Programmer27

Just throwing this out there to kind of hear what other people think.

So growing up I was always a huge nerd... big time into video games, star wars, computers, blah blah...

I majored in Computer Science in college because it was something I was hugely passionate about and I loved it. Still tinkering at home building custom gaming rigs and still playing a heck of a lot of video games. Then I started drinking in college and before I knew it, my absolute favorite past time became getting drunk with friends and playing online video games together. Whether online at home alone or actually at their dorms/house together.

Fast forward a few years and I'm working in the field at what I would have considered my dream job. I realized a while back I was an alcoholic and have since made the adjustments to my life to quit drinking. I've started excersing and doing a lot more stuff outside of my usual hobbies, including not drinking.

SOO what I can't figure out is why all of the sudden I just really don't get anymore enjoyment out of the hobby that I once loved, when I'm not drunk. I still have a passion for technology and gaming in general, BUT I'm finding that my gaming has become a HUGE HUGE HUGE trigger for wanting to drink. I want to figure out how to seperate the two. It's almost as if alcohol cursed that one thing that I love. Any suggestions or similar experiences? It's gotten to the point where I have wanted a career change... but I just can't leave and find another career where I can make this kind of money, and I'm still really happy at work most of the time. I just want to get that hobby back without it being a trigger...

Mark75

Of course, I read this type of share often and I can relate... How long have you been sober?

I found it took a while to get the passion back... longer than I thought it would. And it came back, but very differently. I was hooked on stimulants in addition to alcohol and I think that has something to do with it... the whole dopamine thing. 3-D and High Def and all that... not so much now... just real, LOL

munchkin05

Well I don't have the complete complications you do as my job was not a trigger for drinking but my hobbies sometimes can be triggers.
I love cooking all sorts of cuisines, but I tend to specialize in French, Mexican and Italian. French cooking tends to revolve a lot around wine, as does Italian dishes sometimes so that means in the past I always needed at least 1 to 2 cups of a red or white wine.
Now when I have to open a bottle for a dish I use it up almost immediately in a broth that I will make and then freeze for later. (yes, I make my own culinary broths as well. What can I say? I'm serious about food!)

Programmer27

"""exercising""" wouldn't let me edit and correct that mistake lol.

I made it to about a month sober then slipped... now I'm back at almost a month again. I don't really have any desire to at the moment or anything like that.

Heck it's not even that when I play video games I get a huge desire to drink I guess... I just connect the two and realize it's a trigger... I then just find it as something that is hard to enjoy.

I HATE THAT.

Honestly right now, I'm just so tired of drinking that it makes me exhausted to even think about it.

Mark75

Programmer...

It will get better. Keep playing those video games... There will come a time when you lose that very strong association... I was that way with playing guitar... I am fine now, in fact I think a play a bit better, more accurate and expressive.

It doesn't happen overnight, but it happens.

What kind of recovery "program" are you using? Have you changed what you are doing to recover?

newdayfortoday

I found that it's more the action of drinking then wanting to drink and be drunk. My trigger was when I would come home from work and also when I would have my best friend over. I started replacing alcohol with tea which helped because I was still drinking but this wouldn't give me a buzz. Just sharing what helped me.

Programmer27

I'm in AA, have a sponsor, have talked to my doctor, started taking an anti-d, have a counselor, and a spiritual counselor. Considering starting celebrate recovery too. At this point I'm trying everything, because I just can't do this any longer.

Right now I'm working with a christian based spiritual counselor to kind of... figure out the way I want to look at a higher power. I believe in something greater than myself... and what that is I'm finding I may never know.

Right now I'm considering my higher power is something simple... something in the universe or inside me that is driving me to just be a better person. Something I may not ever fully understand, but I'm making the realization that it is there.

As far as AA goes, I've read the big book and am starting the steps. I'm finding that the most encouraging thing about AA is the end result of helping others get through this (and staying sober myself lol). I only say that because now I know what kind of a struggle it is, and if I ever had the chance to help someone get out of it... well that's a big drive for me.

