lonlygrl22

Hello everyone! Firsttime posting. please be gentle with me I just need some healthy feedback and emotional online support, can't keep on living like this anymore. my name is Lizz, I'm 28 years old.I don't even know where to start. I've been drinking secretely alone almost 2 years at the end of every so other day , vodka in particular for the past year. It's been easy to maintain it a secret because my husband has been the soulbreadwinner for the family, for the past 2 years, so I'm alone at home most of the time. I started drinking back when i was 23 years old it was easy for me to obtain free liquor at work. It wasn't a big problem for me back 3 years ago. it just has gotten out of control. I don't know how to stop i feel like a nervous wreck,deppressed I feel helpless, I don't have any friends and that is a big problem for me, the only person i could ever count on is my dh I feel judged everywhere i go beacause of the way i look and the monster I've becomed, my weight gain has been tremoundous. this past year I've becomed more addictive.I've been visiting this site for the past couple of months reading stories and just getting to know myself around the site, and I feel this would be the only place that I would be obtaining any kind of support in quitting drinking besides my dear husband. I'm a Secret alcoholic and it's killing me physically and emotionally day by day. Waking up these past 2 days have been a nightmare for me. I'M READY TO BE THE HAPPY HEALTHY FEEL GOOD PERSON I WAS FOR THE SAKE OF MY KIDS MY HUSBAND AND MORE THAN ANYTHING MYSELF Sober 2 days and counting...... sorry for any typos, I don't mean to offend anyone or bring anyone down with my posting and story.

~Laughter and smiles may hide the tears ....but it does not make the pain any more bearable~

keithurbanfan

Welcome!

You're not alone here. Keep reading and you'll find lots of support!

sailorjohn

Welcome!!!

Keep coming back, you'll find a lot of support here.

Freyakitty

Welcome and congratulations on 2 days!!!!

ANGELINA243

Welcome! Glad you are here. You are not alone. This place has helped me alot in my recovery. WE do recover.

Anna

Hi and Welcome,

I understand the loneliness you feel. When I stopped drinking, I felt so isolated and alone, I couldn't imagine moving forward with my life. Please know that you can do this and we are here for you. Congratulations on your 2 days sober!

ClosetExtrovert

Hi! I was a secret drunk, too! I think a lot of us were. It's scary, isn't it? But doable. Just keep reading and you'll see.

xxoxox

lonlygrl22

thanks everyone I'm already feeling the support. I love the feedback thanks. I feel i dont relate 2 anyone outside but here on this site. one day at a time, but right now Is just soo hard. one day at time. uff

~getting past any internal issues takes time, patience and hell of a lot of self honesty.

bdiddy5522

Glad you are here. What is your plan for long term sobriety? It has been said that alcoholism is 10% alcohol and 90% everything else. So taking away the alcohol still leaves us to deal with the other 90%.

OklaBH

I feel ya...I am 3 days sober. I feel silly even saying that, like 3 days is such a long time and such a great job LOL. I feel pretty lonely too and all I want to do is sleep. Keep posting & reading. I do, it makes me not feel so alone.

Lushwell

Hang in there. If you want to succeed, build a support network. AA is available to most people in the industrialized world, and most of the world that isn't industrialized. Is it perfect? No. It is available, and has a good track record. Better than yours, anyway. People who have been where you are, and know a way out. For right now, look at AA as a life raft. Your ship is going down, and right now, I doubt there is a better offer on the horizon. Clinging to a sinking ship will have a predictable outcome. Sad, but predictable.

The secrecy of your malady is mostly a game in your head. Your family knows. The adjustment to a "recovering you" will be far easier on your family than the twisted continuation of your drinking. You can be whole again. Available for your family again. What you have been doing to yourself can stop. When is up to you. Now is good. You've paid enough dues. So's your family.

TTOSBT

welcome lonlygrl22 & oklabh!

Yup, I can so relate. I was a closet drinker and hid it from my husband as well. And ya know what OklaBH? 3 days is a big damm deal! Every day sober for us alcoholics is a miracle! It is much easier for us to drink. I can not tell you how many times over the last couple of years that I have had to say to myself, I may not have done anything else right today but I did not drink and so my day was a success!

