HyperBallad

Seeing my b/f's half-empty bottle of JD on our kitchen counter for the past couple weeks hasn't bothered me, but I haven't made a commitment to abstinence yet because "forever" is too overwhelming right now. For the last month I've spent at least 5 days "off" each week, drinking only 1 or 2 days. I spent the last 4-5 years on the opposite schedule, so while I'm not making remarkable progress, I'm feeling braver about going consecutive weeks "off." Drank last night (half bottle of wine & 1 shot), and my goal now is to hold off until weekend camping trip in 18 days. Took 14 days off in January for the first time in years, so I am confident I can do 18 days, and maybe even longer next month. Upper right side back discomfort is slowly becoming less noticeable. Is "baby steps" part of the step program? I feel like it's the only way I can feel good about making progress without feeling deprived and overwhelmed, or worse, discouraged if I have to keep starting over at day 1.

doggonecarl

If at some point you reach total sobriety, then yes, you can call this progress. But if in the long run you fail to get sober, what you are doing now is just drinking. And as long as you're drinking, you are in the clutch of your addiction.

Anna

Welcome!

I do tend to agree with Carol. Stopping drinking and being abstinent is totally different than what you're doing. One thing I noticed when I was trying to moderate my drinking was that I obsessed about all the time. When would I next drink, where, how much and what would the next day be like? Stopping drinking frees your mind from the clutches of addiction.

Jtmlk

I think you have done remarkably to have got this far and moderate your alcohol use. That said the points raised above are all relevant and you need to decide
1. Do you have an addiction to alcohol and if so your better off without
And
2. If you can moderate, and real addicts can't then , what is your plan.
If your thinking about your next drink then you need to look deeper into the person you are and what you want to achieve and become.

tomsteve

what im reading,imo, is rationalization, which has kept alot of people drunk.

doesnt read like ya honestly and sincerely want to get sober.

ScottFromWI

Drinking less is certainly better for your body, but I'd say your "success" depends on what your goal is. When you first came here you had questions about whether or not it was possible for an alcoholic to ever "moderate" their drinking again. For the vast majority of us, moderation is never possible. Look at last night for example - you drank a whole bottle of wine and a shot - that's binge drinking by any stretch of the imagination. So yes, you have had some abstinent stretches and that is better than binging every night, but it's still not good for you.

Sobriety doesn't come in different "levels" so to speak. It's an all-or-nothing proposition. I think what you HAVE proven is that you can go without alcohol..for a while. The next step is to go without..permanently. Is that your long term goal?

EndGameNYC

It sounds as though you're thinking that if you continue to drink (less frequently than you're used to drinking), that scheduling your drinking sessions will help you to avoid "starting over at day 1." If you want to get sober, this is something of a paradox. It's true that continuing to drink will help you to avoid starting sobriety all over again, but it's doubtful that this strategy offers a path to sobriety.

If your future plans include controlled drinking, then, yes, you never have to start over again at day one. The short version of your plan is to continue drinking so that you don't have to stop, and then fail again at getting sober. Failure (or the anticipation of failure) is essentially built into your plan

By itself, I don't believe that cutting back on your drinking is a bad idea, but I also don't imagine that drinking in order to avoid feeling discouraged about getting sober would work for many people who are trying to get sober.

Lightning Bug

Progress is defined. I am a computer programmer by profession. I write code to produce a piece of software that will provide value to the end user in their work.

I don't open my editor and start writing code with no rhyme or reason. What would I write? Where would I start? I can't just start it. What resources do I have to work with?

What I do is design a process flow, a storyboard, with a clear definition of goals, expectations and deliverables. Then when that is done I dive headfirst into the code, no babysteps, to deliver what I promise to myself and my users.

I look at sobriety like I look at coding. I know I want sobriety. That is my end goal. I defined my start (clean date). I defined my resources (what will help me), and then created my deliverables (definition of what I want to get out of it). Now I am executing my code in debugger mode. Checking myself against my goals.

This analogy can work for lots of professions. You can't expect to achieve anything if you don't define your goal, lay out your steps, and execute it with diligence.

So what is your end goal? Sobriety? If so, reducing your intake and taking babysteps is like me writing a bunch of things and expecting it to work. It isn't going to work. It will be stuck and going nowhere. I won't get to my goal. I won't deliver. If you want sobriety you stop all drinking. You make a plan and work a plan.

But Bug, you ask, you are on day 6. What room do you have to talk? Alcohol is not my only addiction. I have clean dates going back years for other vices. Those are samples of my programs. I successfully defined my goal and achieved my goal.

Define your goal and work towards it.

Damn I ramble.

Bug

least

I couldn't get sober for good until I wanted to be sober more than I wanted to drink.

Dime

I tried to moderate and have off days during the week. It only resulted in my alcoholism getting worse and torturing myself as to when I could have the next drink. When I finally realized it was only making me crazy I decided that I could never have a drink again, I got a sponsor in AA, started working the steps and I felt 1000% better. No more anxiety about when I could have the next drink. If I had only realized this years earlier the damage to my life would have been much less. Stopping for good sooner is so much better.

Dee74

I could never maintain any kind of moderation for long...and my life did not get dramatically better while I was drinking any amount of alcohol.

I understand about the fear of forever but we live our lives (something most of us really do want to last forever) one day at a time - our recovery is really no different in that sense

I think if you've got one hand free of the shackles, why not go for the other hand too?

D

JimmyJam

I'm with Anna. Not drinking at all is much less complicated than trying to moderate.