esinger

There's nothing that will get you sober other than not drinking-using. The method you use to cope with the lifestyle change is up to you. Took me a while to realize that there's no magical cure out there for self inflicted abuse other than to stop abusing myself.
The web is a wonderful thing. Do some research. There's a lot of useful links on this sight.
Good Luck!

tomsteve

I can relate to the small town thing. One of the fears I had Walking into AA was seeing someone I knew. What would they think?
Looking back, I can say they'd probably think," awesome!!! Al the times I saw him fall off a barstool and stumbling down the street he's finally getting help!!" which I didn't care if poeple saw me knee walking drunk, why,other than pride, should I have cared if people saw me getting help?
However, AA isn't the only way. Do something. If it doesn't work, find another solution.

IOAA2

Hi.
For me AA was the only show in town before the internet so it has worked for me and millions of others.
As stated nothing will work unless we want it to by constantly working whatever we choose. Whatever we choose we need to want it and accept we cannot drink in safety, period.
The next thing is remembering that my recovery after relapsing is hugely difficult and filled with pain and misery we don’t want to experience.

BE WELL

48heath

AA is necessary for me.

I could always stp drinking,staying stopped was my problem,I could do it for periods of time,up to 3 years,but I always drank again.

Meetings will not keep anyone sober,it is the AA programme that works .I needed someone with long term sobriety to help me with it.

There are AA meetings online,if you really don't want to go to a face to face one.

Wishing you well.

wpainterw

I have had the same concerns in the past. One way of dealing with this is to take the trouble to go to another town, say 15 or 20 miles away once a week or so, but if this still makes you feel insecure I think that one to one counseling with someone who is bound by professional confidence and would not disclose your identity to anyone, might be helpful along with Rational Recovery and focus on the AV. Contact with other recovering alcoholics is very helpful. In my case I found it really necessary but I did it only when I moved to a big city and felt better about going to AA because there were so many different groups. A possibility for you might be some type of group therapy. You could talk it over with your counselor and see whether there is group therapy available. But if this also makes you uncomfortable, maybe it would be possible for you to reach our to one or two recovering alcoholic friends whom you can trust to keep a confidence. The bottom line is that I found it a lot easier and less risky to try to do it with help from some other person or persons. It can be done alone but it may be harder and riskier. Keep logging on to this website. That really helps! Good Luck.

W.

PurpleKnight

All about finding a way that works, for me SR was a great resource for support, but the main thing was to revolutionise my decision making, that's what really made Sobriety happen!!

Pepsi16710

I only use SR, but I am only 5 months in. The alcoholic voice is looming -- havent been on here in a while, so thought today would be a good day to revisit. Usually do when the AV is coming around.

Did not want to go the AA route...I read an interview with Bradley Cooper and he did it all on his own with no AA - just friend and family support. I hope you have those available to you if you decide against AA.