The Brave Babes Battle Bus - Spring Into Summer.

[Mouseface]

Hello

Welcome to The Brave Babes Battle Bus.

This is a quest full of Babes, all fighting to remain sober, cut down or are somewhere in between right now.

You ticket to travel is free, it won't expire, and the Bus will always be here, even if there are days when you are not. So come say hi.

I'm Mouse. I have a thing for cheese and vodka, not together, well, not always!

Here is a LINK to the last thread, where you can read all of the previous threads and the journeys so far.

JWN no-one can be completely boingy all the time. Do you think you might have a case of emptynestness? I know she hasn't been gone for long but your lovely party last week marked an incredible shift in your family life. It is a hard time and really takes a bit of getting used to. My DC have been away from home most of the time for a couple of years now, but I still get some times when I REALLY REALLY miss them. I expect DH is feeling much the same as well.

It will get easier I promise, but I do demand some quality time with my DC on a frequent basis to stop the pangs. Maybe you could book a treat for the 2 of you to look forward to.

Isinde Have a great holiday :)

And JWN I think Isinde's advice was excellent - sorry to hear that you're feeling down. Do something nice for yourself!

Well, weird what can trigger me. Today I had the bookshelves fitted - that's a month's drinking money so they are half way paid for already.

I got home and as soon as I walked in I thought how lovely they looked, then I thought - great! I'll have a drink! The thought, unlike others I've had this week, took a few minutes to shake. Weird.

Anyway, I didn't. ( Am so hammering the cordials, juices and fizzy water at the moment.)

And breathe.

Take care lovely Babes, enjoy your evenings, and sleep well.

thanks everyone! tbh, i think im just figuring out that life can throw me sometimes - over the years this sort of emotional stuff would have been buried by the booze and i find dealing with it sober pretty difficult - im often quite surprised by the strength of my feelings and i still wonder if 'normal' people feel the same? - i am a very demanding, difficult person at times with a gigantic selfish streak which needs knocking down occasionally, i can be very self obsorbed and totally oblivious to other peoples needs, again, are 'normal' people like this too? or is it the personality of an alcoholic? - dh is a very intelligent, deep thinker who takes his time with his thoughts and emotions, im trying to take a leaf out of book but blimey!, its hard work and im causing a lot of angst here atm , after all we have been through, to fail now would be unthinkable!

anyway, just being able to come here and have a 'ponder' helps!

night night babes, see you tomorrow!

L XXX

Morning

JWN sorry you've been feeling crap. Could it be a comedown after the engagement party? I expect there was a lot of planning and anticipation for it and now you're feeling a bit flat? fwiw, quite apart from sobriety being simple, but not easy, I think it must take a long while (a lifetime?) to get to grips with the emotions that we escaped from for so long using the bottle.

In a related way - I did my step one and two yesterday One thing that came out of it was that I was using alcohol to expand my emotions because I actually felt dead inside for a long time but I hadn't made the connection between the alcohol and that lack of emotion because I rarely had a clear enough head to understand how I was feeling - and then I'd either block bad feelings or augment good ones (very VERY briefly) by drinking.

I'm ten days since my last binge now and I can start to feel stronger emotions creeping in a bit, and I'm trying to embrace them rather than push them away, but it's a bit alien to me and the urge to blank out the less pleasant ones hasn't vanished yet.

JWN you said something yesterday (?) about how you thought you might be a bit emotionally immature because of never allowing yourself to grow up by burying everything that leads to emotional intelligence under a pile of bottles. I've felt very much the same many times! A couple of years ago I even googled 'emotional intelligence' and 'emotional maturity' because I was convinced that I was somehow not quite right in that department. I'm really hoping that by staying sober and doing the suggested work on myself that I will be able to catch up in that department. It's an exciting journey though, and I'm looking forward to it

Today I will not be drinking I've been to a meeting every day this week and I think I might go to another tonight. Why not! nothing to lose!

Morning Babes!

JWN Enough of that negative talk my girl! In my experience women problem drinkers need building up and encouraging - not knocking down

It's the old chick and egg thing isn't it - did the drink cause the ishoos or did we drink because of them? and Holly - maybe feeling dead inside pre-dated your first drink - in time it's what caused that, that perhaps needs to be explored with a professional...

In the end and oh my days how I wish I'd done this years before - I really benefitted from several years of therapy from a very gifted practitioner and I now see 1. yes there's an inherited element ( grandfatehr was an alc) but 2. Early environment was critical - had I had a more secure and stable childhood and adolescence I would have had far fewer emotional problems in early adulthood. Being unsettled and unhappy and insecure, not fitting in, wanting to be accepted and belong and yet hating the thought of it, having ZERO feeling of self-worth, leading me to have relationships with abusive and violent men - all of this is NOT a question or moral weakness or character flaws - more a sign that something went wrong years and years ago...

I absolutely feel we need to have compassion for our drinking selves, especially as young women. To embark on such self-destruction when others around are settling down shows that there is something wrong - beyond the many emotional and practical troubles drinking itself creates.

My latest foray into drinking was slightly different - it strated off as an attempt to drink moderately (hah!) There aren't any hideous dark things below the surface that I don't know about and so the psychic damage of pouring alcohol on top of it all has, thankfully been pretty limited. Not so in my younger, pre-therapy days. But I am NOT advocating drinking if you have a problem with it.

