Relapsed after 18 months
Welcome back, Cleopatra. Sorry it's because of a relapse, but so very glad you had the awareness to come here. Like others mentioned, I too struggled with some pretty spectacular relapses...that on the surface I could say, "came from nowhere". But really, it was about letting go of what I really thought about alcohol. That until I let go of the thought that 'alcohol is great and can do xyz for me'. (usually I wanted it to relax me and feel better)..no amount of time sober was going to protect me from a relapse.
It's hard to say all the layers of work and dealing with life as to how my sobriety finally stuck, but I did finally get so disgusted with the hold it could so easily grasp on me after periods of sobriety...it scared me.
This. ^
I had to swap the line of thought;
"My life is nothing / not enjoyable without alcohol", to;
"My life is over and worth nothing without sobriety".
I thought my life was empty if I didn't have alcohol in it. But that wasn't true. My life is not only empty, it's a slow and freaking painful death watching myself continually ruin things if I drink.
Until we treat sobriety as THE MOST valuable thing we have, and place it at the centre of our life / self-care. Then we honestly have nothing of value in our life if we continue to drink. Nothing.
It's hard to say all the layers of work and dealing with life as to how my sobriety finally stuck, but I did finally get so disgusted with the hold it could so easily grasp on me after periods of sobriety...it scared me.
I had to swap the line of thought;
"My life is nothing / not enjoyable without alcohol", to;
"My life is over and worth nothing without sobriety".
I thought my life was empty if I didn't have alcohol in it. But that wasn't true. My life is not only empty, it's a slow and freaking painful death watching myself continually ruin things if I drink.
Until we treat sobriety as THE MOST valuable thing we have, and place it at the centre of our life / self-care. Then we honestly have nothing of value in our life if we continue to drink. Nothing.
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