WaterOx

In her book: Drinking A Love Story, Caroline Knapp describes a phenomenon called "the click". It's where you snap into a state of mind and then back to the other- and the two states are completely different from one another.

click "something is terribly wrong here, I have a serious problem"
click "everything is fine! I was worried about nothing this whole time"
click "I might actually die from this"
click "wow was I ever being dramatic! I'm having so much fun!"

I can see now just how much these "clicks" have been happening to me. When I look back over the last 3 years, I have gone over and over this, from "something is terribly wrong" to just the opposite. I like to think that I have a certain self awareness and control but I am beginning to see this is a total blind spot and it happens so fast that I seem to be less aware of it that I think I really am. That's why the word "click" seems so incredibly accurate.

I'm not sure why I'm making this thread. Maybe it's just a check in. A way to keep me from drinking just for the rest of the day since at some point in the near future I probably will again. Maybe it's good to hash out my thoughts as a form of some small progress. Maybe it will help me stay sober in the future.

This sort of realization is all at once scary and humbling. I don't like it, because I fancy myself in control in most of my life, but I have to admit there's a powerful force at work. And even while I type this, there's a voice inside me that's trying everything it can to say "no you don't have that problem. Not you." Click!

Dee74

I think the thing is you can permanently choose one 'click' over the other - if you accept the premise that if you want the kind of life you want, you need to stop drinking.
you're beaten before you start thinking that way.

I drank hard for 20 years - every thing in my brain told me I could not live without drinking, but I was determined not to die that way.

I changed everythign in my life I needed too - everything about problem solving, dealing with uncomfortable emotions, good and bad, everything about my social life.

sounds monumental I know but I just did what I had to do to stay sober on any given day.

12 years later here I am.

There's no reason you couldn't be here too, one day WaterOx - but you'll need to pick your side - drinking and chaos... or recovery and a solid gold chance at a great life.

D

Tetrax

Yeah I can identify with this. At over six months sober my mindset is still all over the place. My outlook on life varies from day to day, sometimes hour to hour.

sadforldr7

One of my favorite reads during my start in sobriety in 2017...I could relate to so many pieces of her story.

The 'click' to me is my rational brain fighting against the desire to hide, numb myself and ignore the truth that it was truly and absolutely a problem to drink a bottle or more of wine a night alone. After a glass or three...the other apparently insane part of my mind tried to justify that it was all going to be fine. It wasn't fine. Wasn't even close to fine for 10 years off and on.

Today and for 23 days...my rational brain is winning over and I want to live free from the madness and live sober.

silentrun

When I had that click I realized I was out of control for real. Like you that didn't fit with my self-image. I did have the control if I chose to take it back from alcohol. It wasn't some triumphant moment though, I was scared silly.

RecklessDrunk

I think if we are honest with ourselves, completely honest we know which click is the right one and which thinking is deceiving us.

Cunning, baffling, and powerful.

It's like how frustrating it is when some hot woman has some abusive boyfriend, yet she always goes back to him. No matter how bad he beats her up she will always return. Alcohol puts beating after beating on us and we still want to drink.

This is the insanity. When we are sober and want to drink. Repeating the same thing and expecting a different result. Every time we drink it ends bad. Maybe the next time it will just be a little hangover but it never ends there. Once the little hangover wears off that obsession comes back hard and the real trouble is just around the corner. Maybe not right on that first night but it always ends bad when we pick up, everytime. That's how we got here.

Kaily

Yes click click. My mind is often all over the place. Not only in Sobriety but also Mental Health. You think your doing well, then your not.

One thing I must always remember is how badly I wanted sobriety. So why now would I even consider in a click of my mind to give that up.

Cunning and baffling all the way.

Rose335

Thanks for starting this thread. Fascinating and so true. I'm going to read this book, which I didn't know about. I appreciated all your posts and particularly identified with what sadforldr said.

b0glerd69

I liked Knapp's book too. It's an honest and personal story of life with alcoholism and what it takes from someone over the longer term. I felt a sadness for the author at the end as she died very young and was obviously a warm human being with a lot to give.

tekink

I think that "click" only happens when you are still convinced your AV is your own voice.

