ZaBoozer

Good evening all,

Day fifty two down for me. I am lying on the bed surrounded by the cats with a blazing fire typing this to you. Business first.

Physically I am tired. I think the lack of sleep from last night has caught up with me. I had a lot of fatigue on the way home. It has not passed. I am hoping for a good nights sleep though. My headache came back this evening. I ate well today. Full lunch and full dinner. I am smoking too much and drinking way too much coffee. I am going to have to do something about this. Funny, I don't drink coffee at home though.

Mentally it was a fair day. I did a little work. Most of it was spent on conversation skills though. I had lunch with a colleague and the topic was quite a bit of doom and gloom with everything that is going on here in SA. My smoking buddy is trying to convince me to convert my downstairs patio into a conservatory. I quite like the idea. Her husband is going to come and give me a quote on the additional kitchen cupboards that I want. So there was a bit of productivity.

Emotionally I am fair. It was a fairly stable day.

I am becoming quite good around the house with keeping the dishes clean. As soon as I am done with something, I just pop it into the dishwasher and run a rinse cycle. The only thing is that it takes me about three weeks to build up a full load to do a proper wash cycle. Yes I know, bigger is not always better. I just bought the biggest load dishwasher that I could find. Luckily I have more than enough cutlery.

I didn't do any tiling today. There is not much left, so I am saving it for the weekend. At least it will give me something to do. The cats seem to like watching me work. I am not sure whether they are trying to supervise me or whether they have lost the plot, but they keep me company.

I found the short clip below on you tube. If you have ever owned a cat, you will get it.

http://youtu.be/w0ffwDYo00Q

Be safe and be strong.

Cheers,

ZAB

Ginamarie323

You go Zab.....and I laugh every time I see "Keep your pecker up." Hilarious

ZaBoozer

Ta GM, we will have to see what martina12 is going to say when she gets back from her camping.

ZaBoozer

Good morning all,

Today I enter the start of day fifty three. The sun is rising and there is smog on the horizon. The papers all smack of cow sh*t left by the SA politicians' corruption. Clearly the spin doctors are trying to earn their keep. At least it is Friday. Without further ado, to the business.

Physically I am ok. I slept well last night and only woke up once for a bathroom visit. I did not really want to get out of bed this morning and could probably have done with a lie in. Sleep comes easily and as far as I can tell is deep. I don't have any dreams that I can recall. I woke with my slight headache. I am really going to have to address the smoking and coffee issue.

Mentally I am good. I just want to get work over today. It has been a long week and I have had just about enough of it. I have a few things to do today, then I have to spend the rest of it trying to occupy my mind.

Emotionally I am stable. No twinges or dark thoughts yet. I am making peace with myself. Easy thing to say, not an easy thing to do.

Well it is Friday here. I have a few things that I need to finish up the weekend. Tiling and edging being one of them. I will have to start painting the inside of the house soon. Not a train smash either. I seem to have a lot of time on my hands now and it helps to keep busy.

I finished my book last night. Very interesting read. Not really a book for the girls, unless you like history and war. It was an eye opener for me. The scary part is that these things are still going on today. You just have to open your newspaper and it hits you right between the eyes.

Well enough babbling for the morning.

Be safe and be strong.

Cheers,

ZAB

Beeraholic

This is exactly what I needed to read right now. I went a month without a beer and then decided I was going to be a normal drinker. Now two weeks into "normal drinking" the only thing normal is how much I am drinking as compared to before.

ZaBoozer

Hey there Beeraholic, maybe time to get back on that bicycle again mate?

firebolt

Sorry you are living with these - even having mild ones often will get a person down, big time!

I hate to jump on the gluten allergy train, but I've had headaches and migraines for as far back as I can remember. I tried almost everything from injections to MRI's, to a drug from the doc you sniff. Nothing worked. A client told me about gluten allergies, which I had heard of, but assumed it was just the latest fad (I still feel that way a bit.) Nothing to lose, so I weeded out most breads. LIFE CHANGING on the headache front.

Instead of 2 headaches a week, it's one every 4 months now. I haven't cut it totally out of my diet, but I eat a fraction of what I used to and that plus a lot of water has made all the difference in frequency of my headaches. That might mean your NA beers too though.

Anywho, CONGRATS on your almost 2 months - you're doing great, and I thoroughly enjoy reading about your journey!

saoutchik

That happened to me too before I found SR Beeraholic, around about the same time too (a month)

Zab, I know the ciggies and coffee don't help but I would be inclined to to visit the doc about your headaches as you seem to get them a bit too often .Wouldn't do any harm

biminiblue

Yeah, I agree - and said the same thing weeks ago. Zab, it's not normal to take headache meds daily. Something is going on.

Daily headaches are not normal. Gluten is a really common problem - the NA beer can cause issues, too.

ZaBoozer

Ta FB, much appreciated. I will have a look into gluten allergy. Will keep you posted.

ZaBoozer

Ta saoutchick, I think you may be right there. I have a physical scheduled soon and I will bring it up there. I wanted to stop smoking though and see if that would do it. Unfortunately that has not worked yet.

ZaBoozer

Ok mom, I will get it looked into. I hear you with the gluten. I will have to see what I have in my diet that could be a contributing factor. To rule out NA beer, I will just lay off it for a week and see what happens.

ZaBoozer

Good evening all,

Well I have reached the end of day fifty three. It is Friday night and I am approaching another weekend. Business first.

Physical I'm tired. I had a little fatigue today, that has passed. I ate well today, a huge lunch. Pork knuckle, chips and salad. Too stuffed to eat this evening. My headache did not return from this morning. I was laying here listening to the radio and every time I started to doze I had a bit of RLS. I hope it stays away tonight.

