is myself, unfortunately.

Regular activities with my friends is usually pretty PG...maybe they'll hit up a pub, but again, I never drink with them. I'm just tired of hiding my alcoholism from them, and I need help.

Impurrfect

Realizing WE are toxic and need help is a good place to start May not FEEL that way, but it really is.

Hugs and prayers,

Amy

tesquizito

Well, this is lovely. I just had to have a discussion (owner of the company) about my public drunkeness at work recently, he brought it up.

After 8 years working here, and the dozens upon dozen of times I showed back then not in shape to work, they never said anything. This single relapse after a long period of sobriety certainly caught their attention.

I feel like a schmuck, how embarrassing :-(

eJoshua

Sorry you're going through that. One of the hardest things I had to do was to call my boss and tell her I had to go to rehab -- harder even than telling my parents, since I am very private at work and don't open up about my personal life at all to coworkers.

betterlate

Pretty understandable. While you were a drunk, they got used to seeing that. When you sobered up, they got used to seeing that. You walked in drunk and BAM, they can see something different from yesterday.

I'd take it as a good sign. They expect to see you sober because they usually do, now.

tesquizito

I called a number of my closest friends last night, asked them to coordinate with my wife (because she was turning a blind eye to my relapse), they pretty much followed my movements from work to home to make sure I didn't drink. So I'm pretty much now under surveillance, and I actually feel a bit safer knowing a bunch of people are watching over me. That will probably get me through for a while, but I know ultimately I need the internal motivation to stay sober.

This relapse was quite a bit scary, it on a scale of 1-10 it was definitely a 10: public drunkeness, drunk driving, drunk on the job, drinking nonstop from morning till night, lots of hiding and covering up my tracks (and doing a terrible job at it). I haven't done this in a very,very long time.

SB686

This is the truth, and I think this is why we all use and relapse, and turn to the closest, most convenient relief we can get our hands on to stop the pain.


I have yet to pinpoint the trigger and am still using alcohol, but I hope for myself and everyone here that you find the key to unlock the door to freedom from any addiction whatsoever.

Anna

You're right, ultimately, it's up to you to make the right choice.

I'm glad you're back on track.

Betterlife1

Sorry to sound cliche, but you only lost one battle, not the entire war. Get up, brush yourself off, and get back in the mindset that got you sober for 2 months. "The beast" won this one, so what! All the greatest people, inventions, victories, etc all have setbacks at some point, but then recovered from them and persevered. Just learn from the experience and come back stronger!..You can do it!

TheEnd

I hope you get the motivation to stay sober soon, because this is a failed plan. People do not want to be responsible for other people's behavior. You can't count on other people to keep you sober, because when you really want to drink, you will find a way.

tesquizito

Agreed. But in the short term I feel this was necessary.

I could have swept this whole thing under the rug, but I felt it was important that those closest know that an event of this magnitude was happening to me.

Also, I was succumbing to urges on a nightly basis, was I especially afraid of the weekend coming up. I'm almost 48 hours sober now and I feel I owe that in part to the intervention of friends.

Now the immediate term, reinstate all the activities that I've been doing that have supported a sober and healthy lifestyle, attend a F2F meeting tomorrow. For the long term, focus on internal motivation and inspect what really happened where I allowed myself to jump off the deep end.

-tesq

dawnie24

Sorry bout your slip aslong as you learn from it and try to stay away from booze your fine don't make excuses to drink its never good coz you'll regret it