Redss1982

Hi Guys and Girls

I have been struggling with alcohol addiction for many years now. I am 38 and been married 2ce. I lost jobs and I just don't stop. Do I want to stop yes. But it's so difficult. I wasted so much money and I am I. The verge of losing people that I love because of this disease. It's not easy I wish I could stop right now but it just seem like I don't care. Even though I do. I drink between 8 to 10 beer a day. My mental health is struggling and I can feel my health too. I have been to rehab before. It went OK for a few months then I went on a bindge and all started again. Really struggling. It's not fun and I hate the way I feel.
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Reid82

Hello and welcome to SR. No, none of us can get cured of addiction. The way I view it the addiction can go into remission so to speak, but is still there, dormant within us. Have you thought of a plan this time around to staying stopping? Posting here would be a good first start

Tetrax

My take right now (just a way of looking at it) is basically this: you have Alcohol Use Disorder which is a mental illness primarily treated by Exposure Therapy: in this case exposure to prolonged abstinence (and the feelings this will inevitably bring up).

Of course you could word it differently with addiction, alcoholism, etc. but I guess what I'm saying is by grouping it in with mental illness you know what to listen out for when it seems like you yourself want so badly to drink. You know that anxious voice you get and how that's not the real you? That's how I look at the Addictive Voice, which is basically my take on AVRT (my recovery programme has been kind of pick 'n' mix and trial and error...)

You still need some sober time of course and the camaraderie you can find at the likes of AA and SMART - and indeed here - can be invaluable to help you get it. Or if you like what you hear you could of course follow one of those programmes more rigidly.

The key is to get the time.

Right now the scream to just keep drinking will be LOUD. But it WILL get quieter (and thus more manageable). This you probably know from being months sober in the past, now it will be about getting that back, and then working out how not to relapse (and as you already know why through your experience you can use that to help you).

aasharon90

Can't cure my addiction? Sure, you, we, us can.

Yes, you, we, us, can.

It can be done as you read about or hear in person
many who have found success in remaining sober
each day to long term sobriety.

Whatever way you achieve it, it can be done.

You don't have to try achieving it alone or by
yourself, which is comforting to know. If you
need support, it is always available to you, whether,
here in SR, recovery meetings, theraphyists, support
groups and so much more.

Educating ourselves with all the knowledge available
to us about addiction and recovery and then using this
knowledge to our advantage can definitely get you on
the road to building a strong solid recovery foundation
to live upon each day you move forward and leaving your
addiction in the dust.

There are many ways to achieve sobriety with success. It
is in not doing the footwork that will keep you on the merry
go round of insanity that goes with addiction.

Find what will work for you and if you need extra
help, in which many of us have, for me it was to begin
in rehab, then from there I have not let go of the many
recovery lifelines I have held onto for 29 yrs now to
achieve success in my own recovery, then go get it.

So many others here have found a way to achieve
sober or clean time as well. Read their inspiring words
and ask for helpful suggestions that can guide you
into achieving sobriety too.

Kat1313

Stayingsassy

Hi red.

There is no cure, but total abstinence comes close.

I say close because the drinking thoughts will always be there.

But everything else: the shame, the pain, the headaches, the shakes, the sweating, the insomnia, the dread, the regret, the family torture, the addicted hamster wheel; all goes away with abstinence.

So I’d say that’s a pretty good deal we get to have!

Rockbottom1964

Hi, Reds. I see you're in Centurion. I lived in Pretoria East for almost 30 years and I'm now in Springs on the East Rand. South Africa, as you know, is a bad place to be and find help for our disease, but it can be done. YOU can do it. I'm on day 88, and if I can do it, anybody can. Hang in there and visit SR as often as you can.
Good Luck to you...

Hevyn

It's good to meet you, Redss. I felt the same way you did once - and I did nothing to help myself. I knew I didn't drink like others - one drink always led to getting drunk & doing reckless things. It took me a long time to admit I couldn't touch it - I wasted many years trying to be a social drinker. In the end I lost almost everything & was drinking all day. This doesn't need to happen to you. I hope you'll keep reading & posting here. We care about you & want to help. You're never alone.

Dee74

Hi and welcome Redss

read around and you'll find a bunch of people who've left alcoholism behind by simply not drinking.,

Notice I said simple not easy.

Its hard to change but no harder than it is to try and juggle our drinking and all the other parts of our lives,

Support helps and you'll find that here.

What kinds of things have you tried in the past to stop drinking?

D

CRRHCC

I'm truly sorry for you plight. I'm not trying to be sarcastic, but you truly must find more happiness in getting drunk than not being drunk.
We are all biologically wired to seek happiness (reward). When you choose to do something, you do so because you see it as your best available option at least at that moment in time. This concept is vitally important because the only way you will stop desiring heavy substances and change your behavior is by seeing more happiness in the change than in the using. . People stop abusing when they decide (REASON) abusing is not the best option for their happiness. This is precisely why the evidence shows that most people mature out of their addiction (NESARC) .
Most addicts (including myself) are like infants, we expect life to meet our demands instead of meeting the demands of life like adults!
There's always hope. You have already Recognized you have a problem, now Reframe the good and bad benefits, and Replace the reasons you drink with more healthy empowering reasons that will return control in your life. Be curious, kind to yourself and discover yourself. Your posting here is a start.

Sohard

Sohard

SnazzyDresser

Lots of great things in this thread, this is good stuff. SR can help you stop drinking, Redss! You don't have to do this alone, SR and all the great folks here can help. Takes some effort that's for sure, but well worth the fight. It is literally life or death after all, the poison plays for keeps.

First thing I did early on back when I was new in 2016 was to get active in the monthly Newcomers thread, mine was June 2016, never will forget it. It's like a class back in school or maybe a group of recruits in sober boot camp, kinda like that. I would post every day in there, all the weirdness I was thinking and feeling, read about the other people too. Enormously helpful.

Gottalife

I could not cure my alcoholism, yet it could be relieved, placed in remission if you like. I was a smoker too, and I know with both alcohol and cigarettes I cannot take either again without losing control. Yet it never occurs to me to do either. The power of the AA program in a manner of speaking.

Your opening post could have come from the AA book, the part that defines alcoholism - the baffling feature being the "absolute inability to leave it alone no matter how great the desire or the wish". Yet millions of us have been freed from the problem by following a few simple rules.

Simple but not easy.

NYCDoglvr

Nobody can "cure" an addiction. I stopped drinking with the help of AA and 28 years later still go to meetings. It would have been impossible for me to stop on my own......my best thinking got me drunk.

Dee74

hows it going redss?

D