Going Dry????
One brief hour...
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Anywhere, USA
Posts: 1,412
Going Dry????
I post on the F&F board mostly, but am crossing the street to get your thoughts/experiences firsthand. I would greatly appreciate some feedback if you can spare a minute...
My AH has stopped drinking for 3 days now. His alcoholism has spiraled rapidly out of control within the past few months- went to ER in January for alcohol poisoning and just recently went to jail for the first time. That supposedly "woke him up" after about 15 years of being drunk so he said he would quit and has now gone 3 days.
He has sponsor phone numbers in his pocket and is too prideful to call. As a codie that is moving on with her own life (moving out in July and would possibly reconcile in the future if he had at least a full year of active recovery under his belt), I have not pressured him to call those numbers b/c it is NOT my place. I can already tell that he is starting to rationalize his time in jail. Already it seems that his "eager desire" to stop once and for all is waffling. He's irritable of course. He rarely talks and is now feeling depressed. His anxiety attacks (which he is on Xanax for) are on the rise. Has anyone here quit cold turkey w/no support??? Isn't he just really setting himself up for failure???
My AH has stopped drinking for 3 days now. His alcoholism has spiraled rapidly out of control within the past few months- went to ER in January for alcohol poisoning and just recently went to jail for the first time. That supposedly "woke him up" after about 15 years of being drunk so he said he would quit and has now gone 3 days.
He has sponsor phone numbers in his pocket and is too prideful to call. As a codie that is moving on with her own life (moving out in July and would possibly reconcile in the future if he had at least a full year of active recovery under his belt), I have not pressured him to call those numbers b/c it is NOT my place. I can already tell that he is starting to rationalize his time in jail. Already it seems that his "eager desire" to stop once and for all is waffling. He's irritable of course. He rarely talks and is now feeling depressed. His anxiety attacks (which he is on Xanax for) are on the rise. Has anyone here quit cold turkey w/no support??? Isn't he just really setting himself up for failure???
Member
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: Portland, Oregon
Posts: 29
Hi Mega,
I quit cold turkey with no support, and it's the best thing that ever happened to me.
I did go to AA for a year, and kept drinking. I stopped that, and continued on for a couple of more years, drinking less, but still in the pattern.
Then my wife laid down the law, and I quit for good. That was over five years ago. I elected not to return to any programs at the time, bc it didn't really fit my personality.
Does your husband know about the myriad of resources available on addiction? For me, simply hearing that most people do, in fact, quit on their own, gave me the power to do it.
You and I both know that he won't quit until he is good and ready. You would call it "hitting bottom." When he does, maybe he ought to have access to as many theories on addiction as possible. I don't think it would be co-dependent of you to tell him that. You could just click your mouse and send him the link that Don. S. has created on this very site.
--Scott
I quit cold turkey with no support, and it's the best thing that ever happened to me.
I did go to AA for a year, and kept drinking. I stopped that, and continued on for a couple of more years, drinking less, but still in the pattern.
Then my wife laid down the law, and I quit for good. That was over five years ago. I elected not to return to any programs at the time, bc it didn't really fit my personality.
Does your husband know about the myriad of resources available on addiction? For me, simply hearing that most people do, in fact, quit on their own, gave me the power to do it.
You and I both know that he won't quit until he is good and ready. You would call it "hitting bottom." When he does, maybe he ought to have access to as many theories on addiction as possible. I don't think it would be co-dependent of you to tell him that. You could just click your mouse and send him the link that Don. S. has created on this very site.
--Scott
Forward we go...side by side-Rest In Peace
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Serene In Dixie
Posts: 36,740
The expression "cold turkey" means to quit a abruptly w/o medical supervision.
So he has done that.
I think what you are asking is will he stay sober w/o a formal recovery program.
I could not. Perhaps he can.
Can you continue to move forward without support from peers?
So he has done that.
I think what you are asking is will he stay sober w/o a formal recovery program.
I could not. Perhaps he can.
Can you continue to move forward without support from peers?
