whathaveidone84

So having been heavily drinking for as long as i can remember i got myself into a medical mess last year - i was in hospital for 3 weeks having been crapping blood for a while...ended up i lost 6 units and my haemoglobin was under 40 - so they took care of me however pumped me full of dilaudid constantly 24/7 over those 3 weeks - i think i left hospital with a full addiction to that. Everytime i think of a substance i want it so badly i believe if i dont fight this battle i could end up an addicted bum on the streets doing whatever i could - today ive run out of ativan and am seriously freaking out at work (on coffee break right now) i feel like i need something to take the edge off and cud really use a drink - i wont tho im actually a bit afraid to turn to anything, i can refil my script tomorrow - how do u cope with this extreme anxiety??! My thought are all over the place and im sure this post is very poorly constructed i feel like i cant hold a thought in my head and its only day 4 - i feel so shaky nervous and ill and my skin smells weird which is also fueling my anxiety. Anyway just writing this down to try keep myself sane but holy crap is this ever hard...

Dee74

Anxiety's very common in the early days whathaveIdone - our minds and bodies are healing, neurons are firing, we're scared and regretful... and sometimes that manifests as anxiety.

try and focus on that anxiety as a simple process on the road to healing.

Most of us are used to having no 'edge' cos we banished it with drinking drugs and pills.

It's a time of readjustment, but it will get better

D

chrcarlson

I assume you have gotten any medical treatment you need. I quit after 35 years of drinking. yeah there is a lot of anxiety at first. How do I cope? What do I do if I don't drink? These questions will answer themselves if you don't drink. I felt the same way the first week or two but after 40+ days it gone away.

If you smell strange it the booze and toxins coming out. This to will pass soon. I ate and drank a lot of water a lot at first, it helped with the cravings. The physical part should get better very quickly. The thoughts and craving take longer. Try to be active when you would normally drink. Take a walk, watch a movie...anything but setting around thinking. Post on this board a lot and don't worry about typos.

You are doing great! Every week will get easier. The first one for me was the toughest. I'm in week 7 now and it's on hell of a lot easier than week one. Just keep doing it One Day at a Time.

whathaveidone84

thanks guys i read those responses at work i just got done there 10 hours but seemed like the absolute longest work day id faced in a while - racing thoughts and anxiety so bad i wanted to run out the gates but stuck it out and explained to people what was going on - i kinda wear my heart on my sleeve so i dont really mind talking to people, friends of course, about my issues but it still doesnt subtract much from the anxiety i feel....tomorrow i can get more ativan so should be alot calmer, but thanks to u guys for the replies - it makes it alot easier to get through the day when u know ur not alone.

teatreeoil007

You could try taking a long shower or bath... When you go to bed focus on breathing and just breathe... It'll be okay...

least

You are never alone here at SR. We all understand how hard this is. But we also understand how rewarding it is to live a sober life.

Hang in there. It gets better.

JD

I don't know if you can swing this at work, but I'd get out and do a 15 minute walk mid morning and afternoon and a half hour walk over the lunch break. It really helped with my anxiety and mood. I made it a priority to do that every day.

Meraviglioso

Hmm, I just posted and then went to edit out an extra word and my post was gone. I apologize if this is a repeat.
More or less, what I posted was this.
First I am sorry about your anxiety. I recently read a post by someone (on Humans of New York) who said they dealt with anxiety and excess energy/feelings of restlessness by wearing a weighted vest during the day under their clothes. You can find them at sporting goods stores and I think they make them very thin now so it wouldn't really be noticed.
It would be a drug free/alcohol free way of dealing with those sensations.
I also just googled the therapeutic usage of weighted vests and found that it is an alternative treatment for children with ADHD and for helping children with autism stay on task. Interesting!

FarToGo

Early days can be the hardest of all (were for me anyway), do whatever you can to take care of yourself and make it to a week. Hopefully some of these symptoms will have started to ease by then, may have even gone.
Take care
xx

zjw

i luckily had the luxery of working from home but i've heard others taking leave of absences fro this time period and many go to there doc and get medications of sorts.

I'm pretty anti med myself but I should have probably gotten someting to help tho i asked my doctor and he told me no. I'm glad because it would have been yet one more thing to have to eventually get off of. But geeze it might have made my life a little easier.

so what did i do? I paced. i drank a lot of herbal tea (I dunno if it did anything but i'd like to think it did) i tried to keep busy obviously in my case not with work as that was a major source of my struggle so i found other things to do while on the clock to help calm my nerves like read or polish things. I went for walks. and it was not uncommon to see me out walking multiple times a day just trying to calm myself down. I took hot showers. SO you can see why one might want to take some time off of work if possible during this time period.

I think if i had to go into an office during this time period I would not have made it or i would have been fired for assault or simply not being productive whatever came to a head first i guess.

The good news is you'll learn a lot of techniques to help calm youself through this make note of them all because down the line you'll need them again and again.

dogslover2016

I can relate to the anxiety, too. Drinking short circuits our ability to fully experience and deal with the anxiety.

Everyone has great, practical ideas to breathe through it.

One other idea that works for me is to give myself a time limit. I think to myself, "I can cope with this feeling for 3 minutes..." and then I try to breathe and relax .. then "I can live with this anxiety for 4 minutes" and so on. I do this with my cravings, too. So far I have realized that my cravings and anxiety don't last much longer than 10 minutes.

((((hugs))))

Soberwolf

Breathing exercises really help

A breathing exercise that calms panic attacks.

3 Anxiety Breathing Techniques You Can Practice Anywhere - Self help for anxiety - Anxiety Slayer

Hawkeye13

Anxiety is really bad for many when you first quit.
It was for me, but if you stick it out and don't drink,
you'll find it gets better and better.

My anxiety pretty much totally went away by about 6 months.
It just kept slowly getting better.

Drinking anything reset the clock for me and I had to start over,
so I strongly suggest don't drink and do other things to relax.
It's very much worth the effort to be free of anxiety and alcohol.