Anyone gone teetotal after heavy drinking..if so how did you do it and for how long have you kept it up ??

[no1andno2]

Anyone ? I need some help and fast..........

mrsmvc I know how you feel. I was drinking for much longer than a couple of years though. However, during the past 18 months I had managed to drink a bottle of wine each night, and sometimes even a bottle and a half and still function.

I gave up this pattern of drinking around 7 weeks ago (so early days for me). I had a liver function test and was expecting the worst. I was extremely surprised to find that my ALT's and AST's were very low and well within the normal ranges. This is probably going to sound very stupid, but I am extremely grateful that I had these tests done, as it made me realise how serious this could all be if I continued with my previous behaviour. It was the catalyst to changing my mindset towards alcohol.

I am waffling now, but i guess what I am trying to say is that it is different for everyone, but the LFT's were a real crossroads for me. I can honestly say that since I have stopped drinking at home I feel better in the mornings, I sleep better, I actually have a better evening, it is way more relaxing.

I have been out and had a few social drinks, and was worried that it would spark a craving for drinks at home. This hasn't happened, but I am conscious that it is an easy thing to slip back into.

sorry that should be mrsmcv!

mrsmcv - totally understand why you would feel that way but it is so much better to find out about ay damage sooner rather than later. And maybe you will find you've been lucky and things are not half as bad as you fear they will be. Either way, I think you are being very hard on yourself - you have spotted that drinking was becoming a problem and you are doing something about it.

I on the other hand, caved in again last night at the 11th hour and had 2 large brandies before bed. It really is my weakness and am a bit stumped as to a non-alcoholic alternative - ginger ale, tea, coke etc just aren't right and too much coffee is messing up my sleep, I think. Any suggestions?

I have been tempted to ask my doctor for a LFT. But I'm scared that if they came back normal I would just carry on drinking as I am.

At the moment I don't know if I have harmed myself and therefore have the fear. I need to stop drinking because I could be doing real damage.

I had one glass of wine last night. I KNOW!!! One too many. But I gave in to my craving because I'd had a hell of a day. I just wanted to unwind in the only way I know at the moment.

I plan to have a relaxing bath tonight though. DH home tomorrow, so need to get all the hairy bits off LOL!!!!

Do you drink more or less when your DH is around?

hi although we dont live together anymore I drink way less when my dcs father is around - he is pretty judgemental and so in fact I hide my drinking from him entirely - I usually only drink when he is around if he suggests it - pathetic eh

I drink less when DH is around. Although I have been known to secretly drink more

He drinks, but not everyday and not to the extent that I do when on my own. He would happily share a bottle of wine on a Friday night and be happy with that. Whereas I would be thinking "what about the other half?"

Maebee - glad the advice helped you as much as it did me when I received it.

I know what you mean about getting that feeling mid-pint - it's when you are already worrying about the next drink when you've already got a drink that the panic sets in and you reach that "oh fuck" moment ...

Yes I remember being told to follow the scene through by a friend, and it was really useful, helped kill the romantic vision of me sipping chilled wine from the glass on a summer evening... which was just that, a romantic vision, didn't happen in reality, not just the one glass anyway!

We all have different scripts but, for people like me, they all turn out to be horror movies or farces.

Ooooh yes. A cosy pub, sitting by a log fire. It never ends well though

I've been thinking about having lft's done too but like forever know or think that if they are normal it'll be a green light to keep going. At the moment I am convinced I'm about to keel over any day and it's enough to help me. Having said that I drank again last night but managed only 2 small glasses, truly 2 units. Again was doing very well, dh came home opened a lovely bottle of red. I managed to hold off during cooking which is my weak time and had 2 small glasses with my dinner. Still slept very well and feel great.

We chatted about me trying to give up or cut down, he doesn't think I have a problem - what's wrong with a bottle a night and refuses to stop with me. We have compromised with me asking him to go out for drinks with friends instead of coming home and opening a bottle. I drink far more when he is home. SO he's going out tonight, I'm going to eat early with the boys and we'll do this for a few weeks until i get the hang of not drinking with him every night.

He can't see that his 2 beers on the way home doesn't equate to the whole bottle I can polish off while he's having his 2 beers or few glasses of wine

Sibble

It might not seem it at the moment but it is probably for the best that your husband isn't stopping just because you are - assuming he doesn't have a problem, why should he? And, more importantly for you, what will you do when, because he doesn't have a problem, he decides that tonight is the night that's special enough to break the pact just this once? Are you going to crumble too? What happens the next day when he is back to normal but you feel back on the slippery slope?

V sensible to avoid watching him drinking if you can - but, in the long run, you have far more chance of winning if you stop because you want to, and regardless of what others are doing.

