AWOL

Do you remember the exact day you stopped drinking and why you did?
Were you alone, how were you feeling, and what did you do? Are you still sober? I was alone in my house on a Sunday morning after decades of drinking. I was feeling sick and depressed and I had a pain under my right ribs, and my head felt like there was a pneumatic drill having a go. I was lying on the couch wondering how I had got to this low point in my life after being a marathon runner and competitive football player for years. The bin was full of empty beer cans, and I tried to remember how many I'd had the night before. Ten? Fifteeen? And a glass or two of wine? Maybe a whiskey as well? I was about to head for the fridge for the first beer of the day -- after all, it was already about 10 am! Then something in my mind turned. I went to the fridge, took out all the booze and poured it down the sink. I checked the cupboards for any more alcohol poured that down the sink. I took out the last can of beer and poured that down the drain. Then I tied a label around it, which reads: Last Can Standing. Looking at that can now, after nearly four months, always brings a smile to my face. Believe me, if I could do that, anything in this world is possible.
Peace and Love

Rusty Zipper

yes i do awol

3/26-03,

i was exausted from trying to keep up the pace,

i was alone, and i surrendered it all, not just the booze and drugs, the dopey, self centered, childlike, sensitive behaviours.

still sober over seven years later

and taken life as it comes.

good wishes awol

zip

penny74

l remember 1000 days l stopped drinking.
They were not the nicest days to go through.
Wish you inner peace !

Almath

Dear AWOL,

It's really lovely to meet someone from the 'Class of February 2010'! I stopped on the
7th February (107 days ago!) after getting a horrific wake-up call on the previous Thurs/Fri..I won't go into the details now (and can't remember it all due to a blackout..) but suffice to say it left me feeling absolutely raw...I was horrified, disgusted, embarrassed, scared (I could have died and it wasn't the first time..), shaking, sick, depressed, etc. At that point I had an 'awakening' and told myself that I just could NOT get into that state/predicament ever ever again.. Now, if I feel like taking a drink I just have to think about the above and the way it made me feel and other bad experiences in the past and those who got hurt because of it...and it makes me want to run a mile from the stuff!! I also had a 'spiritual' awakening at the time following my attendance at a 3 day retreat during that time and I have gotten so much strength from it during this difficult time. I feel like a different person today.

I'm so glad to read your story and hope that you've gotten back into running or football? I've gone back to the gym and feel re-energised and motivated now! I seem to have much more time on my hands these days as I don't spend my weekends recovering from hangovers!

Do you know any other fellow 'Class of February 2010'ers by chance? Maybe we should start a thread?

Big hugs,

Almath

Norther

Hmm. You mean, of course, the most recent and hopefully last time. I confessed on a Monday everything about my drinking to everybody important - wife, doctors, etc. - and the next day I quit. I decided, in short to paint myself into a corner by exposing everything - how I snuck it into the house, where I hid it, drinking in parking lots and pulloffs, having a couple at three in the morning to get back to sleep, etc. - since I could not quit in the state of isolation I had built for myself. I needed help and pressure, so I sought one and created the other them.

FBL

It was Monday, June 22, 2009. I went in to work and I had no energy, yet felt very anxious, like I was going to die. I had never EVER had this overwhelming feeling of dread like I did that day. A couple of my co-workers could tell that there was something wrong. I finally went to another room with one of them and told what I was feeling and how scared I really was. He finally talked me into going to the emergency room. I told the doctor all about my heavy drinking (12-18 beers per day, EVERY day, with even more on the weekends)...he told me that I was "probably" an alcoholic and that if I didn't stop drinking things would only get worse. As I was lying there with an I-V in my arm, a little light went off in my beer-soaked brain. The doctor prescribed an anti-anxiety medication and sent me home. When I got there I poured all the beer down the drain. I decided that I didn't want to live like that anymore. I only needed the medication for a few weeks, as I finally figured out that the alcohol was CAUSING my anxiety. It's now almost one year later and living life sober is better than I ever imagined

augustwest

12/28/09

Anna

September 14, 2000!

