BullDog777

here's the short version......i contacted an old friend of mine who is a real estate agent about moving to a much larger home. The bottom line is my wife and i decided we need a few more bedrooms and some land.

the good news is it's totally doable...So why do i feel....well...off?

i WANT to move.

yet, i woke up this morning, antsy, anxious, and feeling without purpose. just...off...not really to the point of an urge....but very close to feeling like i could be having an urge and that's something really foreign to me at almost 9 months.

As close to death as i came this time i HAVE to stay vigilant. There is no room for complacency in any way.

i don't understand what i'm feeling.

any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Ken33xx

I`m not a therapist but how about...you`re stressing out over a major change? Never easy moving especially if you plan to buy.

PhoenixJ

Stay safe

BullDog777

i need to contact my therapist and talk about it. i never would have caught that had i not asked. too much stuff swirling in the old noggin.

Maudcat

There is nothing remotely fun about moving itself. Looking at places, visualizing yourslf in a new home, etc. That's fun. Try to enjoy and don't stress. It's a process.

BullDog777

i don't think any of that is fun.

i get what you're saying though.

i think a lot of this is stemmed from me being an introvert though.
i don't like dealing with people at all.

BullDog777

let me put it like this...if i could just buy the place online and then hire movers moving day, and be done, i think that s#it would be ideal.

BullDog777

so i guess a lot of this is simply anxiety related.

zjw

If only i could download a house and car and... hahahah

I dunno i wake up in an anxious funk out of nowhere from time to time. I just ride it out anymore and try to reach into my sanity toolbox and pull someting out that might help etc..

BullDog777

yeah. i think i might take a mental health day today and just go do some fun stuff. thanks. that makes a lot of sense.

Maudcat

Well, if my spouse said, "go find the house you want and let me know when I should pack my toothbrush" I would be over the moon.
But that's me. Would your wife be amenable to doing the lion's share?
Not saying she should, mind. But maybe she would welcome the challenge/chore.

BullDog777

well, that's the thing. she's leaving it to me because of how busy her schedule is going to be. even getting a sit down with her until the end of jan. is going to be difficult.

advbike

Be careful that it's not just an addictive need to make a big change.. lol, I have bought several cars when not drinking.. and a house, oh, and moved overseas.. haha.. every time it was my ego telling me a compelling story that if I changed my circumstances my life would be better.. but with time we learn that has to happen on the inside. Happiness is an "inside job"..

EndGameNYC

My first sponsor in 1983 told me "None of us likes change. We're afraid of it. Why do you think people stay in crappy jobs, bad relationships, and live in places they hate. You have to move slowly in the beginning, work your way up." I asked what he meant, and he said "Get a new tooth brush and see what happens."

Whenever we're in the process of making significant changes in our lives, we're also leaving behind something important and familiar. Which often means something or someone that helped to make us feel safe. We always tend to gravitate towards that which is familiar. Even in the case of traveling and exploring different cultures, or being consistently on the lookout for something "novel," for example, we are on intimate terms with the activity itself no matter our destination. We are all much more alike than otherwise.

Actively drinking and rejecting sobriety is an immediate example of this phenomenon. We know it's killing us, but we still turn to it in time of need. Those times eventually become all the time despite our lives collapsing all around us. Leaving a job for a better job, leaving a relationship, buying a new phone. Change, loss, and anxiety about what's going to happen next are all in play. These things are never about what we know, but about our feelings, about what we believe, and about what we expect. We already know what to expect from that which is familiar to us. That's what makes them so "safe."

Once you make a decision, it helps to abandon whatever personal investment you might have in all the potential outcomes. And as someone mentioned, moving totally sucks.

BullDog777

AWESOME post. THANK YOU...

aasharon90

There are companies that do offer moving
with the company you work for which is what
happened to us back in the day.

Our 2 kids were getting older and needed
their own rooms, one boy and one girl, and
deciding what school to send them to. They
had been going to Catholic school and to
send them to a Catholic HS would have
been extremely expensive for us, so the
move for affordable schooling was what
helped us with that decision to move.

However, I didn't get the memo about the
company coming to our home to pack us
up and move us, so I began packing in boxes
id find in dumsters and stores. Nice boxes
tho.

Anyway, I had filled an entire storage unit
with so many different size boxes of our home
that it did fill a huge Mayflower truck completely.
The day before we moved the company movers
came to the house to pack what we had leftover.

They pulled out these tall same size boxes
and filled what we had in no time where
it took me months to pack in many small
boxes. Crazy when ever I did things my
way, it never worked.

That of course was done during my
drinking career and yes I'm sure I
drank enough to numb all my anxiety
and stress which didn't help in anyway
because I was miserable about the
move away from my hometown in
which I never wanted to leave in
the first place.

Anyway.....if you can get help with packing
and moving that is awesome and if not, make
sure you get these same size boxes to avoid
packing burnout like I did.

Remember, we never have to go thru
anything alone by ourselves or have to
figure out anything by ourselves alone
again.

Asking for what we need, suggestions,
can guide us along in our journey sober
and a lot less stress and anxiety.

BullDog777

no worries about me packing much myself.
i've got a fractured foot. almost everything is going to have to be done by movers and family.

August252015

Really like and agree with what EndGame said. Glad that resonated with you.

I find that I get tired- and sometimes strangely disturbed (I am in AA, so I look for the emotions like disturbance, frustration, anxiety, restlessness, discontent, etc)- when good and bad things happen. Sometimes it takes me by surprise that at 9 months I still find the "yay" stuff (for you, finding a house that is doable and the chance to move) as tiresome as the bad or "ugh" stuff (moving- who doesn't hate it, alcoholic or not?). I have somewhat of a refractory period, as I call it, after a few days of celebration or just consistent goodness. In fact, I am having an I-want-to-be-alone, I'll get back to y'all in a few days kind of deal right now, after a truly blessed Thanksgiving and some great days at work (I'm a server and the money was great and the shifts fun and pretty easy last week).

I stick closer to my program, I talk about it to my sponsor and my boyfriend (also in recovery) and I think about what I want to do (around work, which I have to do) and try to be gentle with my self. It will - it always does- pass.

Hang in there- take the actions you need to in baby steps. Literally, I focus on one thing at a time: today, I need to go to the store and pharm; then I will go to a meeting; then I have the afternoon to catch up on Netflix etx; then I will make a nice dinner for myself, then I will go to bed.

Take care and be patient with yourself. You can get through these decisions and needed actions sober.

Gottalife

Change can be a big deal, especially if you've been there a while. I once had a job for seven years, that I had really liked. It took me a full twelve months of thinking about leaving before I actually left to do something different. It was hard to leave.

Another thought that came to mind is the spiritual aspect. In the big book when it is talking about finding a higher power it talks about worship of other things as a block to a relationship with a higher power.

For me this has worked along the lines of expectations about how I would feel internally, if I was to achieve a particular external goal. Like owning a boat, getting a promotion, buying a new car, travelling to a new place, getting a qualification etc. The thought that such changes would make me feel better internally (which they may have done for a brief moment) turned out to be an illusion. At the end of the striving for the objective I felt kind of let down that I was still me, and not someone better.

Those sort of motives might have driven me to buy a bigger house at one time, and I think if I felt off about the deal, I might want to look at why I was considering such a move, what was it that was making me uncomfortable about it? Do I really need it, will I or someone else be better off as a result, does it make financial sense? Or is it just about doing something, anything, to try and feel better?

BullDog777

great advise August, thanks. your post was very helpful.