Starryskye

Happy new year everyone.

Wanted to post here to see if anyone can relate.... I'm 14 months sober today and life is better than it has ever been. But.... I keep getting this recurring sense of dread... like everything is going to go wrong or I'm somehow going to lose everything. I have this recurring nightmare that I'm going to get thrown into prison for a crime I didn't commit. Sometimes I'll be laughing with my kids and I'll suddenly panic that something awful is going to happen to them which will mean I'll never see them again.

I'm a really positive person but these feelings are beginning to get me down. I practise CBT and when the feelings arise, I calm myself down, recognise that they are just thoughts - not reality and get back to doing whatever I'm doing. But yesterday an interesting thought hit me.... could this sense of dread be my AV? Now that I've become pretty good at ignoring my AV, has it mutated into a different voice? Is that possible? Is it my AV telling me I might lose everything, in the hope I'll become anxious and panicked and start drinking again?

I guess I just wondered whether anyone else experienced anything similar. I'd love to hear that it's a normal part of the journey because that will make it easier to ride this part out and move on to the next stage of recovery. But if it's not normal, maybe I need to look more deeply at where this anxiety is coming from. Thanks for reading xx

entropy1964

I don't know if its your AV or not. I do know for me that 'catastrophizing' is part of the thinking that drives me to drink, however.

I was feeling awful on NYE. My almost 17 yr old daughter was at a friends house. Who really knows what they were doing. I believe she is pretty honest with me overall but, ya know, she IS 17. So I started awfulizing. What if, what if, what if.....and yes, like you, I have to stop myself. Stay in the moment. Stay with what I know I have control over (which isn't much). Pray that the universe has her and that I have to let go and trust that everything will be ok. And more than likely it will. I'm losing her. She'll be gone in a year and half...away at school. Ugh. Its like a punch in the gut if I allow it to be. I talked to her about it yesterday. That I'm 'passing the baton' of her safety to her and that it does make me uneasy. So its going to be an interesting couple of years...as I learn to let go piece by piece.

I think the good ole serenity prayer kinda sums it up.

Mizzuno

I experience these thoughts as well. Mine surface in the form of people dying. I know that it is anxiety as I have had anxiety for most of my adult life.

When I was actively drinking I feared I would do something that would result in my ending up in prison. I do think it is " normal" for the most part. I do think it will go away if you work towards positive thinking, which it sounds like you are. Thoughts are thoughts. They have a life of their own. If the thoughts are starting to rule your life in a negative way please seek out professional help as you are not meant to live in fear and be anxious.

DontRemember

This feeling/thoughts you describe was what I was going through mentally after my DUI and actually when I 1st joined here I felt this way..It kept me drinking. I'd go to sleep at 12-2am only to wake up at 4am EVERYDAY, with insane anxiety over losing everything. Not losing everything from the DUI(that wasn't going to happen legally),but just the general sense of loss followed me around. The entire world was gray to me,colorless. I'm about a year in and the past week/two the feeling is back. I'm still taking my anxiety meds,but still just feel very blah and sometimes scared when I wake up,I'm not even sure what I'm scared of. I have had quite the 'ride' with becoming sober,ending a long term relationship, death in the family,ect.. and I think the holidays in general are hard on a lot of folks. Especially those like us in general.

Dee74

I think fear is a part of a lot of peoples stories Starryskye.

I used to feel like a fraud, that I would somehow be found out and exposed as not as good as I appeared to be.

I had no basis for that feeling but it followed me through school, into the workforce, into University and even into my musical career.

Recovery has bought me a lot of things but most of all it's bought me contentment.

I know I'm not the best at everything, but that ok.
I've worked hard to get what I have & keep it.

I deserve it.
There's no fraudery here

as far as losing everything goes - the only way we can do that is by willingly raising a glass of alcohol to our lips.

If we never do that - never do that one simple thing - we can never lose the great sober life or the peace and contentment we're building

D