off the wagon, and it's ok...
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: UK
Posts: 559
off the wagon, and it's ok...
I'm enjoying it. danced til 3am today. looking forward to movies and cookies and ice cream today.
I had a very nasty (sober) accident 2 weeks ago - severed a finger (4hrs emergency surgery to reattach it) and spent a week in hospital. decided I deserved a beer when I was discharged and am warily learning to moderate.
not looking for judgement here; just checking in.
I had a very nasty (sober) accident 2 weeks ago - severed a finger (4hrs emergency surgery to reattach it) and spent a week in hospital. decided I deserved a beer when I was discharged and am warily learning to moderate.
not looking for judgement here; just checking in.
Guest
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: Canada
Posts: 4,580
GEEZ..I was JUST thinking and wondering about you Ippo...like 20 minutes ago!!!!
I'm sorry...I don't really have any supportive words regarding your decision to learn to moderate. Why? Why do you even need to learn to? You learned how to live without it? You learned how NOT to turn to it in stress? You did all kinds of growing in all the time you spent sober? You learned all sorts of tools to deal that you can pull it out when what you really want is a drink and hide?
Argh. This just makes me sad.
I'm sorry...I don't really have any supportive words regarding your decision to learn to moderate. Why? Why do you even need to learn to? You learned how to live without it? You learned how NOT to turn to it in stress? You did all kinds of growing in all the time you spent sober? You learned all sorts of tools to deal that you can pull it out when what you really want is a drink and hide?
Argh. This just makes me sad.
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 211,372
All ok?
I'm not sure - I think a part of you knows full well the reaction you're going to get here posting that Ippo.
Real friends will tell you the truth.
It's always all ok until it isn't...and that switch can be instantaneous.
I wish you wouldn't.
I understand you had a bad accident, and I'm sorry to hear that - what I can't understand is why you'd open yourself up the very real possibility of more accidents and bad things happening.
If you want to dance til 3, then dance til 3...but why dance with the devil doing it?
That's not judgement - it's just fact, culled from 20 years of wishful thinking on my part.
D
I'm not sure - I think a part of you knows full well the reaction you're going to get here posting that Ippo.
Real friends will tell you the truth.
It's always all ok until it isn't...and that switch can be instantaneous.
I wish you wouldn't.
I understand you had a bad accident, and I'm sorry to hear that - what I can't understand is why you'd open yourself up the very real possibility of more accidents and bad things happening.
If you want to dance til 3, then dance til 3...but why dance with the devil doing it?
That's not judgement - it's just fact, culled from 20 years of wishful thinking on my part.
D
Member
Join Date: Oct 2011
Location: London
Posts: 1,384
Good luck in whatever you do.
Sober is better believe me, yes it can be rocky early days , but its better than imagining one can moderate and all the obsession that goes with it.
Checking in to tell us all how cool drinking was for you , don't really get it.
Sober is better believe me, yes it can be rocky early days , but its better than imagining one can moderate and all the obsession that goes with it.
Checking in to tell us all how cool drinking was for you , don't really get it.
instant
Join Date: May 2011
Location: Australia
Posts: 5,711
Never worked for me- even when it did, it was hard work and I was dissatisfied-My life is fuller and richer without alcohol in it- I tried for many years to 'get it right'
I agree with Dee if you want to dance till three or stay up till dawn then go swimming down at the beach - you don't have to be drinking to do it.
I agree with Dee if you want to dance till three or stay up till dawn then go swimming down at the beach - you don't have to be drinking to do it.
Guest
Join Date: Dec 2012
Posts: 7,097
So many things scare me about your post
- Learning to moderate? People who do moderate do it naturally without thinking.They don't learn to do it
- A beer? When did any of us just have 1 beer
- Just because you've had a few 'ok' drinking sessions doesn't mean you're 'cured' The wheels will come off again eventually
- People who don't have drink problems don't search the internet for alcohol recovery sites
- I don't know how old you are but guessing you've tried to moderate andcontrol your drinking thousands of times and it never worked every time What makes you think it will be different this time?
