iew101

Happy Monday!

I was thinking this weekend about drinking. I’ve never really quite determined if I was an alcoholic or not. What I do know for a fact is that I have a history of abusung substances. Cigarettes, marijuana and alcohol and an all or nothing personality. I actually used to smoke pot 2 to 3 times a day every day for roughly decade. I then got into some legal trouble so I was not able to continue to do that and that is when my drinking careers started, besides my college days.

For me and a lot of people in this SR Group, mental health issues and dealing with reality seem to be the prevailing reason for our use. Personally for myself, anxiety and OCD were the reasons that I drank. I didn’t know how to deal with my thoughts and my anxieties and drinking blunted all of this. Like many of us, after years of drinking and learning no coping skills or making any beneficial lifestyle changes, I relied on the alcohol to function in my daily life. Quitting is so hard because we are ill-equipped to handle reality without alcohol when we use like this.

When I quit cigarettes and marijuana it was actually easier because they had both been causing me anxiety at the time of use. The difference with them and drinking is drinking actually does take it away for a while and only kicks up when you aren’t using. Therefore your brain always associates drinking with reduced anxiety. It really does take a while, at least it did for me, for your brain to make the connection that drinking is not the solution but the cause now to your problems.

I still get requests from my brain to potentially drink in the future. The other day I was thinking about possibly if I could take a full year off maybe I could have three beers. But then I think to myself, well there’s no way in hell I’m going to ever stop at three beers. And the nice thing is at this point I know that I couldnt even force myself to drink again. The cons list is just way too long at this point. I lost my furry friend of a decade last weekend and even contemplated having a drink then for a minute, but I knew that wasn’t the right thing to do and even felt wrong. Which was a slight positive in a very dark time for me.

So back to the point on reality. We have to learn to live in reality and learn that we don’t need to escape it. We need to learn how to cope with reality and be immersed in it. At times life sucks. Life sucks really bad at times. But life sucks at times for everyone on this planet, not just for us. Life is also awesome at times. Life is also awesome at times for everyone on this planet and not just us. So when we quit drinking, or attempt to quit drinking, we have to remember it takes a while to adjust back to reality. And we can’t just quit drinking and expect life to be amazing. Because life isn’t always amazing. Life is boring, life is stressful, life is sad, life makes you angry, and life makes you tired.

Diet, exercise, therapy, socializing, hobbies, new friendships and all sorts of things can help make this transition better. These are also things everyone should have in their lives, but drinking steals the show for many of us. These things should also lead to a more for fufilling life in the future and overtime your coping skills with life will get better and therefore you’ll feel better. But in the beginning it’s rough. I am five months sober now and I consider my sober new life. I truly do not think I would ever touch another substance to alter my reality again, because since I’ve been sober this time I finally making headway. No more making a little bit of headway than drinking and then restarting. Because that process is exhausting. And when you stY sober you keep getting better and better learning to cope more and more making better and better decisions and therefore your life improves by building slowly(it’s a process). You’re not constantly recovering from drinking, feeling like crap from drinking, obsessing about drinking, beating yourself up and starting over with recovery.

I read a meme the other day that said “ I woke up one morning and was sick of feeling the way I felt. So I made the decision not to feel this way ever again.”

What’s helped me is therapy, running, breathing exercises (Weil 4-7-8 method is good for super stress times or craving strikes), 10 minutes of mid-day breathing, meditation most nights (I like the Calm app), supplements and a few hobbies I neglected while using.
That can be today for any of us.

Happy Monday.

entropy1964

I totally agree.

The only question is, if you determine you aren't an alcoholic, then what?

iew101

For me personally it was irrelevant because alcohol was causing new problems and making others worse. And the steps I have taken so far have been nothing but positive and have led to an overall improvement in my quality of life.