I was so afraid, of everything, at that point in my life.

My health was a mess, my family had distanced themselves and it was absolutely the most alone I have ever been in my life. But, I saw a glimpse of my soul, and I picked myself up.

Krodos

Jan 4th 2010 was my first day of sobriety.. Almost 5 months later now and I am much happier with my life and myself

loveon2legs

01/25/10 my new life began....4 months today and loving it!!!

Fandy

February 16, I was home sick from work....I didn't think I could stop, but I scared myself into it...I stumbled upon SR and signed up, never intending to stop..but the kindness and momentum from others that DID stop rubbed off on me.

I read and posted incessantly....Toronto "adopted" me and others were so supportive....actually it was easier than I thought (at first)...I'm still so amazed that I stopped I pinch myself. I look and feel 10 years younger...I actually thought today that I am HAPPY...just by quitting...there is nothing magic that happened to me...but I am sober and happy.

Life still has it's downs and problems...(like the price of a new furnace and AC compressor OUCH)...but i deal with them differently...I no longer get worked up over dumb little things...and i sleep at night, not pass out.

yeahgr8

07/15/09

I'd got out of rehab about 8 weeks before and been to some AA meetings for the first 2 weeks, wasn't really interested someone at rehab just told me to go then i stopped going and had been drinking for about 6 weeks everyday...

My very last friend in the world, which was my ex said she had started seeing someone else, her boss, who is a very nice guy...i knew that our friendship would change as we had both been singleish for a few years...

I had pushed my family away in an effort to stop them enabling me the year before and had lost all of my friends and made sure they would never have me back...

There was no point in getting a job, a friend, a partner, possessions...anything anymore because i knew i wouldn't be able to keep it...

I had started to see a CBT counselor who told me 2 days before i put the last drink down that he would not be able to see me anymore as he was not prepared to become part of my cycle of drinking...paying the guy $100 an hour and he tells me he cant see me anymore and to come back when i am ready...wtf?!

I was alone...really this time...i was certain that something bad was round the corner most likely by my own hand and, whereas before i would always say **** it and drink i said **** it and went to AA...that same night to find a sponsor and work the steps like i had been told...i had no more hope and nothing left to lose except my life...

In hindsight i find it sad, not for me, for others that it seems to be a common theme amongst alcoholics that they have to hit a bottom...but i would never have done the work i needed to without that level of desperation and hopelessness...

I heard it in the rooms once though...you are on a train and there are many stop and you can get off whenever you want...

I am just about to move on from my job, they want me back at end of June for a couple of weeks and im heading off to travel to see the friends i have made since getting sober...i sit here and say out loud this is crazy when i see the difference in me in just 10 months...it is crazy...its a miracle..nuts...gratetful...

I still have skype sessions with my CBT counselor and he always says what if i told you a year ago that this would be happeneing? I just say i wouldn't have believed you but the truth is i would have sneered and said you were a ******* idiot...amazing!

So glad to be just another drunk who isn't drinking today and has been shown a new way of life...it's there for anyone!

NEOMARXIST

Wednesday 8th July 2009

After a 3 day solid drink and drug binge in a flat in London.

Ran out of Cocaine at about 5.30am and smoked enough Weed to pass out. Passed out for a couple of hours and then woke up in panic and was crawling around the flat drinking any empty cans that were lying around. Trying to knock myself out and calm the anxiety.
Needed the toilet really bad and the flat I was in didn't have a usable toilet as the water was being diverted to water sprinklers for the grow room (growing cannabis) and the toliet was all flooded over. So I had to go to cafe totally wasted and anxiety/paranoia ridden. I remember I couldn't get the key in the door when I got back and was just on a major paranoia/anxiety trip. I couldn't go on.
A day before I was sitting in the living area listening to music and playing guitar with my mate and drinking and smoking and the ceiling collapsed. I remember thinking man wtf is happening to my life. This was the last stand with me and booze and drugs.

Spent the whole day pretty much glued to the armchair without moving or speaking coming down. My mate commented that he would take a picture of me and use it as an anti drinking and drugs photograph as a joke. I was totally and utterly mentally and emotionally smashed to bits.

