Stayingsassy

When it comes to alcoholism I think there something to not moving forward until you accept the past.

There’s no alcoholic on earth who doesn’t break sobriety with “its gonna be different, I’ll just make sure it’s different.”

It’s not different, it never will be different, and you can’t make it different because your brain is all screwed up and you can’t control it.

Look to the past and you’ll see that it’s never, ever, ever been different even when you really wanted it to be.

BullDog777

I don't remember the "good ol' days.

Maybe because I drank in almost complete isolation for the last 15 years of my drinking .

I remember those years just trying to keep the withdrawals away,

Maybe it's good I don't remember.

There was no comfort or fun...just emptiness and hopelessness.

EDIT: but that wasn't really your question...it was do i play the bad tapes back? I don't....i don't think I have very much at all.

It kinda lends itself to the past. The past doesn't exist anymore, so what's the point? I know how bad it was. I have no want to remember the depth of that pain.

I watch intervention a lot to keep s#it green. But i don't like remembering my own.

DriGuy

I liked this post immediately, but I'm not sure why. I guess because it's just vague enough to get me thinking. How would you do it? What's on that tape? OK it's coming to me. It's a blank tape. Nothing has been recorded yet. How different the future is from the past. The past is recorded and can't be changed. The future holds only possibilities. What do we do with it?

FBL

I think remembering our suffering is a good way to avoid romanticizing our past use. It's certainly something I don't dwell on, but I never want to forget what it was like at the end for me. Makes me appreciate where I'm at today. There's no doubt in my mind that I would be long dead by now if I hadn't stopped when I did. I need to remember that always.

August252015

Rather than thinking of it as a blank tape, to me this expression means to specifically think through what will happen if we drink. And that story never ends well, so when we are in a moment of making the next right choice (don't drink) it can be useful- often in early sobriety- to literally name what each step will be if we make the wrong choice (drink). Insert choices along the path from start to finish of the inevitably bad end of the choice to drink:
Go to a party with lots of old drinking buddies, at 62 days sober (bad idea for most of us); don't take a bottle of water or NA bev to hold onto (empty hands, another bad choice); stick around to the point we feel uncomfortable (not leaving, another step closer to drinking); decide we will just have one (can't stop); drive home (get a DUI).

Tons of other bad scenarios to play out when tempted to drink, lots of which we all saw really happen in our drinking days.

As I have gone along, the planning to avoid bad choices or, better, make the next right choice, is less and now not really necessary bc I am simply a person who doesn't drink, with really significant reasons why!

WaterOx

That's what has been so difficult. Playing the tape forward isn't easy when you have a little imp constantly revising history.

DriGuy

I do less of that (actually hardly any of that) now too, but when it comes to planning how to avoid situations that place us at risk, I believe it's never wrong to err on the side of overkill. I avoided risk situations probably longer than I had to, but so what? When it comes right down to it, none of those risk situations have ever been necessary events I had to take part in. Even today, there are situations I will avoid, not so much because they are risky, but because there is nothing to be gained from them.

August252015

^^^Me, too. As far as choosing not to do things for a long time, I was really conservative- for me that meant only going out of town twice, once with my parents and once with my now husband (also in recovery), in the first 9 mo- first party at 14, wedding at 19...I gradually started doing one on one lunches and such with only people who, as I describe it, are trying to live their own best lives, whether alcoholic or not, who deserve a seat at my table.

I have learned that I can do only what I want. There is absolutely nothing I cannot decline. Period. Now, that means evaluating my emotional sobriety since it's my primary barometer, and I can handle "stressful" situations much better. But I still reserve the right to say no.

My sobriety is live or die. I don't have another chance. I don't live in fear of drinking- I just keep making the right choices to keep the beautiful life I have in sobriety.

Gottalife

As someone who lost the power of choice in drink, and never got it back, the concept of playing the tape in any direction is of no value whatsoever in preserving sobriety. When the obsession has been on me, the last thing my mind will do is remember why I should not drink. The memory defence failed more times than I can count, and never suceeded even once.

However, the old experiences are turned to good effect in the AA program, not in relating drunkalogues in meetings which is such a tedious thing to have to endure, but in learning how our experience can be used to help others, specifically utilising the parts of our experience that are relavent to the person trying to work out exactly what their problem is.

Using my past experiences in this way, as part of an overall effort to stay in good spiritual shape, has resulted in me not even considering picking up a drink. Sure I lost the power of choice and never got it back, but the whole concept of choice is now irrelavent. The problem was removed, no choice required.

