sfgirl

This is just a question. I usually post in alcoholism. I had a strange experience last night. I went out with a friend and a friend of this friend. The girl I didn't know as well has been sober for awhile and is in "the program." I also thought my friend told me she was in AA but I actually think that she had been addicted to opioids so maybe she actually was in NA. We went out and because I am not in AA or another group I actually do not have that many recovering friends. This is weighing on me lately and I feel the need to attend AA just to get some good recovering friends but that is another topic. So I sort of felt a kinship with this girl being out on a Saturday night. Then we went to this bar type place to dance salsa. And at a certain point she leans over and was like "I want to get a mimosa should I?" And I said, "sure whatever you want." But my heart dropped a bit mainly because this invisible kinship that I thought I had with her immediately disappeared inside of me. I thought she was clean and sober. It is funny because whenever questions about sobriety and doing things that aren't ones' DOC are brought up I am sort of like well to each their own, but those are usually more about the questions of one time taking of a narcotic pain killer for pain or smoking a little pot once in the span of six months. She went on to have many drinks that night and motioned she would be dancing after she got a bit of booze in her. I felt sort of alone in my sobriety, which is just my experience of the situation, but then I realized that I don't really know the deal and maybe this is common although I was pretty sure it wasn't so I would like to know— is it common for recovering addicts to still drink if alcohol was not their DOC? Does NA stress sobriety from everything in the same way AA seems to?

Ok, thanks for letting me ramble.

Lenina

Why didn't you tell her it's OK not to drink? Sometimes I took "permission" to drink. I don't know, she may have been seeking an ally for her drinking.

Love,

Lenina

sfgirl

I didn't take the question like that, she phrased it like should I get a mimosa since it is kind of latin and it is salsa. It took me aback so much that I didn't feel like I could say anything about sobriety since while we had discussed it at dinner we didn't do it in details so I just didn't know her deal. I clearly wasn't drinking. There was a 4th with us and I am not sure if she drank. She has been sober longer than I have; I guess I just never assumed there was any ulterior motive to the question....

bval

NA is much more explicitly strict than AA, actually. In NA it's part of the opening reading that alcohol is a DRUG, period, and that we must abstain from ALL drugs in order to (stay or be considered clean). AA's stated primary purpose is to help people stay sober from alcohol, specifically.

I don't know how 'common' it actually is, but I'll tell you this ... I consider drinking to be very dangerous for the majority of recovering opioid addicts, and as I mentioned, so does NA. And as far as I've seen in the 2 years I've been here in the SA forum, so do most of us around here.

Sorry about your disappointment in the situation and the trouble you're having finding truly sober friends. I think you just need to try more meetings in some new places. There's a great community of recovering folks in the Bay Area. People who feel just like you do about the booze part of the equation. Don't stop reaching out, and keep posting

sfgirl

That was personally my own feeling, and I think I read it somewhere as well especially opioids and alcohol— they must get you "high" in similar ways.

As for finding recovering people, I know they are out there, it is just finding and connecting with them.

SteppingItUp

NA is as serious about it as it gets. That's the foundation of the program. The deal is this: no mind or mood altering substances. In NA, alcohol is categorized as a drug. As far as NA is concerned, drinking alcohol would be considered using.

The following is read at every meeting:

"The only way to keep from returning to active addiction is not to take that first drug. If you are like us you know that one is too many and a thousand never enough. We put great emphasis on this, for we know that when we use drugs in any form, or substitute one for another, we release our addiction all over again.

Thinking of alcohol as different from other drugs has caused a great many addicts to relapse. Before we came to NA, many of us viewed alcohol separately, but we cannot afford to be confused about this. Alcohol is a drug. We are people with the disease of addiction who must abstain from all drugs in order to recover."

The beginning of the meeting also includes this:

What is the Narcotics Anonymous program?

"This is a program of complete abstinence from all drugs. There is only one requirement for membership, the desire to stop using."

If alcohol is a drug, then drinking is not practicing complete abstinence from all drugs.

What really bothers me, though, is that this girl was dancing around and licking her chops about a mimosa to someone who has a drinking problem and is trying to stay sober, and then asking them if it's okay to indulge. Not cool.