Mentally I am fine. I got my work done and spent the rest of the day socializing. I quite enjoy the repartee and mental sparing.

Emotionally I am stable. I had a few twinges, but I think that is the L of HALT making its presence known before the weekend.

I laid some more tiles this evening when I got home. Although I was not in the mood for it, I am glad I got it done. It is looking good so far. I should be able to finish most of it tomorrow. I can't wait to see it in reality.

The week days seem to fly by. I don't really know where the time is going. This seems to be the antithesis of what others are experiencing. Maybe it is because I am able to keep myself busy almost constantly.

Well, Sunday is our mad dash of lemmings. We have the annual comrades marathon on. This is the ninetieth running and the race is ninety kilometers long. I am not sure of the final figures, but usually they have a starting crowd of between 12000 and 15000 runners. You get twelve hours to finish. The winner is usually in around the 5:35 mark. It is one helluva race. I will be participating this year from in front of my tv though.

Well cats are on the bed, I am going to chance RLS. Early start for me.

Be safe and be strong.

Cheers,

ZAB

biminiblue

Well, the beer has gluten/grain - see the connection?

You can Google methods of restriction and testing - and I believe in my case it's grains in general. It's just that wheat is a predominant food item in the US. Corn is right up there, though.

I have a slight gluten/grain sensitivity. I can have small amounts of it - like one serving per day, without repercussions. I also didn't get hangovers from tequila, but I did from all the grain alcohols - and especially beer with heavy hops - like IPAs.

Daylightsavings

Wow... that was ALOT to read. And I learned more and saw more similarities to so many people. I think I may do what you are doing ZaB and journal/post often. When I joined today, I posted that I was going to quit Monday because I have to go to a conference (I drink between 6 and 12 beers a day or 1 or 2 bottles of wine a day... except weekends..then it's ... hard to count ). I will have support of my sister there and be in a different environment but maybe I'll do that today, just maybe. I don't know if I will have DTs or not. I went camping with my cub scouts a few weeks ago and when 36 hours without anything and did sweat a little and felt sort of nauseated. I on occassion, if I have binged over a friday and into saturday night, I will get chills and sweats off and on, but only when i binge which is fairly rare. Anyway, please keep going. You have inspired me.

ZaBoozer

I do BB, and I appreciate the input. At the end though, I was in a permanent hangover. I used to get my hangover already while drinking. I will definitely have a look into this. I know that when I stopped smoking, the headaches went. The other thing is that I have always liked bread and pasta and stuff. I hope it is the smoking.

biminiblue

I kind of am of the belief that we sensitize our bodies to too much grain and then develop a type of overreaction to it.

Grains - yeah, I lived on them back in the day. At least one serving per meal. Now I have one serving per day on most days.

Didn't help that we poured grains down our throats in the form of alcohol, either.

ZaBoozer

Hi there DLS,

I saw your post. I think it is a good idea for you to keep your own journal. It's purpose is twofold. If I ever want to drink - I can go back and see just how hard it was to get back some semblance of normalcy. The positive is that I can see my recovery.

I can't tell you whether you will have DT's or not. I can tell you, do not do what I did on your own. If you do decide to do it on your own, make sure someone knows about it and can check on you. If you feel that it is getting out of hand - get thee to an ER. This can be like playing Russian roulette. It gets worse every time we slip and try to sober up.

The sweats, chills, nausea, diarrhea and that sort of thing pass within a few days. The brain mist/fog takes a bit longer.

There is no time like today. In fact there is no time like right now. You are not losing a dear friend or anything like that. You are getting rid of something that can destroy your life. Given half a chance, it will. You have to want this for you though. Wanting it for someone else is not going to work. Think of it like this, you try to get sober to please a partner. The partner leaves. Now what?

The best advice I can give you, try not to think about never being able to drink again. Instead think - I will not drink now. I will not drink today. Baby steps.

You might also want to look at AVRT to deal with your AV when it does pop up. There is AA or SMART if you are so inclined. The more weapons in your arsenal the better chance you have to beat this thing.

I will keep on keeping on, and you will be too. I look forward to reading your journal soon.

Best of luck.

Cheers,

ZAB

ZaBoozer

Morning all,

It is a bright sunny Saturday morning. It is the start of day fifty four. Tiling is calling. Business first.

Physically I am fine. I slept well. The RLS did not return. I have a hint of a headache this morning. Not anything that I need a pill for. I am famished.

Mentally I am good. I have a lot of ideas running around in my head this morning and have been busy already with research.

Emotionally I am stable. Still early though.

Well, I need to get to the tilers quickly before the traffic build up. Then I need to get tiling.

Be strong and be safe.

Cheers,

ZAB

ZaBoozer

Evening all,

Well it is the end of day fifty four for me. It has not been easy today. More on this later. Business first.

Physically I am good. My body is a little sore from the manual labor. It is all good. I am quite tired. Hopefully I have a good nights rest. The headache faded and stayed away for the rest of the day. I had a good appetite today and ate well. I also had quite a bit of ice cream and a bit of chocolate.

Mentally I am great. My thinking has been utilized more on the creative side today. It is quite fulfilling to get the tile pattern right, but I am enjoying it.

Emotionally I am fair.

My AV was very persistent today. I really battled it for a long time. The L from HALT really got to me. Even just trying to keep busy was not much of a help today. I ended up just watching some mindless movie in the TV. That seemed to help.

The tiling on the patio is almost done. I have five more tiles to lay and then I can start the edging. I think I have a good chance of finishing the patio off completely tomorrow. I think that might just be the sense of accomplishment I need to see. Something that I have done with my own hands.

Well the cats are here. Early start for me tomorrow - got to see the start of the comrades marathon.

Be safe and be strong.

Cheers,

ZAB