RobbyRobot

We all have our experiences. This thread is not about who is right or what way works better. Its about did you reach a bottom and from there get about the business of stopping drinking? Did it work? Or did you find another bottom? Do bottoms actually exist or do we just invent them as needed?

For me, bottoms are just an internal experience with no *outside* correlation that is useful for aiding in stopping drinking and staying sober or even simply in observing abstinence.

I could say, (and I have said) I suppose, that my dying drunk was a bottom, but when I say that, I'm just saying the obvious. Same as saying there is no place but up when you're that far down. Its just common sense, survivor sense, not an alcoholic bottom, even if i can call it that and be understood.

Question: Are alcoholic bottoms required to be reached to really stop drinking and keep stopped?

Question: What is meant by 100% committed to sobriety or stopping drinking? And does that commitment dovetail with having an alcoholic bottom?

Thanks.

zxcirce

I suppose I have 2 views on this....bottom is death.....and

"you hit bottom when you stop digging".

it's all relative.

suki44883

I don't know the answer to your question. All I know is that what I considered MY bottom was a DUI and everything that entails. However, I did continue to drink for about another two years and nothing cataclysmic happened during that time. I just woke up one day and decided that I was sick and tired of living the way I was. I still had my job (of over 20 years now), still had my house, hadn't really lost a lot except for the money I spent and the DUI experience. But when I woke up in front of my computer at about 2:00 am that morning, knowing I had to go to work later, I said that's it! I immediately found online a medical detox facility, sent an email to work telling them what I was doing, called a friend who drove across town to get me, and checked myself in.

So, was my bottom the DUI or was it just a moment of clarity? Like I said, I don't know, but I also don't know that it's really all that important. I like what zxcirce said...you hit bottom when you stop digging.

BackToSquareOne

I had so many bottoms over my almost 3 decades of drinking that the term became meaningless. I had to reach a point where the pain was so much greater than the perceived pleasure that the decision to knock it off for good was easy.

The thing is though that not everyone reaches a point where they want to quit more than they want to drink. Bottoms tend to lose their efficacy as time marches on so in my mind desire is the main ingredient as bottoms could always get worse.

Sapling

I had to hit a bottom....I was mentally, physically and spiritually...bankrupt. The three together just beat me down and I had to give up. I asked God for help...And I didn't have much faith I'd get any. Totally defeated. Something happened and it led me into rehab which led me into AA...Which gave me hope. Something else I had none of. I knew zero about AA and I was willing to give anything a chance because I was done. I couldn't live like that anymore. The more I saw what it was about...The more they talked about how this program addresses the three areas I needed help in...The more I liked it.
If there is such a thing as putting %110 into something...I did it. I absorbed the literature, meetings, speaker tapes, anything I could find on the net that had to do with AA..spritualism...meditation....I even got into studying and researching the history of AA..Which got me into looking into the history of the Oxford group. I got myself into the inner circle of the most quality sobriety in my homegroup. And I picked their brains clean. Chaired meetings..Volunteered..I got a sponsor right out of the gate and worked the steps the best I could do. My sponsor told me he had never seen a more thorough 4th step...And it wasn't 100 pages long...Just thorough. I don't think Ive been more committed to anything in my life. I didn't want to fail.....I didn't want to go back to where I was. And still don't. Now I practice..practice..practice. And there is nothing about AA that I don't love...I feel sane. safe and protected...For today.

BASEjumper

I think you have to reach some sort of subjective turning point. It slowly began do dawn on me that if I kept up driving drunk, drinking for days until I was puking blood, and not showing up for work I was not only going to lose everything and everyone I loved, but I was going to die.

I was utterly miserable, and I felt like I was getting buried under an avalanche of things I could no longer hide or deny. I had a day of reckoning, and I decided I wasn't going out like this. I decided to fight for my own life, that it was worth saving

kanamit

Imagine telling someone who isn't enthusiastic about recovery that they need to hit a bottom first. What if they then drank themselves to death?

