Not Sober, But Trying
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2014
Posts: 65
Not Sober, But Trying
I am not sober. I have been to 3 AA meetings with booze in me. I am inspired by everyone at the meetings, but their advice seems to fall by the way side. I don't feel great about my choices; but, I have made them. I am unemployed, and it gives me more time than I would like. I take walks, play drums, play guitar, but I am having trouble filling up my time. My folks say that drinking is a personal defect. I don't know how to explain that I am trying to get sober, but getting a job is far more important to them. Even if I have a job, I still drink. If anyone has advice, PLEASE HELP!
Member
Join Date: Apr 2014
Posts: 1
Hi,
I am new here, but one thing I can assure you of is that drinking is not a personal defect. I believe you can make the choice to stop. There are many recovery options. It took me a few times and a few different methods to find the right one for me. It may even be a mixture of some methods, but you can find the way, you can find the right one. One of my mistakes was to think that I needed to stick with the first one I tried. My advice is to just keep looking and keep trying.
I am new here, but one thing I can assure you of is that drinking is not a personal defect. I believe you can make the choice to stop. There are many recovery options. It took me a few times and a few different methods to find the right one for me. It may even be a mixture of some methods, but you can find the way, you can find the right one. One of my mistakes was to think that I needed to stick with the first one I tried. My advice is to just keep looking and keep trying.
Member
Join Date: Feb 2013
Posts: 1,467
Can totally relate, Im in a similar position to you, Im ten days sober and trying. My family and father in particular thinks I need to 'grow up' and 'pull myself together' and that everyone goes through a drinking phase. He doesn't understand the whole alcoholism thing and I know ultimately that its pointless trying to educate him. It hurts because he thinks if I move away or change career paths or find the right girl that il change overnight and be 'normal'.
Ive been advised in AA to immerse myself in recovery and Im trying to do this, I had planned on starting my own business this year but that's fallen by the wayside thanks to booze, I feel a job will help fill my time and have some options on that front BUT I know I need to put my sobriety first or il just lose the job whatever it is.
I could win the lottery but id still be an alcoholic, nothing changes until we do. Wish you all the best.
Ive been advised in AA to immerse myself in recovery and Im trying to do this, I had planned on starting my own business this year but that's fallen by the wayside thanks to booze, I feel a job will help fill my time and have some options on that front BUT I know I need to put my sobriety first or il just lose the job whatever it is.
I could win the lottery but id still be an alcoholic, nothing changes until we do. Wish you all the best.
Behold the power of NO
Join Date: Jan 2013
Location: WA
Posts: 7,764
Showing up at AA meeting is not going to get you sober any more than hanging out in a garage will make you a mechanic. The AA program is the steps starting with the first one.
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol that our lives had become unmanageable
We admitted we were powerless over alcohol that our lives had become unmanageable
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Apr 2014
Posts: 65
I am trying hard, but I don't believe in a higher power. I crave human interaction; it keeps me sober. I figured AA would be a good start. If I have money, I buy booze. How do you stop yourself from buying booze?
Member
Join Date: Mar 2014
Location: PA
Posts: 12,000
Sky, just keep going to meetings. Tell somebody there you are having a hard time stopping. It is good to make contact with someone who has already seen you at a meeting. Keep trying. Good luck. Ask for help at a meeting. Do not be discouraged. If you keep showing up someone is going to reach out to you. But you gotta be there.
I know that sometimes folks in AA will wait on someone just to see if they are SERIOUS about this before they get involved. It happens. Keep going and asking for help. Go early and talk to someone BEFORE the meeting starts. And hang around after the meeting. You can do this.
I know that sometimes folks in AA will wait on someone just to see if they are SERIOUS about this before they get involved. It happens. Keep going and asking for help. Go early and talk to someone BEFORE the meeting starts. And hang around after the meeting. You can do this.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2014
Location: PA
Posts: 12,000
You don't believe in a higher power? Then why are you posting here? Right now SR IS your higher power as far as I can tell. You keep posting so it must mean something to you.
I recommend you don't carry enough money to buy booze. I know you are struggling with it. Perhaps have someone else be in charge of your money for now if at all possible. You need to be put on an allowance if that makes sense.
I recommend you don't carry enough money to buy booze. I know you are struggling with it. Perhaps have someone else be in charge of your money for now if at all possible. You need to be put on an allowance if that makes sense.
Hears The Voice
Join Date: Jan 2013
Location: Unshackled
Posts: 7,901
You can't actually drink and try to be sober at the same time. It has never worked like that and never will.
If you don't change direction you are very likely to end up where you are headed.