- I agree with darkdays, Not sure why you feel the need to check in and tell us how 'cool' drinking is. Truth is we don't believe you. Maybe it's not us you're trying to convince, just yourself
- Learning to moderate? People who do moderate do it naturally without thinking.They don't learn to do it
- A beer? When did any of us just have 1 beer
- Just because you've had a few 'ok' drinking sessions doesn't mean you're 'cured' The wheels will come off again eventually
- People who don't have drink problems don't search the internet for alcohol recovery sites
- I don't know how old you are but guessing you've tried to moderate andcontrol your drinking thousands of times and it never worked every time What makes you think it will be different this time?
- I agree with darkdays, Not sure why you feel the need to check in and tell us how 'cool' drinking is. Truth is we don't believe you. Maybe it's not us you're trying to convince, just yourself
lillyknitting
Join Date: May 2010
Location: Loughton, Essex, England
Posts: 638
Why can't we dance till 3am without a drink???
Which takes me back to when I was a kid. Always at parties I would get up and dance and would ask any one of the adults to come & dance with me, the same old stock answer would be "no, wait till I've had a few drinks first!". Being a kid to me it was an adult thing but I could never understand it.
Does this mean that once we start to drink alcohol it actually takes away our self-confidence!! Whereby we are no longer capable of doing certain activities unless we are under the influence. Think about it! How bizarre it really sounds that a grown adult can't even have a dance for Christ's sake unless they imbibe a drug!!!
Which takes me back to when I was a kid. Always at parties I would get up and dance and would ask any one of the adults to come & dance with me, the same old stock answer would be "no, wait till I've had a few drinks first!". Being a kid to me it was an adult thing but I could never understand it.
Does this mean that once we start to drink alcohol it actually takes away our self-confidence!! Whereby we are no longer capable of doing certain activities unless we are under the influence. Think about it! How bizarre it really sounds that a grown adult can't even have a dance for Christ's sake unless they imbibe a drug!!!
Member
Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: North of England
Posts: 1,442
I'm personally puzzled why you would choose to post this (the OP). Do you think it is going to help those of us who are struggling and determined to abstain?
Good luck with moderating. I know it isn't something I can do. I've tried it over and over (and over) again...and actually I don't want to. I want to be free of the stuff that has caused me so much pain for keeps.
Good luck with moderating. I know it isn't something I can do. I've tried it over and over (and over) again...and actually I don't want to. I want to be free of the stuff that has caused me so much pain for keeps.
Guest
Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: UK
Posts: 737
Ippochick - you might get away with it once, you might get away with it twice, but trust me it WILL bite you on the a$$! I have 4 years of experience with ' learning to moderate ' and it doesn't work. I now have 24 days of not having to stress about ' how much and when' - I just don't do it!
Your physiology is no different from mine or anyone elses.
I too am really sorry to hear about your accident x
Your physiology is no different from mine or anyone elses.
I too am really sorry to hear about your accident x
Member
Join Date: Apr 2010
Location: Singapore
Posts: 737
Originally Posted by ippochick 
Hey all
I'm a 40-year-old mother of one (she's thirteen). Happily married to my second husband.
I'm a child of alcoholic parents. My drinking career started at age 9 and has continued until this last weekend.
I had a breakdown last year and spent a month in-patient on a psych unit. Part of my treatment was a medically controlled detox. I was discharged November 2012 and am under the care of my local mental health team. I take anti-depressants and anti-psychotics daily.
After leaving hospital I continued to drink as I had before my admission. Hell, even when in hospital, once I was allowed off the ward, I would visit the local shop and buy vodka, mix with coke and bring it back on the unit. So much for working on my drinking.
Over the last few months my problem has escalated. My husband travels for work and this would always be my trigger to buy vodka and start drinking. Eventually I messed up enough that my daughter became scared and talked to her dad about how things were. I thought that was the bottom, and I promised her I would never drink around her again.
Hubby went to Download festival last Friday. My daughter came home from school and I was passed out drunk on the sofa. Her stepmum had to come in the house to wake me and tell me she was taking my daughter (as is usual on a Friday). My daughter was due to have a sleepover with a friend at my house on the Saturday. I received a text from my ex-husband saying she would have it at his house, and that he would bring her back Monday morning for school.
I was terrified and thought he would take her from me. My husband had told me that if I drank spirits again in his absence he would leave me.