I lost a family member this way.

I find the whole concept odd and dangerous. People should be encouraged to seek help as early as possible. Even if they aren't receptive, at least they had a choice. If you tell someone they need to hit a bottom first, they will only use that as a reason to carry on drinking.

Sapling

I would never tell anybody they need to hit a bottom to quit....The only reason I did...I was beyond listening to anyone.

least

my 'bottom' was all mental/emotional. i hadn't 'lost' anything... except the respect of my kids and my self respect, but waking up sick as hell every day and constantly wishing i were dead was finally too much to keep on going downhill and i quit drinking for good.

vichloe

I don't think it is about "bottoms", I think it is the desire to "change".

I have seen people lose all their money, their families and homes. They go to rehab because they have to, because it is the right thing to do. They get out and two months later are back at it.

I wanted to change because I was sick of my alcoholic self. It controlled me. Didn't wanna go out at night because it would ruin my secret buzz at home. Tired of waking up with a headache every morning. Tired of looking at my bloated, red face in the mirror. My clothes don't fit anyone from alcohol bloat. Tired of not really being part of my family even though I was home every night with them.

I wanted to stop. Not because I hit bottom but because I was a disappointment to myself. I couldn't stand looking at myself in the mirror anymore.

Retread59

I think a bottom is all about when you realize that you need to make a change. Not everyone needs to end up in the gutter to be at their bottom-- but being at one's bottom does not mean that there aren't further lows in store if one does not remain stopped from that point.

Speaking only for myself, as a "high bottom" drunk, if we accept the notion that alcoholism is a progressive disease, why on earth would we suggest someone needs to progress beyond a certain point before they should seek help? We don't do this when we diagnose other diseases. We're generally thankful for the opportunity for early intervention.

RobbyRobot

I was very committed to quit drinking 100%. My drunken life was clearly killing me. In my detox, I didn't care about what sobriety was going to end up being. It made no difference to me. Anything else except being drunk looked good. I already knew that getting drunk again after my detox was a sure thing unless I had some kind of plan to go forward with so I did my rehab and AA. They went together as a package. My commitment to not getting drunk stayed with me as my foundation to keeping sober. I don't know that I ever committed to being sober the same as I committed to not ever being drunk again. For me, that is a real difference that i still enjoy to this day.

Bottoms are what we choose for ourselves, or they are nothing at all. It just depends on how we want to personally share about our experiences is what it looks like to me.

Dee74

For me, a bottom was not an event, it was the moment I decided I couldn't live my life that way one more day.

I was done - and like Rob anything else except being drunk looked good.

I think that kind of eureka moment is universal to us all, and essential.

While I don't therefore find the concept odd or dangerous I do absolutely agree with Kanamit that we should encourage people to seek help and not wait for some 'bottom' to arrive - I'd like to think people can do it easier than I did.

In the end tho, it's not our call when that happens - all we can do is share our experience

For the second part of the question - once I resolved that I didn't want to live that way, it was a natural follow on that I had to resolve to do whatever I had to not drink again and to do whatever I had to to be happy with that decision

I don't think I ever committed to being sober with the same vehemence and desperation that I did to not being drunk anymore either - it was a real life changing moment

D

Stang

I don't like the idea that you have to end up in prison, living under a bridge, or fighting liver failure to quit. I think my reasons were more like Least. True I've been locked up a few times but it was more the damned shame, anxiety, and feeling like 200 lb of smashed a$$holes everyday that got me to stop.
Now I gotta go walk my dogs and I wont be staggering!

DayTrader

I can tell you I sure didn't WANT to quit when I quit. I got my 2dui (5yrs from my first) and I was SURE I could just slow it down and control my drinking. About10 months later, with no license place on my Tahoe, no insurance, and no license......I got my 3rd.

