zjw

teh toher thing with this doc telling me i'd loose the battle is its like the line from the show lost "dont tell me what i cant do!"

min he said that it was liek OH YEAH? i'll show you BUDDY!!! and i did

Soberpotamus

Zjw, that's commendable you took the diet and exercise route instead of the pills. Good for you. Even better that it worked.

biminiblue

Yeah, Sleepie, I didn't feel normal until almost a year. The panic and anxiety would hit for no reason. I just accepted that it was for no reason. Eventually it went away.

Just breathe through it. You're doing great.

I also will never go back to pharmaceutical intervention - nutritious food, exercise, and the great outdoors heals what's wrong for me.

sleepie

Zjw, what was it like, can you pm me if you don't want to put it here? I was so discouraged last week when I embarked on exercise in the heat, only to be ill for the weekend. I really just cannot do hot weather. The few cooler days we had here, I was happy and active and got a lot of things done, even cleaning quite a bit. But here in the thick of august I feel physically ill and just like people complain about in the winter, sad that I can't go out and exercise and feel depressed and housebound. My whole mood just crashed.

D122y

15 months here and I still feel spacey sometime....

But, I am starting to embrace it. The spacey gets my blood flowing.

I never collapse or anything..just feel weird.

Life w out booze.

sleepie

I did a bunch of jogging up and down the stairs today. My heart rate was nuts. I did break a sweat though. I fear my heart is in bad shape despite biking and having lost 30 pounds and I'm unsure as to whether I can really improve it.

D122y

Nice job.

Since the doc says you are gtg...keep pushing.

Pain is weakness leaving our body.

I just got back from a rigorous grappling work out. Didn't think I was going to make it.

Time to get up for work in 6 hours. But, my car pool buddy is at the helm...wish me luck..

sleepie

It wasn't pain so much as my heart rate over 200 and the heat getting to me again.

BullDog777

i quit benzos more than 5 years ago, about the first time i got sober. I can say those withdrawal symptoms, paws, whatever they were seemed to linger on and ebb and flow well into 9 months of sobriety.

However, i can honestly say alot of it, if not 99% of it was anxiety in reaction to the most minor of complaints or discomforts while my body readjusted.

I had heat sensitivity, light sensitivity, noise sensitivity, insomnia off and on, depression, etc. most of it centered around my anxiety about the slightest part of my system getting off kilter or readjusting.

when that happened, i lost all perspective and had a terrible time regaining any for days at a time.

Here's an example. yesterday i stayed up all night watching netflix. I tried to go to bed about 5am, but started tossing and turning. Then I found myself getting agitated and then itchy, and then my mind was off, racing at 100mph.
I was convinced i was itching from paws or my liver was failing, or a half a dozen other things...in reality, when i calmed down and relaxed and stopped thinking about sleeping, all my symptoms went away and i slept. same thing is happening this morning.
My main battle is anxiety. I can manifest almost ANY symptom i can imagine in just a few minutes if i start to obsess about it. it takes total and complete distraction of the issue for me to lose the symptoms and gain my composure enough to go to sleep or do what my intended task was.

Easy enough to fix, now that i know about it, right? not really. I'm just aware about how my mind is still trying to F**k me even after 5 months off the booze and 5+years off benzos.

I think the biggest tool i learned in rehab this time was how to recognize what was happening so i could try to get out of the attack.

I've been around here almost as long as you have and we both share some pretty intense anxiety. I'm not saying this is what's happening to you, but it sure was most of it for me.

I hope you feel better soon, Sleepie.

sleepie

Something about the benzos makes it much harder to live in sobriety. They are really in a class of their own. I can see why relapse is more attractive after quitting benzos. Even now I wish I could take one if for only one night of decent sleep and a day free of anxiety.

zjw

it was awful? I felt like i was on the razors edge of sanity all the time. at 6 months sober or so I felt like i still had these electrical zaps going on like felt like i was being shocked down my spine down my arms and legs out my fingers and toes. It seemed like no one understood this. I was still ruminating in all my thoughts. oh and the depersonalization derealization stuff was a fun treat as well tho I grew to embrace that and was actually kinda happy everything felt fake to me as if i was just a fly flying around in someone elses play of life. Life felt fake to me like something off of a movie set. I lived in a my own little bubble for a while too why? .becuase it was safe there. I'd stick my head out now and then only to get it lobbed off by some crap circumstance of life so it was easier to just withdraw and hide. IT was an effective strategy and i think the derealization and such was my brains way of protecting me from going totally insane.

I couldnt cope with a damn thing. ANY little thing i was blowing a gasket. My wife recently told me how scared she was during this time becuase i was os mentally ill and so far gone. I had no idea she realized it was so bad here i thought i was containing it all for her sake. I guess enough was seepig out i could only hold back so much. That being said i do sometinmes wish someone woulda just carted me off tot he phsyche ward so i could be officially be declared insane instead of sitting on the endge of insanity terrified that maybe i was.

I had all kinds of odd health stuff going on too. That looking back i can only declare it was nothing other then my body getting off booze still and detoxing. The list of ailments is long and many things i've forgotten till i read someones post here and i'm like oh good god yeah i remember those days.