Best of Luck on Your Journey!
If you don't change direction you are very likely to end up where you are headed.
Best of Luck on Your Journey!
Member
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Europe
Posts: 1,361
Originally Posted by SkyBlueSky 
I don't believe in Spirituality. I believe in a dirt nap after it's all over. I guess that is the problem.
you can believe in non-believing...whatever
The god of my understanding is the universe itself and all in it.
Now that's just plain ol' science.
just stay sober first...god and god's and godesses will come later.
Administrator
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Dancing in the Light
Posts: 61,460
Hi,
I do understand that this is hard. But, if you are drinking every day, then you are not trying to get sober.
How do you stop yourself from buying booze? Do whatever it takes. Stay home in the house all day if you have to. Stay home in the house for a few days if you have to. But, hopefully you can get out and do things that take your mind off drinking for a few minutes.
I do understand that this is hard. But, if you are drinking every day, then you are not trying to get sober.
How do you stop yourself from buying booze? Do whatever it takes. Stay home in the house all day if you have to. Stay home in the house for a few days if you have to. But, hopefully you can get out and do things that take your mind off drinking for a few minutes.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2014
Location: New York, NY
Posts: 42
If you google an article from the New York Times about "AA without religion" it might be interesting for you. It's point being, I guess, that for some members, the program and community is their higher power. Ain't nothing wrong with that. I myself believe in God, but I find this idea very comforting.
"After 10 years without alcohol, Glenn ordered a glass of wine and spent the next five years suffering from what he wryly diagnoses now as “the merlot flu.”
Soon after resuming A.A., though, he heard about a meeting designed for atheists. Though he found that group dogmatic in its own way — more concerned with criticizing religion than with reinforcing sobriety — he subsequently discovered a meeting for humanists and freethinkers.
In its “fellowship of concerned, loving people,” he said, he found a secular version of the “Higher Power” to which A.A. literature refers.
"After 10 years without alcohol, Glenn ordered a glass of wine and spent the next five years suffering from what he wryly diagnoses now as “the merlot flu.”
Soon after resuming A.A., though, he heard about a meeting designed for atheists. Though he found that group dogmatic in its own way — more concerned with criticizing religion than with reinforcing sobriety — he subsequently discovered a meeting for humanists and freethinkers.
In its “fellowship of concerned, loving people,” he said, he found a secular version of the “Higher Power” to which A.A. literature refers.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2014
Posts: 158
I don't know if this will help, but I'll put it out there anyway. Maybe "higher" isn't a helpful word, it isn't for me. "Bigger" is closer. "Power" is also a troublesome word to me as it evokes more violent images than otherwise.
What helps me is thinking about the letter I got in the mail. Someone else wrote it. Someone else put it in my mailbox. Someone else manufactured the paper it was written on and the ink it was written with and the pen that held the ink that transformed thoughts into words I am reading. Someone else planted the seed that turned into the tree that someone else cut down so someone else could pulverize it in a way that someone else figured out would turn it into paper.
Meanwhile someone else mined the metals that someone else turned into steel that someone else turned into the parts for the mail truck that someone else loaded with the letter that showed up in my mailbox.
The letter said all sorts of things, and ended with Love.
The collective is bigger than I am. People struggle, that's just part of living. And I got a sweet letter in my mailbox because tons and tons of struggling people did something to make it happen. And when I participate in LIFE, even when I'm hating how I feel, even when I can't see that I matter, I DO matter because even if I never know it somehow what happens when I try is that I make someone else's life a little happier.
SR is a place where I can touch, feel, sense, taste and smell that life-enhancing force of goodness going down. Some people call it a higher power, I am more comfortable thinking of it as grace. It doesn't matter what you call it, it's there and when I can latch onto it things go better with me.
I wish you only the best, I hope you find happiness. I personally think that you won't find what you're looking for until you stop drinking and I hope you'll decide to stop soon... and then you can deal with everything else.
Peace.
What helps me is thinking about the letter I got in the mail. Someone else wrote it. Someone else put it in my mailbox. Someone else manufactured the paper it was written on and the ink it was written with and the pen that held the ink that transformed thoughts into words I am reading. Someone else planted the seed that turned into the tree that someone else cut down so someone else could pulverize it in a way that someone else figured out would turn it into paper.
Meanwhile someone else mined the metals that someone else turned into steel that someone else turned into the parts for the mail truck that someone else loaded with the letter that showed up in my mailbox.
The letter said all sorts of things, and ended with Love.