Getting caught was almost a relief, in a way. I WAS ready to quit running, ducking and hiding. I was ready to face the music and get it behind me. On the other hand, I had NO intention of quitting for good. Reign it in, slow it down, drink in a controlled manner - sure, but not quit entirely.

So....for me.....as far as a "drinking bottom" goes.....I don't think I had one (in the sense that it's commonly referred to in the rooms of AA). Considering I did drink a lot...then stopped....and got sober..... I did have a bottom. Unlike some members though, it wasn't hitting a drinking bottom that drove me to AA. I was forced there as a consequence OF my drinking (and the way I lived my life) but like I said, it wasn't so much a decision that I couldn't take it any longer, bottomed, and then did something about it.

I don't see how an alcoholic......especially a chronic alkie.......could get/stay sober without a commitment to do so. Getting sober is a gift....staying sober requires some work on my part. Without that commitment, I can't see that I'd turn out anything other than exactly like all the folks I've known who got sober (often times..for years), slacked in their practicing AA's principles, and ended up drinking again. That said, the only way I can explain the commitment I DO have is that it's another gift from above....

aeo1313

I was just talking about this with my therapist- and it was AA topic on Friday night. My therapist said he almost thought it would be better for me if I had a "bottom"- got a dui or something like that, bc I have no real motivation right now for quitting.

Years ago I hit a bottom- about 17 years ago. I was in college, had dropped out, was smoking pot daily, deep into bulimia, drinking, and had just been date raped while drunk. I remember sitting on the floor of my apartment surrounded by pills hoping I had enough to kill me.

I now am married and have 2 happy children. I cannot risk hitting bottom at this point in my life. I am responsible for way more than myself now, and it isn't ok for me to drag my family down with me.

So, no, I have not hit bottom this time, but I have seen the bottom in the past and know I can dig my way there if I let myself.

RobbyRobot

Yes, I too both wanted and didn't want to quit when in fact I did quit, which really just means I was thinking and feeling like an alcoholic drug addict addicted to alcohol. In our addiction we want to both quit and use and its this paradox in reality which beats us down. This defines addiction.

I've managed to stay happily and productively sober without breaking my first commitment to simply not ever getting drunk again. I do have an understanding change is required for ongoing sobriety. I do not believe though that a commitment 100% to any program of recovery is essential for recovery though. Like I said in a different thread, I could have gotten sober from many different means which would have all lead to sobriety. I chose what i chose of course, but all my choices would have had the same success because that success depended on me. I am AA for example, but I can make the statement that AA dosen't keep me sober, and the sky dosen't fall all around me. My alcoholism is arrested and my alcoholic mind is silenced <-- that is why I am sober. My sober mind is alive and well and calling the shots on my sobriety. My HP is of my own understanding and I choose a spiritual sober life. I continue to do the AA program each day nonetheless. Of course, not every AA member agrees with me, and I dont speak for AA.

To be clear, if I had waited for the creation of 100% commitment to a program, I never would have stopped drinking. That's me though. Just looking at being drunk took everything I had. My addiction really had me by the short hairs, and there was no easy way out except to just simply not get drunk again and then do the next right thing (for me) to stay that way.

I think what gets chronic alcoholic drinkers drunk is active alcoholism and not failure in any program. Its really just that simple for me. I do believe in gifts from above too, and in that all things are possible, so that is also a way forward of course.

DayTrader

Heh.... I initially typed I believed it IS essential.....but then had some doubts so I backed away from such a strong stance. for now, I can't say I'm completely convinced of.....either for or against. If I had to lean one way, I'd say some level of commitment probably is necessary but I don't think I've spent all that much time at "100% committed" and I'm still here......sober.

Db1105

If you're not an alcoholic then stopping drinking should be no problem. If you are an alcoholic there usually is some reason why you need and want to stop. The gamble is stopping before you die, kill someone else, or do something that has you put away for a long time.

2granddaughters

Re: committed......

The difference is like a bacon & egg breakfast,

The chicken is involved and the pig is committed.



Wishing you the best RR

Bob