Doctor told me its all normal your getting older you have a wife and kids life is stressful its ok to feel this way. I dont think he was quite getting just how Eff'd up i was. perhaps i was not conveying it well or was afraid too let out what all was really going on?

I still felt like crap i still wondered why i bothered to quit drinking. LIfe still SUCKED. i mean i always say life was only a hair better every 30 days or so. and it was borderline enough to make me wanna stay sober. was like well maybe this will take forever to feel better? or well this still sucks but at least its not as crappy as day 1 was i guess *sigh* so i kept going.

I dunno I hate to talk about how crappy it was sometimes I think some folks had an easier go of it some worse . But for me getting sober was CRAP for dang near the first year. I really dunno why i bothered at that time but glad i did now.

I know many here will suggest therapy or meds etc... I'm sure thats a good solution for some. I always felt i'd be told i'm just fine and i'm not that insane while in my head i was going bonkers cause that was usually the case when i tried therapy in the past. or that i'd simply be committed and my family would then really be in a difficult spot since i was the bread winner and couldnt just not work.

In hindsite? i shoulda decalred a family state of emergency o rsomething seen if others could help pump cash into my household while i went off to rehab and got my crap figured out or something. I shoudl have gone to AA right away or at least tried it. I should have found a site like this sooner.

But its over and done with now. and its like i've heard before I might have another relapse in me I wont lie i joke and htink about a 2 week bender once in a while (Nuts I know) but I dont know that I have another recovery in me.

thats why when you post here and some are like oh shes complaining again or this or that i'm a bit more sympathetic cause I dunno at yoru stage in the game i was still a pretty big hot mess myself. and I'm not gonna say that others are wrong I was told many times get the FRICK over yourslef rararara wtf is wrong with you . oh here we go again zjw is on another rant him and his crap life again etc... I heard it all people got tired of listening to me i lost friends for that VERY reason! i abused relationships because i'd talk to folks and all i wanted to talk about was my round and round obsessessing with my issues.

And I dunno in time i guess i just got tired of myself even surrendered gave up started to heal more physically mentally and things started to get easier. Nothing people told me helped but yet at the same time everyting people told me helped. I mean someone might tell me something say at 30 days sober that i didnt wanna hear or i felt was not helpful but 6 months down the line i'd remmber that comment and be like oh thats what they meant oh yea etc...

Its like a journey a process that we kinda just gotta go through or at least i didd. there was no like cure really I just had to push on through it and in time it all started to ease up.

sleepie

I appreciate all your input zjw, at least I know it is not completely unusual to feel bad for so long. Unfortunately for me change doesn't happen overnight and you and I have some other similarities so it can be difficult. I only know that if things ever really improve for me I can share it with those who helped me through the long tough terrain, the kinder ones who really tried to understand.

zjw

Think about it from another perspective tho. Many go through what you've gone through and end up a statistic. Yet here you are with 7 going on 8 months of sobriety. and yeah I know its not like life is suddenly friggen grand. But like you said it doesnt all happen over night and 7 going on 8 months sobriety given your circumstances and situation is pretty stinking amazing in and of it self.

I know I mentioned i started learning to play the bagpipes. well i recently read a story about a guy great pipe player etc.. 41 years old kills himself after his long battles with alcoholism. The story sent chills up my spine in that i'm only 39 and yeah if i kept on down that road that kinda thing coulda been me!

its hard sometimes tho because we want everything over night and sometimes it just seems like its not getting better or never will etc.. But its a process is all.

Look at me with this bagpipe I can get so discouraged that i didnt pick it up and become an instant sensation. Yes seriously!! then i have to remind myself that that kinda thinking is nuts learning to play is work takes time and practice and effort and its gonna be hard sometimes and its gonna be great some times Life isnt much diff.

Even in my garden I see insects that ruin stuff but other insects that eat them. I see bees that might sting me but also will help polinate things. I see some wild plants that might kill me some wild plants that are gonna be awesome for me. I see some plants get ruined by critters but they gotta eat too etc.. I see all the ups and downs in there and i'm like well it is what it is and its all good in there its easy to see it on a smaller scale like a garden or playing the istrument. its harder to see it tho when we look at our whole lives etc. or just life in general.

zjw

other thing too is like i look at recovery and all i went through and still go through and think its like one big spanking / firm reminder not to do that again. and once in a while i think hrmm maybe i should go have a drink and i think do you really wanna go through that all over again? are you insane? and of course the drunk it me is like yeah pff it wasnt so bad i got this. But the sane rational me is like yeah right your NUTS dont do that again you fool etc....

drinking was a pretty insane thing for me. drink myself to near death each day only to wake up feeling like hell a few hours later eager to do it all over again ::facepalm:: and its like but but you almost died and its like but i didnt *cracks another beer open* it was nuts!

Dame

As far as being too young I don't know how old you are but perimenopause could start in your early 30s, maybe sooner because of the alcohol use,

Yes. This absolutely. Sadly alcohol and hormones do not mix very well. I have met many women experience perimenopausal symptoms in their 30's, and when I look back I'm pretty sure that is what my PMDD was all about. I find a lot of women refuse to entertain the idea because it makes them thing "now I'm old." That's a destructive myth and needs to go away.

sleepie

I had my fsh checked and it was normal. This really only happens in the summer time.