BadLove

Hello everyone, and thanks for your kind words. I'm back here on day 1 and enveloped in that crawling-out-of-my-skin-impending-doom type of feeling I'm sure is not unique to me.

What really frightens me about sobriety is this: How do I now face up to the mountain of problems I've been using alcohol to escape from? I realize it's a vague question, but the prospect just seems scary and even impossible. Drinking has contributed to the neglect of most areas of my life, and I guess the bottom line is that I'm terrified to confront the consequences.

I know I should focus on the positive results sobriety will bring, but it's hard to ignore the immediate messes I need to somehow clean up in order to put my life back together.

When you first started recovery, how did you deal with the problems you had used alcohol to avoid? What did you do to make your life manageable again?

Abby

Chavo

I'm seeing a counselor and that is providing backup support.

Live for today and concern yourself with what you can do today - is my opinion

Cheers and Keep coming back!
Chavo

Freedom1990

I participated fully in my own recovery.

I got a sponsor.

I attended meetings on a regular basis.

I worked through the steps.

I tackled wreckage of the past one thing at a time, with the guidance of AA principles.

penny74

It's like eating an elephant.
one bite at a time.
Good luck !

Peter G

The first thing I noticed when I truly put down the bottle? There are no other problems, no mountains. There is only the bottle. (My Zen-ish moment for the day lol!)

Badlove, The biggest pile of crap in your "mountain of problems" is drinking itself. Everything else that is wrong, and I mean EVERY problem you face today as the result of drinking... these issues are mere tourists on your own personal bus-ride to hell. Stop the bus first mate.

If I were you I would forget the other nonsense for now and concentrate solely on that one biggy. Lord knows we all have to make amends, fix what is fixable, and learn how to deal with lifes' nonsense sober, but for now my best advice is to shelve those worries and concentrate on nothing but sobriety.

You can deal with the collateral damage once the bombs stop dropping

"The most important thing in my life at this point is MY SOBRIETY. Everything else has to take second place." someone from SR

Kmber2010

BL.....I felt like that when I decided to get sober. OMG....how can I face reality. What I did in the first few days was just not dwell on the past but on the present. I focused on what I want to achieve versus what I haven't.

I got into counseling ASAP and I removed the negatives from my life. I started making positive changes.....got a job, started eating healthy, vitamins, getting involved in activities that made me feel good.

Its a new you and once you are into sobriety a bit....well you will realize that a lot of what drove your drinking wasn't all that bad. It is more the alcoholic mind telling us life is worse then it is. Sobriety lifts that veil and we can see clearly.

All the best and I am so glad you have chosen sobriety.

porkchopped

BL, I can only second what everyone else has said. The nice thing here is that we all "get it". There is so much wisdom on this forum. You can do this for you. Put all the energy you have been expending into the drink on sobriety and you will be amazed that the problems seem manageable. Start with today. When I was concerned with yesterday and/or the future, I was told by Nevertheless (I believe),

If you are lamenting over the past or worrying about the future, you are pissing on today.

Hah, that really resonated with me. There is no time like the present!

Wishing you the best!

yeahgr8

I could never stop drinking for long because the problems, guilt, resentments, shame from the past would be like a monkey on my back. Getting into sobriety and on a specific route to recovery meant that although i didn't start tackling the problems of the past straight away i knew i was on a path to and that made all the feelings and emotions livable with whilst i did the work.

Like i said on all my other solo attempts to stay away from drinking i would have the attitude that i would ignore the past and that was in the past, pretending that things didnt happen or i didnt do things doesnt work for long, well it didnt for me anyway!

notnormal

Hi BL,
I've found (in the distant past and also in the past 10 days) that the best thing you can do to make up for all the crap we cause is to stay sober. It's amazing how quickly the things we made mountains of seem like less of an issue once we put time sober between them.
Also and don't take this wrong but a lot of the stuff we beat ourselves up over really didn't mean that much to others. I'm not saying that you won't have many amends to make, If you're like me there will be plenty.
What I'm saying is we aren't as important as we think we were..
The first problem we have to fix is the one with ourselves. I know for sure the person most negatively effected by my drinking was me. Once I start taking better care of me I'm in a much better place to square things up with others...
Day 10

prospectkid

just keep showing up sober everyday and your reputation will slowly change for the better. i agree with notnormal totally.

