The Brave Babes Battle Bus - New Year, New Start And With A Firm Resolution In Their Hearts.

[Mouseface]

Hello, I'm Mouse and I have an ever changing relationship with alcohol.

This is the Brave Babes Battle Bus, it's a support thread for those who feel their drinking habits are not what they should be, or even those of another.

Sober, drinking or somewhere in between, come take a seat.

And for those who would like to know where this all started, HERE is a link to the threads before this one.

Make THIS year THE year that you change your life, for the better.

Have a Happy New Year, full of memories to treasure, not to forget.

i like it helpyourself - though might sound a bit harsh on a thread where someone is struggling? dunno.

hi to all and welcome aboard cider

yesterday in the late evening i realised i hadn't had a drink and ended up pouring one, drank about half and then poured it away. of late i've drank one or two drinks every day but not more and yesterday i could have done without it totally. it's weird but it 'seems' with me if i make a big deal out of it and say i can't have it i drink more than if i just let myself drink but make them long drinks so they're barely alcoholic anyway. so for now i'm carrying on like this. obviously if the drink level creeps up again i'll have to reassess.

christ - that sounds like the day from hell - well done you for not using it as a reason drink. i don't even want to think about having to deal with a poo covered bed without hot water.

Mm, could look harsh, yes.

However it represents the way it is with drinking, or indeed any crap situation. The only thing you can ever change is yourself. I know I can't control anything in my life- the only effect I can have is on my actions. Once I realised that it was quite liberating- and gave me a lot of head space to stop trying to change everything, just concentrate on me!

helpyourself is that ciders new name?

venus thank you. I am due to see friends this evening. They offered bar or restaurant I said restaurant because I find if I eat something then I feel better. Saying that, I may not be able to go as have just heard DD2 not too well, might have to go back in to hospital

silly hello, thank you. I agree on the lightbulb moment. I have had a lot of nightsweats recently and have been to the doctor. They have magically vanished over the last couple of weeks. I have been thinking about my children and how i could possibly do this to myself too.

however, one day at a time.

It's me from here SSSM pointed out I was due a name change and it represents the change from a plea for help to what I've done- with a lot of help from the Brave Babes and AA.

Cristiane Fingers crossed for DD2 and hospital ODAAT indeed!

Sorry, I'm not reading and posting as regularly as I'd like, but I'm still on the bus... Day 11 today. Praise the Lord. DH reckons he has never seen me go this long without a drink. Even in the past when I have done several weeks of "no booze mid week" I have always always had a drink at the weekend. But last weekend I did not, and as for this weekend?

I may, just may have a glass of wine tonight, not sure yet. Or perhaps tomorrow instead. See how I feel later.

I am sleeping so so well right now it is a true revelation.

noteven great to hear from you. hang in there. How is DD?
silver hope you do ok today
cider - nice to have you back

Hi cider, nice to meet you :)
I don't know why wanting the best for your children, or considering that you might be killing yourself isn't enough to stop you drinking, but it just isn't that simple, as lots of us have found.
There is no point feeling guilty about it though, that certainly won't help.

Don't focus on that aspect, focus on how amazing you will feel if you don't drink tonight. That anxiety about what time you can drink will go and you can get in to bed feeling giddy with excitement that you have done it. It is a scary prospect, I know, but it is possible and it doesn't even have to be miserable.

Very inspirational! helpyourself

Sending extra strengthened sobriety thoughts to all .I know that Friday and Saturday evenings were always especially tough ones for me,'it's the weekend,I should get pissed to celebrate that'.Hmm.

This 'exercise' helps me ground myself when wobbly..try it and see if it works for you.

S.top- take a break, step away from the situation.

O.bserve - take a self-reflective moment to assess what is happening

B.reath - take three (or more) slow, deep breaths and focus all of your awareness on the experience of breathing.

E.xpand - open your awareness up to include your body, location and overall situation.

R.espond - make a choice instead of getting swept up in reacting.

Being present, here and now, takes coming back to the moment over and over and over again. Take several 1-5 minute breaks throughout your day to SOBER up while you develop the art of being in the here in now.

Afternoon, tis me, Mouse

I am just popping in before being taken out for a pre birthday lunch by DH to let you all know that my Chronic Pain Consultant has been in touch and wants to see me on Tuesday

Also my chest X-Ray has come through for Monday so I'll be spending a lot of time at hospital waiting around next week.

Ma - you're in my thoughts lovely lady. I really wish we shared more than the same birthday. I wish your DH was a thoughtful and caring as mine, I really do. But also I wish that you wanted to be with your DH, or at least be with someone who you loved.

I'm so sorry that you now can't even be taken out for money reasons. xxx

Still off to the Spa tomorrow but I really wish that my closest friend could join me there. I think I'll have to get her here another time and spoil her for the day! Funny how you miss your closet friends even though you text/talk/fb all the time. It's not the same is it?

