Notices

Hi everyone

Old 10-22-2002, 09:07 PM
  # 1 (permalink)  
Raj
Paused
Thread Starter
 
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: l.a.
Posts: 5
Hi everyone

Hi, I am new to the board. I am celebrating two months sobriety today. I'm just starting to realize what an incredibly long, arduous journey it will be and I look forward to sharing it with you and vice versa.
Raj is offline  
Old 10-22-2002, 09:36 PM
  # 2 (permalink)  
Member
 
Join Date: Sep 2002
Location: USA
Posts: 122
Hello Raj,
Welcome, keep coming back. Congratulations on your 2 month anniversary.
H
Hadenuff is offline  
Old 10-22-2002, 10:16 PM
  # 3 (permalink)  
Member
 
sidney's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: new mexico
Posts: 242
Raj

Thanks for taking the time to respond to me.

Sidney
sidney is offline  
Old 10-22-2002, 10:54 PM
  # 4 (permalink)  
Morning Glory
Guest
 
Posts: n/a
Hi Raj,

Congratulations on your 60 days and welcome to the forum.

Hugs,
MG
 
Old 10-23-2002, 07:56 AM
  # 5 (permalink)  
It is what it is!!!
 
Paulie's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2002
Location: Sobriety
Posts: 5,767
Raj -

I would also like to welcome you and - Yeah!!! on your two months!!!!

Keep posting and tell us more about yourself.
Paulie is offline  
Old 10-23-2002, 10:21 AM
  # 6 (permalink)  
Raj
Paused
Thread Starter
 
Join Date: Oct 2002
Location: l.a.
Posts: 5
ok, i'll try to keep this as succinct as possible.

I first drank alcoholically, in the spring of 1989, when my parents went out of town for a few days. I got drunk everyday, had a couple of parties and the like. The following summer, after high school graduation, I drank to excess on several occasions, and then college started, and it became a pretty regular thing. Freshman year ended, went abroad for the summer and didn't touch the stuff. Came back, and was completely uninterested in drinking which lasted for a year. After a year of loneliness and solitude, something in me snapped and i started buying six packs of beer and downing them in a sitting, alone and at home, for no reason. This had never happened before. Thus began my alcoholism. Though for the next eighteen months it ebbed and flowed, waxed and waned, in 1993 it really started in earnest. That was when I started drinking every night without fail, and drinking eight or nine beers in a sitting. 1993 turned into 1994 while continuing like this, and one June evening in 1994 i suddenly realized i had drank several beers every single day of the year thus far, with no exceptions at all. That night, I resolved not to drink,and felt a weirdness i had never felt before or since.

I tried to scale down for a while but it had become a habit, and i was regularly drinking several beers everyday at this point. Then in early 1995 i went abroad to med school and quit drinking for two and a half months. i had vowed not to drink while i was there, but i transferred to another program after ten wks which was to start a few months later and so felt in the meantime i could resume drinking, which i did. then there were a couple of shaky months where i had neither means nor opportunityto drink, though motive was everpresent of course. following that period, though, i don't think i had a decent period of sobriety for the next three years or so, until nov 1998 when i was able to quit for six wks on my own, but went back to it, and then quit again and smoked weed for a couple of months. after that, i quit weed, didn't drink, and was clean and sober for three months, at which point i returned to beer with a vengeance and drank once more or less daily for the next four months. at the end of 99, i had my last period of sobriety, about six wks due to lack of funds and a safe place to drink, for the next one year.