I'm sorry you had this experience. Just know that it's not representative of NA; rather, it's representative of this person's own issues.

I wish you the best.

SteppingItUp

Hi again Sfgirl.

The idea is that addiction is susceptible to triggers, and alcohol is a known trigger.

As for the other part of this question, I can't speak for others, but in my own experience, I never found alcohol and opiate "highs" to be similar. To tell you the truth, I felt like pot had gotten me a lot more high and alcohol had gotten me a lot more wasted, but maybe that's just me.

[/QUOTE]As for finding recovering people, I know they are out there, it is just finding and connecting with them.[/QUOTE]

Definitely! You can find them at meetings, events and conventions. You're in an ideal location for finding people in recovery, and you've a lot more options available to you than people in many other places do. Take advantage of the opportunities. Don't be shy, put yourself out there and live it up!



P.S. I wanted to mention that I hadn't seen BV's post until I had reloaded the page; didn't know I was dittoing.

mumbai78

Your friend obviously thinks that since she could ge off opoiods, she can handle alcohol, and maybe she can, we don't know yet.

I was an opoiod addict and after getting clean I started replying on alcohol thinking it would be easier to handle , turns out I was way wrong..but your friend's experience could be different.

Having said that, if she is serious about staying clean then any mind altering substance should be avoided. Alcohol is a drug, just because it's legal and socially acceptable doesnt make it any less harmful than other drugs.

change4penny

I'm a recovering opiate/cocaine addict, 9 months clean. I have never been one to drink much, just the occasional beer or mixed drink, never at home, always while out. I could count on one hand how many time I've actually been drunk.
With that being said, I do know that each time I have had a drink, it's always lead me to use coke.
I choose not to drink any alcohol because I'm afraid of making a habit of it. Plus, I grew up in a chaos...an alcoholic home, both parents. I'm not willing to risk it, and neither should your friend.

Penny

Nallabelle

From my experience NA does stress abstinence from everything but I think its a personal choice. I have been addicted to pain pills for about 3 years. HOWEVER I have been a casual, social drinker for 10 years without a problem. Is it safer to quit everything? probably. But why should I? I deserve to have a drink or two on occasion. If I start noticing its a problem than I will deal with it then.

Stagebear

Yowza. Didja read this before you posted it? "Deserve" a drink or two? Look at those motives closely before you do drink, okay?
(All said with affection, trust me...)

I can just see me, a few years back, as an alcoholic:
"I know I can't drink, but I am taking pills. When it becomes a problem, I'll deal with it then..."

Timebuster

As a recovery addict. One Drink “for me” the insanity starts all over again.

There is a deference between going to meetings and abstinence. Going to meetings and working the program and being in recovery.

If she was working the program of NA. Sponsorship, 12 steps, 12 traditions, reading the literature, she would have known that alcohol is a drug, a mind altering substance.

As far as sober friends go? I have a great friend at work. Never had an issue with dependency and he respects my recovery 100%. With that said, he just came back from a cruse vacation and mentioned he had a couple of beers. Would I hang out with him? Absolutely.

There are hundreds, thousand of people out there that don’t have dependency issue. That as long they respect your sobriety make great friends.

By the way sfgirl, I love dancing salsa. Cha cha cha….Cha cha cha…Weeepaaaaa…Lol

Ivan

Stagebear

One of my co-counselors sums it up beautifully:
"Booze is the fuse".
If alcohol doesn't become a primary problem, it can often lower inhibitions enough that we go back to our original "drug of choice".
Incidentally, in my experience, folks who don't have an alcohol problem rarely ask others for opinions of their drinking.

margarok

I was abusing/addicted to Lortab (hydrocodone) for several years and during that period I would drink wine weekly or perhaps monthly. Last fall, I educated myself about the painkillers and found this site and discovered I was an addict.

Anyway, when I quit the painkillers, I started drinking a lot more and when I realized that I was simply replacing the drugs with wine, I educated myself some more. There may be people who can take an occasional drink after getting off the drugs, but I'm betting they are few and far between.

Congratulations on YOUR sobriety, by the way. I've never been salsa dancing but it looks like fun.

