musicisluv

So I haven't been on here in quite some time, but I guess this is what Step One feels like? I feel clairity already, if only I could keep this feeling. I haven't drank for 6 days, which is odd for me not to be out. I have a headache and I'm thinking alot of what alcohol has done to me lately. I have somewhat devised a plan that I'm going to try to stick with - and to hopefully move on to Step Two. I work in a bar, which alchohol is around, but I feel as if this will be my motivation. I chose to take this job on the weekends so I wouldn't go out anymore on them. There is a no drinking on the job rule at my work, and I have been following it. So forth, after work drinking is always taking place after hours with staff. I have the decision to whether or not I want to stick around and have a coke, or leave. Those are my only two options. Any ideas on how to improve headaches? Or sleeplessness? Oh another thing. I have told close friends about my decision to "quit drinking for as long as I could".. and some support, and some say otherwise. I want to stick by my supportive, sober friends. I want to rekindle friendships with sober friends I have lost/grown apart with on account of alcohol. I want to try new things other than going out to the bars, and if I do go out to the bars, do what I used to do, have a red bull and get jiggy with it. All of this will have to be spoken of later. I feel as if my mind isn't ready to be in a bar yet. I shouldn't be thinking that way just yet. Clairity & change is what I'm striving for on this attempt. I have promised myself way too much this time to slip again.

CarolD

Welcome back to SR

I was working in the restarant/hotel/bar industry
for years when I decided to stop drinking.
I returned to drinking ....many times... after my decision

Finally....I took an office job...less stress and money...regular hours.
That was a big time positive change ...

I was not staying sober working in them.
Perhaps you can.

Equally important...I connected to new non
drinking friends in AA for social activities.

All my best on your journey ...

sugErspun

What Step One feels like..

It was not pleasant... basically I realize I am going to drink again, and I really don't want to ~ but there is nothing I can do about it. For me, step one = "I am sc3wed".

Then something is offered that "might" work. It's only gonna take a miracle.

McGowdog

Ah... the friends in sobriety! I have friends that drink and stuff, but the ones who I grew up with and partied with... I see them from time to time and they either don't have any problems with me as a sober member of AA or they sort of don't like being around me when they're drunk. It's as if they don't want to be preached to, but I've learned to not do that.

If they're drunk, I don't want to be around them, and if I'm sober, they don't want to be around me. It's pretty simple that way.

I can go to a bar or a restaurant that serves booze, if I'm clear on why I'm going in there. If I'm there for a specific purpose, like to get a slopper smothered in green chile, no problem. I go in there and have a soda, wait for my takeout and go, or I sit and have a meal with my friends. But if for any reason I don't feel comfortable, or I'm just sort of "not spiritually fit", I go somewhere else. Being sober, I don't like being around drunks while they're drinking. When I'm not drunk with them, they make no sense to me. I'll meet with the new man if he means business and wants to talk AA. Sometimes they're drunk, but if they're respectful and if they're not combative or talkative, I tell them to call me another day or to sober up and meet me in a meeting.

We are not all alcoholics and/or we are all not done drinking. But I don't think normal drinkers have to quit, moderate or stop. Hard drinkers and/or potential alcoholics do though... I think.

The book says that I can sit down with the ex-problem drinker "who has found this solution, who is properly armed with facts about himself, can generally win the entire confidence of another alcoholic in a few hours. Until such an understanding is reached, little or nothing can be accomplished."

I was in AA for 4 long months going to meetings before someone in AA actually asked me, "So, tell me about your drinkin'? How is it with you and booze?"

keithj

Wow. I'm having one of those tingling moments where I hear somebody else telling my story and I can relate completely. That is my exact description. When I share about that in meetings, the phrase I use is "I'm f**ked," just because it's more descriptive and was actually how I felt. It wasn't any notion that I needed to do something about my drinking, that I had really screwed up, that I was an alcoholic. It was that I'm f**ked and there is nothing I am ever going to do that will change it. No way out. Still painful to remember. I tend to stay close to that feeling, relive it at times, like now. For me, all steps lead right back to step 1.

And then this tiny bit of hope and tiny bit of willingness pops into the picture and it every changes. Great stuff. Thanks.

sugErspun

That's it exactly Keith...Bill's Story says:
"..I was to plunge into the dark, joining that endless procession of sots who had gone on before. I thought of my poor wife. There had been much happiness after all. What would I not give to make ammends. But that was over now.
No words can tell of the lonliness and despair I found in that bitter morass of self-pity. Quicksand stretched around me in all directions. I had met my match. I had been overwhelmed. Alcohol was my master.
Trembling, I stepped from the hospital a broken man."

Not too pretty a picture eh? Bill isn't saying "I finally realized what alcohol is going to do to me"..he's saying "I accept that I am going to drink even though I don't want to ~ there is nothing I can do about it..."

How dark it is before dawn...YES! Step one was not a good place...when I went through it sober, and took a look at my experience with alcohol and without alcohol. What I wouldn't give? I was guided well...I prayed that any reservations I may have surface and that I have the power to share them. More than anything, in that pain..I was open...willing.

We all know how useful willingness is. I just never knew it was born from such a dark place.


Book ref: http://www.aa.org/bigbookonline/en_bigbook_chapt1.pdf