StevenW

This is about training for being sober while you are still drinking. It is a long read, but it is all about you, even if I tell my story.

A story: Two wolves are fighting within you, a sober one and a drunk one, which one wins? The one you feed. I am sure some of you heard that one. And I think it is so useful for a lot of alcoholics. Here is why:

The usual way of sobering up goes something like this: drink, drink, realization of being an alcoholic, cutting down, drink, rock bottom, stop, drink again, cutting down, drink, stop, drink, rock bottom, stop, drink, stop for good. Or some variation.

This way implied perspective of getting sober is “you are not sober until you are sober (don’t drink anymore)”, it is a 0 / 1, an “all or nothing perspective”.

And I ask you to reconsider this way of self-perception. Why?

Quick, in between, my career with the booze: I have been drinking for over 25 years, coming from a lifestyle drinker to abusing alcohol for emotional compensatory reasons to addictive cravings in the morning for alcohol itself, which I gave in usually on weekends. I drank about up to a bottle of booze each day. I was long time functioning socially, having a Master degree, some executive jobs, long time relationships, but inside it was pure chaos, I never lived up to my jobs, also due to issues of ADD.

While being first blind to the damaging effects of alcohol because being a heavy lifestyle drinker, further on the road I was just disgusted, how alcohol and ADD ruined the lifestyle and person I wanted to be. And because I wanted to heal myself so badly, but at the same time was so emotionally weak, addicted, the only way to deal with both was saying to myself something like “Hey, yes you are an alcoholic, but not all of you, not every time, there is a non addicted true self still living. And in those phases and parts, go and work on your recovery, train for the time, when you will be strong enough to become sober one day”. In these daily short periods of time I “pretend to be a sober person”, live it, as much as possible.

I would start drinking daily at around 1 PM, but I would consider myself a sober man from 8 AM to 10 AM. Again, “Sober” is not about that I didn’t drink in the morning (on weekdays), it’s about engaging for that time in planned behaviors (or fragments thereof) of recovery, e.g workout, stretching, meditating, journaling, nature, inner work, personal hygiene, whatever. I would visualize me being agile, sober and clear despite I knew in a couple of hours I would be back drinking. When I was hungover, I would do at least some stretching and reading. It was training for day 0. Tried to increase the sober man day by day incrementally.

In other words, these are the two lions battling. And I was feeding the weaker, sober lion, despite I knew he would lose for some time.

What happened was strange. My sober me-part grew and grew. Over time I was more and more able to cut down in situations I before would have done half a bottle, I was increasingly aware of situations that triggered me and could steer myself around it. Also my relationship to alcohol was no more love-hate, but more a solid competitor within myself that I wanted to destroy strategically, in other words I studied this competitor, the fight has become less abstract but manageable on details, I got a grip on it.

What you have to understand, is, that the analyzes why I would drink is needed, but not sufficient, the key is to split up your person in a sober person and in a drunk. This will result in two things: first, you accept yourself as a weak alcoholic, but on the same time you can work on your recovery and can attack this person with an authentic yourself below the alcoholic.

Now, some would argue, that is just AV talking to you, because it provides a reason not to stop. No, no, and again no. If I look at most of your stories, the stories of some friends, mine, we all loose so much time fighting, being hopeless to take the step to make the cut. Phases of weeks, when we know exactly we would drink anyway, because we are to weak, but betray ourselves that tomorrow will be the day. Do it different. Make it one hour and start from there. Start today, not tomorrow. Consider yourself a sober, recovering person for that hour and do your work. By all means that is doable. Tomorrow again, next week, one hour 15 minutes. It’s not only the additional fifteen minutes, but the accumulation altogether.

I am sober for 10 month now. I am going strong, I could not see any chance to get back. It’s not that I would be emotionally so strong, but besides being sober for only 10 mont it feels like having more time of recovery under my belt regarding tools, skills are fully developed. My Self perception is no longer alcohol related in any way; I do laugh on my AV, do some stretching and watch it joyfully crawling away. Of course, there are no guarantees and that is why I consider recovery as a life long obligation each day.

Over the last month there has been a lot of hype around David Goggins. After listening to some of his (earlier) Talks with eg Tom Bilyeu (google it, also read his book) I found some parallels to the way I got to sobriety. Also Jordan Peterson, James Clear were talking about the power of incremental progress. This is why I (lurking around in SR for years) wrote my story up for this forum, which is, hands down the most supportive, respectful, functioning online community I have come across. It would mean a lot to me, if I just could help some of you in any way by sharing my story, as a lot of you helped me, by sharing yours.

