The Brave Babes Battle Bus - BOINGing Into Spring, The Jesus(WhatNext) Way!

[Mouseface]

Hello, tis me, Mouse

I'm one of the Brave Babes aboard the Battle Bus, on the journey to sobriety.

We have drinkers, non-drinkers, inbetweeners, notquitesurers...... which is all fantastic.

No matter who you are or where you're at in your personal quest to get where you want to be, come grab a seat and join in the natter, just jump right in.

And, if you'd like to see where we've been up until now, HERE is a link to the last thread and the ones before it

See you soon.

Thank God I drink tonight, ds woken with raging temperature and currently wrapped around my neck in bed. Wide awake but can't move much! If I'd have drunk copious amounts of wine I doubt I'd be lying here soothing him so much. Bloody bored tho! Plus he keeps sneezing on me so guess what I am in store for over Easter...

Meant DIDN'T drink tonight!

Hello all and great to see JNW so chipper

Sorry to report that after 10 clear days, I have lapsed and belong in the sidecar

It was a friend's birthday, we'd all booked the afternoon off. Sunny day on the river. I thought I could resist the "How many bottles are we ordering?" schtick

Unfortunately I am now a bottle to the worse. I am very glad that at least I have NO wine in the house. Otherwise I would be three bottles to the worse:(

Golly just come to bagsy my seat mark my place and see there are loads of posts to catch up on. Had a good busy day with dd - haircuts, shopping, bit of tidying up and then, out comes a good old fashioned board game - Risk. What a wonderful timewaster that game is!

Well done Lola that is fantastic , just what you wanted, to be there for your children when they need you. Sorry ds is ill though x

Hope I was wondering how you were getting on. You need to do the drill now. Drink a pint of water. Then brush your teeth and get off to bed. Tomorrow is a brand new day. You got 10 days under your belt, you can do it again. We are all here to help and support you x

not ok am pissed again, easter holidays and all that jazz..I need more from life than this :( xx

faire it's quite ridiculously coincidental that the day I feel I have my breakthrough moment one of my kids really needs me and I get to feel like the great mum I know I want to be, it was bloody hard though as my dh was drinking my fave wine! Had bloody nettle tea but lying here with my sweaty clingy boy has certainly proven something.

Still don't know how long I'll last. It actually scares me a bit....

top it sounds like u r getting to the place I found myself in. It's a hard realisation xx

Lola it's not coincidence my lovely. You made the decision to not drink. You tried bloody hard to stick to that decision, and the result is, you are sober and there for your kids. This is the person you want to be, this is the person you are. You can have that every day if you want.

I think have a lot of things you want to change at the moment. Just deal with one thing at a time. The alcohol must come first because that affects everything else you do. So deal with the not drinking like you have today. Don't worry about forever, or next week, just get through that one day. You can do this. You are doing this x

Btw I love nettle tea, there's a lovely nettle, milkthistle and fennel one I like.

top maybe you should do the drill too. Have a pint of water, then another, clean your teeth and get off to bed. Come back tomorrow and let us know you're ok. I know loads of people who drink heavily too but am starting to realise I have picked friends who were similar in their drinking habits to me. Now I don't see half of them any more because I don't want to spend my evenings getting wasted. People change, we all move on in life and I think some of my friends are heading in a different direction to me now. That's ok. I need to let them go so that I can have the life I want.

Thank you Faire I'll do just that :)

Morning everyone

It's bucketing down with rain here, and cold!!

I had to make myself go offline for the day yesterday, to try to study, but still managed to procstrastinate to the nth degree!, so I am still trying to study today, but am online .

Hope all are ok this morning, hello to all new Babes.

xxxx

Morning all! Bright here, but cold to come...
How are you top?
Faire had some good advice for last night- not just for the short term- 'lets's get you to bed safely' but about comparing yourself to others. What's your plan for today, tonight?

Best wishes for a good day to all the Babes, old and new- are we hump of the week yet?

Same here with the weather Helpyourself. Helpfully I think I would have done the same in those circumstances. The weekend before last I went out with some friends. They were planning a big piss up and I deliberately arrived late to avoid the afternoon drinking. However, I ended up completely wasted and can't remember getting back to my hotel. Spent the next day, a lovely sunny day, in bed with a ghastly hangover.

Well, Babes, it's Day Three for me. Last night, despite having horrid cold and going to bed feeling ill, I slept better than I have for a very, very long time. Today, I feel stronger and brighter than I have for ages.

However, I am sure I will drink at the weekend. If I can keep it to the weekend, that's not so bad. I just hope I don't get back into a bottle plus a night territory...

Have a fab day, lovely ladies. I can't tell you how supportive this thread is. I feel I am clinging to it as though it's a life raft which, I suppose, it is in a way.

Hello helpyourself and Greyhound

I think we may be past "hum of the week" as it's a Bank Holiday, on the happy "up" to the weekend

*Greyhound" those sober sleeps are the best, aren't they? it takes a while, but the lovely clear, not just head, but Soul, is such a great feeling. So why don't I always remember that .

Yes, Gerald, Roger and Sidecar are definitely amphibian, have to be to pick up the overseas Babes . Your analogy of a life raft is spot on. xxx

We could try a "hum of the week" I suppose

Ha ha "hum of the week"!

Thurso, it actually annoys me how I've been depriving myself (and my family) of so much over the years of drinking. I feel so different today - relaxed and sort of 'free'. I hope it lasts - please God.

One thing that will change if I keep sober is the amount of empties under my bed - not empty wine bottles but mineral water bottles. I drink so much water in the night when I've been drinking and sleep badly. I gathered up about six empty water bottles yesterday...

