Class of November 2016 Support Thread Part 2
Member
Join Date: Dec 2015
Location: NSW - Australia
Posts: 14,524
Hi Emme, hi Samantha.
Nobenders do not give up on each other Emme
If that were the case I would be dead in the water.
I'm sorry about your loss too, and understand how easy (in the early days) it is to pick up a drink as a result. As you say, it is about how we react to situations, not the situation itself.
Day 1 is better than Day 0 Samantha. The days will grow. Keep posting.
Nobenders do not give up on each other Emme
If that were the case I would be dead in the water. I'm sorry about your loss too, and understand how easy (in the early days) it is to pick up a drink as a result. As you say, it is about how we react to situations, not the situation itself.
Day 1 is better than Day 0 Samantha. The days will grow. Keep posting.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2016
Location: Australia
Posts: 131
Originally Posted by Kaily 
Thanks.
I am angry at my miserable life I suppose.
I am angry at my miserable life I suppose.
Not trying to challenge you. Just trying to maybe get you to look at your thinking I guess.
I feel for you. I have definitely felt that way before. Have found myself sitting around on my own feeling angry at everything and everyone for me being so alone. Just makes me feel worse I suppose.
Like phoenix said to me last night. You are not so alone when you are on here. right? It may not be what you'd always dreamed of (
) but it's better than nothing for now.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2016
Location: Australia
Posts: 131
Here's the laughing kookaburra for you.
Hard to be angry when you're watching the kookaburra.
https://youtu.be/S0ZbykXlg6Q
Hard to be angry when you're watching the kookaburra.
https://youtu.be/S0ZbykXlg6Q
Member
Join Date: Jun 2016
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Posts: 28,637
No one is truly alone- if we look hard. Often I will go right around a supermarket trying to find something. Sometimes twice. Then decide the logical thing to do is ask. So I ask- and the item I want is right in front of me. Answers to weird and horrible stuff with booze end up being like that to me. I used to talk to myself in the third person. 'You need to get sober'. By saying 'you' instead of 'I', it gave me permission to distance myself from me. Like it was not my fault. So I started talking to myself with effort saying 'I have to have a shower'. Works. Seems false- a lie, but it is not.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2016
Location: Pennsylvania
Posts: 593
Hey, well 5 hours of sleep ain't bad. I can live with that.
Samantha, you've put together a LOT of sobriety since I've known you. You can do it. Have you figured out what thoughts are going through your head before you drink? It's a good step toward catching them and intervening. Hah, do as I say not as I do. I know most of my triggers, but still I let them get ahead of me if I'm not careful.
Good job not drinking Kaily. And great job posting ahead of time!! That's hard for me to do. A bottle a day (or more) is what I was doing. No matter what we do not want to go back to that. I realized the other day that my liver functions have been elevated at least since 2012. I tell myself: Time's up!! Put the drink DOWN!
emme, I'm sorry for your loss, but nobody gives up on anybody around here. That I know. Maybe write down how you might have handled the situation without drinking, keep it handy in a notebook, refer back to it often.
I'm trying to work the CBT/REBT route harder now. It helps to write down everything, examine everything, refer back to everything that leads to a drink. In my case at least, I've got to catch this stuff ahead of time and have a plan to follow, because when the drinking starts it won't stop for days or weeks. So strange to drink a liter of vodka a day and still function. Very strange place to be. Not good and not sustainable.
Anyway, have a great sober day/night everyone. We will do this, put it behind us, and walk into better futures while helping anyone we can along the way. That I believe.
Samantha, you've put together a LOT of sobriety since I've known you. You can do it. Have you figured out what thoughts are going through your head before you drink? It's a good step toward catching them and intervening. Hah, do as I say not as I do. I know most of my triggers, but still I let them get ahead of me if I'm not careful.
Good job not drinking Kaily. And great job posting ahead of time!! That's hard for me to do. A bottle a day (or more) is what I was doing. No matter what we do not want to go back to that. I realized the other day that my liver functions have been elevated at least since 2012. I tell myself: Time's up!! Put the drink DOWN!
emme, I'm sorry for your loss, but nobody gives up on anybody around here. That I know. Maybe write down how you might have handled the situation without drinking, keep it handy in a notebook, refer back to it often.
I'm trying to work the CBT/REBT route harder now. It helps to write down everything, examine everything, refer back to everything that leads to a drink. In my case at least, I've got to catch this stuff ahead of time and have a plan to follow, because when the drinking starts it won't stop for days or weeks. So strange to drink a liter of vodka a day and still function. Very strange place to be. Not good and not sustainable.
Anyway, have a great sober day/night everyone. We will do this, put it behind us, and walk into better futures while helping anyone we can along the way. That I believe.
Better when never is never
Join Date: Sep 2011
Location: Wisconsin near Twin Cities
Posts: 1,745
I'm up early. I woke up 30 minutes before the alarm so it isn't too bad. I had a plan to lose weight before my 50th birthday, but I am way off track for that. There have been so many plans and so many failures. I'm not sure why I keep doing this to myself. Maybe I need to change the narrative in my life.
