Here I go again...
 

Hi. I know that we can't ask for or give medical advice in this forum....but...was just wondering if anybody who has used medication to take away the desire to drink. I was sober for nearly three years.....after the loss of a family member, a geographical change, isolation and quitting AA.....I have found my way back to drinking. I feel so down, alone and not sure that I can get back on the sober road without extra help this time. Due to the financial disaster that us alcoholics often find ourselves I work long hours and now live in a area that has very few meetings. I don't want to wait for another rock bottom to give up.....and my desire to drink isn't allowing me to stop.....I am prepared to work a program again, but am worried that I don't have enough access to keep me sober. Is it silly for me to consider using medication to help with the desire alongside one meeting a week. Other meetings are about one and a half hours away....and... I just can't afford to get to them. I am finding it so much harder this time. I found it easier to give up drinking after 35 years then trying to give up this time after 6 months....Any suggestions would be truly appreciated.

I used medication with the docs approval and it helps! Its just a helping hand.

Thanku....a helping hand is what i need...not another rock bottom. not sure i could survive another one of those.

I went to rehab, got with a psych and a therapist. They started me on a slew of meds to treat a number of issues, including one to help lessen (not eliminate) cravings. If you can get with a therapist who can recommend a psych, i'd do that. Personally, it's saving my life.

Ask your doctor about Campral. I have taken it and it does help with cravings.

If you can't afford to get to them...Is there any way you could use the money you use to drink...To help you out with that?....I drank a long time...It's mot cheap...

Antabuse worked miraculously for me.

I would be at work and have the usual after-crappy-interaction thought of "can't wait to get home and dive into my wine" thought, then the follow up "oh, took antabuse, can't" thought, and that would be it - I guess my brain agreed that it wasn't an option and didn't spend any more time fizzing about it.

There was adjustment of course. Going out to dinner and being perplexed about what to do when the waiter first stopped by for the drink order. Getting home and not pouring a glass before I even took off shoes or coat - that'll give you a good case of the something's missings. What to do on Sunday. But those were habits, not cravings.

Once that ended I quit taking the antabuse, but I keep it around just in case and plan to always.

I think I'm really lucky the way it worked out, I never expected it to be so easy, but it was. I now take a high-octane sleeping pill to take the night terrors out of the equation and I think that sleeping well gives me the emotional resources to deal with most things in an acceptable way.

That's my experience.

oh yeah, antabuse is dirt cheap too.

I won't name any specific drug, but there are some available. Why not see your doctor and come up with a plan?

Call your AA office and see if they will bring a meeting to you? There are solutions!

aa online chatroom. Online: Addiction, Alcoholism - In The Rooms - Drug Addiction Treatment also has meetings. There are telephone conference meetings and other meetings online if you search for them, there are meetings on SR, too.

In person is always best. If you are talking about the time and price of gas in getting to those meetings, yeah, it's difficult today, but doable, at least once every two weeks, if anything to get phone numbers of people you meet.

Remember your tools and start using them. Yeah, after every relapse, it seems more difficult to stay stopped, something about our brain chemistry.

Wishing you sobriety,

Echoing sugerbear1 :). There are soooo many resources available to you online it's crazy. Pal talk has lots of meeting several times a day, intergoup also has a list of online meetings, make one yourself as well. I do this all the time! I get WAY more out of just sitting and talking to others, discussing progress, steps, life, etc :)
Good luck!