I truly thought I had lost everything. What followed was a 'lost weekend'. I drank vodka constantly. I didn't eat or shower for 3 days. By Sunday night I couldn't keep even water down, and I knew I had to tell my husband, seek proper help and quit once and for all.
I was so desperately ashamed of how I'd let my family down. My daughter came home Monday morning and wouldn't even look at me. I texted my husband and told him everything, booked into a hotel and spent Monday night sweating, shaking and hallucinating.
Yesterday I went to see my CPN (community psychiatric nurse) and broke down completely. The Crisis Team are coming today to assess me to see if I need to go back into hospital or whether I can detox at home with medication. I am being referred to the local Alcohol Support team, and will ask my GP for Antabuse once this support is in place.
I can never drink again. I read somewhere that 'you don't pick up where you left off, you pick up where you would have been if you'd kept going'. This terrifies me. If I carry on drinking I will lose everything and have no doubt that it will help me into an early grave.
Good lord, sorry for the wall of text. I just wanted to get this out there. I am on day 3 of my new life.
Thanks for reading.
I'm a 40-year-old mother of one (she's thirteen). Happily married to my second husband.
I'm a child of alcoholic parents. My drinking career started at age 9 and has continued until this last weekend.
I had a breakdown last year and spent a month in-patient on a psych unit. Part of my treatment was a medically controlled detox. I was discharged November 2012 and am under the care of my local mental health team. I take anti-depressants and anti-psychotics daily.
After leaving hospital I continued to drink as I had before my admission. Hell, even when in hospital, once I was allowed off the ward, I would visit the local shop and buy vodka, mix with coke and bring it back on the unit. So much for working on my drinking.
Over the last few months my problem has escalated. My husband travels for work and this would always be my trigger to buy vodka and start drinking. Eventually I messed up enough that my daughter became scared and talked to her dad about how things were. I thought that was the bottom, and I promised her I would never drink around her again.
Hubby went to Download festival last Friday. My daughter came home from school and I was passed out drunk on the sofa. Her stepmum had to come in the house to wake me and tell me she was taking my daughter (as is usual on a Friday). My daughter was due to have a sleepover with a friend at my house on the Saturday. I received a text from my ex-husband saying she would have it at his house, and that he would bring her back Monday morning for school.
I was terrified and thought he would take her from me. My husband had told me that if I drank spirits again in his absence he would leave me.
I truly thought I had lost everything. What followed was a 'lost weekend'. I drank vodka constantly. I didn't eat or shower for 3 days. By Sunday night I couldn't keep even water down, and I knew I had to tell my husband, seek proper help and quit once and for all.
I was so desperately ashamed of how I'd let my family down. My daughter came home Monday morning and wouldn't even look at me. I texted my husband and told him everything, booked into a hotel and spent Monday night sweating, shaking and hallucinating.
Yesterday I went to see my CPN (community psychiatric nurse) and broke down completely. The Crisis Team are coming today to assess me to see if I need to go back into hospital or whether I can detox at home with medication. I am being referred to the local Alcohol Support team, and will ask my GP for Antabuse once this support is in place.
I can never drink again. I read somewhere that 'you don't pick up where you left off, you pick up where you would have been if you'd kept going'. This terrifies me. If I carry on drinking I will lose everything and have no doubt that it will help me into an early grave.
Good lord, sorry for the wall of text. I just wanted to get this out there. I am on day 3 of my new life.
Thanks for reading.
Member
Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: Long Beach, CA
Posts: 705
So, you cut off your finger, so you felt that you should reward yourself with a beer? By the same logic, if you are hit by a bus, what reward then?
Nah, I'm just screwing with you. Only you know if alcohol is a problem or not, and in AA speak, it's not my job to "take your inventory". My own thoughts on moderation? Nope, no how, no way. I could no more moderate my drinking than jump over the moon. But I tried, and tried, and tried. It's a viscous circle...I wake up hung over, regret my overindulgence, decide I must moderate, then after the first drink alcohol steals any willpower I have, and I drink like a fish. Again. Next morning the carousel starts up again. So much for moderation.
Nah, I'm just screwing with you. Only you know if alcohol is a problem or not, and in AA speak, it's not my job to "take your inventory". My own thoughts on moderation? Nope, no how, no way. I could no more moderate my drinking than jump over the moon. But I tried, and tried, and tried. It's a viscous circle...I wake up hung over, regret my overindulgence, decide I must moderate, then after the first drink alcohol steals any willpower I have, and I drink like a fish. Again. Next morning the carousel starts up again. So much for moderation.