Just one moment at a time. My best advice in these first few days and weeks? Change your routine. Do something different! For the first 60 days I could not come home right after work and make dinner because that is when I would drink. So, I started taking walks and going to the gym after work instead. And I went to meetings but the bonus was that I lost 50 pounds that first year of sobriety.

Keep comin back and know that you do not have to do this alone!

least

Welcome to the family! You don't have to feel alone anymore. We understand and are here to support you in getting and staying sober. Congrats on your sober days. A few days sober is a big deal. Just stay sober one day at a time. You'll find a lot of support here.

aasharon90

Welcome.

Hi Im Sharon. I am an Alcoholic.

Never do I have to feel alone
anymore while helping another
alcoholic who is still sick.

When I was sick, so many
before me shared what it
was like for them before,
during and after their
drinking.

They gave me hope that if
they could stay sober one
day at a time following the
steps and principles set down
before us in a program of
recovery, then I could too.

I did and still do some 20
yrs later as the promises
stated to us in our Big Book
of Alcoholics anonymous
continue to come true for me.

And that is the way it works
for me.

jude70

I'm on day 3 and know how you feel. I almost always drank the major part of my liquor by myself and always had the bottle of wine at the house for my wife and I to have a few at dinner. Last week I drank so much that I don't know how I didn't kill myself and became so down and out. We all seem to hit the same low and have the same feelings so you are in the right place to talk about it. You can do it! And remember we are all over the place and wouldn't know each other if we ran into each other. That makes it so much easier to let it all out and be honest. I have kept it all bottled up inside because I didn't want anyone to know I was hurting so bad and have people think ill of me.

stilltryinghard

Welcome and good luck! Loneliness was definitely at the heart of my drinking. When I felt lonely and depressed, that was a huge trigger for me to go to the bottle. And I could feel lonely in a room full of people. Such a weird disease. Anyway, I found that after being sober for a bit of time, that loneliness starts to fade. It comes back in fits and starts, but it is never as intense and never lasts as long as it does when you are drinking. Alcohol creates this vicious cycle for me where I feel lonely, I solve it through drinking, and feel worse the next day. Eventually the problems pile up and the solution is the bottle. But believe me, if you stay sober, the loneliness dissipates. And I fully concur that having a network of people who know what you are experiencing is great - AA saved my life.

Dee74

Hi lonlygrl22

I lived alone but I was a stay at home, lonely drinker too - I remember the immense burden of secrecy- the weight of that was immense.

As you've already seen, many of us identify with your situation, and many of us have gotten out from that and made new lives for ourselves

Keep on reading around & posting, get some ideas on approaches - I know you'll find a lot of support here...are you interested in face to face support?

Going to talk with your Dr can often be a good first step to recovery too.

Hope to see you around some more
D

FSquared

Glad you're here, lonlygrl22. I can tell you, living the secret drinking life weighed on me more and more as my problem grew. I used to be able to "control" things, having been taught supreme will power and self-determination by my father, who was the son of a raging alcoholic. I now see that "control", "willpower", and "self-determination" as a liability in confronting my disease. I cannot do this alone. And the good news I have have seen first hand is that I don't have to do it alone. The hardest thing I've ever done is reach out for help. But that step, once taken, has opened up my loneliness and despair a lot. I'm not far along in recovery at all, and my old thinking wants nothing more than to crawl back into its hole. But I know that way of fear and control has a singular ending...the same ending that awaits all alcoholics if left to their disease's control...death. Destruction of all that is near and dear to me. That sounds harsh, and frankly, pretty remote to my alcoholic mind...but I've been around the disease long enough to know that is the endgame. Some of us get there sooner, some later.

I hated drinking alone. What kind of insanity thought that drinking alone is any kind of good solution to the overwhelming sense of loneliness that I liked to blame it on?

In recovery, we are not alone. I like that.

eddie73

Hi there, we are all in this together. It is tough to give up drinking short term but the pain does lift eventually, mabee in a couple of days more or so. keep posting and reading and you will find your feet soon!

ISPYSOBRIETY

Two days into forever is a beautiful thing.

After I quit drinking I noticed my weight dropped like about ten pounds. That's about all the fat I had to drop. I'm at 170 now, lean and felling good.

Congratulations on making the best decision an alcoholic can make.