JCinSD

My first post… Here goes.

Day 25, still sober. Made it through the first week with the migraine headaches, cold sweats, nausea, insomnia, body aches & pains, shaking hands… then the mental/emotional withdrawals joined the fun. Anxiety, fear, anger, frustration, depression, mental fog, confusion, lack of focus and concentration, and the ever-present self-doubt that I have no clue how I’m going to get through it all – and the fear that I DO, and THEN what? By the end of the first week the physical side-effects were waning, but emotionally, I felt like I’d just lost my best friend.

And it got better. Well, until now. 25 days. Five days short of my second token. I’ve got a great sponsor, I work the steps, I go to meetings, I read the big book, I listen to speaker tapes via my iPhone all day long while I’m driving around town for work. So why now – this sudden feeling of restlessness, irritability, and discontent? It’s come on strong – hit me like a bus, and I can’t shake it. This past week has been hard, to say the least. Sure, there’s lots going on – life being life; kids, house, girlfriend, bills, and work. Aren’t those just grand problems to have? I’m grateful I have them! So why am I so pissed off? Why do I have so much anger, frustration, and zero patience for anyone and anything that “distracts” me from myself? After 25 days???

I’m doing daily meetings. Meetings I actually LIKE. Seeing people I like to talk to, and more importantly LISTENING to them. The old timers, God bless ‘em! But I have to go home sometime. I have to leave the meetings, and resume to my “life”. And then it begins, all over again. The frustration, the anger, the intolerance… for the littlest things. The funny part is I’m totally aware of it! And I feel terrible, after snapping at someone or something. It’s ME, not anyone or anything else. I’m praying about it, but it’s just there. All over again.

Any thoughts? Thank you, in advance. I’d love to hear if anyone else has/is going through this..

- JCinSD

Dee74

I moved this from Daily Support forum.
Newcomers is the forum for new threads

I think life keeps happening - and once the novelty of being sober wears off a little...life can return to hit us like a truck.

I drank for 20 years - it took me a few months to learn to deal with life sober and reach an emotional equilibrium...it took me the best part of a year, maybe even more, to really fully get myself 'together'...

25 days is great - but it's just 25 days

did you run this one by your sponsor?

D

sugarbear1

Depends on what step you are on right now......have you gotten through steps 4-9?

JCinSD

Dee,

I think you're right; I'm just still so new and not used to sobriety. Things (life) have really stretched me thin lately, and I clearly am not at a place of peace. Nor have I learned the tools...

Yep, my sponsor says to give myself a break and keep working the steps, praying, and in time serenity (and those tools to keep/maintain it), will come.

A year, huh? Sigh. Well, 11 months to go.

JCinSD

Sugar,

I've only worked the first two steps... so yes, I'm just starting out.

Lenina

JC,

Do you write out daily gratitude lists? Try making one each day, ten things you have reason for gratitude.

Find someone to help. Another alcoholic/addict or just some one who needs a hand. Post on SR, write a blog on SR. These are things that helped me.

Love from Lenina

lilgolden73

Hey JC!! 25 days is great! I didn't start to snap out of it until about 3 months, I was the same way you are, hang in there, it gets better

instant

It really took me six months to really settle down. At 20 months I still see myself as in a period of transition

Coldfusion

HI, JC!

You're doing almost all the right things.

I'm not sure about AA, but I think that you're not giving Sober Recovery a chance. You came back today and checked you posts, which is good, but you appear to have logged off already tonight.

I have seen people come here to SR with "anger, frustration, and zero patience for anyone and anything that 'distracts,'" and sometimes all you need to do is vent and then it's better. More than that, I find that by helping others it puts me in a good head space.

Thanks for coming back and reading this!

Fallow

Some days are just like that.

How close do you feel to God? What day are you in?

Questions I ask myself when I feel the way you described.

sugarbear1

You should be restless, irritable, and discontent until you move through steps 4-12; this is the action of recovery!

MIRecovery

"In recovery there are no losers, just slow winners."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From Wisdom of the Rooms


I remember being in early recovery and feeling so bad that I just knew it wasn't working. I'd tell my sponsor about it, and I can still hear him saying, "Michael, you're exactly where you should be, and that's exactly what you should be feeling right now." At first I thought he was just handing me a line, but after a while I believed him and learned to trust in the slow progress I was making in recovery.

Years later I'd hear other newcomers complain about how bad they felt and about how terrible of a day they were having. I can still hear the old timers ask them if they had a drink that day. "No," they'd respond. "Then no matter bad you think you're doing, when you lay your head on your pillow tonight you're a winner." It was comforting to hear that back then, and it still is today.

Now that I've been in recovery a while I understand the wisdom in this week's quote. It doesn't matter what you're going through in recovery or how you feel, the fact that you are in recovery, that you have a program, and that you're developing or improving your conscious contact with a power greater than yourself means that you've already won. You may feel like a loser temporarily, but most of the time and in the long run you'll live a life filled with the joys and miracles of recovery.

Over time you, too, will come to see that in recovery there are no losers, just slow winners.