Member
Join Date: Jun 2016
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Posts: 28,637
JF- narratives tell so much about ourselves. My counsellor (she is a pain- knows exactly how to get me to think about stuff I do not want to think about) told me last week my narrative (as usual) has a common thread running through it. That would be my 2 man grown now sons who do not and have not spoken to me since my extreme r-b a year ago. I have been concerned about them from my point of view of their well being. They however are mature, grown, well functioning men. I do not play a part in their lives. Saddening, soul rendering yes- but that is the ways it is. I accept that. So my narrative told others what I did not want to see. Writing stuff here and keeping a journal also helps me. I also MAKE my sponsor keep an afternoon a week aside so we go through whatever step I deem necessary to talk about with respect to my changing perceptions of me and the world. Have by his feedback 'done' the steps. As if- a lifelong, daily, minute by minute and cyclic thingy.
Hi Steely- has your avatar got anything to do with BHP?
Pelagic- hi. You sound much more grounded than before times. Good to read your stories. Are you doing SMART? I seem to remember you were looking into that. I do as well as AA. And counselling. And psychologist. And here. Overkill? No- keeps me sane and I slowly learn and grow. I almost have the emotional maturity of an 11 year old now.
Hi Steely- has your avatar got anything to do with BHP?
Pelagic- hi. You sound much more grounded than before times. Good to read your stories. Are you doing SMART? I seem to remember you were looking into that. I do as well as AA. And counselling. And psychologist. And here. Overkill? No- keeps me sane and I slowly learn and grow. I almost have the emotional maturity of an 11 year old now.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Minnetonka, MN
Posts: 155
Originally Posted by jazzfish
I'm up early. I woke up 30 minutes before the alarm so it isn't too bad. I had a plan to lose weight before my 50th birthday, but I am way off track for that. There have been so many plans and so many failures. I'm not sure why I keep doing this to myself. Maybe I need to change the narrative in my life.
As for losing weight, alcohol itself is a huge calorie intake, so maybe being sober will help you more than you think in that regard?!
Member
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Minnetonka, MN
Posts: 155
Originally Posted by PhoenixJ
JF- narratives tell so much about ourselves. My counsellor (she is a pain- knows exactly how to get me to think about stuff I do not want to think about) told me last week my narrative (as usual) has a common thread running through it. That would be my 2 man grown now sons who do not and have not spoken to me since my extreme r-b a year ago. I have been concerned about them from my point of view of their well being. They however are mature, grown, well functioning men. I do not play a part in their lives. Saddening, soul rendering yes- but that is the ways it is. I accept that. So my narrative told others what I did not want to see. Writing stuff here and keeping a journal also helps me. I also MAKE my sponsor keep an afternoon a week aside so we go through whatever step I deem necessary to talk about with respect to my changing perceptions of me and the world. Have by his feedback 'done' the steps. As if- a lifelong, daily, minute by minute and cyclic thingy.
Hi Steely- has your avatar got anything to do with BHP?
Pelagic- hi. You sound much more grounded than before times. Good to read your stories. Are you doing SMART? I seem to remember you were looking into that. I do as well as AA. And counselling. And psychologist. And here. Overkill? No- keeps me sane and I slowly learn and grow. I almost have the emotional maturity of an 11 year old now.
Hi Steely- has your avatar got anything to do with BHP?
Pelagic- hi. You sound much more grounded than before times. Good to read your stories. Are you doing SMART? I seem to remember you were looking into that. I do as well as AA. And counselling. And psychologist. And here. Overkill? No- keeps me sane and I slowly learn and grow. I almost have the emotional maturity of an 11 year old now.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Minnetonka, MN
Posts: 155
I'm on Day 7. At the end of the day today, that will be a full week of sobriety, and it's been quite a while I think since I've been sober for a full week. Lots of anxiety bubbling to the surface, but I've got an appointment with a new therapist on Wednesday morning. Also talked to my parents some about my girlfriend situation...I had messed up at the start of all this, forgetting what our plans were for getting together last week, and she got so disgusted with me that she said she couldn't be my girlfriend until I fix things. She really stresses the hell out of me and still manages to do so even NOT as my girlfriend, apparently. I haven't quite figured out if I'm stressed because I love her and am afraid of losing her, or if I'm just in an incredibly unhealthy relationship that I need to get away from. I do know that alcohol will NOT help me figure that out.
Have a good Monday, everybody! Stay strong!!
Have a good Monday, everybody! Stay strong!!
Member
Join Date: Jun 2016
Location: Adelaide, Australia
Posts: 28,637
Illum- for me- I found out too late for me the following...
I thought I HAD to give up for my (then) wife. Not for me- for her. For my sons, my career- not me. I should have focussed on being sober for me. Because all the other stuff did not happen, could not and did not happen. I need to stay sober- for me.
I thought I HAD to give up for my (then) wife. Not for me- for her. For my sons, my career- not me. I should have focussed on being sober for me. Because all the other stuff did not happen, could not and did not happen. I need to stay sober- for me.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2016
Location: Ontario, Canada
Posts: 3,197
Well I am up and showered. Going to eat something and just take some extra care of myself today. Luckily I don't go back to work til tomorrow so I have some time to shrug off this awful feeling - I hate this.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Minnetonka, MN
Posts: 155
Originally Posted by PhoenixJ
Illum- for me- I found out too late for me the following...
I thought I HAD to give up for my (then) wife. Not for me- for her. For my sons, my career- not me. I should have focussed on being sober for me. Because all the other stuff did not happen, could not and did not happen. I need to stay sober- for me.
I thought I HAD to give up for my (then) wife. Not for me- for her. For my sons, my career- not me. I should have focussed on being sober for me. Because all the other stuff did not happen, could not and did not happen. I need to stay sober- for me.
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