RevivingOphelia

Can some of you wonderful people please tell me what this term means to you?


Thanks in advance,
O

DarkDays

For me it means, manic cravings and spending all day fighting drink obsession and thoughts.

desertsong

To me it means trying to get through each day sober without any support or program. No face to face support, no one to talk to, no program to work, no tools to use ... just trying to do it on your own willpower. Never worked for me.

suki44883

I consider it to mean someone who is just avoiding drinking, but doing nothing else. No recovery plan, no support group or therapist or anything other than just trying not to drink.

Purplecatlover

I agree w/DD. It's the constant turmoil of the mind trying to fighting off cravings. Being irritable, wanting relief but denying it.

SOBERINNEPA

To some folks, it means just gritting out sobriety by pure will power. You're hanging on to your sober status so hard you have "white knuckles".

Purplecatlover

I think you can quit by willpower w/ out "white knuckling"
I did that this last time. It's all about perception.

langkah

When not drinking is what you're doing.

Maybe going to the gym and catching a movie once in a while, but mostly you're not drinking. And people should appreciate that and cut you some slack once in a while if you snap just a bit, because you're not drinking.

And it's 153 days now that you've been not drinking. And Summer is coming soon and in your mind's eye you're already there on the beach, not drinking. Sitting without a drink, down on the beach below that fun bar where you had a few and had a great time and nothing bad happened, but there's no use in going back because you're not drinking.

Tonight you're going to go home, lock the door and hope no one calls and wants to go out because you're not drinking.

awuh1

This is what you would see at the 10 and 2 position on the steering wheel just prior to crashing into some seemingly unavoidable object.

As strange as it may sound, letting go, provides relief from this condition.

Spawn

fighting an incredible urge to drink

Change4good

Hummm. . .I am not doing a program, and don't seem to be white knuckling. I don't want to get ahead of myself, and perhaps I don't see the water I am swimming in.

I feel more alive, proud, like I am making positive changes. Sure, I miss it, but I love the new life.

That said, I am only on Day 13. Perhaps I will slip, or have a world of hurt for me down the road.

Hell, I don't know.

jojoba

It means someone who is not reading the the Big Book every night.

Change4good

But there are surely many roads to healthy sobriety, yes?

Sudz No More

It means pretty much the same for me except I haven't had major cravings since I first started trying. Now it is more those fleeting moments when I am driving home from work and I get the impulse to stop at the store. Once I make it home and get a meal and a coffee it goes away.

Sudz No More

I'll have to respectfully disagree here. AA may work great for many but it is not the only way.

LDT

It's a term frequently applied to people like me that got sober without a "formal" program and without reading the Big Book every night......people like me who respect all paths to sobriety, but who chose a different one.....people like me, who have 437 days of sobriety without a "white knuckle" in sight.

suki44883

There are many here who have maintained sobriety and didn't use a formal program. Most of us, however, did have some support, even if it was just coming here daily and sharing what was going on with us. This place is full of support for anyone who wants it and there are no requirements other than a desire to stop drinking.

24hrsAday

to me it was when i was desperately trying to make it through the day without taking a drink. sweating,racing thoughts, unable to feel any peace. because i knew the solution to this was to take that drink...........
^this was before i went back to A.A. and started to really try to get sober.

Dee74

Some people may use the term pejoratively but that's not how I use it.

I remember days, many days, when I would fight against myself and my desire to drink...I would struggle inwardly, back and forth, to the point of exhaustion... and then my addiction would win and I'd drink again.

This went on for years.

I'd never think of asking for help or doing anything else but struggle, struggle struggle with myself...that, to me, is white knuckling.

D

Zencat

White knuckling is when I had such a tight grip on the booze bottle that the blood was forced away from the capillaries in my knuckles.