Member
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: Melbourne victoria
Posts: 1,975
Hi Mega , welcome to our Forum.
For me, I needed a programme to remain sober, and to grow, after I put down the booze. He may be able to do it alone, I couldn't.
Unfortunately there is nothing that you can do to "make" him ring anyone , or go oto meetings. But I am sure you know that.
To remain sober, I had to change my thinking, and my lifestyle, and for that, I needed the help and ESH of those who had done it sucessfully.
I wish you well, look after YOU, and try to hand HIM over, hard I know
be well
HUGX
Lee
For me, I needed a programme to remain sober, and to grow, after I put down the booze. He may be able to do it alone, I couldn't.
Unfortunately there is nothing that you can do to "make" him ring anyone , or go oto meetings. But I am sure you know that.
To remain sober, I had to change my thinking, and my lifestyle, and for that, I needed the help and ESH of those who had done it sucessfully.
I wish you well, look after YOU, and try to hand HIM over, hard I know
be well
HUGX
Lee
One brief hour...
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Anywhere, USA
Posts: 1,412
Thanks for the input everyone. I really appreciate it. I know he really has to hit his own bottom before any chance at recovery can work. I can't make him do a thing, but I hope he truly gives it a chance this time. Thanks again.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Littletown, OK
Posts: 81
Mega,
My first month sober, I zoned out on the Katrina coverage. I spent alot of time around my immediate family, quietly. I avoided my friends. I played video games. I had surgery for a chronic injury.
Month 2...I found myself cleaning and organizing. ALOT! My house, my mother's house...I'd clean any closet or garage...and I was thinking about long term plans for sobriety. I could not sit still. Ever. I walked. I biked. I cooked. I found anything to do. I still didn't talk much.
Month 3...I spent time around extended family members. Planned and helped with holiday functions, decorations and attended functions. I hadn't done that in years. I had another surgery for the chronic injury. I started laughing and telling jokes.
Month 4...I started physical therapy and substance abuse therapy. Spending time with all the family, regularly and I was becoming very dependable. Started reading alot about recovery programs and identifying things I wanted to improve about myself.
I have grown over the months. It didn't happen overnight, nor did it fit other's schedules. I started doing volunteer work last month. I just attended my first AA/NA meeting last week. I kind of did it backwards but I had my reasons. I knew the changes but it took most of my family about 7 months for it to sink in with them. I'm grateful they just allowed me to do my own thing, helped when I asked and didn't press me with expectations. My mother is a really negative person and I know it was difficult for her to resist nagging but bless her, she tried. I still got the suspicious, nasty looks but she didn't say too much. For that, I'll be forever thankful because it's the best she could manage.
You're already planning to leave in July. Take care of your plans and yourself. Your husband will either get sober or not, doesn't matter what you do. His sobriety will never be believable as long as it's dependent upon your will, force, threats or expectations. Letting go and allowing him to do his own thing is the healthiest thing for you both. It's only help if it's asked for, otherwise...
best wishes and warm thoughts,
Ki
My first month sober, I zoned out on the Katrina coverage. I spent alot of time around my immediate family, quietly. I avoided my friends. I played video games. I had surgery for a chronic injury.
Month 2...I found myself cleaning and organizing. ALOT! My house, my mother's house...I'd clean any closet or garage...and I was thinking about long term plans for sobriety. I could not sit still. Ever. I walked. I biked. I cooked. I found anything to do. I still didn't talk much.
Month 3...I spent time around extended family members. Planned and helped with holiday functions, decorations and attended functions. I hadn't done that in years. I had another surgery for the chronic injury. I started laughing and telling jokes.
Month 4...I started physical therapy and substance abuse therapy. Spending time with all the family, regularly and I was becoming very dependable. Started reading alot about recovery programs and identifying things I wanted to improve about myself.
