Teanowforme83

So I e suffered clinical depression since I was 17... so good old 18 years. I have also self medicated with alcohol for the same length of time, until going ‘sober’ 17 days ago.
Now I genuinely thought this would stop/help with my binge eating and depression. But I’ve now replaced the void alcohol filled with more food, and my depression has surfaced even more to the point of it being unbearable. It was like I was looking through misty windows before and now it’s clear as day and I’m sensitive to everything. I cry at everything. I’m angry a lot.
I have a young family to look after and so I have to carry on with routine etc, but I’m tired the minute I get up and desperate to go back to sleep the minute I wake up. I thought getting rid of alcohol would help; abd it has to an extent, but my energy levels have PLUMMETED and my sugar cravings gone off the chart.
Anyone had same issue and how did you get around it?
I’m not tempted to start drinking again- Infact I’m atarying to resent alcohol and what it’s done to me for most of my adult life. I feel angry at myself for so much now( but that’s a whole new issue)
Hope this post made sense🙄x

D122y

Tea,

Imo...Booze did a pretty good job of....medicating...me. But, the side effects and addiction began to slowly kill me. It was insidious.

Depression got better, but it took over a year to pull out. I exercise 4 to 7 days a week. That is my new drug.

I take no other meds as I believe that is another addiction, some need them. I am getting on without for now.

Thanks.

Dee74

Hi Teanowforme83

some people stop drinking and find that their depression is completely alcohol related

Others who have a chronic or pre-existing depression find stopping drinking on its own can only do so much.

Do you have a Dr or therapist you see for your depression?
I really think thats the next step?

D

doggonecarl

Seventeen days is awesome! It is also extremely early in the overall time frame of recovery. It is going to take time to undo the ravages of 18 years of drinking.

I drank for over 30 years. Things were awfully raw in the beginning. They got better, or I wouldn't have gone almost 8 years without a drink.

apollo986

My depression anxiety and depression has decreased dramatically(day 63). I begin to notice a difference around the 30 day mark. Hang in there!

Teanowforme83

Hey, no I don’t see a therapist anymore. In my late teens up until early twenties I had one, but to be honest, therapy never worked for me. And the GP’s are generally useless. Been on/ off Prozac and everything else all my adult life and at the mo taking nothing. I just want a clear head but I’m struggling.
I’m not even sure how much of an alcohol problem I had and whether I was dependent or not. I basically could put away 2-3 bottles wine every other night without being too wasted. Comfortably drink 2 bottles that’s for sure whilst still holding my ‘dignity’ if I even had any. But then over three pregnancies and breastfeeding I managed to abstain. So I have been able to just ‘stop’, if that’s sense or even a difference?
However, past few years i’ve Felt like’ve Needed the wine. And when telling myself I would stop, I couldn’t help myself and bought the wine. And this was all drinking alone- not social drinking.
Not sure what my point is. Guess I’m trying to figure out what relationship I have with alcohol and if I can ever go back to it. But it’s got me into so much s**t over the years you wouldn’t believe it. Surprised I haven’t severely f**ked my life up.

tomsteve

Tean, you say you used to see a therapist. how about a psychologist and/or psychiatrist?

Teanowforme83

Sorry, he was a psychologist or a psychotherapist. Think only psychologists can prescribe meds ( uk) so he must have been the latter.
Anyway, didn’t help :-/
Willing to try again though

soberclover

Congratulations on your sobriety!!!! I needed the counseling - I agree with what others have said to try a psychotherapist/psychiatrist...someone with more experience. And try looking for one with addiction knowledge. I'm a clinician myself and even I needed the help! Early sobriety isn't easy and it helps so very much to have someone to talk with. Check in here often on SR....LOTS of super folks here!!!

Try to get that thought about "will I ever be able to drink again" out of your head. I'm a true blue alcoholic and for me whenever I put alcohol in to my body disaster...true disaster follows. Do a solid for your kids and be there for them in your true authentic self....not your wine soaked self.

Gottalife

This might not be you, but my experience was that whenever I stopped drinking, life got worse. I had a reasonable spell dry after 10 weeks in a rehab. Probably 100 dyas or so. At the end of that I was so unable to cope with life, I couldn't even get out of bed. My solution was to turn back to the bottle. For a time at least, it seemed to supply whatever was the missing ingredient, but I paid a high price in the long run.

It is quite normal with alcoholics to get worse after stopping drinking. That is the nature of alcoholism. It tends to make its presence felt when we stop. It is like an inability to exist happily in the world and there is an emptiness inside. We used to fill it with booze, now dry, we might attempt to fill it with something else. Some describe it as a God sized hole in the soul. Maybe that's it. Or something wrong with our connection to life and the world around us.

For me to get well long term I really had to find away to make my existence reasonably happy and with a purpose that meant something to me. I was able to do that with the AA program.

There are also websites these days that cater specifically to depression and have many good ideas on what can be done short of medication. You could try some of those ideas and see if it helps.

tekink

17 days is not long enough. The first 6 months of sobriety where a complete whirlwind for me.


It takes a while for your brain to adjust. If all we had to do was abstain for two weeks it sure would be a lot easier!

Anna

I dealt with depression since my teen years too and I ended up self-medicating with alcohol. Ultimately, I had to get medication that helped me before I was able to stop drinking. For me, the medication levels the playing field and gives me a chance.

