George88

Hi everyone,

This is my first week sober, after many years of drinking daily. It took a long time to come to terms with the effects that my dependency on alcohol had on mine and my loved ones' lives. On the surface I lived a normal life, I'd be on time to work, I could maintain relationships. Few of my friends even knew how bad things had got. Now I'm desperate to beat this and change my life, but the hardest part for me is realising that while I was drinking everyday, I'd stopped doing anything else. Right now it's the evening of my fourth sober day, and I have no idea what to do with myself! All of my spare time and relationships with others suddenly seem to be solely based around drinking. I love the feeling of being fresh, but sobriety seems so boring right about now. This'll be a tough day to get through. Anyone experience feelings/concerns like mine?

Regards,
George

MrsKing

Hi George, welcome to SR

I think you'll find that many people feel the same in early sobriety. It is natural that having got used to being drunk most of the time and all the highs and lows that it brings, that we are going to find being sober a little flat at first. It only feels boring because we're comparing it to being drunk - people who don't drink too much have found other ways to entertain themselves, and that is what we have to do in the beginning. I have taken up new hobbies and got back into old ones. Baking is my new favourite thing to do.

Congratulations on your sober four days and I hope you find all that I have here at SR.

All the best to you.

mecanix

Hey George,
Well this is the time in which you can make your life far better.

As a "healthy" zone out option i bought an X-box360 and a few game to help me have something to do when nothing was happening .

Exercise and going to the gym is a good option as it makes your body fit and relaxed , also there are often activities you can do with other active type people .

Coming on SR is always an option , there is nothing like trying to use your own understanding and experiences to help a brother or sister in recovery.

Why not learn to play an instrument ? form a band and entertain people. Learn some magic tricks so you have something to do other than drink if you ever have to go to a party full of dull drunks..

Read great works of phillosophy or literature , read comics , paint pictures , colour in pictures .
Take one of your loved ones out bowling , the cinema or bingo . voulenteer at a hospice , voulenteer at an animal shelter ..

Those are just some ideas i've had , some i've done, others i'm yet to do .

Best wishes on your journey, M

Dee74

Hi and welcome George

Like Mrs King said, it's something most, if not all, of us face.

Try not to feel like you need to have all the answers now...recovery is best thought of as a journey rather than a single event, I think.

I felt a little like a new baby learning to walk when I first got sober...but it's a pretty steep learning curve once we get started

We learn to live sober the same way as we learn any other skill, we find ourselves facing more and more situations sober and day by day situation we learn

If you have any hobbies or interests now would be a good time to think about them...

I think a lot of us get used to sitting by the TV as drinkers...our idea of fun and entertainment certainly changes in recovery.

The only real limit is our imagination

Noone needs to do this alone either - you'll find a lot of support encouragement and advice here...I spent a lot of time on SR in my first few weeks

Good to have you with us
D

iWillBSobr

Hi George,

I know exactly what you are talking about! I just did my first AA meeting Monday and that was right before first admitting my problem to my doctor.

Just like you, I kept my problem a secret, and I was doing an OK job functioning normally. But daily routines were getting harder and harder, and I started running in to financial problems, and my liver started to hurt. So I decided, finally, that I had no choice but to give up and admit I had a problem.

After work, when I drank, I would start on my first 6 pack... I might clean my apartment a little bit, listen to some radio, do some home work, ect... stuff that people would say I am pretty healthy and well-rounded. Then usually by my second six pack I and just sitting on my chair, I would not be doing much at all except feeling bad for myself. These feelings were also getting progressively worse. By the end of my second six pack and looking in to to my trash can and seeing all those empty beer bottles... oh man, I don't want to feel like that anymore. Terrible feeling!

Now that I have been off the drink since Saturday, and still on the withdrawal meds a little bit, all I do after work is come home and lay on my couch and maybe watch a movie. Once the movie is over, I have only been going straight to bed and sleeping maybe 9-10 hours a day. But hey, at least it's not a struggle to wake up in the morning! Getting out of bed use to be the hardest part of every day. It's not anymore. I am awake two hours before work and I am writing you! My friends have been calling and texting and I don't even feel like using the phone right now

The idea mecanix had is a really good one, read some Philosophy!

I try to think about all the things I will do once I get through this and my mood balances and return to normal. I am going to start going back to the gym, I can take on a heavier course load in school, and finally finish school, save some money, and who knows what else.