I have grown over the months. It didn't happen overnight, nor did it fit other's schedules. I started doing volunteer work last month. I just attended my first AA/NA meeting last week. I kind of did it backwards but I had my reasons. I knew the changes but it took most of my family about 7 months for it to sink in with them. I'm grateful they just allowed me to do my own thing, helped when I asked and didn't press me with expectations. My mother is a really negative person and I know it was difficult for her to resist nagging but bless her, she tried. I still got the suspicious, nasty looks but she didn't say too much. For that, I'll be forever thankful because it's the best she could manage.
You're already planning to leave in July. Take care of your plans and yourself. Your husband will either get sober or not, doesn't matter what you do. His sobriety will never be believable as long as it's dependent upon your will, force, threats or expectations. Letting go and allowing him to do his own thing is the healthiest thing for you both. It's only help if it's asked for, otherwise...
best wishes and warm thoughts,
Ki
Member
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: in the present moment
Posts: 2,060
Hi Mega,
"isn't he just really setting himself up for failure?"
Nobody here knows the answer to that, because its the future. We don't predict the future. As aan alcoholic and a codie myself though, I can appreciate the attraction to such rumination, but it leads one way off track to even begin this line of thinking.
Your track is likely somewhere else other than inside of another person's sobriety. You seem to have made a decision to leave, and are waiting for the best time and conditions, which you say are in July. If it were me, I might not wait until then as it could be a form of waffling or denial, but thats just me. But, I would be clear that I would never set conditions such as "he must have 1 year of sobriety" in order for a reconciliation.
It puts one in the position of controlling the other person. By attempting to control another person's development around addiction.
I mean, what if he IS sober 1 year, but you don't think he goes to enough meetings, or you don't like his sponsor, or how much time he spends with him, or what if he doesn't go to any meetings, but doesn't drink? What if he's sober 1 year and yet smokes pot? What if he says he is sober but you miustrust him? What if he is sober 1 year and makes friends with women in the program that are also working 12 steps, and this threatens you?
My point is that ALL of this is his business, not yours, not mine, not ours. Your business is to live your own life and let him go.
Good luck and happiness in your new beginning!!
"isn't he just really setting himself up for failure?"
Nobody here knows the answer to that, because its the future. We don't predict the future. As aan alcoholic and a codie myself though, I can appreciate the attraction to such rumination, but it leads one way off track to even begin this line of thinking.
Your track is likely somewhere else other than inside of another person's sobriety. You seem to have made a decision to leave, and are waiting for the best time and conditions, which you say are in July. If it were me, I might not wait until then as it could be a form of waffling or denial, but thats just me. But, I would be clear that I would never set conditions such as "he must have 1 year of sobriety" in order for a reconciliation.
It puts one in the position of controlling the other person. By attempting to control another person's development around addiction.
I mean, what if he IS sober 1 year, but you don't think he goes to enough meetings, or you don't like his sponsor, or how much time he spends with him, or what if he doesn't go to any meetings, but doesn't drink? What if he's sober 1 year and yet smokes pot? What if he says he is sober but you miustrust him? What if he is sober 1 year and makes friends with women in the program that are also working 12 steps, and this threatens you?
My point is that ALL of this is his business, not yours, not mine, not ours. Your business is to live your own life and let him go.
Good luck and happiness in your new beginning!!
Member
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Somwhere over the rainbow
Posts: 1,175
You know if he really hasn't hit bottom after all that he has been through, you have to wonder what his bottom will be. Perhaps it will be when you leave in July.
Then again, he may use that as the biggest excuse to really get into the sauce. Point is, as everyone has said, you have to look after you. If and when he bottoms out, it will be his personal bottom and his personal decision to change.
Levi
Then again, he may use that as the biggest excuse to really get into the sauce. Point is, as everyone has said, you have to look after you. If and when he bottoms out, it will be his personal bottom and his personal decision to change.
Levi
One brief hour...
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Anywhere, USA
Posts: 1,412
Your husband will either get sober or not, doesn't matter what you do. His sobriety will never be believable as long as it's dependent upon your will, force, threats or expectations. Letting go and allowing him to do his own thing is the healthiest thing for you both. It's only help if it's asked for, otherwise...