Thanks for reading.


I wrote this using a new user name to be safe, that no one could track back my real name, since some friends know I am a member of this forum.

Snowydelrico

Sounds a little like moderating and bargaining.
Well done on 10 months

StevenW

Thanks, Snowydelrico. No, it's not about moderation, it's about making steady mental incremental process towards sobriety, when you won't be able to make that big one. It is a workable mental way of tapering off, building habits and push your sober self perception. Moderation would be a status that you are trying to manifest.

Snowydelrico

I think they try and work a similar program in Stockport where they get you ready a bit more mentally before giving you a detox. 6 weeks of prep and talks whilst tapering then detox

MLD51

I understand your approach, Steven. In a nutshell - you started feeding the sober wolf a little more each day, making it stronger (eventually) than the drunk wolf. If it worked for you, I applaud you. Everyone "does" sobriety a bit differently. I would not have had the discipline to do it your way. I had to find a true rock bottom and crawl out of it, quitting cold turkey and assembling my tool kit after the fact. I think that's how most alcoholics do it. But I can see the value in learning how to "be sober" a bit a time, and having some of those tools in place before the "big quit." I think a lot of people achieve that by relapsing over and over again. Each time they are sober for a bit, they learn a bit more about how to be sober. Problem with that approach, as I see it, is that a relapse can be seen as a failure, and with that comes some backsliding emotionally.

But hey - however anyone achieves sobriety is good by me. To each their own.

Snowydelrico

When you’re deep in with the booze all good intentions are thrust to one side.
Discipline is very hard when you are an active alcoholic
In my personal experience anyway

StevenW

Right, MLD51, exactly, thats one way that I want to add to those various options. Thanks bytheway.

But, it's even not so much about discipline. It's about, what Jordan Peterson talks, when he said, you have to lower the bars to a minimum that you can handle. if you feel you are not able to to something, you did not lower the bar enough. In the beginning I started out by drinking just two glases of cold water and focus on that. A couple of weeks later I could drink half a gallon. Again its more about building and adding habits.

No. backsliding es not a failure, because you just have to lower the bar again. That was - to me - exactly the benefit of that approach, because ist not 0 vs 1, it was progress not perfection. And even if I had a backslide, I just was looking at the big picture of progress I made over time. And that progress was not only a better grip on my drinking, but also on the progress I made as a sober self parallel.

Fearlessat50

Congrats on 10 months, Steven!
In a way, my path was similar, though unintentionally. I had so many relapses, some worse than the last, some not so much, but I was growing stronger emotionally every step.

What your story reinforces, for me, is that recovery is a process, a journey. But I wish I had gotten finally sober on the first go, and I wish that for everyone. It’s more efficient, less wasted time, less damage, and less chance of a harder rock bottom. But that’s the way it goes with life sometimes, and everyone has a different path. There is no right or wrong. I respect that.

Thank you for sharing your story

Snowydelrico

I haven’t made up my mind about Jordan Peterson yet.
What I’ve gathered so far is that he finds grey areas and exploits them.
A bit like a sophisticated Piers Morgan.

Sorry for going off topic.
I may be wrong, I have been before

Fearlessat50

This is a good point about small incremental steps. I see value in this, for some, when the whole is too overwhelming to tackle at once. It’s like training for a marathon. You don’t go out and run 26.2 tomorrow if you haven’t put in the training. I could see how the approach could work if it’s a planned one. Then again, I do recall trying a tapering system once and it always eventually caused regression. Ultimately, cold turkey was what worked for me.

MLD51

That makes sense, Steven. I think I'll use that approach of "lowering the bar" when I set goals in the future. I like that. I tend to be a person who sets goals and then gives up when it doesn't go as planned right from the start. It's funny, but I can understand "progress, not perfection" perfectly well intellectually, I just don't do a great job actually applying it to myself. My perfectionism is something I have been working on.

lessgravity

I read Jordan Peterson about 10 months ago, he was intregal to me getting sober. Sad he's compared to Piers Morgan.

Snowydelrico

Sorry less’ I know you like him.
If he helped you get sober then I am grateful to him for that too.
I don’t think piers could have done that.
As I say, I have been wrong before

Snowydelrico

.

Della1968

I think once I got past some of the continuing to drink this was understandable to me. Basically you manifested a sober you. I say whatever works.

August252015

I read your full post this morning. I really didn't know what to think then I thought- "wait, this is simple. It's BS."

The idea of drinking while making progress to not drinking is....what an alcoholic mind would consider a good idea.

10 mo is great. And early.

Mental contortions of an alcoholic are unbelievable.

