Quitting for the 4th (I think) time
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Join Date: Dec 2014
Posts: 7
Quitting for the 4th (I think) time
Hey everyone,
I'm 23 years old and have been drinking since I was 19. I started drinking socially and eventually I'd buy liquor and bring it home. I held a steady job at a school after finishing college but I was teaching English to kids, not what I'd studied. Hanging around kids all day was nice and didn't really drink except on social occasions. I realised my career was not going anywhere even if it existed and I quit to do something more in line with my major. The work was really stressful, 14 hours a day, 6 days a week and a long commute and I'd just drink regularly, about half a bottle of whiskey every time at least.
After much deliberation, I've decided to quit for what I think is the fourth time. I really want to make it stick but I'm craving a drink, not physically, but I just really miss it and I just want to go out and get one.
Would appreciate any support any of you offer.
Thank you.
I'm 23 years old and have been drinking since I was 19. I started drinking socially and eventually I'd buy liquor and bring it home. I held a steady job at a school after finishing college but I was teaching English to kids, not what I'd studied. Hanging around kids all day was nice and didn't really drink except on social occasions. I realised my career was not going anywhere even if it existed and I quit to do something more in line with my major. The work was really stressful, 14 hours a day, 6 days a week and a long commute and I'd just drink regularly, about half a bottle of whiskey every time at least.
After much deliberation, I've decided to quit for what I think is the fourth time. I really want to make it stick but I'm craving a drink, not physically, but I just really miss it and I just want to go out and get one.
Would appreciate any support any of you offer.
Thank you.
Member
Join Date: Apr 2013
Location: Lakeside, Ca
Posts: 10,208
Originally Posted by auronoctum 
After much deliberation, I've decided to quit for what I think is the fourth time. I really want to make it stick but I'm craving a drink, not physically, but I just really miss it and I just want to go out and get one.
in short time it will be worth it to be sober
that is if booze was (is) causing you problems in life
sounds like if nothing else
things have started in that direction
do you have a support system ?
although this site is one of the best that I have found for support
most will also need to seek out other help
MB
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Dec 2014
Posts: 7
I don't have a support system, really, because people I know drink as often as I do and don't think I have a problem and think I'm overreacting. The thing is, I'm highly functional despite drinking. But I've come to realise that most of what I do ends up back to alcohol one way or another.
This is what I wrote on day one, I hope it goes in some way to help you get to know me:
I had decided to quit alcohol.
One of the first things that pushed me towards this side of the fence is the sheer monotony of the cycle. And it wasn’t merely transitioning to and fro between sobriety and inebriation. Twas: Drink, drunk, foolishness and general Tom & Jerry, sleep, hangover + drowsiness. Sometimes there would be intense feelings of guilt, regret, happiness at times, pride, false confidence, arrogance, anger. Then there were the matters of nausea and flatulence. I’ve a vomited a few times, sure, but it has become seldom since I started getting my water in take correctly. But I was just getting better at making it worse.
It would just be endless. And I had an epiphany. A weird epiphany in the sense of knowing it all along, like a person who taps you on the shoulder in an overnight journey on public transport as opposed to a blitz molestation from the ether. And here it is, as plain as an excessive effeminate display at a pride march: what was the point of it all, really?
There’s a character on Criminal Minds, David Rossi’s (former) sergeant in the marines: Harrison Scott. The episode of his introduction ends with Rossi asking him what he’s trying to run away from that he drinks as much as he does. Again, another epiphany that I knew all along came my way. Asking myself the same question, I concluded that I was running away from a lack of perfection. Perhaps it was the fact that my dad always found any of my achievements mundane and hence I tried to make it fantastically more elaborate so that it would really prove to be a feat. That’s why I restrain from bragging most of the time yet have an unconscious desire to scream about what I’ve done and how awesome I think I am. I’m running away from insecurity and a lack of appreciation. Not that appreciation didn’t come my way, I guess it just didn’t come from the right people at the right time and yet poured in excess my way from other quarters. The epiphany was that I didn’t HAVE to be good at everything. I didn’t HAVE to go the best places of learning and do the toughest course and manage to get the most laurels. Achievements like that didn’t really mean anything. Recognition for its own sake was meaningless.
So now I can live life peacefully, retaining goals yet removing the aspect of expectations. I used to feel nervous when I’d forgotten something, hadn’t finished something, wasn’t good enough for something. Why? There a part of my ego that refuses to reconcile with the fact that I can’t be good at everything. And it’s perhaps this self loathing that also causes me to look down upon other people and their efforts. I can’t just ever think that they have made an attempt and that’s a smashing thing, really. To me, it always comes across as they subliminally telling me that they did something very difficult, or at the very least, something that I cannot do. It’s not just common people and common feats either. I once thought of Carl Sagan in the same manner. Imagine that! My love of music in some way was shaped around this feeling. How terribly pathetic.
