Linz

Hi again SR friends!
Just wanted to post to get some much needed helpful feedback. The questions this time are the following:

1. What happened to make you realize that you needed or need to stop drinking?
2. Was it an accumulation of happenings, or was it a sudden instance or as I've heard so many times before, a rock bottom?
3. Did it take you long to stop, or did you just make a realization and then take action to stop?

Thanks all for any who feel like sharing. It is deeply appreciated and I hope it helps others as well as myself.

babycat

I was drinking a lot for a few years and had decided to go back to school. I told myself "when I go back to school, I wont drink as much. Easy!" Turned out to be not so easy. I have still done well in school, great relationship with my SO, everything is fine for now. I just know there is no way to drink like I do and live a long healthy life. Its just not possible. So for me, it has been learning about the health risks I am putting myself at by drinking 1 or 2 bottles of wine a night by myself.
Basically heart attacks, cancer, and cirrhosis scare the **** out of me. Hopefully, I will listen to myself one day.

Nirvana1

For me, it's when I was drinking to try and feel normal instead of drinking for the fun of it. I progressed pretty quickly to that stage after what I thought was just fun drinking. I got indirect help from a normal drinking girl who I was dating at the time. I couldn't figure out why she would stop after a couple drinks. I couldn't believe she had only gotten sick from drinking a couple times when I've gotten sick hundreds of times. Lastly, when I was out of control and finally lost the relationship, I took a good hard look at myself and knew that I needed to stop drinking.

Dee74

I was sick and tired for a lot of years - but what made me stop and what made me come here was falling over drunk and striking my head hard several times in the course of 2 days - then drinking on it more, then suffering several mini strokes in detox.

I looked back over 20years and figured I'd pushed my luck as much as I wanted to.

D

desertsong

I would wake up in the middle of the night with sweats and shakes from alcohol withdrawal. I'd ignore them and try to go back to sleep, only to be awakened an hour or two with worse symptoms. You know you are in a bad way when you can't even get out of bed to function without having a shot or two of whiskey to calm your nerves and your shakes. When I started drinking in the morning, I knew I was done. I'd managed to hold off my drinking during the dinner hour for awhile, but as time went on the "dinner hour" got earlier and earlier. If you're already a mess by 6 am and can't get out of bed until you've had a couple of shots of whiskey, I'd say you have a problem. That was me. Thank God, it is no longer me.

midgetcop

For years I drank at a fairly consistent level, but near the end I could feel by body giving out on me bit by bit. I was beginning to accumulate health problems that 30 year-olds shouldn't be experiencing yet (arrhythmias, high blood pressure, hemorrhoids, etc), my blackouts and hangovers were getting worse, my night sweats were becoming unbearable. And then one day I couldn't function in the morning without a couple of shots of straight rum. It was that day I knew I had to face the issue head on instead of half-arse pussyfooting around it like I'd been doing for years.

Enough was enough. After I'd been slowly committing suicide for 15 years, I finally chose life.

MustStop

Same here, at first she would have 2-3 drinks and be done. Then she tried to run with me and that didnt end well for her. I was passed out / terrible hangover and she's in the bathroom puking up everything in her stomach, until it was dry heaves. She woke me up and said she needed to go to the Hospital, I said Na, its just a hangover, just sleep it off.

That was the beginning of the end of us.

MustStop

Another time (just getting this stuff off my chest) we were on a nice weekend getaway. The first night we had a hotel room and I had planned on grabbing booze for that night but everything was closed when we got there. So it was naturally a night of tossing and turning. Next day we rented a little cabin and I bought an 18 pack. Not only did she not like me smoking, she didnt like seeing me get plastered either. "Oh its our getaway...don't worry about it". Well, later on blacked out she brought up how I said i'd quit smoking not long after we had met. I replied with, "I'll quit smoking when you achieve something, like getting a drivers license and a car"

Now while its pretty common for a 25 year old girl to at least have those two things it certainly helped the inevitable beginning of the end, again because of my drinking.

stubbs

When it felt like I was in prison.I revolved everything around it and I mean everything.Had my little cooler that went with me anywhere I went.wife just simply fed up also.Still trying my best to kick it.8 days.I have my ups and downs but the bigger picture is starting to become clearer with each passing couple days.You can do it,just have to truly want it I think.