This thread demonstrates that we are all wonderful, flawed, caring, capable, competent, compassionate women -with infinte capacity to be who and what we want to be!

BOING

That was just for you JWN

I agree with all the advice you have had, you do so much for everyone else, when do you do things that are just for YOU? xx

Had a great night witht the girls - 3 whole glasses of wine all night. Good chat, talking about EVERYTHING!

Nemo's meds didn't make a difference really so I'm guessing that maybe we'll see a change over time.

DIY and cleaning here this weekend - Joy!

Anyway, just a quick post to say hello all, be in and out but hoping that you are all okay.

luci - thinking of you sweets xx

morning! - ahh!, you lot are not just brave but very wise too! , thanks for the comments, it does help to know that im not alone in feeling like i do right now - another frank exchange of views here this morning but thankfully today we are now about to have 3 little nephews over to take our minds off it all - i think a we ought to now just try and enjoy the day, not try and 'discuss' anything else today (or this evening when we are tired!) and well, just 'be', iyswim? - i think we could spend forever rehashing it all and still never move forward, just build up a bank of resentments - so, to that end im off down the park with a football!

btw mouse, glad you had a nice evening!, hope you laughed till your ribs hurt!

I did "ok" for me. 2 glasses of wine and two beers, lots of pizza and a pint of water to finish the night.
Small steps. Am so glad you had a great night too Mouse. 3 glasses is a totally respectable and normal amount to drink.
I don't have time to catch up with posts. Off to Greenwich Park with the folks and kids.
Have a lovely Saturday all brave babes.
X

2 g and t's for me

Hi 4c4 thanks for your post. I almost wish I had a dysfunctional childhood to blame it all on, but I don't. I had a very ordinary (privileged in many ways) childhood with parents who loved me. I have no idea how I ended up with that dead inside feeling other than that as soon as I started to feel adult emotions I began to squash them with alcohol.

I dunno about therapy, I've had counselling a couple of times and it didn't help for either issue (one of which was alcohol ). I guess that's why I'm now in AA, because nothing else worked.

I hope you're all having lovely saturdays, mine is the usual rounds of shopping/washing/cleaning/taxi driving. Woohoo . At least the sun is shining intermittently and it seems I will have no kids in the house tonight

Well done luci it could have been so very different if you'd let it be! Have a fab day out xx

Corrie - same to you, that's really good.

JWN - For the last Jeff knows how long, before you sorted your life out, you were muddling through, dulling your emotions, fears, worries etc with booze. You don't have than anymore.

It's a bit like post traumatic stress all coming out, slowly being released. It's like now, now you are strong enough to deal with this, whatever 'this' is, and your mind is letting go of things that up until recently, you'd hidden away? Does that make sense?

Your mind/body/soul is ready to release, unclutter and unscramble all of the things that maybe you thought you'd dealt with?

If I'm waffling, tell me to shush

Hope you enjoy your day with your guests. And, FWIW, just 'being' for a while is exactly what you both need xx

Ta-da!

What do you think of my weekend name?

Very splendid name...um, why?

tee hee hee - very good x

How's the Nemster??? xx

Just for shits and giggles Corrie

He's not too bad, just lost his feed again so we're playing catch up again, now I've cleaned him up.

How are you Silver? xx

Erm - good question - not sure - been stupidly tired for no reason (nothing like you but tired for me) - not sure if it's the side affects of naltrexone - otherwise good xxxx

Hey, I have no exclusivity on tiredness

I think I might change my name back now....... I'll wheel Shelia out when I'm feeling a bit norty I think!

NOOOO - I like Sheila

Phew - that last name made me feel like an Aussie Drag Queen

Soooo - I've spent a large part of today on the 'Good Housekeeping' thread - OMG - I am a slattern lazy cow - who in their right mind can be so obsessed with housework - discuss.

Secretly I would love to be so clean and organised - and now I know why I have pools of water in the bottom of my fridge - drain thing blocked apparently - mines not just blocked it's feking frozen - aarrgh

A cautionary tale
Well, I decided after 2 weeks sober I could have a go at "normal" drinking. I bought a nice bottle of red last night, my mum had a couple of glasses I had a couple with dinner and I went to bed leaving about a glass and a half in the bottle.
Very proud I was!!
So, at lunchtime today I finished the bottle. From that moment I wanted more. I bought a bottle of rose, drank most of that. I hid the bottle in the wardrobe because I didn't want to share it.
I found a can of Stella in the fridge left by a visitor which I necked. I am now back in my bedroom (my mum is living with me and dd at the moment) the bottle is in the wardrobe and it's almost finished.
I have NO money in my purse until Tuesday and I'm desparately planning how to get more alcohol.
I am not ready for "normal" drinking

Thorn - a big learning curve babe - start again tomorrow. You've done so well - don't let this put you back.

Lesson learnt

Move on

xxx

Thorn - sorry that sounded really flippant - I didn't mean it to - I don't know what to suggest other than bath, PJ's, something to eat and bed.

Then think again tomorrow - if you have done two weeks then you can do three - and so on and so on.

Take care and be glad that you haven't got the money to just give in to buying more booze - for tonight that is a good thing.

xxxx