The Brave Babes Battle Bus - Staying Springy In Their Quest For Sobriety.

[Mouseface]

Hello, I'm Mouse I have an shockingly abusive relationship with alcohol, mainly vodka.

This Bus is full of drinkers, non-drinkers, thinkers and Babes, all trying to find their way to a happy, sober life.

Some are there, some are almost there and some are not. It really doesn't matter, we're all in this together.

Why not find a seat? Everyone is welcome, drinking or drunk, come and say hello.

HERE is the previous thread, with a link to all of the other wonderful journeys so far............

mia I'm trying to remember what my drinking was like when my dds were young. I think when dd1 was 9 (and dd2 was 4) I mostly drank after they had gone to bed - which was quite early. It meant that I was extremely ratty with them when they were getting ready for bed - or NOT getting ready for bed because if felt as though they were keeping me from my drink. I think I was pretty tough on them

As they got older and their bedtime got later, that tactic didn't work. I think that's when I really got into drinking which preparing a meal - it felt so civilised - and it meant I could start drinking earlier. I do wish I didn't made that switch though - it's taken another 15 years to get back in control.

Mia - nope, they are fully booked until next week so I have to call tomorrow for emergency appt. Diclofenac has been cancelled from my list of repeats. Didn't really help much but I suspect that the dose was the problem not the drug; too low.

Mia - I drink when I'm in pain like today, it heightens the effects of the morphine and other meds. I can't drink though due to my diet. I CAN'T DRINK and actually, I don't really want to. The pain is killing me, I'm barely able to walk now, after being on my feet all day, chasing around after Nemo but I'll be in bed straight after Russell Howard.

Well, not as in 'I'll be up there after him', in my bed or anything like that!! [grid]

Anyway, my point to you was that if you REALLY do want to stop, you will. You're just not ready to give that crutch up yet, are you?

You say you can do it without DD being there....? Why? What changes for you?
Tell me to bugger off by all means, I'm trying to understand what motivates you to drink.

xx

Oh and did I tell you all that I threw my thong under garments across the floor at Stay & Play today?

Let me explain.... I felt a crumple in my jeans, in the lower part near to my shoe, so, I shook my leg and out flew a pair of clean knickers!

Luckily, most of the mums there are friends of mine so they took it in very good humour, whilst I turned purple and stuffed them embarrassingly into my pocket.

Can you imagine the next committee meeting??

One of the big reasons I wanted to stop venus was because since I've been home-edding DD, she's been going to bed later so she was seeing me getting a bit pissed as the evening wore on.

i just don't know how to deal with these feelings without putting in something external to numb them. Never have known how. So if I'm on my own I can just about hunker down and resist the urge, but if I'm trying to behave like a normal human being and a decent parent, I have to keep all of that squashed down or reigned in, and by the end of the day I'm ready to fucking explode. Also pain makes me really really grumpy.

So I've been a good(ish) mummy today, a good(ish) home educator today, and my jug of will power is dry as a bone (which is more than I am).

Mia - Well, I'm seperated, so I suppose I'm fortunate that I can dictate what alcohol is in my house!

Mouse - I've been ready to give up that crutch for ages. I just don't seem to get around to it, as I have no one nagging me, and it impacts on nobody (not yet, I hear you all say). I want to stop before my DDs (10 and 8) realise what a piss-head I am when they are with me. I am so glad to have found you all - and hope I can use you as my cyber-friends to support me along the journey. Reading all the posts, not only have I realised that we are all different, but how much we have in common, and what we can all give and receive on this difficult journey.

ha ha mouse, I know someone who did that in a meeting with a famous TV producer (fortunately while sitting round a meeting table). He realised what it was, kicked them off further under the table, and then left them there when the meeting was over. Imagine finding them in your office

Russel Howard, so cute mmm

So much admiration to you for he-ing dd, and not surprising that you feel a bit frazzled by this time. So, OK for today the wine is open, you've had a couple of glasses, taken the edge off your day. Is it possibe for you to stop now? or are you a 'once-it's-opened' type of person?

On other days, maybe tomorrow? and the days next week - is there something that you can do in the time before tea-time to get a break from dd? A regular arrangement for her to go to a friend, or have a friend over, or go to a club (one where you could take her, then leave)? Maybe that would give you enough space to re-gather your energy. Or are there other people who home-ed, that you could 'swap' a day a week with, so they specialise in the art and history and trips to the gallery, and you specialise in the anatomy sex education and health?

Mouse you made me laugh out loud for the second time today with your knicker story. The first time was listening to my best friend's answerphone message which simply said "let me tell you a list of things that make me really really unhappy... Rain, inlaws, rain, inlaws, rain, inlaws, rain, inlaws. Oh and rain and my inlaws".

I'm feeling much happier now, as I start my 3rd glass, so now I can articulate the feelings that are just a big ol' tangled mess of fury when I haven't taken the edge off them.

I'm just such a horribly irritable bitch. I always have been. So was my dad (and the many similarities I have to him leads me into a really dark and upsetting place). I try to suppress my hyper-sensitivity and extreme irritation all the time totally unsuccessfully because it's destructive and antisocial and hurts people. But then sometimes it overwhelms me and I just want to scream and rage and lash out.

I thought I'd done really well to escape the worst of my usual PMT this month, and I started my period in the uncommited and stop-start way that's become normal in the past couple of years. Maybe it's my hormones partly though, as I've not started properly yet. I ache all over, am fighting off a virus, just feel crappy. So I can hold it together for the day for DD, although I wasn't as patient as I'd like, but it all just builds up inside.

Feel so absurd talking to you about this mouse when your pain is ten times mine.

venus - I was going to start a thread in chat but decided against it!

Mia - full respect to you for home-edding your DD.

