Wishing you could still have a drink really does fade away
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Join Date: Jan 2017
Posts: 2,409
Great post 🙏 For me maintaining my spiritual fitness means that I am in a place of neutrality to alcohol; it plays no part in my life. This is always contingent on maintenance of said fitness however.
A grateful alcoholic will not wish to drink alcohol.
A grateful alcoholic will not wish to drink alcohol.
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Join Date: Jan 2012
Location: West Tn
Posts: 3,043
Originally Posted by Lucinda2 
Thank you for sharing this. I really needed to hear it.
I read your link to your original post and I was a wine drinker in the same way as you. Even down to drinking mocktails while out with mates then cracking open a bottle of wine when I got home. I was fab at pretending to the outside world that everything was ok. I even did it when I arrived on this forum. I made out in my opening post that things were mainly ok and I was still holding it together but that was complete b/s. I was up to all the same tricks as you and feeling the same anxiety/self-hatred/desperation around it.
Your post was perfectly timed for me. I am around 70 days and my AV has been telling me that I didn't really have a problem and never drinking again really doesn't sound much fun. My husband is going away for a week this coming Thursday and I will be home alone for the first time since I quit. Home alone was one of my favourite ways to drink and my AV has been going nuts. It has been telling me that I can crack open a bottle of wine Saturday night, dispose of it in a bin in the park and no-one will ever know about my little lapse.
Right there in that thinking, I know that drinking is not for me. I mean that is crazy right? It is not even thinking that I can have a nice glass of wine or two. I am thinking bottle and then the disposing of it in a dog poo bin!
I know you are right that this wont last forever if we just ride it out. When I quit smoking it was somewhere around 9 months to a year that it just became my new normal and the cravings fell away. By 2yrs I couldn't stand the smell of cigarette smoke. Horrible.
Both your original post and this post are more valuable to me than you will realise TeaLily. Reading it I felt like the universe was looking after me sending you in to share this today. Thanks again.
Congratulations on your 2 and half years!
I read your link to your original post and I was a wine drinker in the same way as you. Even down to drinking mocktails while out with mates then cracking open a bottle of wine when I got home. I was fab at pretending to the outside world that everything was ok. I even did it when I arrived on this forum. I made out in my opening post that things were mainly ok and I was still holding it together but that was complete b/s. I was up to all the same tricks as you and feeling the same anxiety/self-hatred/desperation around it.
Your post was perfectly timed for me. I am around 70 days and my AV has been telling me that I didn't really have a problem and never drinking again really doesn't sound much fun. My husband is going away for a week this coming Thursday and I will be home alone for the first time since I quit. Home alone was one of my favourite ways to drink and my AV has been going nuts. It has been telling me that I can crack open a bottle of wine Saturday night, dispose of it in a bin in the park and no-one will ever know about my little lapse.
Right there in that thinking, I know that drinking is not for me. I mean that is crazy right? It is not even thinking that I can have a nice glass of wine or two. I am thinking bottle and then the disposing of it in a dog poo bin!
I know you are right that this wont last forever if we just ride it out. When I quit smoking it was somewhere around 9 months to a year that it just became my new normal and the cravings fell away. By 2yrs I couldn't stand the smell of cigarette smoke. Horrible.
Both your original post and this post are more valuable to me than you will realise TeaLily. Reading it I felt like the universe was looking after me sending you in to share this today. Thanks again.
Congratulations on your 2 and half years!
I hope that you have a plan or program of recovery that you are pursuing.
It sure helped me.
We're very glad you're here with us and posting and we want you to have the alcoholic life behind you.
For me, it has truly taken 1 day at a time for the drinking obsession to release its grip.
Giving up is NOT an option.
Join Date: Jan 2015
Location: Western Wisconsin
Posts: 7,809
I feel quite neutral towards alcohol most of the time these days. In early sobriety I had all sorts of emotions about it. Anger, sadness, and fear come to mind immediately. I hated the idea of ever drinking again, and in almost equal parts I hated the idea of NEVER drinking again. The only answer was to take it one day at a time. Didn't take too long before the emotions settled down and I was able to really declare myself in recovery and begin to wrap my head around abstinence for life - and begin the work of building a life that does not include alcohol. I'll have 5 years in December. And if I think about drinking it's in a really detached way most of the time. Like "oh that's something I used to do. Sometimes it was fun but a lot of the time it wasn't. I don't drink anymore, and that's a good thing." I don't crave it. I very rarely wish I could have a glass of wine or a cocktail, and even then it's fleeting. It simply isn't part of who I am anymore. I can be around alcohol and people who are drinking without really noticing, until people start to get drunk, and then I remove myself because it's boring (or drama-filled, which no one needs).
So if you're out there on the fence about quitting, or newly sober and wondering if the craving and desire ever stops, I can tell you it did for me. It does get better and easier as time goes on, if you do the work of building a new sober life.
So if you're out there on the fence about quitting, or newly sober and wondering if the craving and desire ever stops, I can tell you it did for me. It does get better and easier as time goes on, if you do the work of building a new sober life.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2013
Posts: 652
Originally Posted by SoberCAH
Your thoughts are no more crazy than my own were at 70 days.
I hope that you have a plan or program of recovery that you are pursuing.
It sure helped me.
We're very glad you're here with us and posting and we want you to have the alcoholic life behind you.
For me, it has truly taken 1 day at a time for the drinking obsession to release its grip.
I hope that you have a plan or program of recovery that you are pursuing.
It sure helped me.
We're very glad you're here with us and posting and we want you to have the alcoholic life behind you.
For me, it has truly taken 1 day at a time for the drinking obsession to release its grip.
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