In this vain, I guess I tried to have a normal life whilst retaining and quenching a thirst for the spirits, trying to experience entheos, as the Hitch once put it. I wanted it all and I wanted it to show that I could get it and keep it that way. Yet, considering that even accomplishing this goal would become clear to me only on my deathbed, it was a life long pursuit that would deprive me of physical if not mental health and also my finances. In modern times, there cannot be three more important things for basic sustenance.
But why, really?
If I can really write that well when I’m sloshed, isn’t that more of a testament to my own will power, where I’m warding off the effects of alcohol while still being able to string words together rather than the inspiring nature of the amber spirit? I’m more verbose when I’ve been drinking. Yet, I posit that if alcohol merely lowers your inhibitions then I can really be verbose whenever I want to, if it suits the context. I can, I’m quite sure, do anything worthwhile when I’m sober that I can when I’m drunk/drinking/buzzed.
Besides, is there nothing else in life that delivers pleasure? Is there nothing else that I haven’t experienced hitherto? I would like to engage in other forms of euphoria. There has been no greater high than the feeling of accomplishment. I’d like to try my hand at that. Being a glutton doesn’t make it any worse off, does it? Oh, the foods that I’m yet to try. Not to mention that books I’m yet to read, the things I’ve yet to learn, the movies I’m yet to see, the places I’ve yet to visit and even the things I’ve yet to say to people I’ve yet to meet.
I’m craving a cigarette right now but I want to sod smoking too. That and any other habit of diminishing returns.
So this is day one. Let’s see how I feel at the end of it all.
This is what I wrote on day one, I hope it goes in some way to help you get to know me:
I had decided to quit alcohol.
One of the first things that pushed me towards this side of the fence is the sheer monotony of the cycle. And it wasn’t merely transitioning to and fro between sobriety and inebriation. Twas: Drink, drunk, foolishness and general Tom & Jerry, sleep, hangover + drowsiness. Sometimes there would be intense feelings of guilt, regret, happiness at times, pride, false confidence, arrogance, anger. Then there were the matters of nausea and flatulence. I’ve a vomited a few times, sure, but it has become seldom since I started getting my water in take correctly. But I was just getting better at making it worse.
It would just be endless. And I had an epiphany. A weird epiphany in the sense of knowing it all along, like a person who taps you on the shoulder in an overnight journey on public transport as opposed to a blitz molestation from the ether. And here it is, as plain as an excessive effeminate display at a pride march: what was the point of it all, really?
There’s a character on Criminal Minds, David Rossi’s (former) sergeant in the marines: Harrison Scott. The episode of his introduction ends with Rossi asking him what he’s trying to run away from that he drinks as much as he does. Again, another epiphany that I knew all along came my way. Asking myself the same question, I concluded that I was running away from a lack of perfection. Perhaps it was the fact that my dad always found any of my achievements mundane and hence I tried to make it fantastically more elaborate so that it would really prove to be a feat. That’s why I restrain from bragging most of the time yet have an unconscious desire to scream about what I’ve done and how awesome I think I am. I’m running away from insecurity and a lack of appreciation. Not that appreciation didn’t come my way, I guess it just didn’t come from the right people at the right time and yet poured in excess my way from other quarters. The epiphany was that I didn’t HAVE to be good at everything. I didn’t HAVE to go the best places of learning and do the toughest course and manage to get the most laurels. Achievements like that didn’t really mean anything. Recognition for its own sake was meaningless.
So now I can live life peacefully, retaining goals yet removing the aspect of expectations. I used to feel nervous when I’d forgotten something, hadn’t finished something, wasn’t good enough for something. Why? There a part of my ego that refuses to reconcile with the fact that I can’t be good at everything. And it’s perhaps this self loathing that also causes me to look down upon other people and their efforts. I can’t just ever think that they have made an attempt and that’s a smashing thing, really. To me, it always comes across as they subliminally telling me that they did something very difficult, or at the very least, something that I cannot do. It’s not just common people and common feats either. I once thought of Carl Sagan in the same manner. Imagine that! My love of music in some way was shaped around this feeling. How terribly pathetic.
In this vain, I guess I tried to have a normal life whilst retaining and quenching a thirst for the spirits, trying to experience entheos, as the Hitch once put it. I wanted it all and I wanted it to show that I could get it and keep it that way. Yet, considering that even accomplishing this goal would become clear to me only on my deathbed, it was a life long pursuit that would deprive me of physical if not mental health and also my finances. In modern times, there cannot be three more important things for basic sustenance.
But why, really?
If I can really write that well when I’m sloshed, isn’t that more of a testament to my own will power, where I’m warding off the effects of alcohol while still being able to string words together rather than the inspiring nature of the amber spirit? I’m more verbose when I’ve been drinking. Yet, I posit that if alcohol merely lowers your inhibitions then I can really be verbose whenever I want to, if it suits the context. I can, I’m quite sure, do anything worthwhile when I’m sober that I can when I’m drunk/drinking/buzzed.
