59 Days Sober, the Honeymoon is Over, Had Enough of Sobriety
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 40
59 Days Sober, the Honeymoon is Over, Had Enough of Sobriety
hi ... I went through HELL the first couple weeks, then everything started getting and feeling better, the strongest urges in the weekly cycle, Friday after work, Saturdays, Sundays have been getting weaker and everything was starting to feel like "ok, I can do this, I'll be better off just not drinking the rest of my life" ... well, for some reason, now, things are getting worse again, I just got home from work and I want to go to happy hour, I want to drink like everyone else I know, I want to have fun, I don't want to miss out, it's really hard right now ... I feel like enough already with this sober stuff, my wife wants to go to happy hour too and here we sit, in front of the TV starting off another completely boring sober weekend, sorry to vent but I feel like if this doesn't turn around for me soon I'm going to do the only thing that will help - let myself start drinking again
Administrator
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Dancing in the Light
Posts: 61,460
Why are you sitting in front of the TV? Go out for coffee, go to a movie, go for a walk, visit sober friends. There's no need to sit at home and be bored. It's just a question of finding new and fun activities that don't involve alcohol. You can do it. Congratulations on 59 days sober.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 28
With your wife, no kids?
Liquor is quicker, but sex doesn't give you a hang over!
OK, that wasn't really helpful (it could be though)
I was kind of going through the same thing, but with pills. With just under 3 months of sobriety from pain med addiction I've been suffering from depression, but the different meds my doc has had me try have caused nasty side effects. I was getting frustrated with them not working which made me feel basically crappy all of the time.
Then I realized that I was expecting my life to be better by taking a pill, allot like when I was using pain meds.
I came to the conclusion that my lifes not going to be magically better from a pill, it's going to take time for me to get better and I need to roll with it and do what I can to get through it.
It took a long time to get really messed up, so I'm thinking it's going to take a good amount of time to get better.
I'm thinking that there is not a recovering alcoholic who's life is going to be made better by drinking again.
Perhaps as others have said, put some energy into coming up with some ideas to enrich your life.
HTH - S
Liquor is quicker, but sex doesn't give you a hang over!
OK, that wasn't really helpful (it could be though)
I was kind of going through the same thing, but with pills. With just under 3 months of sobriety from pain med addiction I've been suffering from depression, but the different meds my doc has had me try have caused nasty side effects. I was getting frustrated with them not working which made me feel basically crappy all of the time.
Then I realized that I was expecting my life to be better by taking a pill, allot like when I was using pain meds.
I came to the conclusion that my lifes not going to be magically better from a pill, it's going to take time for me to get better and I need to roll with it and do what I can to get through it.
It took a long time to get really messed up, so I'm thinking it's going to take a good amount of time to get better.
I'm thinking that there is not a recovering alcoholic who's life is going to be made better by drinking again.
Perhaps as others have said, put some energy into coming up with some ideas to enrich your life.
HTH - S
Member
Join Date: Mar 2014
Location: PA
Posts: 12,000
sometimes sacrificing the short term for the long term kinda sux. but if we want to reap the benefits of sobriety, we have to give it a chance. suck it up and get through it. it's worth it in the long run.
EndGame
Join Date: Jun 2013
Location: New York, NY
Posts: 4,677
What you refer to as boredom is quite natural in early sobriety. You've abandoned your main though self-destructive activity. I didn't know what to do with myself when I first got sober, so I took on a great deal of treatment, believing that things would be, had to be, better for me at some point. Besides, there had become nothing in my life more boring than sitting around drinking, whether alone or with other people.
Boredom is no longer an issue for me, though inactivity sometimes sets me off. I find myself more active in my life than ever before, but it took some time and some hard work to get there.
If your sobriety is contingent upon your not being bored, then you need to do something besides drinking when you're bored.
Boredom is no longer an issue for me, though inactivity sometimes sets me off. I find myself more active in my life than ever before, but it took some time and some hard work to get there.
If your sobriety is contingent upon your not being bored, then you need to do something besides drinking when you're bored.
Community Greeter
Join Date: Aug 2007
Location: Upstate New York
Posts: 51,518
Hi bluhend. I'm sorry you're so discouraged.
You quit for a reason - try to recall how you felt before stopping. Our memories of how it was tend to dim - but if we pick up again we go back to the uncertainty & misery that drinking brings. I felt much better with 3-4 months sober. Can you give it more time? Remember where it takes you!
You quit for a reason - try to recall how you felt before stopping. Our memories of how it was tend to dim - but if we pick up again we go back to the uncertainty & misery that drinking brings. I felt much better with 3-4 months sober. Can you give it more time? Remember where it takes you!
