Dirthawger

Hey everyone,
I really need help trying to quit. I can quit for a while then im right back at it. I've been pretty steady back in my drinking for a few months after my last relapse. It's so upsetting to me because I know how amazing and peaceful sobriety is but I keep coming back. I've gotten DUI's before and have even voluntarily kept my interlock device thinking it would keep me sober. Well I ended up being able to hide my drinking through that. I've learned to calculate how much i can drink and be sober by the time my spouse gets home. I finally got desperate yesterday afternoon and found some antabuse and took 500mg. I got the strong urge to drink on my way home from work that following morning. I decided to take the risk of getting sick and to my horror, the antabuse had no effect on me. So what does someone like me do now. All of my safety nets I have, are either ineffective or I've found a way to beat them.

Dee74

Hi Dirthawger - welcome

For me, support made a massive difference. It want so much to me I wasn't alone and there was a forum of people here who understood.

It also meant a lot that people cared.
SR really helped me turn my life around - I know we can help you do the same.

why not check out of Class of December support thread? All you have to do to join us post in it.

https://www.soberrecovery.com/forums...art-1-a-9.html (Class of December 2019 part 1)

D

least

Welcome to the family. The only thing I know for sure is that in order to stay sober, you must want to be sober more than you want to drink. Sounds like you're not there yet.

Please do join the class of December. I hope the support here can help you get sober for good.

Ghostlight1

Hello and welcome. You'll find a lot of support here.
As Least says, are you willing to not drink more than you want to quit for good?
I didn't have the attitude of I guess I'm going to try this.
I had to throw myself into it and be totally willing. And with an open mind to listen to others who are successfully staying sober.
Half measures availed me nothing.

It took me a long time to quit, and it sounds like you've been trying for awhile.
You can quit. We can help, but you've got to want it. I hope you do.
We only get so many chances at anything in life. This is your chance to get and stay sober. Go for it. Care about yourself.
I hope you stick around. We're here for you.

Dirthawger

I just don't understand why I would be drawn to something that brings me so much pain and turns me into a completely different person. I think im going to have so much fun drinking until that last drop is gone and then I turn distraught. And then the only thing I think about is how great of a day I would've had, had I not drank. Then I keep repeating to myself, you never have to feel like this again.

DontRemember

For me, that constantly 'doing it again' was because I was addicted to alcohol and thus drank alcoholicly.. safety nets never got/kept me sober. It took 'work' (AA,here, therapy) and the acceptance of the simple fact that I can never drink again no matter what.

Ghostlight1

I understand completely. I lived that way the last ten years of my drinking.
I don't know if there is any real, true understanding of it except we get addicted then things are really out of our control.
That's how I got. For ten long years. It was a night mare. I tried to stop, promising never to drink again, only to fail once again.

It did take AA for me. I finally realized I couldn't quit on my own. I needed help. Bad.
I found it in those rooms full of people with the same problem as me, and some were sober for long periods. But we all shared the same problem and reason for being there.
It's been almost eleven years since I've had a drink, and I drank for thirty.
Do what it takes. Do what you know you need to do. Save yourself.

Dirthawger

Its clear that there are no short cuts to sobriety, I'll always find a way. I was sober 3 years one time and it was wonderful. I guess I need to get back into AA, I've just been searching for a magic pill to cure this and there isn't one. I never really bought into this is a disease, but the more times I relapse the more I see that it truly is.

Ghostlight1

Yes, a disease. I don't know either. I've heard it called that by medical professionals and I've heard it called an obsession and addiction. Semantics aside, I have it.
Sober for three years? That's awesome. What did you do then?
And, yep, no magic pill. Antabuse aside. If that counts.
You're not alone. I understand how you feel and how frustrating and baffling it is.
I just take it one day at a time. That I can handle.

PhoenixJ

Welcome, DH. Lots of good advice by others. Whenever you feel like drinking- join lots of SR threads and post.

Kaily

Hi Dirthawger and welcome. I struggled for a long time to get sober. I kept putting my hope in things outside of myself. I desperately wanted to get into a detox/ rehab but I couldn't. So I just kept on drinking, my alcoholic self believed (or wanted to) that without that I couldn't get sober. It sort of gave me permission.

I had also tried to get Antabuse but my Dr refused to prescribe due to other medications I was taking and possible interactions. Again that gave me permission to keep on drinking. I had put so much hope in this magic cure.

Anyway finally last year I did it on my own. I was drinking a bottle of Vodka a day. It can be done. The first few months are hard. You can't listen to your urges, you fight them with every ounce of your being. I would go out on day hikes to exhaust myself. I avoided carrying money of any form unless absolutely necessary, so I couldn't give into a sudden craving. I posted here.

Basically I fought it like my life depended on it. Because it did.

Mags1

Hi Dirthawger, I pondered on ‘what does someone like me do now’. I guess like all of us?
It’s not easy, you know that I guess, being 3 years sober in the past.

What next? I did ponder when drunk once about asking the cops to lock me up. I was a danger to myself and maybe others, but I didn’t ask them.

But a prison cell would do it....but hopefully it doesn’t have to be that extreme.

First and foremost, for me, I surrendered myself to the fact alcohol and I didn’t mix.
Secondly, I stopped for good (I’d tried stopping it so many times and then trying to drink like a normie)
Thirdly, I stayed stopped. With help at from SR, this good support group I came across, knowing without my sobriety my life wasn’t up to much, however good I thought it was through rose coloured glasses.