Member
Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: Uk
Posts: 1,190
No judgement here - I have never spoke to you before but by your post it doesn't sound like you've been having it easy. I feel a bit sad - sad for you incase you go back to hospital sick again - sad for your daughter if she has to see this again.
You know in your heart you can't simply moderate - as Zoe said - once/twice maybe even a few times you'll be ok. Until your not and then your whole world crashes down round you again.
Maybe you posted here subconsciously wanting us to tell you to stop right now. No more. That's my advise. Just don't do it. Don't go it to yourself or your loved ones. You sounded like you'd been doing great - you can get back there again. I such you all the best x
You know in your heart you can't simply moderate - as Zoe said - once/twice maybe even a few times you'll be ok. Until your not and then your whole world crashes down round you again.
Maybe you posted here subconsciously wanting us to tell you to stop right now. No more. That's my advise. Just don't do it. Don't go it to yourself or your loved ones. You sounded like you'd been doing great - you can get back there again. I such you all the best x
Guest
Join Date: Dec 2012
Posts: 7,097
I also hadn't seen your first post so didn't realize how bad things had got for you.
Realistically, if you keep drinking your husband may well leave you and your daughter may go and live with her father either at he choice or his decision.
Is losing all that worth a beer?
Realistically, if you keep drinking your husband may well leave you and your daughter may go and live with her father either at he choice or his decision.
Is losing all that worth a beer?
Member
Join Date: Mar 2013
Location: UK (England)
Posts: 2,782
I could never moderate for very long before i was back to drinking crazy amounts. When i did moderate i was miserable as sin because a couple of drinks was never enough for me. That is because i am an alcoholic and i cant drink. If you feel the need to drink to enjoy a dance or a movie doesn't that tell you there is something seriously wrong?. It seems like you have a lot to lose if this "moderation" doesn't work out for you. Why risk all of that for a drink?
Member
Join Date: Jul 2013
Posts: 2,733
Hi Ippo. The last time I wrote a response to you was not that long ago... maybe a couple weeks. You were fiercely hating yourself because you slipped up. I was worried about how hard you were on yourself and I was worried because that kind of pain can set off a chain reaction which can cause you to continue to self medicate with alcohol. And isn't moderation the only way to drink? Yes, for some. But not everyone is that kind of drinker. It really sounds like you are not. I do not believe everyone can moderate. It is predisposed. It sounds like you are trying to get it back in your life.
I don't mean to brag, but I feel pretty proud of myself because I treated myself for my addictions to meth and cocaine. Those drugs eventually made me so terrified that I did everything in my power to halt their influence on my life. So I stopped completely. In the past I tried to moderate them. Then I said, "Duh, stupid girl. You can't moderate crack!!" It's just not possible with these highly addictive substances! I locked myself in my room for weeks, I failed out of one school and enrolled in another. I threw away all paraphernalia and never looked back for fifteen years.
Yet, alcohol! I have successfully moderated with alcohol about 30 times. It was great, I enjoyed my glass or two (tops) of wine and a really nice relaxing buzz. I went to sleep with no repercussions in the morning. For about two weeks tops. Then wham! I'm in a public fountain full of frogs without my underwear, or I'm crying in some hotel room with a busted lip, or I'm screaming and trying to start a fight with a really dangerous looking dude in some bar. Then the next morning I am desperately crying out for help and asking myself what happened because I thought I had been so good. When did the substance control me? So I ate a greasy meal, drank water and more booze and watched tv, apologized to everyone from the night before, paid my tabs and tickets, and started moderation again. Usually I'd get good and drunk every night for a couple weeks before being able to get a handle on it and moderate again, but lo and behold, I'd do it.
I don't have children or many people who I affect with my behavior. But I was a child who was affected. My mother clings so tightly to her one-drink-a-day-which-becomes-her-secret-twelve. She is a master of keeping up a facade in public. But she has disappointed me and hurt me so much that I can't even be around her. I actually have no feelings other than pity for her. She is not a role model. I look up to my friends' mothers and my stepmother and my aunts. My father was a really important person to me. But his drunk times were horrifying. He quit and for years I was so proud of him. Then he decided to moderate. He didn't get crazy raging drunk. He'd do that thing where he'd just relax a little bit and got slightly goofy and treated me more like his drinking buddy than his daughter. It creeped me out! I loved my father but I was not proud of him, and I did not look up to him. My parents' addiction and inability to stick to sobriety caused them to neglect their true selves and cost them my respect as their daughter.
