LoneWolf04

Hi All... just checking in - trying to make it a point to post something every Monday.

Kept up my sobriety all week last week, but ended up drinking saturday evening - and as a result sunday also... I noticed that lately I struggle during my sober time. A lot of 'existential malaise' creeps up, I start trying to relive past memories, looking back when I was younger and not carrying this addiction around with me.

It makes me fear the future, question the point of my existence. This then leads me to want to drink and break the sober cycle.

I suppose the answer is to truly let go of the past and embrace the future with all of its uncertainty...

PhoenixJ

Identify, understand, accept then let go.

Yep. Hard to do- I am perhaps up to accept.

Support to you.

Dee74

Hi LoneWolf

for me the best thing I ever learned is I can;'t solve any of my existemtial problems when I'm drinking. If really wanted to do somethign about them, I had to stay sober.

It's not always pleasant, but thats why I had a strong support network here and I used it to the max.

Regrets guilt, PTSD from the past fear - all of these things really can be dealt without recourse to drinking..if you give yourself that chance

D

lessgravity

I'm sorry to hear that you're still drinking. However I have to say that you're post appears to me to be a means by which you can just continue to drink. I don't say that as a criticism so please don't take it that way. But I think that the expectation that somehow we all need to be fully healed from the traumas of our lives, or somehow in a state of having finally fully let go, will just lead you to continue to drink.

getting sober can provide us with the clarity, focus and strength to finally deal with the unmet expectations, challenges and pads that our lives have taken. The idea that we need to have gotten their first, before getting sober, it's just going to prevent sobriety from happening. Since I've been sober I've been able to deal with those things that you mentioned in your post. While I was still drinking I was only deep, deep in the muck.

Finalround

+1 lessgravity

entropy1964

I second LG. I can actually be miserable and not drink. I know that isn't the goal, but if there is a reason to drink, I will. I don't have to be all 'sorted' to not drink which is a good thing....because getting sorted takes time. And then there's the whole 'getting unsorted and resorted' thing that just kind of happens in cycles.

My drinking is obsessive/compulsive. Obsess over alcohol, compulse with its use. Take that away and I will obsessively think. And then get frustrated because there is nothing to compulse over. 2 things.....practice focusing on what I can control, letting go of what I can't. Take action when I'm stuck in my thoughts. Do something other than think. Action leads me to feeling better. Trying to feel my way into change usually doesn't work out well.

fini

the letting go of past and such is something i could start to put work into after i was sober; not before.
and it is by no means a prerequisite to getting sober. in fact, i don't think there really are any.
what helped me greatly was to get very engaged with others on the sober path, and posting daily and connecting was the mainstay of that at the beginning.
posting once a week while drinking on weekend and trying to "let go" of past...that would have been a torturous stuck place for me.

PalmerSage

Yes, as the others have said it's more like the reverse: "get sober to get over the past."

Hawkeye13

I couldn't let go until I got sober and did the work.

That's the bottom line, or was for me--
drinking let me avoid my crap past,
wallow in my self-pity,
be angry and explode,
but drinking never allowed me to build any traction to get past the past and into a better future.

You can do it as well--just put down the bottle for good first.

ljc267

I can certainly relate to this. When I was newly sober I had A LOT of these thoughts and feelings. I thought how can I keep living like this.

For me, as time passed my brain started to regulate, for lack of a better phrase. This helped my think things through better.

Also, I don't think you should try to let go of the past. The past is a good teacher if you listen. What helped me is to come to terms with my past and my actions in my past. I did a lot of things I'm not proud of but there is nothing I can ever do to change them, but I have the opportunity to do better.

Purpleman

I wasted so much time convincing myself that I had to "get better" in order to stop drinking. Turns out that when I stopped drinking, I got better