Member
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Domhan
Posts: 1,974
What helps me when I think like that is to honestly face up to how boring I was when drunk. Same routine, same effect, same glaze over the eyes, same talking nonsense, same hangover and fear, repeat, repeat, boring, boring.
Alcohol and drugs are boring and turn us into insufferable bores.
Well done on 59 days - that is exciting and life affirming!
My best wishes,
B
Alcohol and drugs are boring and turn us into insufferable bores.
Well done on 59 days - that is exciting and life affirming!
My best wishes,
B
Do your best
Join Date: Aug 2014
Posts: 67,047
http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...ething-do.html
Congrats on day 59
Your wife wants to go happy hour even tho your recently sober ?
Congrats on day 59
Your wife wants to go happy hour even tho your recently sober ?
Member
Join Date: Jun 2012
Location: Gatineau, QC, CA
Posts: 5,100
Originally Posted by Snotchy 
With your wife, no kids? Liquor is quicker, but sex doesn't give you a hang over! OK, that wasn't really helpful (it could be though) I was kind of going through the same thing, but with pills. With just under 3 months of sobriety from pain med addiction I've been suffering from depression, but the different meds my doc has had me try have caused nasty side effects. I was getting frustrated with them not working which made me feel basically crappy all of the time. Then I realized that I was expecting my life to be better by taking a pill, allot like when I was using pain meds. I came to the conclusion that my lifes not going to be magically better from a pill, it's going to take time for me to get better and I need to roll with it and do what I can to get through it. It took a long time to get really messed up, so I'm thinking it's going to take a good amount of time to get better. I'm thinking that there is not a recovering alcoholic who's life is going to be made better by drinking again. Perhaps as others have said, put some energy into coming up with some ideas to enrich your life. HTH - S
Member
Join Date: Nov 2014
Location: Midwest USA
Posts: 630
I think sometime in the future it gets better. Then it gets even better, and better still...but there will be setbacks along the road. Sometime in the future it will get really GREAT! 
.
BUT if you quit now and go backwards, you will have to start over and go through all that you have gone through to be exactly where you are now.....and you won't achieve the "better and better" then the "really great" because you will be back at square one....feeling miserable and hating yourself.....
So do whatever you can do to avoid starting over....find something to do. Push through.....be a success!
. BUT if you quit now and go backwards, you will have to start over and go through all that you have gone through to be exactly where you are now.....and you won't achieve the "better and better" then the "really great" because you will be back at square one....feeling miserable and hating yourself.....
So do whatever you can do to avoid starting over....find something to do. Push through.....be a success!
Member
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 1,228
Originally Posted by newpage119
I think sometime in the future it gets better. Then it gets even better, and better still...but there will be setbacks along the road. Sometime in the future it will get really GREAT! .
BUT if you quit now and go backwards, you will have to start over and go through all that you have gone through to be exactly where you are now.....and you won't achieve the "better and better" then the "really great" because you will be back at square one....feeling miserable and hating yourself.....
So do whatever you can do to avoid starting over....find something to do. Push through.....be a success!
. BUT if you quit now and go backwards, you will have to start over and go through all that you have gone through to be exactly where you are now.....and you won't achieve the "better and better" then the "really great" because you will be back at square one....feeling miserable and hating yourself.....
So do whatever you can do to avoid starting over....find something to do. Push through.....be a success!
Member
Join Date: Apr 2014
Location: UK
Posts: 6,902
At the beginning it is hard for our partners to understand what the plus side is for them of us getting sober (especially if they lose a drinking buddy or time with the house to themselves in the process!!) Try not to listen to her words of sabotage!
This is maybe the time that it's worth doing some work on your sobriety plan. People on here will be happy to make suggestions, but only you can do this. And those early weeks and months are tough. You're fighting an addiction to cunning, baffling alcohol, and also trying to learn how to Live Sober as well.
My personal suggestion would be to join a support group (AA or Al Anon, or similar) so you've got somewhere to go. People to see, and a sense of purpose. Sure, it might not seem as exciting as happy hour at the moment while you're heads still in thrill-seeker mode, but that does pass. It DOES get easier. I don't suppose anyone told you that this was going to be easy. It isn't. But it WILL be worth it.
This is maybe the time that it's worth doing some work on your sobriety plan. People on here will be happy to make suggestions, but only you can do this. And those early weeks and months are tough. You're fighting an addiction to cunning, baffling alcohol, and also trying to learn how to Live Sober as well.
My personal suggestion would be to join a support group (AA or Al Anon, or similar) so you've got somewhere to go. People to see, and a sense of purpose. Sure, it might not seem as exciting as happy hour at the moment while you're heads still in thrill-seeker mode, but that does pass. It DOES get easier. I don't suppose anyone told you that this was going to be easy. It isn't. But it WILL be worth it.