I hope you find a way that works for you too.

D122y

I learned here that my decades of drinking had caused permanent brain damage.

I needed booze to feel normal. Booze had been woven into the fabric of my every existance...good, bad, and neutral.

I needed booze to have a good time, relax, morn, etc etc.

I was an easy going drunk usually and I had enough luck and discipline to not drink and drive or have a domestic blow out and get caught...yet.

My health began to noticeably fail. That was and is the main reason I learned about booze and remain quit after this many years and forever.

I didn't find sr until I was 80 days clean because I was going insane. I found out i was heavily kindled.

The booze had damaged my brain and now I needed it to feel normal. I lacked the mental ability to produce dopemine.

I threw myself into fitness and found that with enough physical stress I could generate loads of dopemine, adrenaline, and endorphins from day 1, but I still wanted more.

It took the better part of 4 years now to get used to the levels of natural drugs my body can produce. As I adjust, I crave. When I don't give into the crave, I suffer.

It is emotions versus analysis. Left brain versus right brain.

I call it growing up. I have to be a big boy and not give in or else I will suffer the hell on earth of getting cleaned up again.

Because of the kindling, I might not be able to, ull out of another relapse.mi had unknowingly relapsed hundreds of times. With each relapse the brain damage increases.

I guess eventually the crazy just doesn't go away. I figure I am one relapse away from that. I would rather believe that and be wrong than the later.

I am a drug addict for life. I will crave for life. But, I have been clean long enough to get through the tough times.

I have been to AA meetings and they help, but I am able to keep it clean using sr, fitness, and other dopamine producing activities. I get high on life now.

I get happy for no real reason now. I get happy just being able to stay out late and drive home knowing i am sober as a plank and will not wake up with a hang over etc.

I put more details in my blog with most of the important stuff up front.

Hope this helps you or someone else, because typing this out helps me.

Thanks.

SoberStevie

After years of abusing alcohol, we are drinking because we are addicted to it. The buzz, the lovely warm feeling that drinking early in our journey has gone and it will never return. I found this hard to accept. I thought I would be able to drink and always feel like I did in the early years. Then, it was worth it. Why? Because the buzz outweighed the hangovers. I loved my wine and the effects and the morning after, well, it wasn't too bad...slight headache, dry mouth, tired, but a few glasses of water put that right.
Then, suddenly I crossed an invisible line. No warning, I didn't know I had crossed that line until I was the other side. I didn't even now there was a line! Then I needed a bottle to feel 'normal', and the hangovers were severe.
That's why I don't drink now. 3 weeks ago I was drinking my usual bottle of wine a night, and I didn't like the taste, I even sighed as I poured it out. I didn't want the after effects and effect of the wine had gone.
Accepting that we can't ever have those early days again is hard, so hard. But once I realised that, I quit.
Good luck.

DriGuy

I prefer the word "addiction" over disease or allergy. It's a simple well understood word that describes the condition with precision, and it doesn't generate the need to stumble around in your brain wondering about what it's supposed to mean or why someone calls it that.

Addiction is what you have to come to grips with and accept in yourself. It doesn't matter that it may or may not be the most currently favored word to describe what's going on. The cravings, the endless head games that justify your tendency to self destruct, the withdrawal, detoxification, and relapses are all characteristics of addiction. The first Step in AA is to recognize the addiction. But AA by no means has a monopoly on the first step. The need for recognition of the problem transcends ideology, because no matter what you decide to do about a problem, you must recognize it first.

You may want to call it a medical problem instead, but to date there is no medical cure. No doctor can do more than we must must do on our own if an addiction is going to be truly solved.

Do it on our own, without pills? How depressing is that? It shouldn't have to be that hard. But it is that hard. Depressing, yes, but recovery is also empowering, and here is where we can explore and share our empowerment with others in our group. OK, I guess then we can tap the support of others, because we can build on that support and understanding of others. But while that can be a powerful tool, the bigger part of the process involves things we must do on our own.

And I think this is true for any addiction. To overcome, it takes far more than modern medicine has to offer. OK, I guess we probably need modern medicine to get us through detoxification if we get that bad, but detoxification ≠ cure. It can save your life, but it is not the cure for our addiction. There is no medical cure. We have to cure it (actually, we can only arrest it) by ourselves. We must also maintain the cure on our own, and for the rest of our lives.

sugarbear1

Do you want to stay stopped more than you want to drink?

August252015

I'm glad you are here. I think we can all relate to this and all you are sharing. The basic reason is that we do and feel all this because we are alcoholics.

There could be no "try" for me, only "do." I had to quit for good or face a pretty quick death for someone who was 39 (now 43 and headed to 4 yr sober).

The AA axiom "acceptance is the answer to all my problems" really is the crux of the matter for every alcoholic. We just cannot drink without consequences, whether right away or eventually, so once we truly "get that" - what do we do?

I'd suggest you look into anything and everything you haven't "tried" before, and commit to that "do" I mentioned.

Zebra1275

Welcome!

I see you've gone to AA in the past. When I finally swallowed my pride and went to AA I found it very helpful in getting sober. The other key thing I did to get sober was to log onto this website everyday (often multiple times a day) and join one of the monthly sobriety classes as Dee recommended.

That's what worked for me and I'm coming up on a decade of sobriety in a few months.