What I inherited from two people who couldn't stick to their promises was an uncontrollable lust for alcohol, the thing that was so good that it could not be dropped, no matter what you promised your daughter. It was worth more than their word to me. And they tried to tell me I meant the world to them. But alcohol was even more! I also inherited the knowledge that their word to me was never good. But alcohol would make it all better.
The last time that I went to a baby shower and decided to enjoy a couple of vodka-lemonades on the terrace in the hot summer in a moderate fashion, I woke up the next morning and begged myself to find ways to stop. Because alcohol is worse than crack. Sneaky
I don't mean to brag, but I feel pretty proud of myself because I treated myself for my addictions to meth and cocaine. Those drugs eventually made me so terrified that I did everything in my power to halt their influence on my life. So I stopped completely. In the past I tried to moderate them. Then I said, "Duh, stupid girl. You can't moderate crack!!" It's just not possible with these highly addictive substances! I locked myself in my room for weeks, I failed out of one school and enrolled in another. I threw away all paraphernalia and never looked back for fifteen years.
Yet, alcohol! I have successfully moderated with alcohol about 30 times. It was great, I enjoyed my glass or two (tops) of wine and a really nice relaxing buzz. I went to sleep with no repercussions in the morning. For about two weeks tops. Then wham! I'm in a public fountain full of frogs without my underwear, or I'm crying in some hotel room with a busted lip, or I'm screaming and trying to start a fight with a really dangerous looking dude in some bar. Then the next morning I am desperately crying out for help and asking myself what happened because I thought I had been so good. When did the substance control me? So I ate a greasy meal, drank water and more booze and watched tv, apologized to everyone from the night before, paid my tabs and tickets, and started moderation again. Usually I'd get good and drunk every night for a couple weeks before being able to get a handle on it and moderate again, but lo and behold, I'd do it.
I don't have children or many people who I affect with my behavior. But I was a child who was affected. My mother clings so tightly to her one-drink-a-day-which-becomes-her-secret-twelve. She is a master of keeping up a facade in public. But she has disappointed me and hurt me so much that I can't even be around her. I actually have no feelings other than pity for her. She is not a role model. I look up to my friends' mothers and my stepmother and my aunts. My father was a really important person to me. But his drunk times were horrifying. He quit and for years I was so proud of him. Then he decided to moderate. He didn't get crazy raging drunk. He'd do that thing where he'd just relax a little bit and got slightly goofy and treated me more like his drinking buddy than his daughter. It creeped me out! I loved my father but I was not proud of him, and I did not look up to him. My parents' addiction and inability to stick to sobriety caused them to neglect their true selves and cost them my respect as their daughter.
What I inherited from two people who couldn't stick to their promises was an uncontrollable lust for alcohol, the thing that was so good that it could not be dropped, no matter what you promised your daughter. It was worth more than their word to me. And they tried to tell me I meant the world to them. But alcohol was even more! I also inherited the knowledge that their word to me was never good. But alcohol would make it all better.
The last time that I went to a baby shower and decided to enjoy a couple of vodka-lemonades on the terrace in the hot summer in a moderate fashion, I woke up the next morning and begged myself to find ways to stop. Because alcohol is worse than crack. Sneaky
AA member
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: United Kingdom.
Posts: 3,007
Posts like yours ippochick break my heart.Alcoholism is such a disease of denial.
I remember you coming to SR and the desperate state you were in,have you honestly forgotten how bad it was for you?
I tried moderating,I always managed to some degree,but I always drank again and over the years it gpt worse.
I wish youwell.When it gets bad for you again you know where we are and we will always be here for you.
I remember you coming to SR and the desperate state you were in,have you honestly forgotten how bad it was for you?
I tried moderating,I always managed to some degree,but I always drank again and over the years it gpt worse.
I wish youwell.When it gets bad for you again you know where we are and we will always be here for you.
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