Just to give you an example: my almost 3 yr sober self (1118 days) had the conscious thought yesterday that maybe checking myself into rehab for a couple of weeks would be a nice time out from the anxiety that seems overwhelming to me right now. I have no desire to drink, I am using all the tools I have- which are many- to self-soothe, reframe the thoughts that are swirling around family, responsibilities, worry....

And you know what a healthily recovering alcoholic mind does with all that stress? Well, this one comes up with about MOST sobriety- and self-protective idea possible in case it's what should need to happen.

Then I walk myself back from that extreme thought and get back to the daily work of being sober, as it is NOW.

I wish you the best success in permanent sobriety- and that your alcoholic brain doesn't ever succeed in outsmarting itself back into drinking.

StevenW

Hey August, why so harsh with the BS thing? This may not work for you, completely fine, but pls do not discount it as BS.

Don’t get me wrong, but when I read your sentence “The idea of drinking while making progress to not drinking is....what an alcoholic mind would consider a good idea.” I got the impression I could not make the idea behind it clear enough to you.

Just an example: when an addict drinks, it may be unrealistic at noon on a given day to say “I wont drink tonight”, because she/he will. And we all experienced that. Again, off course, if you feel capable to stop right now, then go for it. But for most of us addicts stop drinking need some trigger like to check into rehab, hit rock bottom, grasp a moment of instantaneous change, or become aware of hard consequences, for instance at a doctors visit. To my experience only a few are able to stop at a planned date, me neither. And to create such an triggering event is difficult. Unfortuately this is what we learn when we view the process after we got into sobriety, not when we are still drinking.

So, my question is, what you gonna do with those days that for most of us add up into the hundreds?

And my take would be, fight the addiction by strengthen your sober self as far as you can. By then, at noon, you might find the strength to clean up, get fresh air, drink water or a smoothie. So do it. Now and here. Do aware as possible some "sober self stuff". Repeat. And build up. It may be more effective than telling yourself X times “I wont drink” only to find yourself opening a bottle of booze 4 hours later. Exactly that behavior undermined my self perception on becoming sober, because I was bullshitting myself over and over again.

When I finally stopped drinking, I know I could rely on my by then build habits to gain enough strength. To be more specific: I drank for reasons, for instance frustration with my life. But over time I learned I could also fight frustrations by walking over an hour instead of drinking. Same with gravings. Because I did that.

At a certain point of time I was doing a 2 hour walk every day, no matter what. And why not? I experienced better emotional management, awareness levels even as an alcoholic. And it helped.

Such approaches are described very well by the term incremental change by James Clear, Jordan Peterson, Joe Rogan. Why not use them? Because the alcoholic brain works different?

Of course there is some more to (long term) sobriety, like AVTR, Tools – like playing the tape forward, avoiding triggers. I know that, I use those, but it does not make the above technique less an option. Again, this is not for everyone, as MLD51 said, people are different. I think you found your way and I wish you all the best to stay sober, and that is, what’s important at the end of the day. Keep it going!

August252015

My point was that this sounds like pure, alcoholic mental gymnastics - that are unnecessary to quit. Maybe they are easier for some, and you are finding success- to answer your question at one point, yes indeed I believe the alcoholic mind is different than the non-alcoholic mind.

Your approach sounds like bargaining to me, at best, procrastination for sure, and at core a waste of time that not everyone has, where you keep drinking til you work your way to not having the chance anymore.

Harsh to say BS? I don't think so - this is a harsh and fatal disease.

StevenW

See, you can do both, it is not an either / or. The core of what I am saying, don't wait until you are sober to strengthen your sober self, but start now and here.

Again, as soon as you feel the capability to stop, of course, do it. But frankly, I had tons of days, where I just could not stop, that is why I was an addict. This way described above I could make it happen within half a year, when before I tried it by “just stop” I failed for three+ years. The question is, which way I was are loosing time? Of course, the answer depends on circumstances and each owns way. I am not saying, one is better than the other. But that is besides my first point.

You would bargain, in case you would say, I wont drink as much for this and that reason. That is not, what I am saying. I say: split a sober self up and feed it, no matter what.

And because the alcholics brain is different, does not mean the above does not make sense.

ScottFromWI

I've got to be honest, that sounds like circular logic and mental gymnastics to me too.

A reminder that promoting drinking in any shape or form is strictly against forum policy. I"m not suggesting that your "method" is promoting drinking or moderation directly, but if I were a newcomer to a sobriety site and saw that it was OK to keep drinking for a while until I was really sure I wanted to try quitting my AV would take off running with it.