Mrrryah1

Has anyone struggled with not feeling the desire and motivation to stay sober, but somehow hung on until that desire and motivation came? I hear people say when they came into AA they were ready and willing to do whatever it took to stay sober and that's when it worked for them. I don't feel that way today. Not at all. And that scares me. Does that just mean I'm not done yet? Should I even bother trying when I'm missing that sense of desperation that seems to be needed to stay and get it? I can't keep relapsing and coming back. I just can't. It feels awful. Why don't I care enough to stick with it??

doggonecarl

Live by your signature line, not the lies your addiction is telling you.

suki44883

If you were a smoker and diagnosed with early lung cancer, would you continue smoking until your cancer reached Stage 4 before you decided to do something about it?

Aarryckha

I'm sure everyone has bad days. No one said this would be easy. When the urge comes, you have to get through it. I know you can do it. I don't think it needs to be a sense of desperation. You just have to want to change things for yourself.

Hang in there!

hopefulyogi

I feel like I am in the same place. I KNOW I should stop drinking. I know I would feel better and be happier.....but I'm not DESPERATE to stop drinking and sometimes I get really scared that I won't stop until something bad enough to make me desperate happens.

Forghetti35

I felt that way to when I tried to quit in 2011. I wasn't ready that time I believed. It nearly ruined my life having that relapse. The poison of alcohol lied to me. I believed I needed it for something. I thought I needed it for social occasions, to relax, to relieve stress, to not be lame, to do whatever.....in reality alcohol gave me nothing. It never has. I don't know what honest to god reason I could explain that would rationalize it's use. In contrast to the destruction it did, there wasn't any arguments for me to need to continuing poisoning my body. If I did a pro/con list I couldn't find a pro for alcohol...and if I did I was lying about it. My situation may be different from yours. Good luck to you. we are here to help!

Aarryckha

What is an example of something that has to be "bad enough?"

hopefulyogi

I don't know and that is what scares me. With my eating disorder, it took nearly dying....I don't want that to be the case again but I worry I will not find that desperation until I lose something really important

FeelingGreat

Hi Mrrryah, you must recognise alcohol is a problem for you, or you wouldn't keep relapsing and coming back, right? Maybe there are some lucky people for whom a switch goes on and they never want to touch alcohol again, but I bet the vast majority have a real struggle. If you're looking for some magic moment where the desire to drink just disappears, then you may never stop.
I found motivation a real problem too, mainly because I just loved drinking that wine after work. Intellectually I knew it was harming me and I had to stop.
I worked on the motivation by studying the long-term effects of alcohol on health and brain function. I asked my doctor to describe how i would be in 10 years time if I kept drinking and did everything I could to believe it would happen to me. It 'helped' that a couple of drinkers I knew died of alcohol related cancer. Eventually the motivation kicked in.
Everybody's motivation's different; just saying you may have to work at it. And of course stay on SR.

Aarryckha

Mrrryah and yogi, just concentrate on getting through today. Face tomorrow when it gets here.

FeenixxRising

You might try looking in the other direction. By that I mean you may want to spend time each day thinking deeply about what a sober life would be like, think about how you will feel without the worry and consequences of drinking, think about how much healthier in mind, body and spirit you will be without the obsession for alcohol, think about how much money you will save, think about how much you will respect yourself for staying strong and not drinking.

Most of all, think about no longer being controlled by a desire to drink, think about being "free".

I do this for a few minutes each day. At first it didn't really offer much emotional comfort, but I kept at it and it helps me stay focused on the good things and how good my future can be, and it replaces my thoughts of drinking.

ScottFromWI

It's up to you Mrryah. There are multiple levels of how low you can go, and unfortunately some people never stop and die as a result of their choice.

I'd ask you this...what is better about your life while you are drinking? Make a list...literally write it down. You don't need to do it here, do it for yourself...as you are the only one who needs to be convinced.

Anyone can quit, whenever they choose if it's important enough to them. That includes you.

GreenEggsAndHam

I can only speak from personal experience but I never really wanted to quit in the past when I tried - even when in AA before. I knew I should. I knew I had a problem. I knew I was an alcoholic. But I still wanted to control it - have my cake and eat it too.

