Ptcapote

Just thought I would share this as it seems to be near the top of my list of struggles right now.

First, I am on Day 10. It hasn't been pretty and I have spent a lot of it up in my room hiding with SR the 12 hours a day I am not at work or traveling to and from work. Thank God for this site.

The thing I am struggling with most is realizing and then trying to disassociate do damn many of my "normal" activities from drinking. This became contentious this week for me because I normally spend about two hours a week on the phone with my mom discussing whatever. Well, I find I cannot sit on the phone for any length of time anymore without a damn drink. She doesn't get it but then again she's an alkie too.

Then I found that when I sat down to pay bills? Wanted a drink. Watch TV? Drink. Laundry? Drink. Walk to dog? Drink. Take a bath? Drink. Etc., etc.

I have discovered over the past week that I basically have a drinking ritual established for almost every activity in my life that is not work (which had its own drinking rituals but I have managed to avoid them by avoiding after hours socializing).

I even realized that I used to take a drink before I went to yoga (!!!). Who the hell does that? Who takes a drink to go get Zen? No freakin' wonder I was so flexible...

It is amazing how out of control I was and didn't even realize it because drinking was part of basically everything I did.

So that's been the hardest part. The physical withdrawals stopped after about Day Three or Four but trying to figure out how to do basic stuff without the booze?!

Wow. Challenge.

Anyone else have this? Tips on how you got through?

Thanks and much love as always.

bigsombrero

A thousand times yes. As a day-time drinker and alcoholic, I went through many of those. I don't practice yoga, but if I did I'm sure I'd have been there with a few drinks. Every morning when I sat down to check the news or the internet, I had a vodka with juice. After work on weekdays it was straight to the TV but first to the kitchen to find the drinks. During dinner, after dinner, drinking the entire time. I even had drinks before visits to my psychiatrist. Any social activity OUTSIDE of the house was about drinking also - ballgames, parties, even walks in the park downtown were drinking activities.

My life was entertwined with drinking on all levels, sounds like you share that. I needed treatment and time away from my normal surroundings after that too. Good luck, I have been there too!

hypochondriac

I associated everything with drinking too. Even times when I wouldn't normally drink I got strong cravings and I realised that there were so many things I would drink before, or after. I saw all those things as conditioned responses and the only way to disassociate them from alcohol was to do them sober, repeatedly til the association goes away, and it does eventually. There'll always be little reminders but that stark pang you get in the early days being sober dies down alot. Well done on 10 days x

renaldo

Yup. Breath... drink. Don't breath... drink. Your favorite sports team won... drink. Your favorite sports team lost... drink. The day of the week ends in a "y," drink.

Who in their right mind does laundry without drinking? But for some folks it never occurs to them to drink. Go figure.

Hanna

This might be dumb, but would hot tea help?
For the walk, for the phone calls, for the bills?

Also, perhaps picking up some new hobbies and leisure activities might help since you won't have created the habits around those.

wiscsober

Certainly I went through this.....I noticed greatly though I didn't go through so many minutes on the phone after sobering up. No more drunken phone calls...one right after the other to anyone who'd listen. I walk around now when I'm on the phone...go outside.

Big time trigger to get over was smoking and drinking. If I drank I had to smoke...but if I smoked I didn't have to have a drink...

And, I had to drink when I was writing, painting. For a long time I couldn't create anything sober. The brain settled down and the creative juices did come back with even greater inspiration.

LDT

I also use to drink before Yoga. It was insane....not to mention dangerous. Happy those days are behind me.

Learning to live your new sober life is like learning to walk all over again. baby steps....baby steps....

Ptcapote

Not dumb at all, Hanna! I have taken to the tea drinking quite well and have used that to replace on several occasions so am going to try with the others. I was always a tea lover---even as a boozer---so that might be the ticket.

As for new hobbies---for sure. I am going to have to figure out what else I like to do that doesn't have an alcohol association. Right now my hobbies/leisure activities are AA and SR and these are two places I don't feel like drinking at all so gonna stick with that for the moment.

Thanks for the suggestions!

27cougar

For me it is making a concious decision and actually telling myself out loud that I will not drink while doing whatever - ie, "I won't take a drink with me walking the dog" - somehow saying it to myself helps my brain wrap around it. Also keeping something else with me to drink - even just a bottled water, so there is something in the drink glass' place. Good luck.

