Feel strong with no recovery program
quat
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: terra (mostly)firma
Posts: 4,823
I absorbed recoveryism and treatment mantras through social osmosis and used them as excuses as to why I could not quiton my own. Finding RR/AVRT taking the crash course and reading the material proved that not only was it up to me, but that I alone have the power. I quit in as much time as it took to read the crash course, I'm an atheist but god bless JT 
Kaleidoscope eyes
Join Date: Oct 2013
Location: London
Posts: 5,243
Originally Posted by eco 
I just wanted to share my experience and see if anyone has felt the same.
I got a DUI a couple years and decided to quit drinking. I drank for about a month after the DUI and stopped for three months. But then I had to take a DUI education course and attend AA and started drinking again. After the course I drank for awhile and mainly managed to keep my blackouts to once a week. I was constantly reading the big book, going to smart recovery, and obsessing over not drinking again. Its all I thought about, and I always ended up relapsing.
Finally, early last Summer I said screw it, I'd rather drink myself to death than attend AA because it just freaked me out and made me feel depressed and horrible.
When I left AA I just went about my life, and I never drank again, or really thought about it at all. I quit having any real cravings. I really just quit thinking about not drinking. I just didn't drink or think about it. I found a gf, told her I don't drink, and really feel in control. I have no pressure to drink and it is not a problem right now.
I honestly feel that AA, and SMART, just made me feel that I couldn't be happy on my own, or make it not drinking on my own. All I did was obsess over not drinking and end up drinking and craving more and more. I'd see people fail in AA and SMART and I'd become convinced I'd fail. And in AA there were always many people at the meeting, but very few people were there for any period of time and I always felt doomed.
Does anyone think that working a program does more harm than good. I needed that initial break from alcohol, but after that I really needed to just not think about it.
However, I am not sure how it would be if I had to be around alcohol constantly . I am around drinkers, but its a small part of my life.
I got a DUI a couple years and decided to quit drinking. I drank for about a month after the DUI and stopped for three months. But then I had to take a DUI education course and attend AA and started drinking again. After the course I drank for awhile and mainly managed to keep my blackouts to once a week. I was constantly reading the big book, going to smart recovery, and obsessing over not drinking again. Its all I thought about, and I always ended up relapsing.
Finally, early last Summer I said screw it, I'd rather drink myself to death than attend AA because it just freaked me out and made me feel depressed and horrible.
When I left AA I just went about my life, and I never drank again, or really thought about it at all. I quit having any real cravings. I really just quit thinking about not drinking. I just didn't drink or think about it. I found a gf, told her I don't drink, and really feel in control. I have no pressure to drink and it is not a problem right now.
I honestly feel that AA, and SMART, just made me feel that I couldn't be happy on my own, or make it not drinking on my own. All I did was obsess over not drinking and end up drinking and craving more and more. I'd see people fail in AA and SMART and I'd become convinced I'd fail. And in AA there were always many people at the meeting, but very few people were there for any period of time and I always felt doomed.
Does anyone think that working a program does more harm than good. I needed that initial break from alcohol, but after that I really needed to just not think about it.
However, I am not sure how it would be if I had to be around alcohol constantly . I am around drinkers, but its a small part of my life.
Member
Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: Scandinavia
Posts: 1,344
I do not have that much experience with stop drinking, this is my first time where I have decided to stop for life.
I have struggled with stop smoking all my life since I was a teenager, not with much luck. Well I am not smoking now, but I have stopped several times without it has lasted.
I sense a strong subconscious element in this.
If you use the picture of the beast, I can fight the cravings with mindfulness exercises and mediation. But there is a subconscious element in silencing it.
If the decision is firm that I will not touch it – the beast will be silent.
It is not within my conscious decisions that I wake it up.
I am not AA, but I sense some powerless or maybe more internal conflict element.
I do have the power to mediate daily stay mindful so I am up to taking on the beast if it wakes up – but it is outside my conscious control whether it wakes up.
I have struggled with stop smoking all my life since I was a teenager, not with much luck. Well I am not smoking now, but I have stopped several times without it has lasted.
I sense a strong subconscious element in this.
If you use the picture of the beast, I can fight the cravings with mindfulness exercises and mediation. But there is a subconscious element in silencing it.
If the decision is firm that I will not touch it – the beast will be silent.
It is not within my conscious decisions that I wake it up.
I am not AA, but I sense some powerless or maybe more internal conflict element.
I do have the power to mediate daily stay mindful so I am up to taking on the beast if it wakes up – but it is outside my conscious control whether it wakes up.
quat
Join Date: Jul 2013
Location: terra (mostly)firma
Posts: 4,823
I see it as the treatment /disease model teaching that we are powerless against our urges/wants/desires. I thought or was comfortable thinking that having certain urges meant controlling or not acting on them was beyond my conscious control. But I now see that as not true. I experience various urges / wants through out life on a day to day basis . I act on some and not others. The ones I know are dangerous or unhealthy I do not act on. This is something I think we all recognize, but we make a special case or classification for intoxicants.
Having been addicted , I understand the specialness of the category, but after ending the addiction I can now put the urges I experience into the proper context and not act on them. In time the further from active addiction one gets, I assume the subconscious urges will dissapate. Intoxication is someting I know longer consciously desire, with time my subconscious will follow suit, thats's my theory at least and I'm sticking with it.
I have used tobacco since youth and have switched to e-cigs since Jan of this year. I do not consider nicotine to be as detrimental to my well being as 'smoking'. I have had paper cigs since and find I do not enjoy them in the least.
Having been addicted , I understand the specialness of the category, but after ending the addiction I can now put the urges I experience into the proper context and not act on them. In time the further from active addiction one gets, I assume the subconscious urges will dissapate. Intoxication is someting I know longer consciously desire, with time my subconscious will follow suit, thats's my theory at least and I'm sticking with it.
I have used tobacco since youth and have switched to e-cigs since Jan of this year. I do not consider nicotine to be as detrimental to my well being as 'smoking'. I have had paper cigs since and find I do not enjoy them in the least.
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