Cobber3

Hi All,

I hit 6 moths two days ago! I thought that was going to be the magic number and all these weird little quirks were going to magically disappear, not the case.

Quick run down, was a heavy beer drinker for a long time off and on, 12 pack a night wast he usual towards the end,more on weekends of course. I am 30 years young and now have 6 months under my belt. The whole not drinking thing i am completely content with. I go to the liquor store everyday to get chew and am around people every weekend who are drinking and i have zero problem with not drinking. Hell i am going to Ireland on Friday and don't give a **** that i am not drinking.

My life has drastically changed in the last 6 months. I am skinnier, i am a better father, working is BOOMING, i am surfing everyday again and just almost back to being in the swing of things like i was at a young age before i traded a lot of talents and relationships for party scenes and eventually a nasty drinking habit.

Now i have posted on here a couple times throughout my recovery about what i would call PAWS symptoms. I can not get out of bed in the morning, feel drained all day, sometimes just straight up feel like garbage. All that i can handle! Its this anxiety that is literally making me feel like, "maybe i have a lost it, maybe i drank myself to the point i cannot be around people unless I'm drunk or buzzed". I started to get that anxiety towards the tail end of my last drinking before another run at recovery and that subsided with no drinking, not this time though. I would almost call it panic/paranoid, their looking at me and they can tell I'm tripping out kind of vibe. I just don't get it to be honest and i wanted to come here to see if anyone can relate.

Don't get me wrong, there are days where i feel better than i have in years and i couldn't be more grateful that i am back in my kids lives, am a better husband, and i am just an all around better human being. My best friends wife is a counselor at a rehab and she claims by brain is healing and its new neurotransmitters and theres just a lot going on. She also suggested a low SSRI which i am not a fan of at all. I just have week long funks where i don't feel myself, don't want to be in a meeting at work, or hell, even talk to someone and look them in the eyes. I just mentally weird out and its an issue as i am pretty notorious for being such a social person. My work demands that i talk to high level people on the regular and i am getting by, but hell some days are hard.

Point being; where were you @ 6 months? Can anyone relate to this anxiety that won't go away? is it PAWS? Will time run its course?

I know i put my body through hello since i was 20 or so and i can't expect to be "healed" in 6 months but a little reassurance right now could help.

No I'm not going to meetings or working a program. Agreed they will help, I'm working 14 hour days and simply don't have time right now. I have two friends with 5+ years under their belt that i utilize as sponsor types. They didn't really get the anxiety part.

Appreciate ya!

-J

shockozulu

At six months I had some anxiety similar to what your are describing. A friend explained it well. At six months my sober life was transitioning from the acute, short term recovery to the chronic long term recovery. We treat each phase differently with some different behaviors. For a basic example a person may go from having to drive the long way home to avoid their old bar in the acute recovery phase. Once chronic recovery sets in the same person can now drive the old route home without any temptation.

My explanation didn't do it justice but I hope you can understand my word mush.

least

Well, I certainly felt better at six months, compared to one or two months, but was still up and down until about a year. Give yourself a few more months and see how you feel. If you still feel badly, you might consider seeing a doctor for a check up.

Cobber3

I get what your putting down. Thanks!

shockozulu

I remember at about 9 months getting angry because I shouldnn't be having ups and downs if I'm not craving on a daily basis. Now I recognize the absolute in that thought and it back were it belongs

Changes123

Hello, it sounds like your recovery is going well. Keep it up! I am 239 days sober today. At the 6 month mark I was still a MESS. Poor memory, brain fog, anxiety, panic attacks, word finding problems, social awkwardness, and being completely conversationally inept accurately summarizes my symptoms. My memory is still touch and go and I still have my battles with anxiety. It does get better with time. Hope this helps.

Andante

Reassurances coming your way! I completely understand the frustration of not being where you think you ought to be, or of making progress only to wake up feeling like it's Day One again.

At 6 months in, I still had more bad days than good ones. Part of the bad days was the unshakable feeling that I'd never get better. I'm convinced this hopelessness was part and parcel of the package of peculiar wonky brain symptoms I was dealing with, as opposed to defective thinking resulting from my not "working my recovery" hard enough or something.

Try to ride it out. I often found that a run of bad days would be followed by a longer period of much better ones. This progression continued until I had mostly better days and only a few bad ones.

Hang in there!

kenton

Thank you for posting Cobber, I'm at 6 months too and I could have written your post! Anxiety, social awkwardness, low mood... I got it all. And I'm not an anxious, socially awkward, grumpy person. Yesterday I seemed to have a peak in my symptoms ....driving to work I started crying and couldn't stop. Got no idea what I was crying about. Got so bad I had to pull the car over. Felt like I was in a trance and before I knew it I'd turned the car round and was driving to my doctors surgery. Didn't even bother phoning into work, just got to the surgery and stood there crying until they told me I could see a doctor. I need to stress that I have never done anything like this before. Sitting in the doctors surgery I started thinking what I was doing there. What did I want? A magic pill to make me feel better? Left the surgery, didn't hang around to see doctor, got back in my car and went to work. Posted here and some people with more sobriety and wisdom than me talked about a dam of emotions. Drinking keeps that dam blocked up. Sobriety starts to open the dam. The emotions had been trickling out for a while but yesterday there was a flood. I realised that I'm not good at sitting with my feelings. I've never done it before. When things were bad, I'd blame it on someone or something else and then drink to block out the pain. Can't do that anymore. Got to learn to feel again. I'm not ruling out depression for me and I will go back to the doctors and actually see a doctor if symptoms don't improve. But first of all I want to try to deal with this myself. Stands to reason that there's going to be some pretty major emotional upheaval now that my biggest coping mechanism is gone. I toughed it out yesterday and I feel better today. One day at a time. Not sure if this helps. Just read your post, could relate and wanted to let you know you're not alone. Have fun in Ireland. Love it there