The previous week I had been on drink and drug binges after a couple of months off and on the merry-go-round. I was beaten and I knew what I had to do and what was the right thing for me to do. I knew what the alternative was and I didn;t want to feel like that anymore.

I remeber the train journey back to my hometown and knew I was beaten. Went back to AA on Friday and shared and broke down in tears. I didn't want to carry on like this anymore but couldn't see a way out.

I had an appointment at the job centre on Thursday 9th and I got off the train and went to the job centre. I was f*cked up man, couldn't be doing with the clerk and his comments man. I was just like let me sign-on and f*ck off out of here.

11 months sober on 8th June 2010. I have completely turned my life around compared to what it was then. I have been in employment for 9 months, have a car, self-respect and I am going to a top University in Autumn. All courtesy of staying sober one day at a time and accepting what I am ie- an alcoholic and drug addict. Without that acceptance then i would have been p*ssing in the wind for the rest of my life.

peace and Love

Toronto68

I had been waking up every morning with less and less energy (had begun to nap on the weekends earlier in the year - unheard of). Work-home, work-home. I'd begun to say things like "I don't give a _______" out loud to myself while getting ready. The soul was bleeding out of me. Eating habits were the pits, and home was cyclone-ville. I quit my job after weeks of contemplating it, even though I had a lot going for me in certain respects, with a view toward starting something new.

I started my new "venture," and plugged away it right after I left my last job, and suddenly a couple of weeks into it, I determined that I needed to change my spending habits drastically in order to give myself a good foundation in the early stages of my work. I looked at the brute facts honestly and decided that drinking needed to go and ideally tobacco too. I had never really quit before, but knew that alcohol had been a medication for me for years and I was fighting the depressive effects (and all the others) of it - making life more UPHILL than it conceivably could have been without it. It was an inspiration out of nowhere in a sense, although I knew someone, not an alcoholic, who had died recently with liver problems. I seized the thought and went with it.

I drank the last 3 (insufficient for a normal intake) beers at home and resolved not to get anymore the next day (2009/11/18). I lived with the post-cyclone nature of home and working on my venture for a few weeks after that; and then started the mass-exodus of "empties," not to mention lots of other tidying projects to keep me busy for days on end. I made it in and out of the beer store (two occasions) without replenishing, and the purpose of going there was only to drop off and redeem for deposit (huge feat). I left a final awful-looking case of empties (some broken, etc) in the house for a while as a sort of final task and then tossed it in the recycling and enjoyed the sound of the crap thumping the bottom of the stupid bins we use in this city nowadays.

After 2 and 4 weeks went by, I started to see myself again, and it was like life was returning to my eyes when I looked in the mirror. Then my spirits seemed to drop down and apparently the mental acuity that I needed for the venture (or I just didn't want the venture for the time being), then just existed relatively healthfully for a couple of months and found this site, and proceeded to explore myself and my changes some more, and "adopt" people where I could.

And now I am more in the thick of looking for what I want for work and not settling for the wrong thing, right smack dab in the middle of a beautul spring ready to segue into summer. Brilliant as usual, I am, when you consider the timing; but that's OK. I'm _back_ and my post-alcohol depression thingy, or whatever it is, is the only thing that makes me feel thwarted in my new, changed journey. But it's not enough to keep me down, now that I have stopped drinking and looked at my thinking and doing and habits and feelings, and just generally chosen life.

Kmber2010

April 16, 2010. I had been sober since mid January and in early April....well I wanted to feel "normal" and thought I could handle a drink here or there socially. I did and that built confidence. Then I began feeling like a drink at home and that started every few nights but just a few. Still felt normal and thought I was doing ok.

April 13th, hubby went on a mission and I had a bad ankle sprain. Still laid up on crutches I gimped off to the liquor store for booze to handle the anxiety of him going and me feeling helpless. I drank the next 2 days straight while on codeine that I the days are a blur. My anxiety became a straight through panic attack and I wanted to die. I couldn't breath, walk around my apt or do anything.