Stayingsassy

The imp lies. The part of you that knows the truth doesn’t want to listen because it wants a drink. That part of you gets super depressed when the truth leaks into your fantasies. Any thought of being able to control or moderate your addiction is a lie.

I resisted for so long. I even battered myself with weekly withdrawals so I “could still drink because I don’t drink every day.”

I actually accomplished the game that I laid on the table for myself but the benders got worse and worse and worse....sure I could withdraw, but when I hit it, I blew it to smithereens, every time, after every first drink. Guess what that was like?

I had won my own game, but the cost was so incredibly high, “winning” wasn’t what was happening.

Over and over and over and over again for a decade while I lost my soul and my life started crumbling at the edges and I finally figured out deep down what was a lie. And what was the truth. And that I’d only follow the truth, and with the truth I’d find myself in there, somewhere.

SoberCAH

This is a great thread, Steve, and I'm glad you brought up this topic.

For me, I don't have those old memories in a box for me to take out and romanticize about (or ruminate on).

They represent a lifestyle I gave up when I got sober and they illustrate the sacrifices I have made to get and stay sober.

My drinking days involved a lot of lost weekends, lost weeks, concerts, car races, strip joints, bachelor parties and other debauchery that I participated in, all the while thinking that it was what "fun" entailed.

For me to sober up, I had to grow up.

And being grown up does not include the abusive and idiotic behavior I exhibited on a daily and weekly basis.

Getting and staying sober took a lot of time and living and learning on my part, which is why I make it my primary objective every day.

For those of us who have shared this forum with you over the years, I gather that your getting and staying sober has likewise involved successes, challenges and setbacks.

I recommend that you seek to jettison these notions (specifically, the seeming fun and decadent times) from your topics to ponder and, instead, focus on your sobriety and your blessings.

MindfulMan

I used "playing the tape" a lot in the first 6 months of sobriety. If I ever thought "a glass of wine with friends would be nice and/or OK" I'd roll the tape through waking up in rehab and not really remembering how I got there. That's where that sip has the potential to lead, in fact, it almost certainly WILL lead back there.

It puts that "one glass" into perspective.

I'm also a big believer in positive reinforcement. Think of how great sober feels and how much better life goes after you play that tape. At this point my memories of being only buzzed aren't all that positive.

Not only is alcohol potentially extremely destructive, even a relatively innocuous one drink buzz isn't all that desirable or interesting compared to mindful presence.

Alcohol is a silly drug.

jimmyJlover

All of this, minus rehab. Great post thanks.

ThatWasTheOldMe

It's bad for me to forget what happens when I drink because I'll start romanticizing it. The reality is that it makes me sick and it causes me to become a different person (in a bad way).

elhen

I think there's a difference in reliving old memories of our behaviour and the situations we got into while drunk ( rolling back the tape) and " playing the tape" which is one of Smart Recovery tools.
When I play the tape I think, well if I start drinking, it will take about 15 minutes before alcohol starts to have an affect. In half an hour to an hour I'll be in the buzzed and feeling no stress stage. After an hour, because I drink so fast I'll be starting to get drunk. After 2 hours I will be drunk, will have lost control and not be able to stop drinking. After that will be blackout. Usually I'll only stop days later, when I have ran out of money, or gotten too sick to hold down anymore alcohol.
Then would be the withdrawals to contend with and trying to put right any damage my drinking had caused and not eating for days because I had spent all my money on the booze

zjw

i had a time when i would think back and be like what a waste. child hood TRASHED by abuse. followed up with YEARS of RUIN from alcoholism. Like damn near half my life gone to CRAP. and heck more then half of htat crap was DONE TO ME then the other crap was ME just trying to cope with what was done to me.

I dont really view it like that anymore. i do still feel i was cheated out of a childhood but thats a diff story. I guess i got enough sober time now that i feel like i'm getting it back now my life that is.

I pulled up an old photo again tho took a long hard look at it. and thought WHAT THE HELL WAS I THINKING!!! WHO IS THAT GUY?! thats how far away i am from that alcoholic i once was.

I had a lot of godo times tho. but a lot was followed up with crap too if not all of it came with a hangover of some form so was it really all that great? I dunno. I'm glad to have done what i did and made me what i am now sure. But perhaps it woulda been wiser to not remain an active alcoholic for as long as i did or not at all. having been able to expierince it has its benefits tho like being able to helps someone else sober up and such.

I think it can be all things tho you can look back and feel bad it could be a trigger or you can look back and feel grat about your progress just really all depends and its probably ok to look back and feel all of this its probably normal.