How can I stop?
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 11
How can I stop?
I have been trying to stop since May. I have been to AA and have only stopped drinking for 20 days at the most since July of 2012. Just a short story, been drinking since I was 13, now 29. Have 3 kids and married for almost 12 years. I have stopped for several years. While I was pregnant and Breastfeeding, and it picked up after my last child. I know I'm an alcoholic. I have even drank mouthwash before. It's sickening to me. I'm a good mom. I love my kids more than anything. From the outside looking in it all looks perfect. Nice house, nice cars, 3 kids and parents who love them. But I'm an alcoholic. I can stop drinking once I start. I'm on the verge of a divorce, but he has given me many chances. He loves me more than I can explain, and I can't believe my alcoholism has taken me this far. I have no insurance and can't go to rehab. My youngest child is 2 and I stay home with her while my older 2 are in school. Please help. I can't lose my family or my life.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Ohio
Posts: 3,785
Welcome to SR sweetmama. I am glad you are here.
I also stopped when I had my children but in reality my drinking had not yet progressed to the point that I could not stop or at least take a break. I look back now and realize it was merely an interruption in the process. It did not stop the progression, it just slowed it to a crawl. Once I had the kids it started back up at an aggressive rate.
Have you considered going back to AA? Maybe last time you were not ready. They say when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Are you ready this time to do what ever it takes?
When I first went I was not ready, it was not my time. The difference between last time and this time is unbelievable. It is entirely different for me.
Maybe you should try a meeting. It only takes that first day to set the change in motion.
I also stopped when I had my children but in reality my drinking had not yet progressed to the point that I could not stop or at least take a break. I look back now and realize it was merely an interruption in the process. It did not stop the progression, it just slowed it to a crawl. Once I had the kids it started back up at an aggressive rate.
Have you considered going back to AA? Maybe last time you were not ready. They say when the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Are you ready this time to do what ever it takes?
When I first went I was not ready, it was not my time. The difference between last time and this time is unbelievable. It is entirely different for me.
Maybe you should try a meeting. It only takes that first day to set the change in motion.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 370
My story is not unlike GracieLou's (except the kid part, I'm a man). I went to 30-day rehab, and quit for almost 5 years, but never engaged AA when I got out. I was young, the meetings were a drag, and I didn't see the value.
16 years later now, drinking has finally spun out of control and cost me the most valuable relationship I had. I've paid too high a price, and I decided it stops here. This time I am open to God, open to the program, willing to get out of my own way, willing to make this my first priority, and willing to do the hard work.
No one but you can help you reach the point you're truly done, ready and willing to do what ever it takes to succeed. I knew 20 days ago when I woke up bloody and beat to hell, with no knowledge of how I got home, or the events of the night before, I'd had my last drink.
If you are ready, make it a priority. It sounds like you've got a supportive man, I'm sure he'd watch the kid so you can go to meetings and get involved.
16 years later now, drinking has finally spun out of control and cost me the most valuable relationship I had. I've paid too high a price, and I decided it stops here. This time I am open to God, open to the program, willing to get out of my own way, willing to make this my first priority, and willing to do the hard work.
No one but you can help you reach the point you're truly done, ready and willing to do what ever it takes to succeed. I knew 20 days ago when I woke up bloody and beat to hell, with no knowledge of how I got home, or the events of the night before, I'd had my last drink.
If you are ready, make it a priority. It sounds like you've got a supportive man, I'm sure he'd watch the kid so you can go to meetings and get involved.
Keeping it simple!
Join Date: Dec 2012
Location: Surrey, BC
Posts: 3,282
Hi Sweetmama, welcome to SR. Glad you have found us.
I can certainly relate to not being able to stop once I start drinking. I could quit for 2 weeks and then would start back up again. I finally reached my bottom when it got to the point that my daughter was going to have to kick me to the curb and I didn't want to put her in that position.
You can do this. It is scary, but it is so worth it to live a sober life. You will not be sorry.
I can certainly relate to not being able to stop once I start drinking. I could quit for 2 weeks and then would start back up again. I finally reached my bottom when it got to the point that my daughter was going to have to kick me to the curb and I didn't want to put her in that position.
You can do this. It is scary, but it is so worth it to live a sober life. You will not be sorry.
Recovering ostrich
Join Date: Aug 2012
Location: Tampa Bay, Florida
Posts: 2,551
Hiya sweetmama. I wish I had stopped when my kid was younger but it wasn't in the cards. If you tired AA before, did you have a sponsor and had you started on the steps?
You can do this!
You can do this!
Member
Join Date: May 2013
Location: North East, US
Posts: 2,310
Hey sweetmomma
I'm a stay home momma too! It's a tough gig, isolating reward less frustrating, tiring, endless. For too many years I thought the light at the end if the tunnel was having my vino at night. Turns out that wine was making my already hard job harder.
As a sober mom my job description is still tiring however, I feel fabulous. I don't have a trigger switch anymore, I'm calm I'm happy I'm the mom I always PRETENDED to be!
Give yourself this opportunity to start living a full life. Big changes are going to happen and you just might actually find who you were really meant to be
Be well and welcome to SR!
