The Braves Babes Battle Bus - NOT stopping at the pub!!

[Mouseface]

Hello

I'm Mouse. I've been sober for over a month now, thanks to the support of posters on this and previous threads.

No matter where you are up to with your sobriety, you'll find someone here who has been in your shoes!

Come and meet the other Brave Babes........

And here are the other threads for those who want to read them.

JWN's original thread (and the reason we are all here!)

Thread two

Thread three

Thread four

Thread five

Thread six

lowenergy - it will be great to have you onboard for the weekend! (Although as usual I will be absent Sat and Sun, boo!)

If it helps, I'm glad - as long as no one thinks, "oh well, the car I crashed was a red manual, not a pale blue automatic, so I CAN'T be an alcoholic!" It's sometimes helpful, when hearing an alcoholic's drinking story, to think, not just, "have I ever done that?" but "have I ever done anything LIKE that?"

MIFLAW - thank you for that. two things that stood out for me were "I attended for a few weeks, stopped drinking for about two of them, and decided I was cured. When someone started banging on about God in a meeting I decided I would start drinking again. After all, everyone drinks at Xmas, so I would go unnoticed - and I could always come back..."

and "One day at a time, it's been working ever since.'

For me, tose two parts are the whole - 'How long will it take me to be 'cured?'' and 'Can I drink again once I feel in control?' questions that get posted.

It really is and has to be ONE DAY AT A TIME and you have to STOP COMPLETELY.

Again, thank you MIFLAW, your post has certainly confirmed any niggling doubts I had about my ability to have a 'civilised' drink.

I hope others benefit from it too!

lowenergy - that is what this thread is for, posting!! It's great to see you back oon here. IYSWIM!!

Red - I'm going now, be back around 2ish. Limping!!

Mouse

I agree, but I never say "you have to" do anything.

People sometimes ask, "when can I drink again?"

I tell them, "whenever you like. Just don't expect it to be any different from the last time."

Also, I left out the most pathetic bit.

The woman banging on about God wasn't even talking about the programme. She was saying that she was a Catholic and helped out at her local church - and that, for her, that counted as service.

It would have been so easy to ignore that, like I do other people's personal religions - assuming, of course, I hadn't secretly wanted to drink again ...

MIFLAW - true. It really is up to the person in question.

It has to be there choice so that was a poor choice of words from me.

Mouse

It's only words.

I just wouldn't like anyone who's still "wondering" to think, "oh, I'm not going to AA - they make you do XYZ."

They don't make you do anything. They just tell you what works and what doesn't and leave you to make your own mind up.

Hello all - I posted on the very first thread and have been lurking ever since. Really admire you all, and how much support this thread is giving everyone. I've been in the rooms for two and a half years, and it's the best thing I've ever done for myself. (Actually probably the ONLY thing I've ever done for myself!)

I just felt compelled to join in today, I hope nobody minds. I was at a meeting last night where, once again, I found myself questioning whether I was an alcoholic because everyone else's stories were so much worse than mine. I'm sort of OK with this, as the bottom line is that I don't want to drink anymore and I'm in the right place, but every now and again it niggles. Anyway, people were talking about controlled drinking and social drinking and just having a glass or two and the old 'I thought AA would teach me how to drink like a gentleman/lady' ... and I thought - my God, why would you ever WANT to just have two? What's the point of that? Yes, I might think (in a deluded way) that it was clever in some way to stop at two - to prove I wasn't an alcoholic - but seriously, what's the point? EVERY time I drank, whether it was in a 'controlled' way or not, I WANTED to get absolutely smashed. And most of the those times, I did.

And at this realisation, my 'Oh, you're not really an alcoholic' demon packed his bags and left the building

Sorry to go on! I'm a bit of a 'shy sharer' and didn't speak last night, so I think I'm getting it out of my system ...

Good luck to all you Brave Babes.

Thanks CJ, I remember your words of encouragement from the first thread. And it's so great to hear how things are for you. I love the picture of the demon packing his bags and leaving the building! You are as much one of the Brave Babes as any of us. And if you are a shy sharer all the more reason to share on here

hi all!

feeling a bit brighter here so thought i would ponder the thought of what makes us a real alcoholic

so here goes, i have never been down and out, dirty, smelly or without access to money BUT!

i have been pulled from the gutter outside the orential club in london - i have puked up outside the dorchester, i have wet my knickers in a first class train carriage, i have parked my expensive car in a field and forgotten where, i have been asked to leave the ivy, i have bet a months wages on a horse and then cried because it lost, i have been to the most wonderful wedding, real ok material and puked down my self on teh way home and ruined a D&G dress - i could go on, but you get my drift, for all teh world i look like a middle-class, fairly well off, home-owner, wife, mother, employer - im a whisker, (or whisky) away from being the poor old dear you see dragging her worldly goods about in an old shopping trolley.

so

TODAY I WILL NOT BE DRINKING!

that must be start in teh right direction in getting mine and my familys lives back on an even keel?