As for why I'm leaving in July, we share a lease together and we're running out the lease together. I already have a deposit on an apartment for me to move into alone in July and we have already settled everything we need to settle w/the manager of our current apartment. It's all a matter of finances and no waffling.
As for the 'maybe' on reconciliation... we both understand that there are no guarantees for the future. He could very realize when he's had a while sober that I'm not the woman for him, etc. The list of "maybes" can go on and on. We will take that one day at a time. Thanks again everyone. You've been really wonderful.
Administrator
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Dancing in the Light
Posts: 61,509
I stopped on my own 5 1/2 yrs ago.
I wanted to change my life. I hated the person that I had become and I have worked every single day since then on recovery. It's physical, emotional and spiritual and requires balance and constant attention. I really wanted to change.
I wanted to change my life. I hated the person that I had become and I have worked every single day since then on recovery. It's physical, emotional and spiritual and requires balance and constant attention. I really wanted to change.
Member
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Santa Fe, NM
Posts: 59
I don't think there is anything spiritual about drinking. As far as emotions go, you might be confronted with some emotions that you ignored or buried while you were drinking, but those will be dealt with sooner or later, and then you'll move on. If you're not ready to quit, you won't quit, whether you have a daily cult meetings in back of the elementary school or whether you sit in your basement, alone in silence. Getting alcohol under control is very much like getting food under control--you might need to read a few books or watch some informative television shows, or go through some gimick program with "support" at first for motivation, but the bottom line is that these things don't help one bit if you haven't made your mind up to be successful. These books and programs (for both diet, weight loss, and alcoholism), there's thousands of them, they aren't exactly as they'd have you believe--they aren't just different ways to accomplish a goal, and you pick which one works for you. Absolutely not. If that were true, they'd never make any money selling this crap. What it is, really, is a cycle of different plans that hopeless addicts and failures go through, over and over, in a never-ending desire for instant results--they know you'll go through 50 or 100 plans (each one making money along the way) before you finally find success. And why does one find success? Is it the last book/program/plan they followed? Absolutely not. It's that they made the choice to be successful. So, you could do yourself a favor and skip all the pop culture mumbo jumbo and just stop drinking, or keep drinking until you're ready to give it up.
I quit 6 weeks ago, cold turkey, on my own. I have always had power over my body and my drinking. So do you, and don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise. The last thing a vulnerable person with flailing will power needs to do is give up control, or give themselves over to someone else, or an imaginary "higher power". To do so is suicide of the soul, and a guarantee you'll never succeed in the long run. Everybody has urges. Will power is required to handle those urges. To say "I had no control over myself" is merely a figure of speech one uses to describe a situation in which their urges were strong, and their will weak--but never is it unsurmountable. Everything worth doing is difficult--hard work doesn't equate to "can't be done".
I quit 6 weeks ago, cold turkey, on my own. I have always had power over my body and my drinking. So do you, and don't ever let anyone tell you otherwise. The last thing a vulnerable person with flailing will power needs to do is give up control, or give themselves over to someone else, or an imaginary "higher power". To do so is suicide of the soul, and a guarantee you'll never succeed in the long run. Everybody has urges. Will power is required to handle those urges. To say "I had no control over myself" is merely a figure of speech one uses to describe a situation in which their urges were strong, and their will weak--but never is it unsurmountable. Everything worth doing is difficult--hard work doesn't equate to "can't be done".
One brief hour...
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: Anywhere, USA
Posts: 1,412
Well everybody--- he is one week with no alcohol whatsoever!!! My codie ways are making me question my leaving, but I am sticking with my plan. I have money invested into my new apartment now anyway. One week is not much in the big scope of things. Hell-- before I met him, he had quit drinking for 5 months only to start back up again. He was drinking when I met him, but quickly downward spiraled shortly after our vows were taken. The timing of all this sucks. He had everything in the world to "stay sober for" (sounds stupid I know), but chose the other path. I've given him so many chances to make a change... he threw all those away repeatedly. I'm letting go and if he's serious about long-term recovery, he'll do it w/o me living in the same household. So be it.
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