Berrybean

I hit my own rock bottom at 6 month. Crying whenever I was alone. Praying every night that I wouldn't wake up the next morning. Full of regret over my very existence. It was then that I got desperate enough to find the willingness to lean into my fears and make time for recovery work. Counselling didn't work for me as I did not have the capacity to be honest with my counsellor. When I realised that it kind of flashed up for me that I, like all the people I knew who had the kind of recovery that I wanted for myself, would have to find the humility to get a sponsor and do the step work (or I suppose fully engage with some other kind of recovery work). We get out of recovery what we out into it. The good news is that the work I had / have to do invariably took / takes less time and energy than sitting in my abyss of despair did each day.

Time is all very well, but i needed to work at change. My problem was my alcoholic thinking and faulty perspective, and I wasn't going to learn what I needed to learn by biding my time. Perhaps you are different, but I can only share my own experiences.

When I did the work, gradually I found the promises coming to fruition. They have now all come true. They are NOT extravagant promises, but we do need to work for them.

Wishing you all the best for your sobriety and recovery. BB

PhoenixJ

Support to you

August252015

Six months is great- I felt good then but will concur with the others that there are ups and downs. Lately- at 446 days today- I have been irritable and more anxious than usual. I felt my "downs" at "odd" months/milestones like 7 not 6....it is different for each of us. The whole is way better sober, though, so keep going!!

You said you aren't working a program because of time- making some kind of routine has been really important for me. Mine is AA and a lot of time spent on recovery work- finding a way (internet, books, devotionals, whatever) to get in the habit of things that will soothe and lead you is something I am grateful I have done.

No matter what, remember the good things you mention that you did NOT have when drinking- and keep going- it does get better.

FreeOwl

At 6 months I was all over the place emotionally and physically. By one year I'd begun to realize I'd always had some anxiety and just tried to keep it at bay with booze and drugs.

I also began to realize that being around people drinking wasn't really where I wanted to be or who I wanted to be with.

By two years things were pretty dang good all around. By three years even better.....

Just keep at it, don't get too hung up on waiting for it to be something other than what it is right now, every today. Realize that sobriety is a journey because it is LIFE. You spent many years blotting out life and convincing yourself that life was what you saw through the mental and emotional haze ofor beer. Learning and adjusting and letting go into what life IS takes time..... and in every single day there is beauty and reward if you open yourself too it. Embrace all the everyday beauty life really IS and don't worry about what you expect it to be.

And stay sober.

D122y

Cobber,

In my experience....

It is kindling, paws, and ptsd.

I probably was in that state for the last 10 years while drinking.

Drinking caused them, generally, and when I quit drinking they went away...very very slowly.

Now, at 2 years sober, they are deminishing to a nearly laughable state. I am so used to them coming on and leaving that when they occur...I know they will dissappear shortly.

Those hellish feelings are obviously a huge motivation to never drink again.

I believe that meds mask/stop/cure those feelings which may lead alkys, like me, to start drinking again. The suffering, for days and months, off and on, on end is burned into my memory banks.

The memory of my suffering is the major motivation for me to never drink again.

Only folks at SR know the depth of the hell I endured. My wife, son, family etc. Don't fully get it.

I have brought it up to some folks i care about, especially to my son , only to plant seeds of understanding about what careless booze use can lead to. My son has been warned extremely well. Even my normie wife shys away from booze now more than ever.

I wish to God that when I was a kid I had 1 hours worth of the education SR has given me.

I believe I would have dropped booze like a hot potatoe. Right?

So the short answer is....it gets better and better....if you stay clean.

Thanks.

bunnezjp

Don't put timesamps and expectations on how you "should feel" at certain points in your sobriety.

~Bunnez

BrendaChenowyth

You still have to put a lot of work in to maintaining yourself and your life, the point of sobriety is that you have the ability to do it. The bare minimum we need to do is stay sober, but we have to do a lot more than that to feel good.

I need to start my day by meditating and eating some breakfast. And I never do either and wonder why all morning I'm SO cranky! And then I'll go have wine for lunch!

poolside

Congrats on six months! Well done. At almost 4 months myself, I'm still experiencing physical issues from the initial detox period: fatigue, leg/muscle weakness, some residual swelling. I'm working hard on turning these around. But mentally I'm ready to get back out there and start working out again. I'm not (yet) experiencing any of the anxiety, cravings, or depression some recovering addicts report. Everyone is different.

entropy11316

I'm at 6 months as well (11/3) and I'm experiencing all of the above off and on. Word finding and short-term memory issues are things I never had problem with and now do. I work in a demanding professional and technical field and it's been a struggle some days. I've spoken to others and read that it gets much better as your brain adapts and "re-builds".

congrats and hang in there