Member
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Midwest
Posts: 419
Get out of your chair. Turn off the TV. You are sober. You can go do anything. Get creative. Did you ever have a hobby? Go do that again. Don't have a hobby? Start one. If you don't like that go do something else. Something you can do with your wife.
Anybody can sit and drink. How interesting is that?
I heard this on Sesame Street (yes, I love it. I even learned to count to 17.)
What I heard. just a question they threw out there to get the kids to think about:
"What do you do that makes you interesting?"
Here's an interesting thing. If you do things, that makes you interesting. If you don't, you aren't. Go be interesting. Interesting is great. People love it. You will too.
Anybody can sit and drink. How interesting is that?
I heard this on Sesame Street (yes, I love it. I even learned to count to 17.)
What I heard. just a question they threw out there to get the kids to think about:
"What do you do that makes you interesting?"
Here's an interesting thing. If you do things, that makes you interesting. If you don't, you aren't. Go be interesting. Interesting is great. People love it. You will too.
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 211,348
Originally Posted by bluhend
hi ... I went through HELL the first couple weeks, then everything started getting and feeling better, the strongest urges in the weekly cycle, Friday after work, Saturdays, Sundays have been getting weaker and everything was starting to feel like "ok, I can do this, I'll be better off just not drinking the rest of my life" ... well, for some reason, now, things are getting worse again, I just got home from work and I want to go to happy hour, I want to drink like everyone else I know, I want to have fun, I don't want to miss out, it's really hard right now ... I feel like enough already with this sober stuff, my wife wants to go to happy hour too and here we sit, in front of the TV starting off another completely boring sober weekend, sorry to vent but I feel like if this doesn't turn around for me soon I'm going to do the only thing that will help - let myself start drinking again
I dunno about you but I drank for years. Expecting all that to be sorted and squared away withing 60 days is a really tall order.
I think you need to honestly examine your expectations and ask yourself how realistic they are?
It took 3 months for thing to start to level out for me and for mind and body to start to heal from the abuse I'd given it. I think 33 months is a pretty good deal really.
the other part of the equation is...a lot of people expect they'll stop drinking and life will suddenly become unendingly awesome.
That wasn't the case for me.
I'd been unhappy before I started drinking. That was why I started drinking.
I needed to work on that unhappiness too.
That, truth be told took a lot longer than 3 months - but I was committed to change.
The old way of drinking just doesn't work for me, and I suspect for you too?
D
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 40
Originally Posted by EndGameNYC
What you refer to as boredom is quite natural in early sobriety. You've abandoned your main though self-destructive activity. I didn't know what to do with myself when I first got sober, so I took on a great deal of treatment, believing that things would be, had to be, better for me at some point. Besides, there had become nothing in my life more boring than sitting around drinking, whether alone or with other people.
Boredom is no longer an issue for me, though inactivity sometimes sets me off. I find myself more active in my life than ever before, but it took some time and some hard work to get there.
If your sobriety is contingent upon your not being bored, then you need to do something besides drinking when you're bored.
Boredom is no longer an issue for me, though inactivity sometimes sets me off. I find myself more active in my life than ever before, but it took some time and some hard work to get there.
If your sobriety is contingent upon your not being bored, then you need to do something besides drinking when you're bored.
one thing I hear a lot from longer term sober people is how full their lives are, that gives me hope, right now I'm in that awkward/difficult in between place ...
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 40
Originally Posted by Hevyn
Hi bluhend. I'm sorry you're so discouraged.
You quit for a reason - try to recall how you felt before stopping. Our memories of how it was tend to dim - but if we pick up again we go back to the uncertainty & misery that drinking brings. I felt much better with 3-4 months sober. Can you give it more time? Remember where it takes you!
You quit for a reason - try to recall how you felt before stopping. Our memories of how it was tend to dim - but if we pick up again we go back to the uncertainty & misery that drinking brings. I felt much better with 3-4 months sober. Can you give it more time? Remember where it takes you!
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2015
Posts: 40
Originally Posted by Behan
What helps me when I think like that is to honestly face up to how boring I was when drunk. Same routine, same effect, same glaze over the eyes, same talking nonsense, same hangover and fear, repeat, repeat, boring, boring.
Alcohol and drugs are boring and turn us into insufferable bores.
Well done on 59 days - that is exciting and life affirming!
My best wishes,
B
Alcohol and drugs are boring and turn us into insufferable bores.
Well done on 59 days - that is exciting and life affirming!
My best wishes,
B
Currently Active Users Viewing this Thread: 1 (0 members and 1 guests)