You can make it last Greyhound. I only wish that I had found something like this thread when my children were younger, I would have so many less years to berate and hate myself about .

I had so much good advice when I first came on here, and was hating and torturing myself about times gone past, I have sort of (excuse English!) worked through a lot of it now, remorse for the days that I was hung over, and the "why, why did I do it", knowing that I did so much with the Dc's, but knowing that sometimes I was assuaging guilt about being hungover. If you can catch yourself now, you need not have those years to look back on with shame.

Oof, taken the lid off my box now, speak later xxxx

Morning! Quick post as I am in Lon-don (as we say in the sticks) en route to client meeting. (good luck with yours isinde)

Glad I didn't drink last night, hungover does not make for a good impression with a new client!

We could have a Winnie-the-pooh like "Tum te tum of the week" too

chasing I can't seem to do controlled drinking - well I can for the first half glass, but then whenever I got to the end of that glass, all control seemed to have gone. I have had several years when I probably looked like I could do controlled drinking - going out for lunch and having one glass so I could drive. In reality it was so I could drive home via the supermarket and stock up for the rest of the afternoon. So in your position I would not now have the 'couple of glasses of champagne'. I know champagne can feel very celebratory but how many people actually LIKE it? I usually found it tasted cheap and acidy (unless it was extortionately expensive) and it left a nasty taste in my mouth. Why not look for the most celebratory non-alcoholic cocktail you can find - the sort of long drink with fizzy apple and ginger and mint and lemongrass, and really enjoy what you are drinking.

Thurso yesterday my internet was not working for most of the day. I was going a bit crazy, but I got a big project done offline because I had none of my usual distractions.

isindie I hope you weren't on the bog when you replied to my pm - 'cos that wasn't a quick text [wipes thought from brain]

Morning all you busy, productive, hangover-free babes .

Thurso the thing is, you didn't just find this bus, you used it to help you get sober and stay sober. You could still be living under the illusion that you need alcohol and be putting it before all your other relationships, but you don't do that.

So face those regrets, once and for all, look them square in the face and ask for forgiveness. You have the whole rest of your life to enjoy, why waste a single moment more on the past. You must have tons of happy memories too and your dcs love you and always will x

Jade welcome to the bus, how are you getting on today?

Oh, and nice multi-tasking Isinde

I wrote a huge post and then lost when one of the boys turned my computer off. That will teach me to MN in the mornings Will be back later!

For now. It has been great reading some of your posts. Greyhound your words earlier were really interesting and I could relate a lot.

Venus your description of your friend made me cringe as I could see so much of my behaviour in what you wrote.

Top I agree that there does seem to be a lot of women like me who are happily married with young DCs who drink wine because they are bored/stressed and need to drink to relieve this. Maybe it is the new "Mother's ruin". However, when I asked a couple of close friends recently what they thought about my drinking pattern they made it clear that it is not normal.

I am only on Day 11 and don't feel that I can offer advise about not drinking but I can say that I feel better than I have done in years now I have got over the Day 6 sticking point. I feel more patient with the DCs and have more energy. I feel guilty about my past lack of patience etc but can not change that and can only remind myelf so I hopefully stay on the straight and narrow.

As far as controlled versus abstenence goes. I have tried controlled drinking so many times in the past and it never worked. I have an addictive personality and I would always start with good intentions and then lapse within days. I t wasn't until I came on this bus and posters talked of how exhausting all the bargaining and rules around controlled drinking can be that I realised what I had been doing. For me, not drinking is the only way.

I feel that I have turned a corner and , although I know there will be hard times ahead, I feel that I can do this now because I want to not jut because I know I should. I will continue to ride on the bus because I have found the support here and knowing that I can post anything and not be judged and have people read who understand what I am going through helps. I am finding it encouraging that some of you guys have gone a lot further down the road and stayed away from the booze.

Well best go before the DCs get restless. Not too sure what the plan is today as it is raining. Maybe some baking

hey all - some good success stories here - keep at it.
Thurso how are you, my friend?
Anybody seen Silver? Please God don't tell me that Isindie is behind the wheel?

I'm here Ma - bloody wet and cold here

Off to hospice in a bit - Mum seems better in herself but they have told us she can only stay for 8 weeks - so WTF we do then is anybodies guess.

Welcome to all new Babes - you are all doing brilliantly

xxxxx

I am definitely one of those women - married, middle class, with kids - who use wine as a relaxant and an escape. It is definitely the new mother's ruin. In Victorian times, gin was cheap and the drink of drunks. Now, wine, beer and cider are cheap.

I was in Iceland on one of my 'buy two bottles for ten pounds or three for twelve" (I always bought the three bottle deal) and they have a whole section of "tramp's booze". Cheap spirits - brandy, gin, whiskey, a crude copy of Jack Daniel's bourbon, that sought of thing. Now, people don't buy those drinks for the taste, do they? I don't buy wine for the taste. I like the taste but it's the alcohol I buy it for.

My addictive personality has a ridiculous element - I am also addicted to fizzy mineral water. Like my wine, it has to be the cheap stuff. I love the bubbles in my mouth and the taste of it. I drink loads. In fact, my addiction to fizzy water has become a replacement addiction.

Of course, it is a harmless addiction but it's still an addiction IYSWIM. What I'm saying is that I will always have an addictive personality. I don't particularly like sweet fizzy drinks like cola or energy drinks. My uncle replaced his alcohol addiction to an addiction to cigarettes and cola.