Nallabelle

I have no reason not to drink. I got addicted to opiates. I drank for MANY years prior to taking a pain pill and probably got drunk like 5 times total. Its not an issue. I can see why people stay away from it being opiate addicts but its something I enjoy on occasion, in moderation. I just never really loved drinking that much but Im not going to punish myself either. I am at risk for abusing other substances now, I agree. That doesnt mean Im going to though. Besides what about nicotine and caffeine? Do they count?

sfgirl

Yeah, when I quit drinking one time for 4 months I really ramped up my pot smoking and the funny thing is that I don't even like smoking pot. Ha. But I term that time now as my dry drunk time. This time I just stay away from it all but really because I want to not because I am adhering to any rules. It just seems like the right choice for my recovery.

Nallabelle— I totally get that it is to each their own. Thanks for sharing your experience which is probably similar to my friend's friend.

margarok

Nallabelle... In many ways I wish having a glass or two of wine wasn't a problem for me too... You are one of the lucky ones because I don't think having a drink now and again is a bad thing. Unless you are like ME and can't stop at one or two.

But, at least I know that I can't have one or two now and have gotten past it.

I quit smoking almost three years ago. Am just now reconciled to THAT! LOL.

spittake

I imagine this happens to a lot of addicts; certainly it's happened to a lot of the ones I've met. I'll bet NA specifically names booze b/c, as others state, it is socially acceptable and legal. Many look at alcohol as no big deal, and without hardcore addiction potential.

I know I looked at it that way. I went through a long period of switching drugs until I got stuck on weed. Then, I decided I wanted to quit that, too. I thought to myself that I would have a couple beers maybe 2-3 times a week just to take the edge off of quitting weed. The very day I stopped smoking, I started drinking every single goddamn day. I sure as hell wasn't keeping it to a couple drinks, either. I could not skip even a single evening of drinking. This went on for months. I became desperate to stop, so I went back to AA, something I was loathe to do at the time. It was that bad.

Tryin2Recover

I used to be just a drug addict. Then I actually began to live recovery. I found out that it wasnt the drugs, or the alcohol, that was my problem. All along, that whole time, it was me. I was my problem. The drugs, the alcohol, they brought out behaviors in me that made me become something I despised. They where the catalyst to me acting out in my character defects, they helped make me oblivious to the next right thing. Today I choose to partake in neither, I have found a better life, I have found the easier, softer way.

bval

I just want to add ... I've come across a lot of interesting tidbits about the subject of the 'link' between alcohol and opioid abuse, regardless of whether the 'high' really feels the same. Some of this is purely anecdotal, and some of it I've just read over the years, but here it goes:

1) This is something I read somewhere, take it with a grain of salt because I don't remember where it was exactly, but it went along these lines: In the brain of a 'real' alcoholic, ethanol is processed differently than in other people. One of the effects of this processing is that the alcoholic's opioid receptors are stimulated by the byproducts of the breakdown of the alcohol in their system. This is why alcohol can be so addicting to some people, because in effect, alcohol acts like a form of opioid to them.
2) Anecdotal: I can't even tell you how many times I've heard people in the rooms of AA and NA talk about how opioid pills or alcohol (whichever one was NOT their original problem) led them straight back to their DOC. It's such an amazingly common story, you can't even believe it.
3) Both drugs fall into the class of drugs known as CNS depressants. Therefore, even if the 'high' is different, they are closely related in terms of their overall effect on your system.
4) A VERY high percentage of opioid abusers also regularly drink (and many abuse) alcohol. Especially heroin addicts. The cross addiction rate on this combination of drugs is very high. Statistically, the VAST majority of people who OD on heroin ... were also drunk at the time, and this combination is primarily the cause of death for most addicts who have died from OD.
5) For my own part, I drank quite a bit for a LOT of years before I finally got tired of the hangovers and acting stupid and decided that pills felt a LOT better, and were a much better option. I think, for ME, at least, all the years of boozing directly led me into my pill addiction.

So these beliefs and experiences are why I believe alcohol is very dangerous for opioid addicts in general, and I personally choose to abstain. But my g/f drinks a glass of wine pretty much every day, and doesn't seem to have any problem ... at least, none that are caused by alcohol

Lucky her, I guess...