Not sure what your reasons for deciding on home ed are & tell me to bugger off if I'm sticking my oar in, but is this working out for you both?
Are you able to cope with the responsibilities of being both parent & teacher? I know there is no way I could do it as frankly it is those few hours a day sans kids that keep me relatively sane!

Is it working well for both you & DD?
Xx

joey mia thank you! >

MIL situ is bloody rotten and what fecks me off is that I have to live with this utter madness for the rest of my life. I dont deserve it. Didnt ask for it. And dont want it.

Still.

Id better get on with it.

I am not drinking. :o)

Rain - you nutter. I had two babies in 11 months and STOPPED. It was manic and I was a sleep deprived sweaty mess for 2 years.... I salute you! Youre fecking amazing. And I dont know how you do it.

Can you use nursery for a half day twice a week? Maybe? Bit of sane time for you?

Mouse. I cant believe that you have to suffer so much. Im so sorry..... I wish I could make it better for you. x

I also want to add to the Mirena coil Fan Club. I havent had a period for years and I love it. If I get crabby - I have to look at the moon for clues to see if it might be PMT.

Sometimes tho - Im just crabby. :)

Venus - how did you get so beautiful, calm, kind, generous and wise..... I love your posts.

*chasingtail - I confess I wondered the same!

Mia, how old is your daughter? I know it would drive me nuts, and when there is an alcohol problem thown into the equation, it must be stratospherically difficult. I need to go to work to give me a sense of perspective on life, as I certainly don't get that once all the 'have-to-dos' are dealt with. xx

Sorry cross-posted with you venus. I've cooked and we've eaten, but it hasn't stopped me - I'm on the red now. Just wanted to blot things out tonight. I don't feel pissed, as such, but it just took me 4 attempts to type 'tonight' correctly.

btw, Mirena coils are fab; I've had one since DD no.2, and no bleeding at all, ever. Not nice having them put in, but 60 seconds' pain for 5 years' of no hassle is well worth it!

See the thread's moving too fast for my slightly pissed brain and fingers now... Thank god I'm not on the ipad, typing would be even worse.

blanket I thought of you earlier when I got the message about inlaws from my DBF.

mia - felt instantly better when i read your post and realised that Im probably not the only person to have fucked up MIL.

x

venus not sure I can stop tonight. I'm not usually really really bingey, and I'm not going to get smashed, but I;ve lost the plot a bit today, I really don't know quite why.

When DD was at school ('til end Oct '11) she would come out of school in such a hyped and ratty state that we didn't often have people over, and she was in her bed by 7pm. Since then, she's been much happier and less tired, so almost every day she has between one and three of a family of sisters (who live in our street) round. They're in and out of each other's houses all the time, which I love, I really do, since she's an only and it's great for her to have that 'sister' vibe. But on days like this, the noise, the slamming doors, the shrieking, the clattering up and down stairs, the clamour of voices and requests etc etc... drives me up the wall. DD does go round there lots, but I'm acutely aware that the girls' parents have a tough enough time (with four of them within a year age gap ) without my DD in the mix too, so I tend to encourage DD to have a couple of them here, usually. My glass of wine at c.5pm usually takes the edge off the noise irritation. Now I don't have that.

chasing overall it's working quite well, although I do keep threatening to send her back to school if she doesn't drop the reluctant attitude to learning. My DxP summed up the process of getting DD to enjoy her learning...
"It's like trying to start a reluctant engine; you crank and crank the engine and you don't think it's going to start in a million years. But you keep cranking and then suddenly the it takes; the engine starts and she's off and running".

So it's a huge effort to get her to do anything new, but once you get going, it's really rewarding to see her enthusiasm and attainment. Bloody tiring though. I need to be able to not take the resistance personally, and not be affected by her mercurial moods (half an hour of crying today because I wouldn't sign up to a moshi monsters monthly subscription - which did lead to a good maths and ethics lessons, but was nonetheless a pain in the arse).

Anyway blah blah.

The point being that I thought that if I didn't drink then my massive levels of irritation would magically disappear. Hence, I think, my fury yesterday and today when I realised that despite having not drunk to excess for over a fortnight, I am still exactly the same person as I was before. (Who knew? )

back from London - I thought there was supposed to be a drought "down sarf" - it pissed down the whole time. managed a whole 30 minute jog along the Regent canal towpath though which was fabby - I love being out on my own in the rain - and a potter round Camden Market.
Haven't caught up with the thread - hope you are all ok.
PS Bought "Fifty shades of Grey" to read on the train Oh MY!!!!!

Ma - read all three - bet you do too

Felt a bit bereft when I finished them xx

well, it's certainly "interesting" . Better make sure DH doesn't get hold of it......
How's yer ma silver me old mucker?

Instantly googles "50 Shades of Grey" - add that one to the list

Fifty Shades of Grey is repetitive filth!

Sorry I have been quiet but I have goofed.

I had a shitty day yesterday and instead of sucking it up I sent my DH to the shop for a bottle of white and I would have 'just one glass', needless to say I had the whole bottle.

Tonight, I have secretly scoffed the 1/2 bottle of awful wine that was in the cupboard for cooking

DH is on day six, I suck!

Silver & Ma xx xx

Carrie she's 9.

Blanket my DBF is British born of Indian parents, married to the same. Her parents are quite progressive, her PILs... not so much. She really struggles with their expectations of her, and is just as angry and arsey as me a very strong character who reacts badly to the expectation that she will be the DIL they want her to be.

I've read about the 50 shades of grey series. I do like a bit of the kinky stuff sometimes, so maybe I should order it. Anne Rice used to write some interesting SMy stuff under the pen name AN Roquelaure, if you like that sort of thing.

Ginger want to sit in the sidecar with me?