MythOfSisyphus

I'm glad it's going well, Jazzfish. As others have said, AVRT really takes away the choice/agonizing. You have the choice but you made it when you made the Big Plan. It's kept me sober for almost three years now (will be three in Oct).

dwtbd

^^^ 'will be three in..'
That's what I really like about this corner of the interwebs, it's too bad the ideas of self empowerment aren't more prevalent in other corners.

Btw Cheers Myth

jazzfish

I keep wanting to post here, but when it's working I'm not quite sure what there is to say.

I first started this thread last December. For better or worse, I still had more decluttering to do - some ideas die harder than others. I still believe everything I wrote last December. I finally bought the Rational Recovery book and read it. As I read it, I started thinking that I wasn't really an alcoholic, and I drank again...with all the normal results. I hopped back on the crazy merry-go-round fretting over what it would take.

And then I read something that hit me hard. Someone wrote, "I didn't quit drinking to get sober." I went back and read my old journal and saw how stagnant my life had become - not with the drinking, but with the years of "struggling" to quit. In a crazy moment of fatigue, I just decided I was done. I said I will never drink again and I will never change my mind. Once the option to drink was off the table, there really wasn't much more to talk about.

brynn

Well said, jazz! Glad to hear the struggle is over....for good.
That's the moment of true liberation for all of us.

Hevyn

I'm so glad to read your good news, Jazz. You sound great.

jazzfish

Hi all, it's been a while since I posted. I am enjoying this sober morning. I am reflecting on a (shocking, simply shocking) discovery, which is that I need to take active steps to improve my life. Sobriety removed the obstacles and unlocked the shackles, but without moving, I was just standing still.

I started drinking early in life and did not develop healthy coping skills. I am working on this with a therapist and a DBT skills workbook. I want to get as fit as possible before my 50th birthday next year. I have started exercising regularly and eating better (usually). I realized I need social and creative outlets in my life, so I joined social groups based on creative activities. I realized I was lazy and loved to procrastinate, I was going to get to this, but decided to put it off until tomorrow. No, seriously, I recognized if I wanted to accomplish things, I actually had to do the work.

While my sobriety does not depend on the above, my life getting better does. There were certainly huge benefits from putting the drink down, but they only took me so far. The other benefits need to come from actually living life.

jesshonesty

Thanks so much for this post and the thread. I totally identify. I also am working with a therapist and it has been so, so helpful. Seeing my thoughts and emotional patterns and then getting a little space to actually recognize them in real time has been helpful to change them. Not immediately, but it is happening and has given me hope that I can actually do this.. I have for so long wanted to find something outside myself to fix me. Amazing to realize I actually have much more resources inside than I imagined.

I am also trying to get a much more interesting enriching life. I love ides and music. I plan to join groups but admit I hate actually doing it! Trying to give myself smaller and more realistic steps in the process. Same for excercising.


Please keep this thread going it is great!

fripfrop

I was just about to pack it in and leave this site. Because I don't find giving up drinking agonizing, I'm not full of angnst, I don't mull over every tiny thing that happens to me and turn it into an excuse to want to drink. I'm not depressed and anxious. I don't like being told because of this I'm on some non-existant pink cloud. I'm just happier because I'm not full of toxins.
I don't ever want to drink again. I also don't want to stay in recoveryism all my life.
And I don't want to be told if I am feeling good and confident, it's my AV creeping up on me.
I just want to be able to put down that chapter in my life and get on with a new one. That chapter is over and I don't want to end up obsessing about not drinking for the rest of my life as much as I obsessed over drinking.
I just want to live again.
It has been very refreshing to read the people here in secular connections

jazzfish

Thanks so much for your post. One of my favorite quotes I keep coming back to is: "I didn't quit drinking to get sober." There were one of two paths my life was going to go. I chose the one that was going to lead me back to life.

fripfrop

Couldn't agree more.

shockozulu

Glad you decided to stay. One thing I love about SMART Recovery is that it is expected there will be a time for folks to be ready to leave and no longer attend meetings. You don't hear about that being normal in many programs!

That doesn't mean I don't appreciate it when I see someone stop by and let me know how they are doing down the road. It inspires us all

JustFine

Love your thread and am incredibly happy to read this. I was sober for a few years with RR and then one day decided to have a beer. That was a year ago. Now I have 3 weeks sober and am not scared every day that I may "pick up". When I did "pick up" I chose to and not "picking up" is also my choice. I too don't want to live and breath recovery. I just want to live and breathe happiness and peace.

fred59

fripfrop I too do not want to be in recovery forever I have been in smart for almost 5 months I am not ready to leave yet but eventually I hope to end the meetings.
I had 23 years sober the first time I rarely went to AA and I did not obsess over recovery that is where I intend to be in the near future with the hope is if I need a meeting I can always check in once in awhile.
best of luck to you and all of us as we navigate life sober

CelticZebra

I'm almost 3 years sober now and have recently felt the 'need' to have a look again at SR and I'm so glad I did.
It's like coming home to familiar words and names and the struggles I face in my life seem all so less of a struggle knowing I never now drink, you also never now drink and we are all getting along with the ups and downs of life without needing to refer to alcohol or recovery to do so.
Not saying it's easy but this place is amazing, I'm so glad to be here and post this sober

Driving my wagon of hope through beautiful views on my road to myself

ardy

you know what people we are people that need each other.. every day once in awhile maybe only on the holidays.. why cause we are the best family we have.. so far apart so far away.. and yet once a day.. something will cross our minds and we think of each other Great GrandDad.. miss him as much my own Grand Dads... hugs to you all prayers and check in and say hey Mom Iam home...

graced333

some Rumi: No more words. in the name of this place, we drink in with our breathing, stay quiet like a flower. So the night birds will start singing. Blessings to all here.