The collective is bigger than I am. People struggle, that's just part of living. And I got a sweet letter in my mailbox because tons and tons of struggling people did something to make it happen. And when I participate in LIFE, even when I'm hating how I feel, even when I can't see that I matter, I DO matter because even if I never know it somehow what happens when I try is that I make someone else's life a little happier.
SR is a place where I can touch, feel, sense, taste and smell that life-enhancing force of goodness going down. Some people call it a higher power, I am more comfortable thinking of it as grace. It doesn't matter what you call it, it's there and when I can latch onto it things go better with me.
I wish you only the best, I hope you find happiness. I personally think that you won't find what you're looking for until you stop drinking and I hope you'll decide to stop soon... and then you can deal with everything else.
Peace.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2014
Location: PA
Posts: 12,000
Hinduism has no traditional ecclesiastical order, no centralized religious authorities, no governing body, no prophet(s) nor any binding holy book; Hindus can choose to be polytheistic, pantheistic, monistic, or atheistic.[51] Within this diffuse and open structure, spirituality in Hindu philosophy is an individual experience, and referred to as ksaitrajña (Sanskrit: क्षैत्रज्ञ[52]). It defines spiritual practice as one’s journey towards moksha, awareness of self, the discovery of higher truths, true nature of reality, and a consciousness that is liberated and content.[53][54] < borrowed from wikipedia
Then we die. I myself always answer the question of what happens after death with, "We cease to exist." The dirt nap if you will. I get it. I think the same way. Give the Hindu idea of spirituality a try.
The reality is this: If you don't put down the drink, it doesn't matter what you believe or do not believe cause it just doesn't matter. No higher power is going to come knocking on your door and take that bottle away from you. Now I am starting to understand the mantra of "Death, Jails and Institutions"
You my man at this current moment fit the mold of the "powerless".
Or, perhaps it is just a defeatist attitude that you are looking for someone or something to take that drink away from you. It starts with SELF. All the advice in the world is not going to help anyone if they choose to ignore it.
Give life a chance.
Then we die. I myself always answer the question of what happens after death with, "We cease to exist." The dirt nap if you will. I get it. I think the same way. Give the Hindu idea of spirituality a try.
The reality is this: If you don't put down the drink, it doesn't matter what you believe or do not believe cause it just doesn't matter. No higher power is going to come knocking on your door and take that bottle away from you. Now I am starting to understand the mantra of "Death, Jails and Institutions"
You my man at this current moment fit the mold of the "powerless".
Or, perhaps it is just a defeatist attitude that you are looking for someone or something to take that drink away from you. It starts with SELF. All the advice in the world is not going to help anyone if they choose to ignore it.
Give life a chance.
Member
Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: North salt lake
Posts: 3,325
Sky, oh man I would love to give you a big spout on religion and dirt naps. I'll try not to. The only advice I know on sobriety, and I keep posting it (how boring, I know), never stop trying to quit. I don't care how many sideways glances you get when you say today is the day to people who know you relapse. Screw them. Keep trying, and one day you'll be sober if that is truly what you want. It's not easy. No one here will tell you it's a breeze. For myself, I could not be 78 days sober without God. Just keep trying.
Administrator
Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 211,354
There's many different approaches and methods of recovery around - here's some links to some of the main players:
http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...formation.html
I recommend you visit the Secular Connections forum if you think you may benefit from a non 12 step approach.
The main thing tho - whatever you decide to do - is do something.
In my experience, inaction just leads to more drinking SBS
Did you explore the volunteering suggestion I posted in an earlier thread?
D
http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...formation.html
I recommend you visit the Secular Connections forum if you think you may benefit from a non 12 step approach.
The main thing tho - whatever you decide to do - is do something.
In my experience, inaction just leads to more drinking SBS
Did you explore the volunteering suggestion I posted in an earlier thread?
D
Member
Join Date: Oct 2013
Location: Midwest
Posts: 9,029
We can only help by relating what has worked for us. No one has a magic wand. Walking around with money in your pocket might work but my husband always managed to drink even while stone broke. Don't walk into liquor stores or bars. Don't go to the grocery store. As Anna said, don't go out of the house. Give yourself twenty four hours sober. Whether you believe in a higher power or not, none of it is going to make a difference unless you want to get sober. And There is a huge difference between saying you are trying and actually trying. I say I am trying when I want to get out of some jam or uncomfortable situation or to get someone off my back and to feel better about myself. When I say I'm trying it means I am thinking about maybe, possibly doing something, at some undefined point in time. When I am actually trying I take action and do something to remedy the situation, whatever it is. The thing that helped me the most in getting sober was being completely honest with myself. I'm still working on that part. If you want it, you will work on it and not overthink it.
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