EDIT: Another thing that I've noticed about myself is that my personality is one of extremes. Started going to the gym... not a few times a week, but 5-6. If i start playing a game, I'll play for hours and hours. If I eat, I eat until I'm exhaustingly full. When I was in college I would obsess over the classes I knew I could do well in, if I thought I was going to struggle I would drop the class until I could devote a lot more time to it. I chose computers because I can spend hours doing it and not think twice. When I would drink I would DRINK until I passed out. I either do something full throttle... or don't freaking do it at all. If something minor interupts my attempts to do those things... I get anxious and depressed, or irritable. I have not mentioned that to my doctor who prescribed my anti-d, which I'm thinking that I probably should.

I need some moderation and patience in life.

Mark75

I can relate to that too.

All I can offer you is my experience. I have found joy and fulfillment in all the things that I used to associate with alcohol, with the exception of going to bars and drinking parties, of course...

Maybe inventory this thing... I did, and I came up with some very surprising and astonishing insight which helped immensely.

MentalLoop

i have a bit of a similar problem. I have a touch (some say an extreme) OCD issue. I can't do something and half ass it - it's either all or none. By way of example - I even optimize my showers so that i get the most conditioning time while doing other things like soaping my body and brushing my teeth (yeah I have issues). If i start fixing a computer problem like a double NAT (i threw that in for you specifically) that kills my VPN, i can't walk away until it's fixed which has resulted in 2X24hr sessions. I found that my drinking exacerbated this problem many fold because not only was i neurotic, but i was also grouchy the next morning when i started to tackle my issues, foggy in the sense that I worked in a circle when a straight line would have solved it much faster, and error prone when i continued my efforts with glasses of wine in hand come the evening. In the last sober 30 days, i have found my ability to attack my issues super successful. In fact just last night i fixed a Dish network over the web issue for my mother that customer service couldn't fix in 5 hours by simply putting the device in the DMZ (20mins solve). I also have found a new approach to tackling my OCD...apply OCD to OCD itself. I now try and force myself to do things that i know I am not ok with - As a challenge, i try to accomplish daily tasks in a non-optimized fashion - not so much to be inefficient, but more specifically, to do it, and not feel anxiety about it. Something i couldn't even think about when clouded by alcohol. Even my shower has changed...i brushed my teeth before getting in, did all my activities prior to conditioning, then just stood in the shower with conditioner in my hair for 10 minutes under the water (we'll tackle wasting water another day). You know what i learned? Standing under hot running water and doing nothing is actually very very relaxing. Furthers the happiness of the day!

Programmer27

HAHAHA omg that's hilarious. I too brush my teeth in the shower. I have found myself so hungover (read drunk) early in the mornings that I would sometimes add users to in our active directory, give them rights... and having to call them later to see if they could log on or that their drives remapped, because I wasn't sure if I had actually already done it. Luckily (or unluckily) I could remote in to work from home when I was "too tired" to make the drive.

Jitterbugg

I think I can relate. My alcoholism really took hold when I lost my job in late 2008 and had too much spare time. I would drink beer and play World of Warcraft all night. It was great because it felt like I wasn't drinking alone. Anyway, I went to rehab earlier this year and haven't played WoW since. It seems to have lost its magic without the booze.

GirlFromCO

This was a serious challenge for me! I like painting, and in the years leading up to my recovery I always drank heavily when doing it. It was so hard at first without it. I didn't know how to be still and creative... it was like I was afraid to be alone with myself. It was not easy for me to overcome that mental barrier, but I forced myself and I am glad I did. It took sitting in the studio with no drink (after posting a similar thread, lol), no music or anything else besides my own thoughts and the canvas. I was really rusty but it was honest work, and it's gotten easier and actually far more enjoyable over time. I'm learning new things and actually finishing projects now. When I was drinking I was a caricature of an artist, now I am starting to feel like a real one

foxyfox123

sell you home pcs mate

Programmer27

I wonder if we have any other recovering gamers on here? Surely there are some xbox live/psonline people to connect with. If you want to play sometime PM me your user name and I'll add you on either system.

