TheRake

So the critical voice in my head has started again as the ferris wheel turns in my head to the soundtrack of we didn't start the fire....

"you're nearly forty.....what the hell are you doing with your life???"

I'm 38 and I the usual anxiety and panic is starting......I feel I should have sorted this problem out a long time ago. I should have put this issue to bed. But here I am again....

I remember at age 29 after one unsavoury incident (the tradegy here is I can't remember which unsavoury incident) I was determined to quit drinking....after the bad incident.....I thought "there's no way I'm drinking again. no way" I thought "ok so I'm approaching my thirties......let this be the moment, do not taint your thirties with bad alcohol incidents. I'm not drinking in my thirties" I felt it. that was eight years ago.......I could have and I should have.....8 years sobriety right now because said incident was kind of tragic and enough for most rational people to quit for life. and I thought I was rational.

I'm now 38 and if I were to go the next 8 years successfully sober I would be 46......OMG that sounds mental like that. And sad because I wish I had of stuck with it at age 30. That would be amazing .....think of how different my life would be right now. I may be a little obsessed with thinking of "what age am I know and how old will I be when I have...." ....I really think that after that incident that should have been that. Now when other incidents happen I'm almost in a state of shock. Of disbelief. Wow were still doing that??? really???

what age were you when you got sober? etc

buk1000

27, but I thought it was way too young to get sober at the time.

sva777

I knew I should at 25 but it took me 10 years to actually do it. Don't think about the time you missed already but the time ahead of you that you won't waste anymore.

LivingBetter426

So sorry to hear this. I'm 24 and today is day 2 for me. After reading your post I'm definitely going to try my best to stick to this. I wonder what terrible incidents u had to endure. It's crazy how no matter what's happens to u - things still may not change. After i put myself in a wheelchair, i still drank. I would think, you almost killed yourself and you're still drinking like it's nothing. I started thinking if maybe I hated myself deep down inside and felt I wasn't worthy . Why else would I abuse myself intentionally??. Idk but what I did find is that it has to be soemthing you actually WANT not jus something u know u need. Whats helping me is actually finding the want. The want to wake up not full of regrets, they want to be taken seriously. Everybody calls me an alcoholic nobody takes me serious. It's the want that is driving me. We know that we need, but why do you want???

SoberLife90

23. I am 25 now. You still have plenty of time left. I have a friend at AA who stopped drinking when he was 48 and is now 73. He says those 25years have been the best years of his life. You cannot change the past. You can always think "what if". What is important is that you have a decision today, and you don't have to continue to throw away anymore time over alcohol. Have you ever been to a meeting? Plenty if support there to help you. SoberRecovery is good support too. What worked for me to kick off my recovery was inpatient rehab. You should look up "The Doctors Opinion". It's actuallt a chapter in the Alcoholics Anonymous Big Book but I bet you can find it online. Do yourself a hugeeee favor and read it ;-). Goodluck!

Leshar

I agree with Sva. All you have is today and hopefully a plan. I knew for years I had a problem but with the help of an addictions agency and the wonderful people of SR, I quit at age 55. I'm almost two and a half years sober. It does get better!

Zebra1275

47.

Although I started realizing I had a problem and needed to quit drinking at about 27. I kept thinking I would do it tomorrow, or next month, or next year.

Two decades slipped by.

hopefull24

34

Mountainmanbob

At the age 40 stayed sober just short of 3 years

Prox age of 53 sober once again just short on 3 years

Age of 57 - still sober - 8 years sober

Mountainmanbob

Jackie1214

I'm older, a lot older. It took me a long time to build up to drinking over a bottle a day. It definitely impacts your health a lot when you're older. I'm only on day 2, but I'm going to live the rest of my life as healthy as I can.

entropy1964

Which time? I started my getting sober process at 38. I'm 50 now been sober for 5 months-ish. For me focusing on the could haves, should haves, would haves keep me mired in guilt and shame. Also keeps me fearing the what ifs? All of that keeps me stuck in thinking that I not only can't control but has no potential for growth. The here and now is it. If I fall, I get back up. Of course I have to remember that every relapse has the potential to kill me. I don't freak out over that, I just accept it as reality. I will never stop trying to achieve recovery and I do that by being present in this moment only.
You are young. Stop now and you'll have no more regrets.....or at least not alcohol related ones. You have choices here.