But yeah man, I am JUST like you right now, going through the same crap. Just laying on my couch thinking about... my problem and realizing for the first time how bad my problem is and wondering how it came to this.

Sapling

I found being around other recovering alcoholics was a great introduction to sober living...Glad you're here.

instant

This seems to be common. I was at a loose end. I really was, but the "feelings" associated with this situation I later came to recognise as being part of my resolving addiction.

It really took at least six months before my emotional state got back to normal.

It takes time. Like you it took me years to get where I was, it takes time for it to rebuild.

Needsassistance

George, been sober almost four weeks so new and hardly and expert... I keep myself busy with focussing on me. I learned in counseling that early recovery is a selfish time, focus on you and your recovery. So I'm back into my body... going to the gym everyday, focusing on my diet, cooking healthy dinners for myself and my wife(recently lost my job because of drinking). In the remaining down time I come here, read and study baseball and football information, and job hunting... coming here is a good way to spend time, lots of good experienced people to talk too. Oh, and most importantly to me, I attend an IOP rehab three nights a week for three hours.

Weasel1966

G,

Being idle is an odd feeling when sober. Idle drunks are just drunk. Its a world of difference.

Sober minutes are defiantly twice as long as drunk minutes.

So how do we handle the extra time? We savor it.

I take long walks. I take weekend trips. I call old friends. I have no solutions any more than anyone else.

But... Idle time is ok in the beginning. You will figure out what you want to do. This is no excuse to drink more.

Saliena

For me in the beginning I did ALOT of read... alot of journaling.. and I learned that as someone who was drinking I LOVED and THRIVED on the high drama that drinking brought into my life. Remove the drink and magically all that drama is gone. It is weird in the most common way.
What I have done in the 9 months since my last drink is learn to live life in my skin and enjoy life in my skin. I spent so much time trying to escape what I was feeling... that learning to deal with my emotions was overwhelming.
Now I do lots of things other then chase the drama of the drink... I workout. I hang out with friends. I am thinking about taking up painting. I put together weekend trips for me and my husband to enjoy. I do whatever I can to make myself and my life around me okay. Because the bottle would lead to death for me.

Auvers

I am new to sobriety too, couple of months. My sense of time is different, days seem to have more hours. I think it's because I used to be foggy the first hours of the day, so those were basically spent trying to get going. Then late afternoon, anticipation of beginning the drinking routine and the rest was all a familiar road to getting enough alcohol to be buzzing, then falling asleep. I figure I had about 6 or 7 hours of the day in which I actually was engaged in things unrelated to drinking. Now that I do not drink, it's as if the earth's rotation around the sun slowed down and put about 8 or 9 more hours in the day. So I am having to come up with lots of things to think about to fill those hours. The extra hours are not yet filled as productively, as creatively as I hope to fill them as time goes on. I am spending some of the extra time here on SR. Giving my dogs extra attention and grooming is fun. Reading and organizing my books also fun. The longer day makes me a bit wistful to think of all the wasted time of my past years, but it's exciting to think I just dropped onto a planet that has longer days!

NoFireWater

I feel like the days are longer too, but I'm still so tired I'm not using the hours as productively as I'd like to be. Small steps! We're used to the drama and chaos of drinking, so when that's absent it feels a little odd and boring. You'll find if you stick with it you'll like the peace and calm that replace the boredom.
You'll find activities and won't be bored once you get used to a new lifestyle.

2granddaughters

Hello George88:

I'm an alcoholic so putting the drink down was just the beginning of getting sober.
I attend AA meetings regularly and work the 12 Steps as best I can.

All the best in your recovery.

Bob R

navy0923

I hit the gym on pretty much a daily basis now, something that was nearly impossible before I got sober since I was either drunk, hungover or a nasty combo of the two. Now I make sure I get a workout of some type in, esspecially during the evening when I would get hammered. If your a real social person get with a local bootcamp group, you can meet new people and get healthy at the same time. I also read a ton, usually a book a week if not more. And a little Call Of Duty can go a long way as well.

sugarbear1

Welcome to SR!

Glad you are here!

George88

Thanks for the messages guys, yesterday was my toughest yet but made it thanks to the support I found here! Amazing how much healthier you can feel after 5 days!

jsml1234

Strong work G88!

mecanix

Keep with it George88, it gets far better the longer you have.

Bestwishes, M