Peter G

This is definitely in FTW as quote of the week.

Anna

Stopping drinking is only the first step.

Then the real hard work begins.

I had to learn patience and that was really hard for me. Try making a list of things that you want/need to do. Prioritize as much as possible, and then aim to do one or two things each day, as much as you feel comfortable with.

I found a ripple-effect in recovery. When I worked on one area of my life, it affected my life as a whole.

RobbyRobot

The anwser is in your own words, Abby.

When i first got sober, i had both positive and negative experiences day in and day out, as i lived my life. Same as today, years later, i still have both sides although the positive totally overcomes the negative.

When i first started out the negatives overwhelmed me. At first i blamed in many ways my sobriety too, just like you are doing.

i was wrong blaming the struggles of my new life for the problems of my old life. What i know now is that it was actually my alcoholism that was still very much affecting me in those early days. That was the "real" source of my fears, my problems, my unmangeable life, my whatevers, and not the slowly becoming aware of my new sobriety. Simply not drinking is not the end of our alcoholic struggles. It takes time to heal.

Don't be so much in a hurry to say that being sober and the life of being sober is a "new problem." Please don't forget that alcoholism is the real problem here, not being sober. Seek out your problems within your alcoholism and you will find the required solutions to all those problems in your sobriety.

Godspeed.

RobbyRobot

NewMe11109

This is really what the 12 steps have been for me. The steps didn't teach me how to abstain from alcohol (although that is very important), but rather they taught me how to live with life as it comes.

ElegantlyWasted

" There is only the bottle. (My Zen-ish moment for the day lol!)"

Agree; especially early on. Accordingly I'd rather have a bottle infront of mex than a frontal lobotomy.

That being said, psychology addresses both the symptom and cause by different and varying methods. Go easy on yourself, don't drink, you're going to have to figure out new ways of doing things and that takes time. The big thing (Taoist to the extreem). Is that the past is the past. Lear from it, but don't dwell, obsess or let it get you down. Make ammends to those yoou hurt if you feel it's the right thing to do. As best I can figure out it's our actions that really matter.

shaun00

Same way I tackle problems that crop up in sobriety.
By taking action..to the best of my ability.
Like you I had years of inaction....head in the sand and not giving a hoot.
It's scary isn't it....impossible to solve..or so our alcoholic head will have us believe...
To climb a mountain action is involved...one step leads to another
not overnight but action never the less
I took a personal inventory....and still do pretty regular.
It stops those problems..fears..and resentments building up.
Hey congratulations on choosing life...lol.

Dee74

Hi Abby

When I was first recovering I wanted to sort out my life and I wanted to sort it out NOW.
I didn't want any trace of my former insanity around.

Wise old heads here said to me - 'your first duty right now is to stay sober - thats enough of a fulltime job right now...' and it was.

Later on when I was stronger, more focused and more secure in my life life I began to sort out the wreckage of my old one...piece by piece.

Prioritise. Focus on the important things - sobriety first...then take it from there.

I'm not saying do nothing and lie around in bed...but they don't call it recovery for nothing....

Take it easy
D

hendershot

I continually find that the best way to deal with the wreckage of the past/future is not to.

All I can do focus on the thing in front of me in the moment. The rest is white noise.

Things work themselves out in one way or another as long as you work toward your recovery and becoming a better person.

Peter G

OK this had me ROFLMAO!!

ninja7

If anything happen, sobriety may be the best condition to cope with. I am now 15 months sobriety.