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I relapse because I want to chance it one more time?

Old 06-03-2015, 07:26 PM
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I relapse because I want to chance it one more time?

Ok so it's only day 3, and yeah I know since my last post it should be day 5, but I messed up. Sorry about that.

I've spent hours each day really thinking about my past. What is the reason I relapse? It's because I'm bored, and I don't know what to do about it. It's becoming clear to me, that I'm not so much an alcoholic as a gambling addict. Alcohol just happens to be easy to gamble with.

Anyway, I'm bored and nothing seems exciting to me. Go for a walk, cook a nice meal, exercise. Read a book. Yeah I'm doing all that, it's nice, but I'm still bored.

Here's the question. Why do I want just one more time? Well it's because I want the possibility of utter destruction. Why do I want to self destruct? Why do I want to take risks? I want to put myself in danger, risk a DUI, get laid with a crazy hookup, and risk an unwanted pregnancy. Play chicken with my boss ( what if I don't come in to work tomorrow? what are you going to do? , fire me? ) I want to wake up with cuts or in the hospital.... I bet I can run down my stairs after 15 beers without falling.... I want to be spinning at 5am laughing knowing that I'm an hour from sunrise, where I have to wake up and be at work.


I don't REALLY want anything bad to happen. I just want the chance that it could.... otherwise life is boring... I don't feel alive without these risks..... I Don't really want to fall to my death... I just want to ride the rollercoaster and feel scared.... and I'm sitting here sober envying all the times I "escaped" or that I was "lucky".... am I alone? does anyone else feel like this? Or do most of you relapse because you just want to feel drunk...? I feel like I'm going insane...
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Old 06-03-2015, 07:51 PM
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I can relate. We need a new perspective on what's fun. I always want to take a break from the mundane and feel that excitement but it won't be worth how I feel after. Time to soul search and figure out what really makes us happy without alcohol. Hold on with me and let's see if we can find the highs without the poison, find what life has to offer when we are more present. Best wishes
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Old 06-03-2015, 07:52 PM
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By the way, day 3 for me too
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:00 PM
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I should note that I'm also giving up smoking as well.... so day 3 for that.... Im just sitting here bored....

a lot of people have suggest giving up drinking first, then smoking, but smoking triggers me to want to drink.... I have to do them at the same time...... this is so hard.... how did it get this way.... why am I so messed up that I'm bored unless my life/job/criminal record is on the line?
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:13 PM
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Originally Posted by Serper2014 View Post
.... this is so hard.... how did it get this way.... why am I so messed up that I'm bored unless my life/job/criminal record is on the line?
It's called addiction. It makes no sense and it's nearly impossible to know "why" we are this way. But the solution is to accept it for what it is...and learn to live without it. Some of us need more help than others to get started, have you considered local support like meetings or counseling? You've been trying to do this in your own terms for quite some time, perhaps it's time to accept that you cannot do it alone?
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:19 PM
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I will be a year sober this month and I still often miss all the drama and mayhem in my life. It made me frantic for a long time and I couldn't stand not living on a knifes edge. Not only with alcohol but relationships and I enjoyed the risk taking as well. It's taken me a long time to get comfortable on some level with being "bored" or "boring" at times. For me I just had to go through it for a period of time, I actively went to Therapy, AA and other recovery programs. I kept a strict sleep hygiene. I got back into shape and reconnected with family and changed my environment. It as been a process, but that urge to self destruct is becoming softer and softer. Now I feel that going through that same cycle of self destruct and then self loathing made me predictable and boring. Life is far less predictable sober but that often is a good thing.
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:23 PM
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Mostly I wanted to find a way to drink and not have bad stuff happen. Sometimes I just didn't care if something bad happened.

I didn't want to change my life. I didn't want to have to 'be good' or deprive myself of the things my friends did.

I kinda got used to the chaos of being down to my last twenty, or waking up in a garden or wondering where I got those bruises from or what I did last night.

I wanted to see how far I could stretch the rubber band of my life until it snapped.

It was kinda like an intellectual game. Survival by wits.

I didn't want to grow up.

For all those reasons, and many more, I kept drinking.

It was all nonsense.

D
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:37 PM
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Don't sweat it. When all we do is put down the drink and make no other meaningful changes in our lives, we'll soon fill it up with enough mayhem to drive us to drink.
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Old 06-03-2015, 08:57 PM
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If you're missing the thrill of life, and taking risks, there's loads of risks you can take that don't include alcohol. Mountain climbing, sky diving, hang gliding, base jumping, scuba diving, and hundreds of others.

Maybe something like that would quell the risk taker in you?
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Old 06-03-2015, 09:38 PM
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Serper, I can relate during the initial 10 years of my drinking cycle. I thought I was invincible to a large extent. I thought I was living life to its fullest, having fun, living on the edge while narrowly escaping falling off about every day.