Be cautious with your thoughts that you might not be an alcoholic. You might be right, but denial is a huge part of alcoholism, and it's also a fact that alcoholism is progressive and will get worse unless you stop drinking.

Tc4ever

Good job on day 17. I ended up going on meds for depression and anxiety as it never would get any better, it just became worst. The tiredness for me lasted about 1.5 months, and a great tip I got from here is ice cream helps cravings so much.
Peace...
TC

tomsteve

THAT is awesome to read! willingness is a ver good thing to have.

personally i think it would be worth it. hopefully you can find one that has a background in alcoholism,too. s

nightshade131

Hello Tea,
I can completely relate to everything you have said! (Except the pregnancies bit, though). I keep lapsing back to day one, but each time I am sober for longer and during those times I am learning about myself and what alcohol does to me. Sober brings out some serious anxiety in me - which was already there, but alcohol dulled it. So now I have taken to listening to some hypnosis videos on youtube. They have really helped to calm my mind and keep me focused. I also tend to fall asleep listening to them, which is also a bonus.

Congratulations on being sober, keep at it!

xx

Verdantia

Hi there, Tea. I suffer from depression too and certainly did a lot of self-medicating for many years until my life became unsustainable and it was quit or die, and deep down I really wanted to live. I am autistic as well so that adds another layer to my situation. I needed a lot of help to quit and I do see a therapist. I'm glad you're willing to try again--that is very important. I would just give up the notion of ever being able to drink again; it's not worth it and I assure you that things will only get worse if you continue and you eventually will severely f things up. I speak from painful experience. Wishing you all the best--17 days is excellent but it's still early on--it takes a while for your brain to recover.

wheekie

Teanow, I can totally relate to what you're going through. I cry at everything, angry and irritable, depressed, etc...

I'm still learning how to deal with these sorts of feelings myself, so I'm not an expert.

I keep telling myself that feelings in and of themselves aren't harmful and they will change and likely get better in time. Meditation and practicing staying in the present moment has helped some with the anxiety also. Recognizing the thoughts that accompany feelings and knowing they are just my brain reacting to lack of alcohol and trying recalibrate.

InApickle

Being angry at yourself isn't going to change anything, all it does is keep you down in the bottomless pit.

But alcohol kind of made the bottom of the pit more comfortable, took away the darkness yet also blurred the light.
Nobody is born depressed, depression seems to creep in with things we experience along the way. Some people have the ability to deal with all sorts of crap, they seem to encase themselves in some kind of protective bubble and just get on with it.

Others fall apart and spend their life going over the past and wasting time thinking somehow by morning everything will be ok, it never is ok, it's a continuous loop.

I did that for years.

The thing is though sober time can be used to play it all back, go back to the point you feel you fell into the pit. I couldn't even guess when that point of time was for you or what reasons built up to it.
But facing these times sober can help to pave a way out. Nothing in the past can be altered, what has happened has happened and it is absolutely impossible to change that, but it is possible to learn to deal with it, and in effect you are creating a bubble that many place around them like I mentioned earlier.

Life isn't forever, one day everything you're feeling now will cease to exist at all, the only memory of you ever being here at all will be left with your children. History can and does repeat itself, children watch and learn from our behaviour and this can engrain itself into them.
What I'm saying is I have learnt my own kids kind of look at me for direction and coping strategies, before I dealt with my own past they were starting to copy me, once I worked out this connection I could change it.

You have to find what works for you, at the end of the day you are the most important person in your world, this goes for everyone of us, the only one that really matters is yourself, because if you are not right, no-one around you is going to be right. All that happens is everyone around you either walks on eggshells or avoids you as much as they can.

At certain stages in everyone's life their are things they used to love doing , this could of been something from childhood, or something in later teens, maybe their is something you have always wanted to do/try and never have.
It's a good time to start because this is a rebirth time, a wake up call if you like, nothing to lose but everything to gain
.

Because it needs the energy to change thinking patterns, without this energy you will loop and loop until the end.


Their used to be a saying I would periodically hear through my life. It was "Life is a walk in the park"


I now think they were referring to "Jurrasic Park"



17 days sober off the bat is brilliant going btw!

Good luck tea

MindfulMan

I have been suffering from bipolar disorder (BP II) for my entire adult life.

After the pink cloud wore off and I got home from inpatient rehab, I spent a summer in depression until I started my outpatient rehab. Part of my recovery team was psychiatric and I started taking medication again. It worked.

Just over a year later and I feel great, and have stopped most of my cocktail. But it definitely got a lot worse before it got better.

I have no idea why people have this bias against medication, and that it's "cheating" to take an antidepressant or a mood stabilizer. I have a lot of experience with these drugs, and for me they work to get me through some rough patches. You can definitely become dependent on antidepressant medications in the sense that if you stop suddenly you can get withdrawal symptoms. But they don't make you intoxicated, and you don't see people turning to crime and prostitution to obtain them.

Talk to a psychiatrist. You are in very early sobriety and can expect a lot of ups and downs, particularly if you have a history of a mood disorder. No reason to add needless depression or whatever to what you will go through.

My psych meds worked far better for me when I wasn't drinking. Self medication isn't good.

Keep quitting please. Drugs/alcohol do nothing but make any mood disorder worse in the long term.

gettingsmarter

AD's pretty much saved my life. If you feel the need to use them you are not a lesser person.

Just don't drink on them.