Dee74

I drank with everything too.

It really helped me to remember alcohol was killing me.
If I wanted to live, if I wanted a new life, I had no choice but to do all those things without a drink.

tough - but not impossible

Eventually it became less of challenge...then it became no challenge at all.

Now I don't really know how I lived my life with a drink in my hand.

D

Fallow

Im very familiar with that position! Ive never tried Yoga either

I got through it by filling up some time with AA meetings myself. After awhile I could do the chores and began to enjoy getting things done sober. Be easy on yourself...

flutter

I was the same way.. drinking before and during just about everything. Not that it makes it easy, but the more you "do" without it, the easier it will be. I completely avoided my house for a week or two in the evenings because cooking dinner=drink, watching tv=drink.. we did a lot of restaurant meals, movies, I even dabbled in video games which is NOT like me at all, I devoured new books and spent hour upon hour at the gym. You'll get into a new normal

Eventide

Me too .... looking back the funniest was gardening. I perfected the art of one-handed gardening, because I had a glass in the other hand.
In the early days of giving up I really felt I needed to drink lots of liquid, so I still had a glass in my hand but it contained lemon squash.
A few months on, I dont need the huge quantities of liquid anymore but just regular cups of hot tea.

Keep at it - as someone said above, you will soon establish a new normal.

soberlicious

Yes. I drank before most everything. When it got to the point when I needed to drink to get through work, I discovered xanax and klonopin. Doesn't go over well for the teacher to smell like booze. Like others have said, it's true that you find a new normal. Now, I could not imagine poisoning myself. The thing that was once intertwined with every single thing I did, every thought, now seems completely foreign to me. Cool huh? It'll happen, you'll see.

paul99

I did yoga drunk too - I was still horrible. I am as flexible as a telephone poll in winter.

Nonetheless, ritual is much of what we used to do. There is a joke that if an alcoholic does something once, it's a habit. And I had my habits for sure. And even though I had been sober for a little bit of time, I still had those niggling associations that I had with drinking. Cooking, for example. I didn't feel the need to drink, but man, something was certainly missing when I started to cook without any alcohol around. And cooking wasn't the only thing - going to work, writing, playing hockey (need courage to stop a puck!), reading, etc. All I could do was just do what I had to do without alcohol. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It was just plowing through it, and as mentioned, creating a new normal. Not always easy, but I am now at a point where there isn't any activity that I did while drinking that I do now and don't associate with booze any longer. And that's a liberating thing.

Hevyn

Well, sure I had that - I had one by my side at all times. Didn't even go grocery shopping without taking a little nip along (would dash into the ladies room). Once it gets hold of us we are completely dependent on it - in the end, I could've worn a flask around my neck and it still wouldn't have been enough. That's why there was nothing left to do but quit all together and stop pretending I had any sort of control.

Booniecat

I did not drink in the morning or while I was working but thought about it incessantly. I was either drinking, thinking of drinking, planning my drinking...... You get the picture. Not drinking has been like whe I quit smoking and did not know what to do with my hands. I have a glass of water or Gatorade or a cup of decaf coffee going all the time.

Tammy47

Yea PT. I can relate. I did all my chores (washing, cleaning and mostly cooking) whilst downing bottle of wine. In these early days of sobriety, I'm doing the bare essentials, because I associate such chores with drink (trigger). I'm giving myself a break for now, getting to bed early with SR and books, staying out of danger, focusing mostly on staying sober, at least till the major craving subsides somewhat, and I can then face those chores more diligently, without constant thoughts of booze (as others have described here, that the strong cravings subside)

least

I had a lot of help in my early days from my counselor. It was so helpful to hear my thoughts bounced back at me from her perspective. Helped me to see myself as others saw me.

I did all my drinking at home alone and since I live alone I just had to 'bite the bullet' and not drink as usual. It was hard at first but became easier as I went along.

renaldo

Well, it's been said that it's best to avoid your old stomping grounds, but every place within a 30 mile radius is a place where I've drank any time of day or night, and not at a bar, so I guess I'll just have to deal with it. Pulling a demographic is probably not going to change things.

I don't associate any place with drinking, which is good. No particular place stands out to remind me of drinking since I've drank in all of them. Except Salt Lake City. I'm not a bar goer, and I couldn't find a convenience store that sold beer.

That place is unique. I suppose you could order some wine at a restaurant, but perhaps not.