Weasel1966

I can go one of three ways....
Drunk
Sober
Drunk
You see where I am going with this?
If two out of three times I will lose then why try?
Ok flip it...
Sober
Drunk
Sober
Is that any better?
God I hope so.
My head is light
My heart is heavy
Who says two out of three ain't bad?
F the clever words.
I need to keep trying. I need to keep asking for help. I need to.......
God damn!
F the AV.
F the counting days.
F my partner.
F F F F F.
You see where I am going with this?
I just cannot say it.

Dee74

There is a third way Ken after the drunk sober merrygoround - recovered.

It means change - and takes commitment - but it's open to all of us

I believe you can do it

D

Weasel1966

I drank. I still have a hard time with it. I still ,think I want to get better and still do not. In fact I got worse?

How can that be. How?

If I try harder and get worse then what's tomorrow going to be like?

Weasel1966

Merry go rounds are fun.

They are for kids to feel special.

They are for people to laugh.

They are not for drunks.

We use elevators.

Up

Down

Up

I hear you Dee.

I would not be hear it I did not think it was possible. I just need to care.

My partner just emailed me to say he is dying inside.

I beat him to the punch. I am there before him.

Oh brother how desperate does that sound?

I am fine. Just sad.

flutter

Sorry you're struggling today Weasel. I'm glad that you posted here though, we understand.

Weasel1966

Flutter... Thanks...
This seems to be every damn week I come and blab to the fing world that I drank.

I am not sure that's good for anyone to hear. Who gets helped by reading this. No one!

But I have no place else to go. No other person to tell.

And no AA folks.... I have been to plenty of meeting and while there are other drunks in the room.... No one can help me but me.

I have been to rehab... Same thing.

I am here.... Same thing.

I am not stupid... Just dumb at the moment.

Ok... Now I sound angry and desperate. Sheesh.....

Weasel1966

My head is cloudy at work yet again.... I want to say... You have no idea how much this sucks.... But you do.

I want to scream at the top of my lungs.... But you already hear me.

F

Live2Run25

You NEED to come here and tell us. We are your support group. We all want you to be sober and well. We are struggle. You can do this Ken. I know you can!

Weasel1966

I know I can too....
I did not post to have anyone tell me that I can do it....
I want you to tell me that.
But we both know it.
How many times do you need to say it and I need to hear it????
Am I the prodigal son?
Will I waste my fortune on booze?
The cycle of redemption is not easy on anyone.
I am not clear in my thinking right now.
No more posts.... They only solidify my sounding worse.
Let me get myself together and will post then.

Zee

How do you feel when you take the first sip? Are you up or down?

I'd like to know because the choice to stop drinking was taken out of my hands. It was quit or die. The emotional side was not an issue open to me.

I have bad days, I have anxiety, but I don't have an option to drink anymore.

I know alcohol is a toxin that slowly and painfully kills you (I didn't nail the killing bit, but I got a good dose of the slow and the painful). It needs to be as simple as that.

Saying that, it can be a struggle, and yes it does suck. If I wasn't thinking about it every day, I wouldn't be here on SR. I would be happily skipping along in my own little bubble, getting on with life.

How long do you want to go up and down before you commit to un-cloudy middle? x

Weasel1966

.

Weasel1966

I am getting it together today. It gets tougher when I drink now. I have a real hard time reconciling it in my head. It feels unnatural. I was conscious ever second... Ever sip. I felt each hit. I died a little in every movement. I will not need to do this again. Come here with a woe is me.

Weasel1966

And sorry to babble on.... You know what got me.... I got to the bar at noon.... And went back at midnight for a to go cup.... The guys I was drinking with at noon... Then so called friends... We're still there.

Wow...WTF... Are you kidding me.... While I too was drinking a while... I saw them as very sad.... Wow... That's not ken. That's not who I am. No damn way.

Attached a lot of descriptions to me but pathetic will not be one.

I am angry....

