sublimeami

I know this is a newcomer's forum, but I know there are so many gracious people out there with long-term sobriety who are looking to share their help and experience... So being that I and many others out there are very early in sobriety, I have 3 questions:

1) What sorts of behaviors helped you maintain your sobriety for the first 30 days?

2) What sorts of behaviors helped you maintain your sobriety for the last 10 years or more? In other words, what has helped keep you from falling off from the wagon?

3) And in one sentence, what do you love most about your life after being sober for such a lengthy period of time?

Thank you for any insight you have to offer.

Dee74

I'll give it a shot although I haven't got a decade yet

To be honest my first 30 days were purely and simply about not drinking.

Some days I felt like every cell in my body wanted a drink. I knew I would not drink if I sating inside my house, so I stayed inside my house.

I also made great use of SR - support was everything to me...even when I wasn't posing about myself, posting to others helped me clear up some of the disconnects in my head...I obviously knew what good advice was but I could never apply it to myself before SR.

Again regular posting here, regular helping others here and community volunteering, finding new ways to deal with anxiety, insecurity, stress and crisis rather than drinking...

some of that was counselling, some of it was time, a lot of it was growing as a person.

my old life was drink-sodden. The new me needed a new life.

I like my new life so much I don;t want to lose it and that helps keep me sober

Everything
My life is not perfect, but I love it and I like who I am. I could never say that before when I was drinking

D

IOAA2

1) HI. For long term sobriety I and others obviously needed to not drink and that was sort of simple but for an alcoholic work. First I needed to stop thinking of drinking and think non drinking thoughts. Very important is to be honest with myself about my drinking. I/WE need a support system and back then AA was the only proven choice. For many people CHANGE within us is very important and difficult, talking and walking the talk in other words.
2) Same as above along with sticking to the learning and practicing the program in my affairs and being with short memory continue to go to meetings to REMEMBER WHEN.
3) Being comfortable in my own skin most of the time is my reward.
Thats a starter.

BE WELL

Soberwolf

I just to say a massive well done to everyone with ten years or more you are all my inspiration

doggonecarl

Sub, don't think about being sober ten years down the road, think about sobriety today, just today, and not falling some time in the distant future.

Hobbers

I hear what doggonecarl says, but I have an impossible time not thinking about 'life', as opposed to just today/tomorrow. I can't get my head around a post-booze life, and what it looks like, and unfortunately, my brain won't work that way.

desypete

1) What sorts of behaviors helped you maintain your sobriety for the first 30 days?

i had gone a long way down with drinking, i had nothing to do as i had no job and no money and certainly no computer nor internet etc so my time on my own in my flat was a huge problem i had with my constant battle in my head
i had to have a program for living life daily, or learn a routine, just to get up in the morning, brush my teeth, have a bath, etc i had to learn all over again just how to start living with just basic things it took me weeks before i could eat a full sqaure meal
the only thing that helped me was going to aa meetings i went day and night and the people there helped me, they gave me money for food and kept me company as they knew just how scared i was on being on my own
i really do owe those guys everything as there the ones who carried me for my first few weeks, then of course they let me go and i had to do it on my own but the seeds were sown i knew i couldnt do it on my own so without me even knowing it i did the first 3 steps of aa right in my first day of going to the rooms

2) What sorts of behaviors helped you maintain your sobriety for the last 10 years or more? In other words, what has helped keep you from falling off from the wagon?

regular meetings has been the key for me and being around real sober thinking alcoholics, also doing aa service work and helping other alcoholics has kept me well grounded in the fellowship of aa, also i am really so grateful to what aa has given me that i feel its my sense of duty to be there to help the fellowship help others like it does,

so to keep what i have then i have to give it away, its funny how that works but it does in giving it away i am able to see a lot more and understand a lot more about alcoholics and the early days of thinking, i am just the same as any new comer in aa the only difference is i have grown more from experience of living life sober.

3) And in one sentence, what do you love most about your life after being sober for such a lengthy period of time?

i love having my kids love back and they have there dad back, i am able to take hard knocks in life today without the need to run off and pick up a drink, despite all the hard times i have had living sober i have had a peace in my mind and my heart that is priceless to me