Besides, is there nothing else in life that delivers pleasure? Is there nothing else that I haven’t experienced hitherto? I would like to engage in other forms of euphoria. There has been no greater high than the feeling of accomplishment. I’d like to try my hand at that. Being a glutton doesn’t make it any worse off, does it? Oh, the foods that I’m yet to try. Not to mention that books I’m yet to read, the things I’ve yet to learn, the movies I’m yet to see, the places I’ve yet to visit and even the things I’ve yet to say to people I’ve yet to meet.
I’m craving a cigarette right now but I want to sod smoking too. That and any other habit of diminishing returns.
So this is day one. Let’s see how I feel at the end of it all.
Member
Join Date: May 2014
Location: Washington, MO
Posts: 2,306
Congrats on making the decision auro! Welcome to the "Quitters who Don't Give Up Club".(I would like to think I made that up but maybe not) Changing routine is helpful for many working-class drinkers. The whole time-of-day-drive-home-unwind thing. Lotsa ritual there. You should see a doc if things get rough or even if they don't. My biggest thing was filling chunks of time the ritual of drinking filled. I had to DO a lot of things sober repetitively to get used to it--even driving. Irratability is gonna be there. Maybe trouble sleeping. All of this will pass soon. Have you seen the Secular Forums? RR and AVRT really clicked with me and I view alcohol's pull much differently now. Best wishes. I'm a Hitch fan too but do not want to go like that. He was right about everything but caring for himself. Secular Martyr
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Dec 2014
Posts: 7
Thanks a lot man I don't have any physical symptoms (yet and hopefully never). It's just doing things sober, as you'd said. I'd get a lot done after drinking and since I don't drink anymore, it just doesn't feel the same and I feel uneasy about it. I'm dreading the first social gather, already skipped 3 because they were at bars.
How long did you take to get used to being sober all the time?
I don't have any physical symptoms (yet and hopefully never). It's just doing things sober, as you'd said. I'd get a lot done after drinking and since I don't drink anymore, it just doesn't feel the same and I feel uneasy about it. I'm dreading the first social gather, already skipped 3 because they were at bars.How long did you take to get used to being sober all the time?
Canine Welfare Advocate
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Norfolk, VA
Posts: 10,962
Originally Posted by auronoctum
I really want to make it stick but I'm craving a drink, not physically, but I just really miss it and I just want to go out and get one.
How do you get through it? You make the committment to quit and you don't change your mind, you don't succumb to the craving.
How you maintain that committment is what recovery is all about.
Canine Welfare Advocate
Join Date: Sep 2010
Location: Norfolk, VA
Posts: 10,962
Originally Posted by auronoctum
Do cravings really last life long?
I can't say what will happen for you. If you stop drinking but miss alcohol, romanticize drinking, and feel that your life is incomplete without booze, you are going to be miserable.
It is one thing not to drink. It is another to embrace soberiety, to learn to cope with living without diving in the bottle to deal with its difficulties. If you can do that, you won't crave drinking your whole life.
Administrator
Join Date: Aug 2003
Location: Dancing in the Light
Posts: 61,514
Welcome, and I'm glad you decided to stop drinking. The mental obsession is really hard in the early days. For me, changing my routine really helped. Shop in different stores, go to different restaurants, avoid places to buy alcohol on the drive home from work - any kind of change helps you through this. The cravings will get easier as time goes by.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2013
Posts: 297
I started struggling with my alcoholism early in my 20's as well. I was very aware that I was drinking abnormally even at 20-21. It was just so easy to justify my drinking because so many people in that age group are binge drinkers. But I had been really honest with myself, I did not drink like they did. I was always the last man standing after a night out. I was always the one who wanted to grab a drink. I didn't put things like work and school first and would drink on nights when I really should have been studying or sleeping. Most of my friends would binge when they could, but would stay home and do their work when they needed. I couldn't do that.
It still took me a few more years to even work up the nerve to try and quit. I wish I had truly started trying the first time I realized I had a problem. But hindsight is 20/20. It is a huge first step to admit that there is a problem, especially when it is still socially acceptable to be a bit irresponsible. Good for you. Stick around here, you will find people who can really relate.
It still took me a few more years to even work up the nerve to try and quit. I wish I had truly started trying the first time I realized I had a problem. But hindsight is 20/20. It is a huge first step to admit that there is a problem, especially when it is still socially acceptable to be a bit irresponsible. Good for you. Stick around here, you will find people who can really relate.
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Join Date: Apr 2007
Location: Australia
Posts: 211,445
I think a lot of us ate a little too much junk food or sweets for a while, but most of us return to normal.
Depends on how you feel about it healthwise. if it concerns you (and I mean you not your friend) then maybe snack on fruit and veges more than the fast food
D
D
Depends on how you feel about it healthwise. if it concerns you (and I mean you not your friend) then maybe snack on fruit and veges more than the fast food
D
D
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