Again sorry to babble on and on.

Done.

FredG

What you need to do Weasel1966 is to not only hear the people that are telling you that you can do it, but also hear the people that are telling you how to do it. The next step to that is to actually do it.

Quitting drinking isn't rocket science. The answer to quitting drinking is an easy one. Don't take the first drink. Don't get me wrong, it's not easy, but then nothing that's worth doing is right. We all can see that you have the smarts to do this. So do it.

Chose a way. AA. AVRT. ... whatever. Then commit to it. Do whatever it takes. Do what you're told to do and do it exactly the way you're told to do it. When I came into the AA program, if my sponsor had told me to strip naked and run down mainstreet at lunchtime to get sober, I would have gladly pealed and ran. ( OK so I'd have put the residents of the small town I lived in, into permanent shock, but I'd have done it.)

You say ... no AA - Absolutely every drunk in the room (as you say) has been to the exact same place you are. The only difference between them and you, is that they've solved their problem and you seem to be still on the merry go round.

When you've decided, and I mean really decided, that you're sick and tired of being sick and tired, then you will also decide to do whatever it takes to be otherwise.

When I first went to AA - I hated it. I hated the fact that I was being told I was powerless, by a bunch of drunks. I hated having to admit I was powerless ... over anything. My concept of an alcoholic was far from what my concept of myself was. I basically facing what i was.

...but I went, because I hated what I was even more.

Took me a while, but I ended up liking AA a whole lot. Even met my wife there.

RobbyRobot

Its good to hear being drunk is not working for you, Ken. The dying inside is what convinced me I didn't want to die drunk and be found for dead. Being drunk was just not working in ways that gave me any upside anymore. Even drunk, I wasn't drunk anymore, you know? I was just wasting away, no joy to be had in that situation.

Surrendering to the idea that I was always gonna want (desire) to be drunk, on some internal level of awareness -- even though it was killing me, is what turned things around for me. I didn't care about sobriety early on either.

Honestly facing that I would and could drink myself to death, woke me up enough to quit drinking long enough, to make changes enough, to ensure I didn't get drunk ever again. Not complicated. Doable. Workable.

So, back when, I put my drink down for the last time and searched inside of myself every idea, thought, and feeling that wanted me to drink and get drunk. Whatever I found, I called my alcoholic mind (now also known to me as my Beast). My sober mind I called my being aware of my alcoholic mind. As time went on, I changed out my alcoholic mind for my sober mind. At the time, 1981, AVRT was not around, neither was the internet. I used AA to help me change out my psyche. Well, it worked, and here I am.

I appreciate where you're at, Ken. I hope you can hear me. You're not stupid, as you know, but drinking, the action itself, is stupid, because it only leads to getting drunk, and when you realize you dont want to be drunk even when you do want it, its such a stupid paradox.

Surrender, brother. Sweet surrender.

RobbyRobot

Yeah, for me, I never hated AA, back then or now. I knew I hated being an alcoholic. I hear you when you say you hated yourself even more. That was me. I hated myself more than anything, and its why I was such a chronic drunk. My detox, rehab, and AA were my first beginnings of my journey into asking for help. I never have drank again after asking for serious help.

Doing the next right thing to not ever get drunk again works. Whatever that is for whom ever, it always works, when psychic change is also experienced on the journey, imo.

Great share, Fred.

Weasel1966

My point was not anything specific to AA. It was that no matter where I go... What method I follow. I need to do it and no one else.

I am not an AAer... Never will be... But all the power to those that are.

The fact I may not be there yet has little to do with me not being an AAer. Being abstinent is the same around the world.... When we are ready.

I thought I was.

Influences this weekend were intense. Real intense. No excuses here.

What's the point of posting here that i want to be abstinent if I give myself permission to drink and then get angry when I do. That's crazy and pointless.

I know I am at a crossroads. I see it all around me.