This time I am completely ready and willing (willing was a tough one for me) to quit and things are going so much more differently. Do I still have moments where I struggle? Sure, but this go I have realized that I will never be able to control my drinking again. Not ever. The only thing I can control is *not* drinking and only with the help of my higher power and a strong support network (and therapy and treatment for my anxiety :~p).

Nothing ever super bad happened to me (no jail time, arrests, DUI, loss of home, divorce, etc) but my relationships were a mess and I was drinking myself into a deep pit of despair where I honestly felt the only way out was suicide, drinking myself to death, or rehab. I guess I have a high bottom, but that's as low as I cared to go.

Maybe ask yourself what you have to gain by continuing to drink? I can't think of one thing...

deeker

Pros and cons list is a great idea.

What have been the benefits of drinking? Feeling numb to life?

If you can continue to drink and live with the voice of your conscience the next day then
maybe you are not ready. But we were given a conscience for a reason. I believe it was
put there by God.

Everyone deep in their heart knows right from wrong.

Sounds like you wish maybe you didn't have a conscience so it wouldn't feel so bad the day
after, but you do have a conscience.

Now it's up to you if can go on and deal with listening to it the day after you drink. Over
and over again.

That little voice was probably the one thing in all my drinking career that bothered me the
most. Not the DUI;s Not The jail stays, that little voice telling me it's time to stop doing
this to myself and my family.

FreeFall

I quit before I was "ready" or hit "rock bottom". A friend's health scare triggered it, but I have known I had a problem for years. It worked well that way because I still felt like I had a choice-when you hit rock bottom there are no choices. When I stopped trying to control it and just stopped it fell into place. I agree with people that say look at the benefits of not drinking over what you're "missing".

Each time my AV tried to convince me it was okay to just have a few once in awhile, it had no answer when I asked what the benefits of that would be.

Stop associating booze with fun and exchange those thoughts for the reality-the embarrassment, the headaches, the lost money, etc. It will get easier. Please don't wait for the desperation stage-it may be too late to undo things at that point.

SoberLeigh

Oh, myrrah, please don't wait for the bottom, for that horrid feeling of desperation. Your intellect has spoken to you; that is a gift. Accept and embrace that gift.

Hevyn

I agree with the others Mrrryah - waiting for further proof that you need to quit is so dangerous. I had to be brought to my knees to finally stop & that's definitely not what you want.

Nonsensical

doggonecarl has it right - because your addiction is lying to you. How else can you go from this:
to ambivalence in 2 months? Alcohol's dominance lingers on...

Going back to drinking until you feel bad enough to quit is as unimaginative as it is foolish. I know - I tried it dozens of times.

If your sober life is unispiring, get to work! Make it inspiring!
Get to work.
You. Can. Do. This.

RobbyRobot

Quitting is its own reward. The need for desperation is only important to those who already feel desperate, and naturally they'll talk from their experience. Your experience is different, your feeling apathy for your condition and situation. This is enough reason to stay sober too. The alternative is to suffer and eventually pick up that drink. Nothing about taking another drink to reach a most desperate scenario is required.

Why don't you care? Well, actually you do care, but you also want what drinking offers you, and so this obsessional want is masking and distorting your caring for yourself. If you take some time to reflect, and you take drinking off the table as an option (really off - not just for today -but for good) you'll soon see how your apathy is directly linked up with your wanting to drink. Drinking would satisfy you short term, and then the misery would begin again, same old same old. Your feeling apathetic because you have no way out if you drink again, and I believe you know that to be true, and your thinking is looking for justifications to have that drink so you can at least feel satisfied, if only for a time...

Addiction ambivalence is an unholy process which leaves us feeling defeated from both sides of wanting and not wanting. You need to make a serious choice. Choose what is real for you with not drinking. That choice will light you up and ring all your bells if you really decide drinking is not an option. For some people just for today works, and for some its gotta be never again. Try the never again choice and I'm sure you start to feel differently about being ready to stay quit.

CAPTAINZING2000

I came into recovery one step ahead of the law. Had it not been for that, I might have continued on in my downward spiral I was on