mercurial me

I realized I was an alcoholic many years ago when I realized that drinking made me feel normal or at times superhuman. Then I drank not to feel good, but to not feel bad. Classic addiction. Organs can only take so much abuse over time. Taking another run at sobriety but I have a feeling my legacy will be just another statistic who had a disposition for alcoholism.

aeo1313

I have wondered for many, many years if I had a problem. I would get blacked out drunk on a friday/Saturday and spend the next 3 days in regret, guilt, and physical pain. By the time Friday came rolling around again I felt great and ready to drink again! Repeat, repeat, repeat. As for the pills, I basically ran out. Had I had an unlimited supply I'd probably be in very, very bad shape.

TheJungianThing

1. The World didn't end in 2000 so I was going to cut back.
2. 9-11, I was ready to quit for good. My attempts ended with a DUI a year later.
3. I could not stop from starting again. I figured I drank for 15 years I owed myself 15 years sober before I killed myself, but realized I couldn't stop. Figured I'd go to an AA meeting and ask how they stopped.

robc33

when i realized that i planned everything aroung getting drunk and spending way to much time and energy getting drunk rather then on more positive things and i just recently got a dui

catmilkyo

1. What happened to make you realize that you needed or need to stop drinking?
2. Was it an accumulation of happenings, or was it a sudden instance or as I've heard so many times before, a rock bottom?
3. Did it take you long to stop, or did you just make a realization and then take action to stop?

1. Lost a very significant relationship, problems in general with relationships becoming more chaotic. A few rehabs and detoxes and psych wards, lost jobs, interrupted education, severe mental distress. Last spring I had a really bad mental breakdown AGAIN and did some exceptionally crazy crap that made it hard to deny the extent of my dependence.
2. It wasn't one event but an accumulation of many that finally got through to me. Although I was in the worst spot I'd been in last time around, I really didn't want to stop even then.
3. Tried to stop many times. Honestly, I never made a firm decision to stop. I had little will power or faith in myself. Support groups and therapy have been a lifesaver. I have had lapses but never went back since last spring. I guess I did make a commitment to never going back, but again, nothing was firm, I had no magical moment that changed everything, it's been and still is a slow and unfolding process of change with more clarity coming every day.

TwelveSteps

When I realized how much I "needed" my two bottles of wine to get through the night and sleep every night. I tried quitting for 30 days, then a week, but after repeated attempts I would always drink again after a day or two. It wasn't until I found AA that I was able to experience my first week sober in at least 5 years. I'm so grateful that I did.

GG

LeeK

A combination of things lead up to it. I had been in several car accidents, one of them that nearly killed me, arrested three times, spent thirty days in jail, been broken up with my girlfriend, all from drinking. That didn't stop me. I went to work hungover and hazy hundreds of times, woke up puking and shaking. I finally just looked at myself one day, and thought "is this really normal? I know some people love to drink...but this just doesn't right." I explained my situation on this site and asked what y'all thought, the general opinion was that I had a problem. Someone said, "try to quit for a month, if you can't you probably have a drinking problem". I made it a day and a half. That was my wake up call.

alaskasunshine

Ditto, I think I have pushed my luck as far is it is going to go. I have NO more breaks left. I can feel it. I know it.

JBhere

Thanks for the post.

I thought it was my dui, the my 2nd dui, the the lost job, etc etc.

Im not sure we as alcoholics are ever done and that is what scares me the most. We are never cured/absolved/whatever you want to call it/ from this disease.

I wish in the future that something is found as I really am starting to think I am not wired right or something.

Anyway, sorry for the rambling.

JBhere

wow. jesus. never thought of that. maybe I better start considering that

rws177

It was an accumulation of things for me, not just one instance. There was one DWI, two hospital visits and missing work a few times. Many other things as well but not one big thing really, they all just added up over the years.

Qutting wasn't instantly either for me. Did and an out patient program, then addiction counseling, then inpatient, then "my own progam" and now I'm in AA and it has given me the most success maintaining sobriety.

And of course logging on to SR :-)