It's not.

WaterOx

Maybe you're right, Dee, but I just read one of my first posts I ever made on here, talking about how fed up I was with drinking, how basically this was the end, never again.........that was four years ago.


Clearly I am full of crap and my word means jack squat. So maybe it's time to stop kidding myself and see where that goes.

sadforldr7

For years I didn't recognize the shift in my thinking regarding whether I was drinking too much, too early in the day, why I drank alone, why I felt desperation combined with shame in buying not just one, but two bottles at a time.

My mind would go through short episodes of panic ("clicks") that something was terribly wrong. I didn't recognize what those moments of panic were until I was scared. Our poor bodies fight so hard to keep us alive and healthy...glad I have finally listened. So so so overdue.

Dee74

Don't confuse the drinking you with the essential you

D

SoberCAH

Drinking, A Love Story by Caroline Knapp is my favorite recovery story book by far (are you listening, Anna?).

Even though Caroline was a woman (and I'm a guy) and considerably smarter than me (think she went to an Ivy League school), I could related completely with almost everything she wrote.

It crushed me to find out she had died, because I felt like I knew her so well.

snitch

I read this book years ago when I first started trying to quit drinking and I remember thinking it was a really good book but I cant remember it now. I still have it, it will be good to read it with some sobriety behind me.

I can identify with "the click". For me though this is where my Higher Power comes in to play.

Step 2... came to believe that a Power Greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

My drinking had many many consequences . My last drinking binge was 10 days long. I spent days in blackout, tried to smash someone's window, had a police visit, phoned In sick for work, abandoned my daughter, fell into a basement flat onto concrete (and got up from) fell out with friends and attacked my daughters daddy in front of her both verbally and physically, ate xanax like candy just so I could sleep and then continue drinking again. All of that **** stuff happened and yet my mind will still try and convince me that it is ok to drink. Click. But no look what happened. Click. It will be different this time. Click.

So step 2. If I start thinking that a drink is a good idea despite all the consequences I have suffered previously then I am insane. That is insane thinking. I need a Power Greater than me to restore me back to sanity. To sane thinking. When I am sane I know exactly what a drink will do to me. What an effing insane idea it is to drink that poison that is going to completely **** up everything that is good in my life. So, I pray to my Higher Power. I ask God (of my understanding) to please keep me sober. Please don't let me pick up a drink no matter what. This restores me to back to sane thinking and when I am restored to sanity I can follow my prayer up with some action. Get to a meeting. Call another alcoholic. Post on SR. Share my thoughts and take the power put of them. Snuff them out before the flames take hold.

This is what I did in those early days every time I started to get that obsession to drink. Click. Insanity Click. Restored to sanity.

I havent picked up a drink in 18 and a half months. Just my experience.

🙏❤🙏❤

DriGuy

I change states of mind, but never by a click. My changes can take a day or two and I suspect they are happening before I even notice. Then it seems like one day I will notice that I'm in a different state of mind. I don't do anything with it. The state of my mind will change again soon enough.

The one that is the most disconcerting is a sense of danger. I don't know why this happens. Logically, I cannot identify a danger. I just feel like something bad might happen, and I check to see if I did something wrong to put myself in danger, but I come up empty. I'm sure there is something that causes this. It's probably some learned tendency to expect danger, but I don't have a clue where I would have learned this. I think it's irrational, so I tend to ignore it. I may experience that one 2 or 3 times a year. It may last for a day or two.

ThatWasTheOldMe

Yep.
I just stopped drinking for months because I had convinced myself I could handle it and I was just being stupid.

Except with every single binge, i would make an idiot out of myself. And then I'd be remorseful and then I'd convince myself i can handle it the next time. And then i would go into withdrawals after making an idiot out of myself yet again.

I hate alcoholism. Now I want to be part of the solution.