I didn't even walk the dog since I was in pain with my ankle and incoherent. Let him crap on the floor for now....that is what I thought and tomorrow will get better.

I kept drinking and popping codeine and whatever other crap I had. I just wanted the panic attack to stop. i was uncontrollably shaking, crying and on top of it and was overwhelmed. I took the remainder of the codeine bottle and washed them down with the rum/coke.

I became lethargic and my tongue swelled up to the point I couldn't form words and I could hardly breath.

I passed out with a cigarette at my computer and destroyed my keyboard.

Crawled or rather I dragged myself to bed and somehow passed back out.

Woke up on Friday April 16th and puked violently and even through my nose. It was everwhere and my body was heavy. Surprised I didn't break the mirror from the way I was banging and shaking. I crawled back to bed and a few minutes later....I was back puking.

I saw worms and crap on the wall and was in and out of it. I was so thirsty but everything that went in just went right back up.

I went to the kitchen and dumped out the remainder of booze and swore that this was it.

I have sober since and haven't touched a drop of alcohol. Even the german chocolate with a bit of rum in it has been banned. I believe that period was my awakening. It is a miracle I am not dead because I should be.

CAPTAINZING2000

they don't serve alcohol in the drunk tanks in jail where I live !!!!!!!!!!

Worst day of my life. All the fun was gone from drinking. At that point, getting sober was easy, living life on life's terms was a lot different. I had to stop finding a solution in a bottle and meet every challenge from people, places and things!

lauraandersen4

Wasn't too long ago, but I had been on and off of quitting for some time (1 year) with my husband/family/friends begging and support... after I was put under supervision in clinic for missing too many morning sessions and my MD telling me that my heart problem could be alcohol related and that I needed to stop... What a perfect time to get completely wasted... right? (dumb) missed some big plans I made with my husband that evening and scared the h*$# out of him and me (my intent was to be sober by the time he returned from work but I set the alarm wrong and slept through it anyway) He said he was ready to call 911. I don't remember a thing.

He went on to tell me I needed help and make a list of every AA meeting in town.

That night, my husband said he promised for better or for worse... and that living with an alcoholic was the worse part... and he wasn't sure he could deal with the 'worse' part afterall. He said he didn't trust me anymore. I had already gone through the physical withdrawal before (starting March 19) and had only drank 3 times since... I ended up sick for 3 days straight after -- shaky mess of nausea.

Almath

Quote:

Originally Posted by NEOMARXIST

11 months sober on 8th June 2010. I have completely turned my life around compared to what it was then. I have been in employment for 9 months, have a car, self-respect and I am going to a top University in Autumn. All courtesy of staying sober one day at a time and accepting what I am ie- an alcoholic and drug addict. Without that acceptance then i would have been p*ssing in the wind for the rest of my life.
peace and Love

WOW - a true and shining example of hope and triumph over adversity for us all to learn from!!

AmericanGirl

The night before has a lot to do with it, but to focus on the day I actually quit:

A Sunday morning.

Woke up alone hungover with enormous head fog, headache, panic, anxiety, suicidal thoughts, sleep deprivation. I had spent part of the evening before denying I was even drunk, but this was a hangover of the magnitude you can't deny.

Went to my computer and typed out a note to my boyfriend explaining that I wanted to quit drinking forever, and that although I knew there were many reasons our relationship might fail, I was not going to let my drinking be the reason. (He didn't issue an ultimatum nor was there a threat that this particular fight would have ended things -- but I clearly saw that this relationship, along with everything else I cared about, was absolutely at risk if I continued to deceive myself about what drinking was doing to me.)

Loaded all my booze into boxes. Most of it was disgustingly cheap crap. Loaded this into my car. Drove to his apt and rang the bell. Went in and handed him the letter before I spoke so that I could not back away from it or couch it in gentler terms. Talked with him a long time. Left his house (and left the booze with him) a few hours later.

Went home. Found this website and read it for hours on end. Sat in my living room all day thinking things over. A horrible day I am glad to have had.

TFANC52

May 25, 2010...Checking into a detox facility at 8pm tonight.