As time went on, I had to drink more and more just to maintain the addiction that I created. I couldn't do anything without drinking... and drinking a lot. Little did I know back then but living on the edge was really just an allusion that I created in my mind. None of it was necessary to truly enjoy my life. But it became harder and harder to stop as each day progressed.

Finally by 20 years of heavy drinking, there was nothing left. Absolutely every move I made was determined by alcohol. Every waking moment, structured around that first drink.

Living on the edge, or so I thought, was all just an illusion in stupidity. Maybe it's because I am a little older now, maybe it is because I just couldn't physically drink any more than I was drinking, I don't know. But I do now the past 43 weeks that I've been sober have been real. No more need to be drunk all of the time to falsely enjoy life. Now I enjoy my days sober and under my own power, not dictated by alcohol.

I threw away years, decades to this addiction. Now I can truly enjoy what I have to give to myself, to my wife and kids, to everyone that was affected by my living on the edge.

I'm just lucky to have been given the gift to survive all of that stupidity so that I can enjoy life the way it is meant to be enjoyed, with a clear head. To really enjoy your every day with crystal clear clarity. No more fog, no more excuses.

In my opinion, you've got to redefine your boundaries, redefine how you process enjoyment, redefine your goals... redefine what triggers you to be happy. Utter destruction isn't happiness.

A friend of mine witnessed utter destruction over the weekend. A minivan full of four teen aged girls was being driven by their grandmother was rear ended on the highway while trying to make it from Memphis to the Florida coast. The driver that hit the van had 5 previous felony DUI's and was driving on a suspended licence at 6:45 in the morning totally drunk. He hit the van which caused it to hit a utility pole and flip several times. As it turned out, two of the teen aged girls who were about to be seniors in highschool next year were dead. Dead because this stupid M***** F***** was living on his edge and caused utter destruction. The wreck happened as my friend was swerving to miss the debris from the van flipping. He saw body parts being ejected from the van. That is utter destruction, stupidity, that has taken lives of two innocent girls and affected countless others by his selfish actions.

I am so happy that I will be able to enjoy tomorrow without the burden of drinking.

You can do this, it's going to take some work, some hard work, but you won't regret the decision to be sober.

Congratulations on day 3. You can make this change stick.
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Old 06-03-2015, 09:52 PM
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The way I see it, that'll be the 'ism'...

Life a bit ****?? Don't worry, you can make it better with:
risk- taking thrills (gambling; sex)
or why not try some mind-altering drugs (alcohol; pills; whatever)?


Being sober is not drinking; drugging; gambling; sexing (or whatever your escape of choice is. You take away your means of washing the greyness from your vision and everything is dark and scary.

Recovery is finding ways to change our dodgy / skewed perception so that we don't need those behaviours to keep the greyness at bay. It's not easy, and most people will have needed help of some kind. (For me personally, that came in the form of the 12-steps program of AA.)

Good luck. I'd suggest looking at your sobriety plan and making sure there is a means of recovery included in it. I wish you all that best in your recovery - lots of advise and experience on this site to draw from.
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Old 06-03-2015, 09:58 PM
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PS:

Originally Posted by Serper2014 View Post
Here's the question. Why do I want just one more time?
That's your AV (alcoholic voice) telling you you want 'one more time'. Don't listen to it.. It's a liar. They always say that. It wants this 'one more time' and then another, and another and a while lifetime of 'one more times'.

(One thing I learnt fairly quickly in recovery is, just because it's in my head, doesn't mean it's true. Esp if it's some stupid excuse of why taking a drink would be a good idea).
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Old 06-03-2015, 10:27 PM
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I don't have time to real all of the posts by now. But God is unique, and he has something special for all of us. Hang in there, and His gift will be revealed to you...
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Old 06-04-2015, 02:37 AM
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Hi Serper,
You described my situation pretty good, I just got my forth dwi, might be getting weekends in jail, I've been doing crazy hookups almost daily (it get's expensive) I got a young lady pregnant (she's 21, I'm 57) and she's getting her abortion tomorrow. I got all drunk and screwed up, called in sick and was forced into the employee assistance program, was drug tested, mentally evaluated, the shrinks basically removed my brain, played with and it and put it back. I can't even say what the worst thing I have going on is, but just imagine what is the worst possible thing that can happen to someone is, and I'm partially responsible for that, the guilt is overwhelming. so just be happy life is boring, I might like to trade places with you.. oh yeah, I found out yesterday that my hardship license is gone once my case in court is final, so I'll have at least 2 years w/o a license and there's a law in NY that provides lifetime revocation of driving privileges with a five year waiver for repeat offenders (if your lucky they waive it after 5 years) I have to drive to other cities to perform my job so this is becoming more of a problem now. oh well, I'm not dead or in jail
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Old 06-04-2015, 02:52 AM
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Originally Posted by Serper2014 View Post
.... Im just sitting here bored....
That was my preferred recipe for relapse. Sit around bored and wonder why I couldn't be happy unless I was drinking.

