free2Bsober13

Lately I feel like I just can't keep up this life of constant "recovery". I'm growing weary of it all. When I first accepted my drinking problem, I was totally on board. For a while I was excited about a life of sobriety. Since my last relapse 8 days ago, I feel like I just want to be done! Am I crazy? Is it possible to go back to just being a normal person again? This is all getting to be way too hard! Things weren't terrible all the time. Very often I was good at social drinking, and I think I can be again. I know I can. Advice???

alphaomega

I would say its your battle, your life and ulitmately your recovery.

But not many of us are successful at moderation. God knows I have never failed at anything so miserably as I fail at moderation. I make up for lost time, drink to blackout, or if I don't I'm disappointed that I can't. Wake up in Hell and get exhausted at the thought of having to start at day one.

What led you here to begin with ? Might your resolve be down because you slipped ? Are you possibly just wanting to throw in the towel because it feels easier to do that than start again ? I know that's what happens to me when I slip. I'm all "Screw it" I'm over it.

But I never am. I would like to be, but I wont ever be.

Because, like it or not, I'm an alcoholic.

Mizzuno

Great advice Alpha. In all honesty, It came down to this for my recovery: Quit drinking and deal with the discomfort (which in time leaves) or live a life of trying to moderate and be miserable while sabotaging myself. I choose to live my life free of the sabotage.

changeiscoming

For almost a year now I have gone back and forth. Sober for a week then drinking for 2 weeks straight, then getting sick and tired of that. I tried the "I will only drink on the train ride home, or I will only drink if I am out with friends." Deep down inside I know I am an alcoholic. Although it was not long ago my last drink was on 10/3/13. I realized when I drink I turn into a liar and a sneak and I dont want to be that person. I want to be able to look at myself honestly. I know my road ahead is going to have some difficult challenges but I need to face them head on.

If you have to tell yourself you can drink socially or responsibly you most likely cant. Actual social drinkers never have that come into their mind.

Be well.

actorchris

Its a cliche thought. Straight out of the AA book. And one I've suffered from and fallen from a handful of times, with multiple years sober. So the thought can go away and then later return. I'm coming back from a relapse. Last month I had 2 years sober. Now I've relapsed each weekend since. Terrible, awful relapses. And each week that same idea your describing would convince me that this time would be different.. Now I'm scared I'm going to lose everything I spent 2 years in recovery building up. My whole life..

So, I wish I had just planted my foot and said I'm not going to chance it. The risks are too great. But I didnt. And now Im struggling to keep it together and just get past a week. That thought your describing will come for me again. This weekend most likely, once i start feeling a bit better. But not this time. I'm not doing it again. I'll say to that voice, "No. Drinking is not an option".

So that's my hope strength and experience. I'm gonna try and get myself out to a noon meeting. Be my first since this weekend's relapse. YOu may consider same and sharing what you shared here.

Rooting for you. -Chris

SkyeSea

Welcome to SR Changeiscoming x

changeiscoming

Thanks! I want to feel again!

Anna

I wonder what part of recovery is making you so weary?

For me, recovery is just a simple part of my day. I try to do yoga, read something positive, spend time on SR - all things I enjoy doing. Understandably there are times when life is difficult, but it's not my recovery that makes it difficult. It's just life.

Notmyrealname

I am curious, what part of being a drinker do you miss?

hypochondriac

I totally get it free2Bsober. Things got worse for me in sobriety before they got better. In some ways anyway. Physically I was healing and I could feel that, but mentally it was a bit of a struggle. One of the things that kept me going was thinking 'this is ridiculous! no one should have to have alcohol to function.'. I was determined that I would find a way to live sober. Nowadays it is not so much of a struggle, more just maintenance. At just over 8 days I would expect no miracles. Please keep at it, it gets better. For me recovery isn't about hard work, it is about moving forwards. You will only stagnate if you keep drinking, there is no good that can come of it. But if you stay sober you might find a whole new life you never knew existed...

Dee74

try and think of it this way - we drank for years.

It's going to take a little time for you to adjust to not drinking, especially if your life revolved around drinking like mine did.

early recovery takes a lot of effort - there's no way around that - but it's not like that for ever - I still work on my recovery but it's like breathing or eating now - it's not a chore, it just is

you can romanticise your drinking and rationalise it away as not that bad really- but the fact is something bought you here, and something keeps dragging you back to drinking - to me that signifies a problem that needs to be worked on more, not less?

does your faith help at all Free?

D

Hevyn

Hi free2be. I'm sorry you're feeling down and disillusioned. Glad you wanted to talk about it though.