Actually, seeing them, talking to them in person is, watching their expressions, seeing them laugh with you is much nicer and personal in my book.

Right, off to get the play dough out of my hair from nursery!

Nemo had a dreadful night, he was up for two hours just very unhappy and very unsettled. I think he may have a bug brewing. Again.

Hello to all the returning babes, good to have you back on the Bus for support.

hey mouse its not so bad. He has gone to Asda to buy stuff to make a birthday cake with DS (well, with ingredients, we're not planning to eat the child), and says if its nice we will go out to the beach on Saturday then he'll make a nice dinner. Sounds like a plan.
I get by.
enjoy your Spa day and relax for once!

Afternoon.

Helpyourself, great name! :)

Mouse you got an appointment! Thank goodness for that! Nothing to do with the complaint of course... Hope it goes well next week. Everything crossed for you. You will have to make sure you go back to the spa with your friend some time. Hope you had a nice lunch today and that Nemo feels better soon. There are some nasty bugs and viruses around at the moment. I think I've gone for about a week without a cold, but now I've got another one. Think the DC are coming down with it too. DS has been up since 5am (and therefore so have I...) so I'm not the boingiest today. Anyway, enjoy your birthday eve!

Venus, Faire, OneSunny, cat's piss/cats' piss (how many cats are doing the pissing I wonder? ) is down the drain. Go me!! Smelt revolting. Don't know whether I'm losing the taste for it (I doubt it) or it's gone off. If someone had poured my only chilled white wine down the fridge a few months ago I would have gone bananas. I would have turned into a crazy woman. I am starting to realise that the thing I thought was relaxing me actually caused quite a bit of tension. Where was I going to get the next drink? When was I going to have it? Has DH realised how much I'm drinking? Where shall I hide the empties? How rough am I going to feel tomorrow because of what I'm doing now? And becoming more and more aware, with every sip I took, that I had a huge problem.

I love your quote, Christi. Permission to use it again please? :)

'We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit.'
Aristotle

Isinde, I think us self-critical people could learn from this. Actually you sound great, so it will just be me! :o I know that if I'd drunk when I'd not planned to I'd have the tendency to beat myself up about it and think all the good work had been undone. But actually I'd have still done the same amount of sober days as I had done the day before I drank. I just drank for one day. So, so long as I go back to long periods of abstaining then who cares? No damage done (assuming no damage is actually done, if you know what I mean?! ). If it was just a few drinks and not the alkie-style drinking that I used to do then I'd like to think I'd let it go and just go straight back to not drinking for a while. So I propose that Aristotle would allow someone to still consider themselves excellent if they had had one act/day of moderate drinking within an overall habit/life of abstaining. That make sense?

This may sound like I am persuading myself that it's OK for me to drink tonight...well I'm not bloody going to. Or tomorrow night. I just think about things too much, and project all the time. Unlike JWN, I need a plan for everything! Plans change all the time and that is fine (if you knew me in RL you'd realise just how much plan adjusitng I've had to do in recent years) but I find it impossible to do the ODAAT thing. My plan is that I will drink again at some point. But it will be the occasional drink, and in moderation, not like before. So I won't feel guilty and worthless and begin the whole spiral into drinking every day again. But right now I'm really enjoying not drinking. There are so many benefits and I'm not ready to give them up :)

There endeth the brain-dump. Now then, what I can rustle up for tea?

ma it's a beautiful evening - all melodramatic grey and peachy light ad a great golden glow in the west - hope that all bodes well for calm weather tomorrow, although I love the beach even more in wild weather.

Have a great birthday weekend ma and mouse

Having a plan is fine, necessary even sometimes. But taking it one day at a time is the way to achieve it. Each day is but a stepping stone to the next. As long as you know where you're going, you only have to think about today.

Well 'tis Friday and I forgot to remind you but I am re-introducing face pack Friday (FPF) for those of us who may struggle tonight. We will do beauty treatments instead. So back here, 8pm tonight with face packs on, or toe nail polish, or whatever .

Mouse what treatments will you have at the spa? The only one I've been to is Centre Parcs with all those gorgeous scented steam rooms. Bliss!

Well done s/sm for pouring it away, and i bet it did smell horrid. After all this time it would have started to oxidise and turn into vinegar. However I also know that there would have been a time when I would have downed even cat's pee stuff like that. Tbh I struggle to remember a time when there was ever any wine left over once a bottle had been opened

I remember one evening dp and I went to dinner with a couple (not close friends, just people being polite). We took a bottle of wine, which the four of us drank and then we (dp and I) sat around looking at our glasses and making small talk. Eventually male host said "would you like another glass of wine - I think there's some open from last week?" dp and I were for weeks - firstly at the low consumption of alcohol, secondly at them not even buying wine for dinner, and thirdly at offering guests some week old rubbish wine. We didn't go back but we might get on with them rather well now.

s/sm I just want to say how amazing you sound in comparison to when you joined the bus..... I am a mere lurker but I do read this thread every day and I am constantly amazed by everyone's journey, but your post above just made me realise what this thread does for real people with real problems...... I know there are many others with equally inspirational journeys but I think you should look back at your history on this thread and be so proud of how far you have come......