Thanks Red and Mouse for your encouragement btw the film was Farewell My Concubine !

SAF we are doing really well arent we I hope you dont mind but I have sort of latched onto you > because we have begun at the same time , like joining WeightWatchers or something

Well some serious reading to be done and I am not liking the stern message about how we cannnot ever be controlled drinkers in the distant future. Yes MIFLAW I read your story and think "oh thats fine I havent done that or close to it" so really its just a matter of time before I am living lowenergys notion of gently sipping a chilled glass of white and waking up the next day to see half the bottle still in the fridge. Which I finish a couple of days later.Not.

I think my best bet for now is to stick rigidly to the one day at a time plan because I find it too depressing to think about no alcohol ever again. Sigh

Anyway something else MIFLAW said was how jwn 's husband might be annoyed that a bunch of people on the internet had succeeded in getting her to stop drinking where all has failed.

Well thats how I feel ie I cannot believe after years of bargaining with myself,schemes and lord knows what else to control my drinking a couple of days lurking about on this thread and then joining in has resulted in even 1 alcohol free day.

However I am not spending too long dwelling on that in case I spoil the magic

Yes JWN, it is the right step. And I will join you - TODAY I WILL NOT BE DRINKING.

I have never had a drink first thing in the morning (oh except champagne on Christmas morning, champagne on the morning of my wedding, champagne on the morning of my best friend's wedding, champagne on the morning of my birthday, champagne on the morning of my wedding anniversary). But of course champagne doesn't count as drinking in the morning.

I'm not much of a puker either, fortunately. But I have been asked to leave a restaurant (after having a 'discussion' with the waiter about how much chocolate was in the dessert). I have hidden behind a car to have an emergency pee in the street. And to my eternal shame, I have picked up my darling, darling daughter from the station and driven her 50 miles in the car. I too look for all the world like a middle-class, fairly well off, home owner, mother, and business woman, but I am also only a whisker away from being the alcohol-ravaged grieving mother who caused the death of her dd through drink driving.

getting I remember your first few posts (the same night as me I do believe) and I can't believe the difference in your outlook after only 4 days!! Mind you, I can't believe the difference in myself either and it is largley thanks to this thread......so thankyou everyone

Day 7 here and feeling ab fab this morning, slept like a log, headache gone.....dull ache in my abdomen, I don't think my liver knows what's going on, but I am sure that it will soon pass.

Good luck everyone with NOT DRINKING TODAY!

getting I think early on in all of these threads I posted something similar to you about my continuing hope that in the future I might be a 'normal' drinker. MIFLAW replied that yes, it was possible I might be the complete exception. All I can say is I am still taking it one day at a time, and personally I am not yet willing to try that experiment.

OK, in the spirit of confession: I have been pulled up from the pavement and taken to my FIL's house in the early afternoon, I have wet the bed (three times), I have cheated (pre-DH I must add), I have slept with totally inappropriate men, I have lied endlessly and run up massive debts. I am sure that there are many, many more delightful incidents but they are the ones that I can instantly think of. I hope that confession is good for the soul !

MIFLAW - this is probably going to come across as sounding really needy or something but here goes: Since you have been using MN (originally for the bi-lingual threads, I believe, see I do read properly!) I am sure there have been loads of alky threads but is this the longest running one? I am just interested because I really believe that we have something so special here.

Moomin, I haven't confessed yet about the hunky Australian (not quite so hunky the following morning) - and I'm not going to

Hi again, and thanks for the welcome, RedMoomin.

I don't want to be a 'normal drinker'.

I want to drink like a bastard and get away with it.

Unfortunately, I can't. So I don't drink.

After years of 'control', I find it much easier to see it in these terms.

CJ - "I want to drink like a bastard and get away with it."

Ha ha, that is so bloody true and has actually given me a lot to think about! Who am I kidding 'normal' drinking?!

Ah go on venus, promise you confession is good for the soul !

"Yes MIFLAW I read your story and think "oh thats fine I havent done that or close to it" "

If so, I am glad - but, the longer I am sober, the more I can relate to the stories others tell.

For example, I was never homeless - but, thanks to drink, I found myself sleeping on trains parked in sidings on more than one occasion. And what's the point of a home if you don't sleep in it?

Similarly, I very rarely drank in the morning. But I quite often woke up at 3, 4 or even 5, finished what was left in the bottle, then went back to bed for two hours. How is drinking at 5 in the morning anything other than "morning drinking" just because you've had a bit of a snooze after it?

Certainly if you comibne all five (six?) threads it's the longest I've seen.

Fnar fnar.

Christ where's one of the flirters when you need one? JWN, venus, mouse? Double entendre over here and I have no idea what to do with it

Just sit on it for now