I'm a stay home momma too! It's a tough gig, isolating reward less frustrating, tiring, endless. For too many years I thought the light at the end if the tunnel was having my vino at night. Turns out that wine was making my already hard job harder. As a sober mom my job description is still tiring however, I feel fabulous. I don't have a trigger switch anymore, I'm calm I'm happy I'm the mom I always PRETENDED to be!
Give yourself this opportunity to start living a full life. Big changes are going to happen and you just might actually find who you were really meant to be
Be well and welcome to SR!
Kaleidoscope eyes
Join Date: Oct 2013
Location: London
Posts: 5,243
Originally Posted by sweetmamaof3 
I have been trying to stop since May. I have been to AA and have only stopped drinking for 20 days at the most since July of 2012. Just a short story, been drinking since I was 13, now 29. Have 3 kids and married for almost 12 years. I have stopped for several years. While I was pregnant and Breastfeeding, and it picked up after my last child. I know I'm an alcoholic. I have even drank mouthwash before. It's sickening to me. I'm a good mom. I love my kids more than anything. From the outside looking in it all looks perfect. Nice house, nice cars, 3 kids and parents who love them. But I'm an alcoholic. I can stop drinking once I start. I'm on the verge of a divorce, but he has given me many chances. He loves me more than I can explain, and I can't believe my alcoholism has taken me this far. I have no insurance and can't go to rehab. My youngest child is 2 and I stay home with her while my older 2 are in school. Please help. I can't lose my family or my life.
AA member
Join Date: Apr 2009
Location: United Kingdom.
Posts: 3,007
Welcome to SR.
Make a decision to stay away from the first drink,think it is only one drink you are giving up.
Go back to the stings,find a sponsor and work on the recovery programme.Meetings alone won't keep you sober.
Wishing you well
Make a decision to stay away from the first drink,think it is only one drink you are giving up.
Go back to the stings,find a sponsor and work on the recovery programme.Meetings alone won't keep you sober.
Wishing you well
Re-Member
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado
Posts: 7,583
It is my belief that once you really want to quit for good, the rest are just support. I broke my problem down into two realizations. I was going to drink myself to death because I HAD progressed to drinking on waking up every day to stop the shakes and get functional, then drinking all day and night every day and only consuming two drinks an hour because I thought I was a "functional alcoholic." (oxymoron for folks up de Nile without their paddles) The last two years I drank it went from no hangovers to bad hangovers to barely being able to drink coffee for the shakes, then spiking the coffee to stop them, if I could hold it down.
I was not in denial I had to quit, and in the last year quit every day by not drinking scotch in my first coffee then since that proved I could stop, I celebrated my control by having a triple and drinking that one last day and quitting tomorrow. Repeated that at least 365 times.
My two realizations were first that I detested the taste and smell and effects of alcohol. That I had drunk my fill years before, and that if I relaxed or kicked back with alcohol any more than I was I'd have to be dead! And was heading that way fast. Alcohol no longer was a relaxer, it was my suicide choice. The more I drank, the less I was able to . . . anything! It was disabling! I was losing my health! All for the adult equivalent to a baby's Binkie. It was not the real thing, as in really easing tensions, it created a whole new set of real health and life issues. I made my life a caricature of who I was by allowing myself to increase my tolerance by going to the well so much I had to stand by it and pour it in.
My first realization was that I had to quit and wanted to desperately. But Just had no safe way as I really could have seizures. And I am not rich so could not afford the rehab places. So I found I qualified for a VA in hospital detox. And started preparing friends and family for my month plus absence for the detox and follow on 28 day rehab.
My second realization was that if I indeed survived the detox I would never, ever, go back to being self enslaved by drinking alcohol ever again. I realized I hated it in every form. I also smoked three packs a day and they triggered drinking alcohol too. So the medical detox was the perfect solution if I was really not going to waste it with a relapse. I knew all about stupid relapses as I talked myself into "trying" a cigarette 18 tears before after successfully quitting for 18 months a two pack a day habit. My relapse resulted in a three pack a day habit and 18 years of regret for getting hooked again. Moderation wasn't!
Three years ago I decided to enter detox because I wanted to, not because I had to. It was the tool to reach my goal of breaking free of that addiction. I used every support in the beginning starting with my doctors, here on SR, then AA in the first month after detox. As well as counseling and reading everything including RR, and SMART online pdfs that are terrific.
I was grateful to have gotten that head start with medical detox. I do not feel deprived of alcohol or craving it at all. Sure, a few early sobriety physical and emotional hard adjustments like sleep, bowel, emotional, and energy wild swings. Knowing they were to be expected made them just tolerable to wait out.
You said: Sorry but you can lose your family. Many here have. You can have your family and a good life and remember your drinking days as a part of your being like a baby, then deciding to grow past the adult "Binkie" of alcohol we all used instead of making the effort to exercise, problem solve, or just plain deal with life.
Or you can keep your alcohol "Binkie" and remember how you used to have a family that got in the way of your drinking. Don't worry, you can drink them away.