I had to do some real work to build a happy sober life. At times it was drudgery. You know what I found at the end of it, though?

Freedom.

When you can't be happy without booze you are a slave. If you think alcohol makes life exciting try emancipation. OMG what a thrill!

Best of Luck on Your Journey!
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Old 06-04-2015, 06:17 AM
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Originally Posted by Serper2014 View Post
Here's the question. Why do I want just one more time?
I don't know why you want to relapse, but maybe the reason "one more time" or "one last drink" works as a justification for you is because you haven't taken drinking completely off the table. "One more" is the crack in the door through which all reason flees.

We mean it when we say it, we believe it when we make the promise. But in the end we are just coming up with ways to compromise our sobriety when we promise to quit "after" the next drinking episode.

When you're done drinking, you're done, and you'll know it. Like a switch going off in your head. Until then, you are just playing games in your head.
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Old 06-04-2015, 06:55 AM
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I can totally relate to the risk taking trait. I get it. I've owned motorcycles, dirt bikes, spent 7 years living in the Rockies so I could ski the back country (took WAY too many chances there but didn't become a statistic thank god), rope swings, quarry cliff jumps, skydiving, surfing waves beyond my ability, you name it. If it was scary and fun I did it. And of course drinking and drugs were always in the background. Knocked off the drugs pretty young but drinking was downfall.

I really liked Troy's post. Most of my risk taking activities didn't include drinking. That came afterwards to rehash the fun day over drunken conversation. However, I can still do some of these things now. There's a zip line/agility course near my house. Everything is 20+' in the air. I'm going to hit that with my kids.

There are plenty of ways to channel the risk taking urges into sober and safe activities and get plenty of satisfaction (and dopamine). Rollercoasters, tandem sky diving, white water rafting, go cart tracks, waterslides, all come to mind.

If the thrill of risk is really the main driver of picking up the bottle then there are plenty of opportunities out there to score the rush without the booze.

I have no scientific evidence to back this up but I believe there is a connection between risk taking personality types and substance abuse. I've been a risk taker since well before I got into drinking and drugs. I have many friends who are no different.
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Old 06-04-2015, 07:03 AM
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Originally Posted by Serper2014 View Post

Here's the question. Why do I want just one more time? Well it's because I want the possibility of utter destruction. Why do I want to self destruct? Why do I want to take risks? I want to put myself in danger,

.
For some, life in the fast lane will grow very old.
Others may go insane or die early ??
Yet, others may make it through.
Some would say, "that just ain't fair."
MM
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Old 06-04-2015, 07:55 AM
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Originally Posted by Serper2014 View Post
Ok so it's only day 3, and yeah I

I don't REALLY want anything bad to happen. I just want the chance that it could.... otherwise life is boring... I don't feel alive without these risks..... I Don't really want to fall to my death... I just want to ride the rollercoaster and feel scared.... and I'm sitting here sober envying all the times I "escaped" or that I was "lucky".... am I alone? does anyone else feel like this? Or do most of you relapse because you just want to feel drunk...? I feel like I'm going insane...
Yes, I can identify with you. Sometimes I even miss having a hangover, trying to figure out how I am going to get through the day, how I will avoid my boss, lie about my whereabouts, etc. I miss the drama and the urgency. It's not that I really want to feel ill or possibly get fired, I just miss the drama. The truth is though, when I actually went through all those things, there was no excitement or glamor about it, it was just nervewracking and unpleasant.
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Old 06-04-2015, 09:14 AM
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I want to put myself in danger, risk a DUI, get laid with a crazy hookup, and risk an unwanted pregnancy. Play chicken with my boss ( what if I don't come in to work tomorrow? what are you going to do? , fire me? ) I want to wake up with cuts or in the hospital.... I bet I can run down my stairs after 15 beers without falling.... I want to be spinning at 5am laughing knowing that I'm an hour from sunrise, where I have to wake up and be at work.


actually NONE of that sounds Interesting or Exciting or Fun. sounds like just another drunken incident. and about as BORING as it gets.

a saying from AA is "a new pair of glasses" - a new refreshed way to look at the world and at ourselves. to accept we can't run away from being grown ups, that life is not there just to keep US enterained, and that if WE want an exciting fulfilling life we must get off our duffs and put forth the effort. we must be willing to try NEW things, explore new avenues, open our minds to new ideas. to break out of our miserably uncomfortable COMFORT ZONE.

and the addict inside of us wants NONE of that. no change, no try, no nothing but the soul killing emptiness of one last time.
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