The more people in the pact (as opposed to the people on here and in other group-help orgs, who will support you selflessly and without making deals and bargains), the more potential weak links in the chain.

Do it for you - you deserve it!

This post is not entirely related to this thread, and please excuse me if I am going aginst MN ettiquette...

There is a post on relationships "untitled" about a poster worried about her mother's drinking. If ManIFLAW or other AA's are on here, perhaps you could offer some ideas???

ManIFLAW - I guess you are right. dh doesn't have a problem in that although he probably does drink most days he can easily just have 1 bottle of beer or 1 glass of wine and often does. He is also very black and white about things in that he stopped smoking a few years back. He'd never smoked at home or around me and the kids unless it was social, but smoked heaps at work. Just woke up one day, thought that's it after about 30 years and hasn't smoked since so he can't understand why I can't just get up and say - that's it no wine today. In his mind if you want to stop you do and if you don't you don't. Simple.... and I guess in a way it is that simple, it's all about choice. Only it doesn't feel like that when the open bottle and glass are staring at me! HE also refuses to believe I have a problem in that I don't touch spirits or beer - only wine and if we go out will often go without and drive. It's mostly a habit at home...

Ooops forgot to say that my goal is to go without tonight and tomorrow, if I do I'd have had 12 units this week with 3 wine free nights. Although not what I had intended a huge improvement on my usual consumption and I know I will feel good about it.

Have done, BH - thanks for the tip!

How are YOU tonight?

Sibble - it's all about choice if you don't have a problem with drink. If you do, the very definition of that problem is that your ability to make choices around drink is low to non-existent. This is all the more confusing for some people as they have very strong willpower in other areas of life and can't understand why drink is different. In my case, I think I ended up using my willpower in order to drink - the times I woke up feeling shit and still got a drink down me; the times I finshed the bottle before going to bed rather than leaving a glass in it, though I was already feeling queasy; the times I walked through all weathers to get to the pub or the off-license when my common sense was telling me to go home.

Apart for special occasions, when I might partake of a few single malts or Irish whiskeys, I almost never touched spirits. That didn't keep me out of the most expensive club in the world, sadly ...

i blew it last night and had 12 units. trying not to beat myself up about it today and just get back on track instead.
my excuse was i was going out for dinner, we ordered a bottle of wine, and the lovely waitress who has served me before there was so nice to us, she gave us a free jug of sangria and a free spirit. can you see where this ends? yeah. me coming home so drunk i couldn't speak. i did come home in a taxi though, which is good...a woman was sexually assualted at knife point opposite my house yesterday so trying to be extra cautious and not staggering home alone pissed...
anyway. deep breath. now. off to a toddler group. have a lunch date with some friends in the pub, but we are all with our kids so won't drink. have meeting tonight, will resist there. and then should be fairly easy rest of week.
damn me.

btw in a week i have forgotten how horrible hangovers are. but they are rotten. for all of you who don't have one today, well done! today is guilt and headache and stomach dis-ease and tiredness etc

MaeBee, that's exactly what i was thinking on Sunday morning when I felt like crap! I did drink 2 bottles of wine on Saturday night though and was waffling like a good'un. Poor DH.

I've found it much easier this week with the no weekday drinking. No really strong cravings. I had a passing thought last night that I would rather have wine than the ginger ale, but it went away again.

It's my dd's birthday today and Man U are playing tonight. I must admit i am debating whether to have a "celebration" night....

Oh Maebee And you can't just lay around and feel sorry for yourself because of the little one. But in a way, doesn't that make you want to quit even more? I haven't had a bad hangover for a while because the memory of having to still function and look after two kids is enough to put me off.

The fact that I drink nearly a bottle of wine and NOT have a hangover is a bit scary though.

How is everyone else this morning? Lulu? No1andno2? Beinghonest? Bellabelly?

You can play the film through to the end ... Or you can get the script out and act it out yourself to find out what happens.

I find watching it less painful these days.

Hi everyone - well done to you all that have been able to stay away from or cut down this week - I have not I dont understand how I can feel so strong in the morning and so determined that I am going to change and then not - wish my CBT would come through some time soon - feeling really locked in with my drinking right now

Lulu

I think that, if this thread illustrates anything, it is that a drink problem is an illness of forgetfulness. You are not alone in being this way - I know that doesn't help with the drinking but at least know that this is not happening because you are weak, stupid, or a bad person. That's just how it is, and sadly it will probably stay that way until you find a solution to the problem itself - because it's the problem that's doing this, not the drink itself. That's why others around you can drink sensibly and you can't - there's nothing special or evil about alcohol per se, it's all about your relationship with it.

I know, because I was the sort of drinker who would decide in the morning that I was not going to drink that day; get to about 9.30 pm; and think to myself, without any sense of irony, "I've done really well today - I think that deserves a pint!"