2000 was all about daily drinking. I drank every day with very few exceptions. I went to law school, and got dismissed after three weeks because i had been to two classes. i still couldn't stop drinking. my friend's sister hooked me up with some weed, and i dropped the beer like a hot potato, and smoked weed everyday for two month, with some exceptions, lost a bunch of money on internet gambling and etrade, and then broke, confused, and somewhat depressed but mostly confused about myself and my life, went crawling back to my parents house.

it was right at this point that my major effort at recovery began. i regularly went to the bookstore and read recovery books and frequented recovery message boards. i remained clean and sober for the next 89 days. on the ninetieth day, living on my own, in the town where i had gone to college, i searched everywhere and asked random people for weed. finally found one, and sparked a j with a dime bag that lasted me two days.

got back on the wagon, recognizing my folly, and didn't drink or smoke for the next 3 wks. at that point, was delivering pizza, a guy backed his car into mine in a hotel parking lot, i had to call the police, i filed a report, in a routine check, a warrant for a thirty dollar bad check i wrote three years earlier came up (which was itself a long story, but the long and short of it is i was charged for dry cleaning when i only asked for washing, and the bill was inflated, and i had to pay with a check which i had not expected and i mistakenly paid with a check from a closed acct, and didn't receive the notice from the d.a. in the mail, because it went to my parents house, and i wasn't in touch with them in any way shape or form at that time.

following this, the worst event of my life, i resolved at the station while being booked that i was going to get wasted after getting home, which i did, and continued to do for the next three months.

made another push for sobriety in july of last yearwhich lasted only about 3 wks. a cousin who i'm close to visited that month from india, and we drank like fishies. he stayed two months but the last two wks we cut way back. after he left, i started a new job with dell computer, a really good job, and resolved not to blow it by drinking.

that month, oct 98, i drank to excess routinely, but only on the weekends so my job wasn't threatened. november rolled around and daily drinking resumed once i had the hang of the job and a little security there. the drinking morphed into smoking pot the day my manager told me i had to dramatically improve my performance or i would be fired.

i started smoking weed in mid nov, and a co-worker at dell sold me ounces of the stuff, and for three wks straight, i was stoned out of my mind. my connection then dried up, my mood soured, and after a week without any weed, (i hadn't drank in a month, because weed totally takes away any desire for alcohol), i basically got myself fired from dell for walking out in the middle of the day, after a formerly friendly co-worker had been harassing me over the network for an innocent joke i made about bush getting assassinated.

that day was the last time i worked. 2002 has been a focus on recovery and a giant period of sloth, well, that's not saying much because that would describe most of the last eight years for me.

my new year's res was not to drink or smoke, and basically i drank 3 times in jan, 4 in feb, 3 in mar, 3 in apr, 5 in may, 6 in june, 8 in july, and 8 times in aug. Each of these occasions i drank between 4 and 6 beers, no more and no less. the only times i have smoked pot in 2002 are one joint shared with a stranger on feb 3 at the sleazy motel where i was living, and a dime bag bought from said stranger on june 14, which lasted about two days.

since aug. 24, i have not drank or smoked at all. this is my second longest period of sobriety in the last decade, but there have been periods like earlier this year from feb 8 to apr 12 when in that period, i only drank on three occasions (sixer each time).

i have babbled enough so i will leave it at that. i know if i fail to stay sober this time, that is it.
Raj is offline  
Old 10-23-2002, 03:02 PM
  # 7 (permalink)  
It is what it is!!!
 
Paulie's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2002
Location: Sobriety
Posts: 5,767
Raj -

How about meetings? a program? working the 12 steps? Are you doing any of those things?

This is just my opinion, which means nothing to anyone but me, but right now I am going to share it with you.

I am an addict and have been since high school if not before. If I told myself that this is the last time I will attempt recovery, it would definately be the last time, I would probably be dead right now. That is exactly what my disease wants to hear. Don't put limits on yourself like that.

Go to meetings, meet people in recovery and hang out with them. Get a sponsor, work the steps, give yourself a change.

You have been through hell, we all have, but we don't have to live that way, we have a choice, the choice is recovery. Sometimes we slip and fall, but we pick ourselves back up and we keep trying, again and again. Don't let your disease rule you like that. I never say that I will never use again, almost everyone in the years I have been around that has said that has relapssed and some have died. Never say never, but never say this is my last try.

Thanks for sharing your story with us, now i would like to hear about your recovery.
Paulie is offline  

Currently Active Users Viewing this Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
 
Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Trackbacks are On
Pingbacks are On
Refbacks are Off




All times are GMT -7. The time now is 06:13 PM.