Tomorrow will be day 14
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Mar 2013
Posts: 73
Tomorrow will be day 14
This will now be the longest I have been sober in 2 years when I managed to make it just a week shy of 3 months in 2015. I have noticed some definite positives already. I feel much more clear headed and motivated to get things done. I feel like I actually want to improve areas of my life that I had become complacent in before.
One thing that helps me is to point out to myself that many of the memories I have of having fun drinking are memories of a life I no longer live anyway. I'm not 23 years old with little to no responsibilities anymore. Not only do I have a young daughter to look after now, but the friends I used to drink with have families and kids of their own now too. The reality of my drinking life was no longer going out to the bars or spending the night at a friend's house (not that doing those things were healthy for an alcoholic like myself to be doing anyway). It had become me drinking by myself every Saturday night after my girlfriend put our 1 year old to bed. That realization helped stamp out the old nostalgic feeling I had attached to alcohol. Not only did I physically crave it (I still do) but I mentally craved it as well. Whenever I thought about quitting I would instantly get flooded with memories of all the good times I had while drinking in the past and think to myself, "There is no way I can give it up completely and and not allow good times like that to happen ever again". I feel like I finally broke free of that mindset when I realized that those times are never coming back again anyway. Now I realize how much better life can be without alcohol. I can create new memories of my life with my family. I don't need alcohol as a crutch. I know I can do this. I owe it to myself and my family.
One thing that helps me is to point out to myself that many of the memories I have of having fun drinking are memories of a life I no longer live anyway. I'm not 23 years old with little to no responsibilities anymore. Not only do I have a young daughter to look after now, but the friends I used to drink with have families and kids of their own now too. The reality of my drinking life was no longer going out to the bars or spending the night at a friend's house (not that doing those things were healthy for an alcoholic like myself to be doing anyway). It had become me drinking by myself every Saturday night after my girlfriend put our 1 year old to bed. That realization helped stamp out the old nostalgic feeling I had attached to alcohol. Not only did I physically crave it (I still do) but I mentally craved it as well. Whenever I thought about quitting I would instantly get flooded with memories of all the good times I had while drinking in the past and think to myself, "There is no way I can give it up completely and and not allow good times like that to happen ever again". I feel like I finally broke free of that mindset when I realized that those times are never coming back again anyway. Now I realize how much better life can be without alcohol. I can create new memories of my life with my family. I don't need alcohol as a crutch. I know I can do this. I owe it to myself and my family.
c011:
Gratitude Gardener
Join Date: May 2017
Posts: 278
Your thought process about this is exactly what I went through... and how I still feel about drinking now 21 days into sobriety. That life actually, for me, never REALLY existed anyway. Sure there were times in my twenties (before alcohol became a DEPENDENCY, and was still only a weekend thing, and not every weekend even) when we were wild and crazy (my friends and I), but even those times were sort of better in the hours leading up to the drunk... the anticipation of getting drunk was what was fun... the actual drunks were, from my perspective now... Not nearly as great as I imagined they would be, and I blew it MANY times even then... Doing things I would NEVER had done had I been sober (and in those cases, thats wasnt a GOOD THING).
(one particular memory haunts me still to this day... chills me to the core... At a house party in a high rise apartment building in San Francisco... I got the genius idea to climb the fire escape out the window (13 stories high, or so) and enticed all the other drunk party goers to come along behind me. So there we were, drunk out of our minds, just a misjudged hand grip of a railing away from falling to our certain deaths, as we swayed, drunkenly ... climbing... and, at the last story... climbing ONLY ON A TINY LADDER.... up to the roof... with downtown san francisco blurry under our toes. Its entirely possible (probable, actually) that many of us were ALSO carrying our cocktails in one hand while climbing, too. Because, you know, that a very sensible thing to do in a drunk persons mind.)
SO BAD. So, so, so astonishingly dangerous.
I dont think of alcohol with any lingering romantic notions. The last few years of my drinking career dispelled all of that pretty thoroughly. I feel I have explored that way of life to its complete end (a dead end, at that).
Congratulations on TWO WEEKS!!!
We are doing the absolute right thing for ourselves, and our loved ones, now.
There is no room, in my mind at least, for any doubt about that.
(one particular memory haunts me still to this day... chills me to the core... At a house party in a high rise apartment building in San Francisco... I got the genius idea to climb the fire escape out the window (13 stories high, or so) and enticed all the other drunk party goers to come along behind me. So there we were, drunk out of our minds, just a misjudged hand grip of a railing away from falling to our certain deaths, as we swayed, drunkenly ... climbing... and, at the last story... climbing ONLY ON A TINY LADDER.... up to the roof... with downtown san francisco blurry under our toes. Its entirely possible (probable, actually) that many of us were ALSO carrying our cocktails in one hand while climbing, too. Because, you know, that a very sensible thing to do in a drunk persons mind.)
SO BAD. So, so, so astonishingly dangerous.
I dont think of alcohol with any lingering romantic notions. The last few years of my drinking career dispelled all of that pretty thoroughly. I feel I have explored that way of life to its complete end (a dead end, at that).
Congratulations on TWO WEEKS!!!
We are doing the absolute right thing for ourselves, and our loved ones, now.
There is no room, in my mind at least, for any doubt about that.
sober style
Join Date: May 2016
Location: San Antonio
Posts: 2,382
14 days is great! Sounds like you're doing good, Lindbain. Challenging your old habits and old ways of thinking, etc. The nostalgia thing is one of alcohol's favorite lies it likes to tell us, good that you're seeing thru it and rejecting it.
Member
Join Date: Jan 2016
Location: London
Posts: 2,040
Congratulations Lindbain 🎉🎉🎉
I am completing a 30 day online sobriety programme and through completing the daily action steps I am discovering a host of false beliefs I have had regarding alcohol and my drinking, just as you have. One of them was as silly as I will not be able to dance at parties/social events anymore because without alcohol I won't have the confidence. When I cross-examined this I realised two things (1) that I was envisioning my dancing whilst drunk to have rivalled Beyonce...when in fact I would be out of time, stumbling and needing to be dancing with someone in case I lost my balance...in essence a drunken mess and (2) I entered dancing competitions as a child...no alcohol was involved...I can find that child-like confidence again somehow
Wishing you well on the rest of your recovery journey x
I am completing a 30 day online sobriety programme and through completing the daily action steps I am discovering a host of false beliefs I have had regarding alcohol and my drinking, just as you have. One of them was as silly as I will not be able to dance at parties/social events anymore because without alcohol I won't have the confidence. When I cross-examined this I realised two things (1) that I was envisioning my dancing whilst drunk to have rivalled Beyonce...when in fact I would be out of time, stumbling and needing to be dancing with someone in case I lost my balance...in essence a drunken mess and (2) I entered dancing competitions as a child...no alcohol was involved...I can find that child-like confidence again somehow
Wishing you well on the rest of your recovery journey x
Member
Join Date: Aug 2012
Posts: 3,777
This is great.
Yes, as we get older the things that were important become less. Family and all the responsibilities that come along with "adulting" take on new meaning. Good for you! Keep up the stellar work. Life is much more manageable this way.
Yes, as we get older the things that were important become less. Family and all the responsibilities that come along with "adulting" take on new meaning. Good for you! Keep up the stellar work. Life is much more manageable this way.
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