DisplacedGRITS

I hear you Programmer. I used to play a Halo drinking game with my husband. We would play versus and it was stuff like 4 shots for death by falling, 3 for sticky granades, you get the drift. I haven't played Halo since I admitted that I have a drinking problem. I kinda want to play now since my desire to socially drink is nil. It's taken a long time, as in years, to feel okay. I've just had to get a lot of time to break the desire to drink and play. Abstinence has worked for me. Good luck.

Programmer27

I guess the disassocation will simply grow over time as I'm sober. As it will with everything. I've started meditating for about 5 or 10 minutes in the morning and the same after I workout and take a shower... this has been extremely nice for some reason. I would have always thought it was bogus before trying it.

I've also started doing some pretty easy yoga... which is great. It's amazing, even with the one relapse, I've still managed to lose 30 lbs in about 2 months.

Sobriety in every single way is amazing... sure I feel depressed at times, but I'm working through that. I just want that thought to NEVER enter my mind, no matter what I'm doing.

I seriously think about alcohol more playing a round of halo or battlefield than watching a beer or liquor ad on T.V. ITS ANNOYING lol

DayTrader

Prog.......great posts all around in this thread. They put a smile on my face.

....and I feel ya on the gaming deal. For me, it was more "just being on the computer" but, with practice, I re-learned how to do that without drinking - just like I had to learn how to post, browse, game and what not WHILE drinking.

CR (Celebrate Recovery) is a great thing. In my area I found a lot of celebrating but not much "recovery" in the meetings. Lots of fellowshipping and lots of spirituality but very few were managing to stay sober for long - but your mileage may vary.

Like the priests, the rabbi, the minister, and the 2 nuns I know in recovery...I needed a plan for living life in sobriety in addition to what I was finding at CR meetings.

Keep going with the honesty and the openness......they'll serve you well in getting and staying sober for the rest of your life.

dawnrunner

i think it is fabulous that you are meditating and doing yoga. Bringing you back into your body from your busy mind. That is so helpful.

I was just wondering if there's a game you have never played, that would be new and without the old associations? Can't think of anything I've heard of lately but I am not a gamer...there's a new Call of Duty, right? But it is probably much like the previous ones.

Anyway, for me when new to sobriety (which I have been on several occasions, alas), having something totally new in my life is extremely beneficial and aids the fresh start feeling that I need.

Programmer27

Actually, there is! I went out with my girlfriend and bought it lastnight. It's a new star wars online game... similar to WoW. I've started playing it with a few of my now non-drinking college buddies, and I admitted to them online and over the phone that I was an alcoholic and have decided to quit.

Funny enough... most of them, including one of my close friends, was like "ah you're finally seeing what many of us saw long ago, that's good man"

We all drank heavily in college, but they quit afterwards. Even when we were in our hayday, I was the one that was causing problems 90 percent of the time.

EDIT: To the credit of my buddies in college, we did reach that point towards our final year together where they did actually attempt to help me moderate, but they didn't understand the... I guess complex nature of alcoholism and the need for complete abstinence. In that regard, I never in a million years say they encouraged my drinking, and that they did have my best interest in mind. As everyone here knows, it's up to the person (me) to want to change, nobody else can do it for you.

InsertNameHere

Just discovered and read this thread and I am going through the exact same thing I posted the below a couple of days ago.

I am mainly an RTS player but when playing I alwase had a beer sitting next to me and would usualy play until I couldn't keep up with the pace of the game anymore then switch to a total war game because it is turn based LOL. But yeah it is still difficult for me to have the same amount of interest in the games that I once had and not have the constant desire for a drink when playing. I have thus far been mildly successful by just keeping a glass of something next to me be it water soda or other random nonalcoholic concoction. I like dawn runners sugestion of finding a new game though trouble is I don't know of any new RTS's that have come out recently except SC2 and I have that but need internet to reactivate it (sigh).

INH