Dee is right - these feelings won't last forever. No one would have success with sobriety if that was the case. I was obsessed with 'not drinking' for awhile, but now it never crosses my mind. I was sorry for myself early on - but I made a list of all the awful things that had happened & reasons why I stopped in the first place. I knew I couldn't trust myself to drink socially ever again. I'd tested that idea too many times - with disastrous & dangerous results. I hope you'll stick to your plan of being sober. As Dee said, there's a reason you came here - a reason you wanted to be free of it.

Itchy

"Alcohol provides us an avenue to run away from all of our problems . . . except the results of using alcohol. <sigh>"

Wrote that in early recovery. Now, things are better. But in the last three years there were some challenges from sobriety to overcome. I had a very tough time for my first three months. Only tough until six months. After that it got better and better. I am recovered, no struggle anymore. But I still can't ever handle one drink, or one smoke. Then I would be exactly where you are and have to go through it all again. Like you said it is hard to do once. Why would you go through it again? See, my health was going and I have no choice. I lucked out and mostly healed. But I am out of tomorrows to waste drinking today.

I hope you do whatever it takes to get sober.

free2Bsober13

It sounds crazy, but I just miss having a couple of drinks out with friends or with my husband. I certainly don't miss the drunken acts of craziness, most of which I don't even remember. I'm jealous of people who can continue to drink normally.

pinkdog

Hi free2bsober, I know what you mean. Recovering takes alot of effort. It gets easier tho. I know I can't drink and be well. Keep going. It really does get easier.

free2Bsober13

I believe my faith is the main thing that's keeping me going. I believe God wanted me to quit drinking. I'm stubborn, I guess, and just want to prove I can be under control. That's aweful, I know. I would love for the desire to just go away! I look forward to a day when not drinking is the norm for me.

doggonecarl

Yep, sounds crazy. Chances are the drinking-normal train has left the station long ago. But us telling you that moderation doesn't work won't convince you. Even remembering you own failed attempts at control won't convince you. No, only drinking again will convince you, one way or the other.

Good luck.

bloss

Just take it daily, by not taking the first drink, the real "you" is living the day.
You are in control, not the addiction. No need to test it.

Dee74

I dunno about you but I very very rarely ONLY had a couple of drinks....and even when I did I had more at home or the next day or whenever which led to those drunken acts of craziness.

It took me many years to realise I was missing something that existed largely only in my own mind


I think the greatest thing we can do in our recovery is accept what and who we are - not to settle for that necessarily, cos there's always room for improvement, but to accept our basic 'us-ness'.

I really believe that's who God wants us to be - but don't worry you're not the first person to kick against what God wants us to do

D

Itchy

Free2be,
How are you doing today?

I go out and have drinks with my wife and friends easily. Just mine aren't alcoholic. I don't miss alcohol at all anymore. That is what I call normal now. No thinking about it, no craving, but most of all no missing out on anything. Being under the influence is not missed because I have the exact memory of how it felt before, during, and after going under the influence by my own hand. Nothing missed or yearned for or craved. Then there is the I am cured I can drink normally now or the I just want to see if I can, or the ridiculous I just want to remember what it feels like again.

WHAT? (my self says to myself) So I did the math. I drank morning to night for the last two years. Pretty much 30 units a day of beer wine and scotch. 30 drinks a day times 365 times 2= 21,908 drinks in my last two years of drinking. Sick, miserable, shaky, but that many just in the last two years I drank.

No rational part of me can deny that I know quite well the taste and feeling and results of each one of them. I never acted out. I never blacked out. Never hurt others. Just became alcohol dependent and was proceeding to drink myself to death, a death I felt closing in.

I have no penance to pay, no guilt over anything. But losing the years I used for living in an alcohol haze is the price for what started out as fun, progressed to habit, became my goal at work, counting the minutes until I could have the drinks I use. Then not waiting and having just one in the morning to get steady, two at lunch, then one before heading home so I wasn't drunk, but was steady enough to get home to settle in for a night of booze. Finally I just quit because I have a retirement and investments and started drinking at noon. The had to put shots in my coffee to stop the shakes. I rarely slurred or stumbled, appeared sober because I was no longer getting the kick. At the end, alcohol kicked my butt.

THERE IS NO WAY I WILL DO ANYTHING TO REPEAT THAT EVER AGAIN!

I am free, and easy. And will never fool myself into even one tiny drink or cigarette for whatever loony reason we all can, and have, come up with.

Under the influence my mind and life were an unmade bed. I have simply made my mind up.