daisy1

A doctor in the hospital one time during detox asked me what I was doing to stop drinking. I wailed 'I go to my groups I see a therapist it's not working!' He put up his hand and said 'you could have the best people in the world helping you, but still ultimately it's down to you and you alone to stop drinking'. I don't know why but that hit home more than anything anyone had ever said to me.

PhoenixJ

meetings and hours upon hours of walking

Obladi

Hi Tweetie, this quitting thing is not easy. What an understatement, right?! I've gone through the cycle of stop/start/stop again more times than you could probably count on all of our combined fingers and toes.

From my perspective today, I think action and "doing things" is a great help. However, something in the fundamental Me needed to change. I had to expand my view from the action of drinking/not drinking to the much broader view that my entire outlook and life needed change.

Don't get me wrong, I didn't pack it all in, quit my job, move to Tahiti and start yoga classes. But since my last stop 8/5, the main pillar in my life has been doing things to support Not Drinking. Every morning and evening, I send a "please" and "thank you" out to the universe. "Please help me to not drink, thank you for another day sober." I cut back on work hours, am attending Intensive Outpatient Therapy, going to meetings, working with a sponsor, and posting here on the regular. Aside from all of that, life is pretty much the same. But it's not - shifting the focus to support sobriety has been a very positive (if challenging) move. It's so much better and easier than fighting the constant battle to drink/not drink.

The thing that popped out at me is that you work from home. Is that part of the equation? For me, it sure was! Many a work from home, I'd be sipping on the vodka to ease my way into the day, then I'd celebrate the end of business by letting loose around 3. A bonus 3-4 hours of drinking! So one of my self-imposed restrictions is no work from home. If that's a factor for you, maybe you could work from work? Or work from Starbucks?

This can be done, and you can do it.

I'm glad you're writing about it here ,
O

tomsteve

i went to meetings,read the BB, worked the program, prayed like crazy, didnt drink even when my ass was falling off, repeated.
seemed to work- the mental obsession was removed as promised.

August252015

That.
I started AA, I saw med and psych drs to get a baseline for everything that needed to heal...I only spent time with my parents, basically, and then I added anything and everything to pass time.

It takes time to CHANGE and IMO a dedicated program for recovery and staying sober first, then everything else.

August252015

And it's 4 days since your OP - what are you doing now?

sva777

Find out where the AA meetings are and go every night for the first 30 days. This will help out immensely since you wont want to be drunk at a meeting. you will also get the benefit of talking to people in the same situation as yourself.

Ken33xx

I could never get the thought of a drink out of my mind for more than a few days at best. I always returned to the bottle.

It was only until I became sick and tired of being sick and tired that I decided to walk into an AA meeting. Didn't know anyone and knew little about AA (this was pre-internet/)

I just knew that six years earlier I planned to attend an AA meeting but couldn't find it. So I said f-it and went out drinking

Now, I really can't explain why I was suddenly able to stop except to say God decided that was enough for me. Because the desire to drink left me after that first AA meeting.

Step 1 hit me like a ton of bricks. Didn't know much about the other steps but I didn't have to be a rocket scientist to realize my life was unmanageable and I was powerless of alcohol.