You're a star among many other stars. Brave babes rock.

evening all!!

been to aa today, womens meeting i really enjoy, i think the way we chat is very like this thread, the topics are WIIIIDE ranging!

thingumy, love your check list!, i need to stop and think sometimes, i live my life in a general whirlwind of 'stuff' and im certainly never going to have 'thoughtful deep thinker' carved on my stone! it does me good to step back and take stock occasionally, not just regarding staying sober either!

dug out some embroidery to do, got a load of books that need reading and i have volunteered to do some work for local refuge, so, got my new year on track, feel much better for it!

venus, we were once asked round to some neighbours for a drink, when we got there it turned out that they were born-agains who regarded booze with deep suspicion i dont know who was more shocked, me or dh, when we were offered dandelion coffee! ugh ugh ugh!!

Fecking Hell

Ma and Mouse

HAPPY BIRTHDAYS LOVELY LADIES

HEP HEP HURRAY

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

It's tomorrow Silver but thank you

We're not having any treatments, they were fully booked but we're going to use all of the steam rooms, hydro therapy pools, snow cave, sun meadow and have some lunch and a glass of fizz in the spa lounge. You get to lie on a day bed snuggled in a huge throw. Bliss.

Time to bath the little fish, be back tomorrow if not later on.

Night Brave Babes, stay safe, warm and in control wherever you are tonight xx

Thanks Horses . I do sometimes think about looking back at my old posts but I would find it hard. I was coming to the end of an incredibly stressful time (a lovely combination of bankruptcy, redundancy and immigration issues) and I was a nervous wreck. I have to admit that my life would have improved to some extent anyway, but I have no doubt whatsoever that without this thread there is no way I'd now be on Day 12 of not drinking, and planning not to drink for the foreseeable future. You're right, this thread does change lives

Faire, I am going to stick to my plan for the future whilst taking one day at a time!!? Well it makes sense to me!

Have good nights y'all.

Just checking in......

Day 13today, can't say it's been easy, had a SHIT week at work and have felt the need for oblivion a number of times, my apprentice is off sick, I think it is long term poor baby ( only 18 & loves her job here!) but will find out Mon how long term it is! Senior tech is also now off sick, so only me keepin the department going.........enough to turn anyone to drink....llll it's been feckin' hard......but you lot are a MASSIVE inspiration, I have not picked up, I cried last night with DH about the situation ( unheard of for me) but no godamnalcoholxxx

noteven good to hear from you.......stay strong!

Isindie you KNOW you can do this lady, bypass the slip-up and keep going, don't let it drag you down.

mouse I never know what to say to you 'cos all the shit seems to be thrown your way and I never have to deal with anything remotely like it........I hope you get what you need for you, DH, DD and Nemo 'cos God knows they are goddamn lucky to have you! And I for one am thankful give your time to us aswell!

silver you need to do whatever is right for you and I really hope it works, or at least gives you that boost you need to knock this shit on the head!

ma you have done so well recently, I really think this is your year, you sounded so sorted and strong over the last couple of weeks. Don't let a slip-up ruin you progress.

I'm shaking my pom poms for you everyday........keep it up x

Got to go and pick up a takeaway........out tomorrow night at a birthday party, but I am driving........see you all over the weekend sometime.

Stay strong babes, today I will NOT be drinking.

Just checking in......

Day 13today, can't say it's been easy, had a SHIT week at work and have felt the need for oblivion a number of times, my apprentice is off sick, I think it is long term poor baby ( only 18 & loves her job here!) but will find out Mon how long term it is! Senior tech is also now off sick, so only me keepin the department going.........enough to turn anyone to drink....llll it's been feckin' hard......but you lot are a MASSIVE inspiration, I have not picked up, I cried last night with DH about the situation ( unheard of for me) but no godamnalcoholxxx

noteven good to hear from you.......stay strong!

Isindie you KNOW you can do this lady, bypass the slip-up and keep going, don't let it drag you down.

mouse I never know what to say to you 'cos all the shit seems to be thrown your way and I never have to deal with anything remotely like it........I hope you get what you need for you, DH, DD and Nemo 'cos God knows they are goddamn lucky to have you! And I for one am thankful give your time to us aswell!

silver you need to do whatever is right for you and I really hope it works, or at least gives you that boost you need to knock this shit on the head!

ma you have done so well recently, I really think this is your year, you sounded so sorted and strong over the last couple of weeks. Don't let a slip-up ruin you progress.

I'm shaking my pom poms for you everyday........keep it up x

Got to go and pick up a takeaway........out tomorrow night at a birthday party, but I am driving........see you all over the weekend sometime.

Stay strong babes, today I will NOT be drinking.