PiratePrentice

Haven't read through all these responses- mainly just your old initial post. Just wanted to say thank you for putting my thoughts down. Sorry I'm just now reading it. That's exactly how I feel, too. That quitting is just as simple as not drinking. That anything else (at least anything elaborate) overcomplicates things.

I've had long periods of sobriety under my belt. For me, my goal for recovery is not complete and total abstinence. It's just breaking the initial habit of habitually drinking and feeling like I'm in control. As an example, I'm four days sober. No problems (anxiety, etc.). I just chose to stop. That said, tonight, I'm going to a bachelor's party. I am going to choose to drink. Perhaps even excessively. Then tomorrow, I am going to go back to complete abstinence. It's not important to me that I'm missing a day of sobriety (whatever that even means), as long as I go back to not drinking tomorrow, which I will, with no problems. I usually don't count the days I've been off alcohol. It's not important to me. Sobriety and recovery is more a state of mind for me, than it is counting days. I know when I'm problem-drinking. I want to avoid that. It's in my best interest to stop. I don't want to waste my life away with alcohol. That's why I'm here. Posts like yours give me support. But I also don't want to waste my life away talking about alcohol (meetings, etc), reading about alcohol (literature, etc), and counting days I've gone without alcohol. It's entirely within my power to stop, and I've proven that before.

tursiops999

Welcome to the secular corner, PiratePrentice. Personally I've found it much easier to maintain total abstinence, so I can't help much with the idea of starting and stopping. You might read around here about the "Addictive Voice" as I think that beast is suggesting the "start/stop" idea to you. As another suggestion, you might want to re-read the thread you started last week:

http://www.soberrecovery.com/forums/...-my-story.html

your last post in that thread included this:

"Woke up this morning feeling absolutely terrible. Not really hungover. Just extremely ashamed. I can't convey to you how ashamed I felt/feel. I was bloated, I had diarrhea, I hadn't brushed my teeth or taken a shower, so I was disgusting. I went outside for my morning smoke, and I looked down at my shorts. At first I thought it was vomit. It was all over them. Then I came back downstairs, and I've been finding food in my bed ever since. Apparently I filled a bowl with cheese sauce and started eating tortilla chips. But I somehow managed to spill it everywhere. I still keep finding chips. So my shorts were just completely covered in cheese sauce. My sheets are covered in cheese sauce. In addition, my underpants were soaked. I apparently wet myself last night.

I had a text message from someone I didn't remember texting. Then I looked at my texts, and I texted 9 people last night. Most were innocuous, like, "Hey" or "Still up?" (these were all sent after midnight). Some were weird and gross, though. I was spilling secrets to people, even though no one was responding. I'm so ashamed. I'm depressed and almost suicidal just from the texts alone.

I sat here, feeling terrible about myself for about three hours."

I'm not trying to be a jerk or call you out ... just pointing out that there's a part of your brain that's messing with you, trying to keep you drinking. You don't have to listen to that part of your brain.

Stick around, there's lots of support here.

PiratePrentice

Thanks for calling me out. It's probably worth discussion. I don't disagree that I have a problem, and that I still do have that voice from time to time. I would just point you to the original post in that thread, where I discuss my experiences with drinking a little more clearly. If I didn't have a problem, I wouldn't be here. And you're right- complete abstinence is the ideal. When I said it wasn't my absolute goal, I was more referring to what the non-secular folks sometimes view as the only correct sobriety and recovery.

Drinking is a problem for me. But, as I further said in the post you quoted, I'm making the decision to drink tonight. I feel like I'm in control of it. Of course I also felt that way before I wrote what you quoted, but I feel especially in control tonight. My goal is remain abstinent, remove the habit of drinking from my living vernacular, but once that happens, learn to have control over my drinking- not just mindlessly be sober. So I'm able to make decisions like the one I'm going to make tonight. I don't think it's right to if you have, say, a year under your belt, choose to drink one night (with complete control of the decision) for whatever reason, then go back to abstinence immediately, that your sobriety clock has to go back to square one. Obviously it did for me the other day, because I didn't feel in control. But if I achieve complete abstinence for a substantial period of time, I don't want to be discounted completely because I chose to have one drink. As long as I pick back up where I started.

I'm saying the same thing over and over, and it's not coming out any clearer. Hopefully you can make out what I mean? Again, my post here was a reactionary post from all the hardline non-secular folks, and I found solace in OP's first post in this thread.

tursiops999

Hi PiratePrentice - I think I understand what you're saying -- you'd like to be able to learn to have control over your drinking?

A lot of us wanted that too, and tried for a long time. The difficulty is when I choose to drink, I "feed" that part of my mind that is addicted, which doesn't want to stop. It just leads to more drinking. Part of my mind wanted to pick back up with sobriety, and the other part wanted to pick up another drink. I got tired of that battle.

The meaning of the "Secular" name in this forum doesn't refer to controlled drinking versus abstinence -- it refers to the method used to get permanently sober (secular methods for abstinence/sobriety). The idea in the secular forum is that as individuals we may or may not follow a personal faith or religion, but our experience has been that abstinence from alcohol does not depend on a faith-based or religious approach.

That being said, it doesn't mean you should be "discounted completely" because you choose to drink. You're welcome here even if you choose to drink.