Threshold

Ken, when you stop coming here and sharing, and opening up and being part of our recovery family, THAT is when I'm really going to worry.

A few random things that bounced into my mind as I read your thread...

the harder you try...at some point we stop trying and just do it. Like a bird on the edge of a nest, flapping its wings, peering over the edge, feeling the wind, then nestling back down. One day it flies. One day the nest just wont cut it anymore.

It sounds like you know the "nest" (bar) isn't home anymore, but you rush back to it...and can't get comfortable.

Birds don't live in nests, a nest is something they build to hold the eggs and the new born babies. Then they leave and get on with things.

Your partner says he is dying inside, you say you are already there

there is a Marilyn Manson song I've listened to about 10,000 times, while I was drinking/using and still after I've stopped. here are the lyrics that your words reminded me of.

"It's better to push something when it's slipping, than to risk being dragged down.

If you want to hit bottom don't bother trying taking me with you, and I won't answer if you call, I'm two heartbeats ahead in hell, trying to break your fall...ahhhhh owwww"

sometimes we go to hell, just to be with someone, in some effort to "save" them, in a panic to not lose them or be alone. They don't always need to drag us down, we go willingly, or we all slide together, or we push them away to save ourselves and then swan dive after then in fear and regret...I don't know, that's what rushes through my brain when I hear your words, and the lyrics of that song.

First I identified with using, then I identified with addiction, then I identified with being a newbie, then I identified with relapse, then I identified with hopelessness...clean but what was the point anyway, and now I identify with living.

It was a process. And I was unwilling to let go of each identity because I had been clinging to it, thinking it was "me". I had to be willing to be a different me, to try on a new identity. And there were many times I went rushing back to the previous one in a panic, even relieved to feel crappy again, because it felt safe. Because I was practiced in the role.

But all those roles were limiting. Stifling. The role of not using/not drinking is NOT limiting, it's huge. It's freedom.

My boyfriend is an alcoholic. Ten months ago he decided to drink again. He spent eight months in a morose binge. I was in recovery.

I was "there" for him, the few times he was sober. I was "there" for him when he was so ill from drinking and binge eating that he thought he was dying. I offered to drive him to rehab.

Then I was done. The last time I was "there" for him was 6 weeks ago today, when he had a dental appt, and I went to drive him and he came to the door naked, in a blanket, sick from alcohol, he hadn't been out of his house in days, shades pulled against the summer Sun.

I told him to get dressed. I took him to town. It was our last "date". I was done.

Two days later he stopped drinking. On his own. No ultimatums, no drama from me.

My own sense of self, of living, of sobriety has soared since being done with HIS drinking. I had to be done with it in my life AND by my association with his addiction.

I was still tied to addiction, tied to an addiction related identity.

For me, staying tied to his addiction, was keeping me tied to addiction.

I only know this in hindsight. I didn't see or feel it when I was involved in it.

He used to tell me daily that he was dying.

He hasn't said that in six weeks.

Cheng and Eng, the "original Siamese Twins", who traveled with the circus circuit before settling down and raising families were an interesting "couple".

One was an alcoholic, one was a teetotaler. In the end, when the alcoholic brother passed, in was only hours later until the other succumbed. After the death of Cheng, dr's offered to do an emergency seperation, but Eng refused to be seperated from his brother. Love? Madness? fear? I am not judging, I don't know, but the story turns over and over sometimes in my mind.

I find it interesting that their fused liver was preserved and is on display in a medical museum.

Due to the twists and turns of life, my boyfriend and I will soon be seperated by a distance of 2000 miles.

I suspect we will still be closer than we were when we were subject to our addictions.

RobbyRobot

Yeah. You got it. It's all around.

Weasel1966

Threshold....
This really made a difference for me.... I get this....

First I identified with using, then I identified with addiction, then I identified with being a newbie, then I identified with relapse, then I identified with hopelessness...clean but what was the point anyway, and now I identify with living.

Thank you for your generosity of spirt.

Ken