GnikNus

Last year at age 37. 38 was my first totally sober year since age 19. I'll be 39 in a month and and looking forward to turning things around in my 40's.
I had a half hearted attempt at 35, but I wasn't ready to quit at that point.

soberclover

25 and stayed clean and sober for 13 years.....then I started drinking again while my marriage fell apart. Then I got sober when I was 46 and I've been sober for three years in two days

CurlyGirl1978

I first started drinking at age 26 and my first attempt to stop was at the age of 27, but I lacked the tools I needed and didn't know much about the disease. I had no internet, no one to talk about their experience and to share mine. I thought it was as simple as stopping but my surroundings were still the same. 72 days went by and I started back again. I tried again at age 32 and it lasted 42 days, then at 34 and it lasted 36 days. Here I am at age 37, 10 years later and it's go time. I'm done. This time I have the tools, the support, and I'm gaining the knowledge for lifelong recovery.

Jsbodhi

I'm 32, been working on complete sobriety for a year now.
I'm actually not too bad anymore and I don't really drink much, but I suffer from alcoholism.
I'm done with it now though, I turn 33 in 2 months, so I'm going to say end of my 32nd year, start of 33rd is when I got sober

Angie247

I stopped at 38, one month away from 39.

Bird615

21 the first time (but knew at 17) and 55 the second time after a four-and-half-year relapse.

I remember thinking at 21, something like, "Wow, I'll be 41 if I make it to 20 years" and that seemed so unimaginable to me. I went on to have a fairly contented sober life with life's regular ups and downs of marriage, divorce, deaths, etc.

Funny (not haha funny) thing is, when I hit 20 years, I had recently remarried, my home group moved, I moved across town, and I just drifted away from my recovery program.

Ten years later after sliding back into negative thinking and an all-around general bad attitude towards life, I thought I'd try drinking again because maybe I had just sobered up too young and wasn't really an alcoholic.

It got bad again real quick and I spent those relapse years jumping back and forth between desperate attempts to moderate and half-hearted attempts to get sober again.

Now I have almost 5 months this time. I'm back to following my recovery program and life is much better again. I can't think of a drink anymore without having a clear vision in my mind of all the misery and suffering that most definitely comes with it.

Sometimes I have regrets that I relapsed, but I try not to feel bad about it. Instead I try to look at it as a valuable learning experience and to use it to possibly help someone else.

TheRake

Thanks. Your response made me think. What was the incident at age 29? I've had so many "incidents" that it's ridiculous. But I think it was after this one that I wanted to quit as opposed to thinking that I should....

Actually at 21 I nearly killed myself. The festive season and I had gone out with my girlfriend at the time. Somebody that I knew had earlier asked me if I could get them ecstasy. And of course me thinking I'm the man with connections duly obliged. They gave me a couple and I took them that night in the company of my girlfriend who was very anti-drug. What was I thinking. Stupidity. We had an argument later that night and I went and got on my motorbike. Drunk and high I drove my bike head on into an oncoming car. How I wasn't killed or badly injured I don't know. But that didn't make me want to stop really....

A lot of people say it's best to leave the past in the past and it's better to focus on the present. And that's always being my opinion too. But thinking about what happened then and the incident at 29 is making me realise something. I tend to try to fix these incidents and then sweep the past under the emotinal rug. There such a discord between drunk Rake and sober Rake that it's possible I'm not or haven't faced up to the reality of these incidents......did I really do these things???? I think I've kind of mentally seperated the incidents from reality...

It's possible a psychologist needs to be part of my overall plan

Soberpotamus

Age 27 for a year, and then again at age 35. It'll be three years in April.

TheRake

I kind of did have a little experience with AA. The first time I didn't want to be there. About a decade ago I got into some trouble with the law. Stupid things really...drink related. I decided not to go to court. Warrant issued, eventually arrested and put in custody. Bail set and nobody would sign/put up the bail bond unless I went to a rehab centre. I did it just for the court really and to get out of the system and in that centre there was 3 by weekly AA. It wasn't my cup of tea at the time. But oddly enough I would love to have the luxery of going to that place again now that I actully want this for me.

I briefly tried AA again a few months ago but probably didn't really give it a chance. There's not that many were I live, well there is one relatively near that's on 3 by weekly and another a little bit further away...on the same days. Now that I think about it I did try to go to the one a little further away....in the rain one night a few weeks ago....and couldn't find it. I'll maybe try go this week....

I hate to write "try go", because it reminds me of the wisdom of Yoda "there is no try. there is do or not do". But I write try because the last few weeks I've been dead after work and not sleeping at all good. trying to find a new place to live. Maybe they're just excuses.