The problem? Staying quit? No, just not allowing the delusional beliefs to grow in your mind. If you feel deprived or resentful that you can't drink, and not that you survived, you will relapse. I won't drink. My permanent personal decision. Not can't, won't. I recently had a person quote me but added a single word. I said "We don't drink so are free to do anything we choose." Quoting me the word "if" was added to the beginning. "If we don't drink" is 180 degrees from "We don't drink."
All those "ifs" are the problem. The knee jerk reflex. They are the escape clause.
Yes I know I can't stay sober forever. One day I WILL die and then I am neither, my choices over in this life regardless of beliefs about after life. But, when I do die, as I surely will, it won't be from alcohol. I did not say I hope it won't. I said it won't, because it won't.
Keep your family and be happy. Or drink them away and be happy. You see, not making a decision, is a decision too.
I was not in denial I had to quit, and in the last year quit every day by not drinking scotch in my first coffee then since that proved I could stop, I celebrated my control by having a triple and drinking that one last day and quitting tomorrow. Repeated that at least 365 times.
My two realizations were first that I detested the taste and smell and effects of alcohol. That I had drunk my fill years before, and that if I relaxed or kicked back with alcohol any more than I was I'd have to be dead! And was heading that way fast. Alcohol no longer was a relaxer, it was my suicide choice. The more I drank, the less I was able to . . . anything! It was disabling! I was losing my health! All for the adult equivalent to a baby's Binkie. It was not the real thing, as in really easing tensions, it created a whole new set of real health and life issues. I made my life a caricature of who I was by allowing myself to increase my tolerance by going to the well so much I had to stand by it and pour it in.
My first realization was that I had to quit and wanted to desperately. But Just had no safe way as I really could have seizures. And I am not rich so could not afford the rehab places. So I found I qualified for a VA in hospital detox. And started preparing friends and family for my month plus absence for the detox and follow on 28 day rehab.
My second realization was that if I indeed survived the detox I would never, ever, go back to being self enslaved by drinking alcohol ever again. I realized I hated it in every form. I also smoked three packs a day and they triggered drinking alcohol too. So the medical detox was the perfect solution if I was really not going to waste it with a relapse. I knew all about stupid relapses as I talked myself into "trying" a cigarette 18 tears before after successfully quitting for 18 months a two pack a day habit. My relapse resulted in a three pack a day habit and 18 years of regret for getting hooked again. Moderation wasn't!
Three years ago I decided to enter detox because I wanted to, not because I had to. It was the tool to reach my goal of breaking free of that addiction. I used every support in the beginning starting with my doctors, here on SR, then AA in the first month after detox. As well as counseling and reading everything including RR, and SMART online pdfs that are terrific.
I was grateful to have gotten that head start with medical detox. I do not feel deprived of alcohol or craving it at all. Sure, a few early sobriety physical and emotional hard adjustments like sleep, bowel, emotional, and energy wild swings. Knowing they were to be expected made them just tolerable to wait out.
You said:
Please help. I can't lose my family or my life.
Or you can keep your alcohol "Binkie" and remember how you used to have a family that got in the way of your drinking. Don't worry, you can drink them away.
The problem? Staying quit? No, just not allowing the delusional beliefs to grow in your mind. If you feel deprived or resentful that you can't drink, and not that you survived, you will relapse. I won't drink. My permanent personal decision. Not can't, won't. I recently had a person quote me but added a single word. I said "We don't drink so are free to do anything we choose." Quoting me the word "if" was added to the beginning. "If we don't drink" is 180 degrees from "We don't drink."
All those "ifs" are the problem. The knee jerk reflex. They are the escape clause.
Yes I know I can't stay sober forever. One day I WILL die and then I am neither, my choices over in this life regardless of beliefs about after life. But, when I do die, as I surely will, it won't be from alcohol. I did not say I hope it won't. I said it won't, because it won't.
Keep your family and be happy. Or drink them away and be happy. You see, not making a decision, is a decision too.
Re-Member
Join Date: Oct 2010
Location: Colorado Springs, Colorado
Posts: 7,583
Only one post? Sweetmamma, don't give up. We all have been there. I know it seems impossible to do, and I felt the same way when I quit too. Heck I had to check into a medical inpatient detox before I could break free. I needed help! Then support. That is what SR here is all about, like AA, SMART, rehabs, alcohol counselors, family and friends. If they are willing to help take it. WE all have made all the same excuses why we can't. But got by it with gentle recovered and recovering people like you'll find here.
How are you doing today?
How are you doing today?
Member
Thread Starter
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 11
Thank you so much everyone. I have started attending AA again. I feel right at home there. Everyone can relate to that obsession and I know I can lose my family at any time from this disease. I have unfortunately still been drinking but I made the choice not to pick up today. I'm on day 1. I went to a really good meeting and I was brought to tears by a lady who told a story of her son dying at the young age of 42 from alcoholism. She was also a alcoholic, I have 3 kids who I never want to go down this path. I need to let go of this "adult binky" lol Ain't that the truth itchy! I got a woman's number today t the meeting. We seemed to click real well and I might ask her to sponsor me. Thanks for all the encouragement. You all are awesome.
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