inthekeyofg

Many of you will read this and say "well, obviously", but this is a huge realization for me. Everything changes when I drink. See, I don't know if that's rightly worded as the actual realization was so much more intense... words aren't doing it justice.
I'll try:

Everything about how I see myself changes. (When I drink.)
Everything about how I see thee world changes. (When I drink.)

I had myself convinced that there was something wrong with the world, so why not drink? Or, even more saddening, I was convinced there was something wrong with me and that drinking would ease something, cure something, right something.
The truth is, the world is a beautiful place and I, though in recovery and healing, ain't so bad either.

The lens through which alcohol allows one to see the world is so very distorted, fractured, bent, skewed...
... Anyways!

I wish you all a lovely Monday!

Aellyce

I absolutely agree with you. Heavy drinking totally discolored my vision of both myself and the external world to a very dark shade. There was a period of time when I convinced myself that the whole desolate world was on a slow decline to its soon-to-come ending, and I was meant to experience the whole process more intensely than most around me, just because I felt a strong contrast between my life and thinking when I was younger and that time. I could come up with many "creative" ideas about that dystopia, except the one single truth, that it was caused by my drinking and that it was only inside my head (and in the head of others similar to me, to whom I was continuously drawn, of course).

It's how delusional and ill we can become as a consequence of alcoholism. I remember that a bit over a year before I finally quit drinking, I got a series of psychiatric questionnaires from my work that are used to screen patients (I work for a Psych department) and I took all the tests. Came out "positive" for 4 or 5 different conditions, and a couple of them in the very severe range. That is all gone now in sobriety.

I'm glad you got out of that "place", inthekeyofg

GnikNus

I was just talking to a friend of mine (recovering alcoholic as well) about this the other night. I told him about how I could have made so much more progress over the last 12 years had alcohol not been a part of my life. Negative thinking, extreme pessimism, self sabatoge- these are all part of heavy drinking.
That's what scares me about ever taking that first drink. I'd be thrown right back into that.

ScottFromWI

Whether it's acceptance, salvation, a breakthrough thought, whatever you may have, I think many of us have come to the same basic realization - and it's pretty amazing when it happens. Glad that you have found that peace to move forward without the chains of alcohol around your neck.

freshstart57

Congratulations, InTheKeyofG, on your arrival here at this understanding. Once this stuff becomes clear, the question of future drinking simply disappears. Permanent and unconditional sobriety marks the end of the recovery process. Onward!

inthekeyofg

I thought I had found it before, but it was just a sort of frustration and sadness with my situation.... that wasn't enough to really break the chains and bad habits. It's weird, really, to see yourself being aware of something or seeing yourself seeing something. Sounds a bit esoteric, I know, but it's a huge waking-point.

inthekeyofg

I have had this thought as well. I don't think of these past years as being wasted (pun intended) but rather forcing me to a place (rock bottom?) that I needed to come to, to see things very, very clearly.

Soberwolf

Well said & congrats

Dee74

Great post inthekeyofg

D