Don't throw away your money Weekender 5-7 May
 

Towards the end of my drinking career I tended towards being a solitary drinker as I was ashamed of how much I drank.

I would however go out drinking on Friday nights with some friends that I only ever saw within a drinking context (a little aside here - since I stopped drinking I rarely see any of them, they made no effort to stay in touch and neither did I)

London is not the cheapest place to go out drinking but since we were all middle aged men there was no clubbing, dancing or restaurants involved, just drinking and banter (mostly bs)

Even this limited excursioninto sociability would cost £25 on booze plus £5 for a greasy burger or fried chicken. Once I got home I could get on with the serious drinking, another half bottle of scotch or about £8 worth.

Writing off Saturday morning to a hangover I would emerge around lunchtime to buy pre cooked meals and produce from the deli. All pricey but requiring no preperation, a good £10 more than preparing food myself. Saturday night would be alone in front of the TV drinking another £10 worth of scotch.

Sunday - rinse, repeat.

So the financial cost of poisoning myself for two and a half days was circa £80 ~ US $110. For years and I am not including broken pairs of glasses and trodden on TV remotes and all the attritional damages the habitual drunk racks up.

This will be my 122nd weekend of not doing that, I will leave you guys to work out the savings in your own currencies but as you can imagine it is a fair amount.

Money is by no means the worst thing drugs or alcohol take from us but when we are drinking or drugging I doubt we are doing long term budgeting or financial planning which in turn causes us stress and stress makes us ... well you can see this is going.

This weekend kick booze or drugs into touch and look forward to a better financial future.

:bus :bus :bus :bus :bus

It's the (other) S-word!

Wonderful and very practical post, Sao! A real motivator! :)

Thank you as always.

Money in my pocket. One of things I quickly noted early in sobriety is I no longer stress about hanging on to my money for booze. It's wonderful to walk around with a few bucks in my pocket. I regularly contribute to fund raisers I come across now. Take my kids out for coffee, buy my self a few things here and there on a whim. All thing's I would never do before because I needed it to 'survive'. I've even opened up my own personal savings account down at the bank. At the end of the week, I'll put some of what's in my pocket into the bank. I'd roughly estimate that I'm not spending ~$85.00 Canadian per week on booze.

Congrats on shotgun Glimmer! About time too.

Oh, PS. Today is my 21st wedding anniversary. "May the 4th be with you."

Congratulations, Dragon!

Any special plans?

Thanks as always Sao :)

Congrats STDragon!
Hi Gilmer :)

D

Hi, Dee! :)

Yea.... I'm staying sober this year... :lmao

Congrats on the wedding anniv! We're in for a good weekend. Driving to see friends and relatives. Relatives don't drink, but friends may have beers, which I never liked. Intend to have my new favorite drink cran-sparkling water. Spouse and I already talked and she might have a beer with them, they're more her friends. Asked if that would be ok with me. i said sure.

They mostly know me from before when we moved away, and that was during my (about) 6 year sobriety stint.

Thanks sao! I still spend all my money, but on cool stuff like RC cars and home improvement projects. I didn't get sober cuz the cost but there were days I would think about it and say "no thanks AV, I prefer to keep this cash in my pocket, thank you" and it helped.

IN!

First workout in the gym last night.

Send me your Motrin. I need ALL the Motrin. :bigcry

I didn't do it for the money, but when I get tight firsted about some small thing, say under $10, I remember how freely I spent it when I was buying wine. Never thought twice about spending that money. So I say to myself just buy it (whatever small thing I'm being stingy about).

Good for you, Nons!

I'll send you some Motrin if you'll send me some of your self-discipline!

Happy 21st Wedding Anniversary SoberDragon!

Staying sober is the best plan.

When I lived in London every Friday I'd finish work at 5pm walk across Oxford St to Soho and end up boozing pretty much till Sunday night. 80 quid a gram of coke and countless amounts of money on booze.

Anyway, living back home now and looking forward to my first sober weekend in possibly 2 years or so. I still haven't slept right all week so I feel like a bit of a zombie, although it's way better than any kind of a hangover, even a very mild one. Not sure what I'm going to do yet but I just want to get home after work tomorrow and put my feet up for the evening. Saturday I'll probably go for a run and a drive or have lunch somewhere nice. Good luck folks!

Congrats dragon. Im in to save more $. Perhaps throw an extra dollar or two towards a 7th tradition.

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In my forever-Sober Travel Trailer Soirees around the Desert, I saw this RV for sale just South of Bullhead City Arizona. Identical to the one in Breaking Bad.

Only $5,500- OBO. So, the Owner will negotiate. Another reason to save those Shekels not spent on Booze, and get busy Livin' Large! :cool:
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http://i66.tinypic.com/oh4c5c.jpg
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I'm in.
One of the exercises we did in treatment was to add up what we thought we had spent drinking over the past 5 years, including legal fees if any, damage to property, fines, etc. It was a staggering amount for me, as I mostly drank in bars and I had two DUI's with car accidents in that time period leading up to getting sober. In the past 29 months I figure I have saved about $10,000. Maybe more - that's just the cost of booze. Not counting any other costs that could have occurred.

But the bigger gains have come from rebuilding my self-esteem, regaining trust from people close to me, and a new job that I would not have bothered to get if I were still drinking (I was working sporadically, and only part-time, for about 6 years before getting sober). The money savings is great, but the other things in my life that I have gained are more important, by far.

And congratulations on your anniversary, STDragon!
(and I love your avatar)