The Brave Babes Battle Bus - Starting the New Year in Fine Style

[venusandmars]

Hello, I'm Venus, and standing in for Mouse (who usually starts all our threads)

This is a safe and welcoming place for anyone who is facing up to a problem with alcohol. It may be something you’ve known for years, or it may be that struggling with dry January has made you re-think your relationship with drink.
Anyway, welcome old and new, lurkers and posters. It can be a weird thread at times – travelling on a bus called Gerald.... he takes us up and down and this wondrous land, searching high and low for Babes in need of some support, a warm place to sit and chat, and to have someone to listen to them.

So, grab a seat as we swing by your way. There's lots of hot drinks, food and fleeces, places to just be and places to sit around and chat if that's what you want.

We don't judge, because we've all been in your shoes, be they stilettos, wellies or crocs!...

We're just us, we're just honest and we just do what we can to help, if we can, when we can. If you find all the banter off-putting just jump in with a cry for help.

And HAPPY NEW YEAR xxx

Here is the very first, emotional thread if you would like to see where this all started

Our most recent thread, if you want to catch up

Hi babes,

Further calamity to add!!! Earlier today I rushed out to pick up dd1 for an appointment and en route realised I had my teeth whitening gel and the gum shield still in my mouth. Told you I'm a doeball xxx

Hello and welcome GetSober. You've come to the right place.

I am a newbie here but you'll have figured out that everyone is lovely (if a bit mad ). You will get great support, and if you're very lucky, the odd opal fruit to boot. Sounds like you and I are in a very similar place and I am sure that the most important initial step is to do what you've really bravely done and admit to the issues. Moving on from there ain't easy and it ain't fun, but at least there are some eccentric diversions and a lot of laughs to be had on this bus. Plus loads of hugs and the odd interbosie [sp?] (proud I now know what this is, having wondered lurkily for months at the arcane terminology) from Wry

Good luck and keep posting - can you tell us a bit about you (if you want to!)?

I am, of course, aware of Damien Lewis' work, Small, but having just checked IMDb, I am shocked to find that I have actually NEVER seen him act! I must be the only one in the whole wide world!

Baby you crack me up, that is comic genius!

Welcome Get (We all get shortened in some way) or would you prefer Sober? You will get unconditional support on the bus. As Small says - it can get a bit eccentric some times, but we are all here for the same reason. Acknowledging that you have a problematic relationship with alcohol is the first step. You will want some strategies for those times when you reach for a bottle - whether from frustration, commiseration, celebration or merely habit, lots of nice substitute drinks, and sweets. But most of all, you must be prepared to be kind to yourself.

Thanks SmallFox sounds as if I'll fit right in here!

I'm 35. I've been a functional alcoholic for the whole of my adult life. Atm I don't have much insight into what drives me to drink. I'm working on this with my counselor.

I've reached crisis point as yesterday I was away with work. I drank on the way home, and arrived so pissed that I fell in the mud outside my own front door.

My long-suffering DH has said that if I don't stop drinking, he's going to take our two children and go. He doesn't want to, he still loves me, but he can't live like this any more.

sober hi honey, you just completed the hardest bit, that FIRST post,

It's scary I know but the warmth , kindness and support here will let some light in, your safe here, big squishy hugs xxxx

Thanks Sweet. Your last sentence nearly made me burst into tears. My counsellor said exactly the same thing the other day - that I need to be generous to myself. I stared blankly back and said "I wish I knew how to do that".

I recently won a promotion at work and DH doesn't get why this isn't helping me with my eternal feelings of hating myself and not being good enough. He doesn't understand why all the external validation in the world makes no difference when I think I'm a piece of shit.

Aw crap, you guys are all so nice, maybe it was a bad idea to start posting here while I'm at soft play. Crying in the ball pool, it's so not a good look

I get it totally, Sober - I find it very hard to accept that I deserve the good stuff, or even that the good stuff is worth anything. I am fortunate that DH understands, but not many do. You can change, it's slow, but it's also worth it.

Argh! even the thought of going back to the soft play years would have me in tears!

Well this is half the trouble. Sometimes alcoholism seems like the only sane response to parenthood

I knew every pub in a 20 mile radius that had a soft play .

Have you stayed AF (alcohol free) so far today, Sober? When is you're usual time to sink into a glass? I ask because your DH is going to have to help if he has given you an ultimatum. Mine is being in the kitchen with the radio on - any time of day, but Eddie Mair on PM at 5, I actually had to avoid him to begin with because , I simply couldn't hear his voice without a glass in hand. If your DH can take over for a while if you're used to cooking a la Keith Floyd, or can hand you a cup of tea before you even reach the fridge, you can begin to break old habits and build new ones.

Nope, can't do it Isinde, but to give you a bit of insight, I saw Hugh Bonneville with a beard earlier in the week - and I so TOTALLY would!

I am pissing myself laughing her because the very beautiful and dignified Puss-the-Cat has just fallen off the clothes drier/airer thingy whilst trying to steal a pair of my knickers - and is now trying to pretend that she achieved it with grace and aplomb!

Thankyou all. Thankyou, thankyou thankyou. In tears again (by the noughts and crosses board now). I can't tell you what it means to be able to talk to people. I'm ferociously secretive irl (again, afraid people will find out what I'm really like) and that's something that is really going to have to change.

I haven't drunk today, no. Am still in that bit where you're so ashamed of the night before that you can't imagine ever wanting to drink again, but I know from experience that that doesn't last. I drink in the evenings, usually. I like white wine. I think I'm going to go and put it all in the garage as a first step. I know that won't stop me getting at it if I'm determined to, but it's something.

DH will be supportive but I've got so much to prove to him. At the moment he doesn't believe a single word I say, having been lied to so many times, and he's right.

So, lots of us have trouble with liking ourselves, then? Figures. Why else would we behave so self-destructively?

'here', not 'her'.

Sweet "What? I TOTALLY meant to do that. Yes, yes I DID".

Out of sight is definitely a good start, Sober, if it's there every time you open the fridge it will be torture.

You appear to be a cat owner!

In fact, realistically we should just get rid of all the wine entirely. DH doesn't drink it, he's a beer man. I'll give it (3-4 bottles of white and 3 of champagne) to MIL. She'll think Christmas has come early

I am an ex cat owner. Had them as a child and then as an adult, we had two up until a couple of years ago. Sadly we had to rehome them when DS1 reached the toddler years. He just wouldn't leave them alone and they found it all far too stressful. They were both getting on in years, and we couldn't see things getting better for them while there was a child in the house. Still miss them, of course, and wonder what they're up to now. But they deserved a far more peaceful old age than they were likely to get with us.

Toddlers and cats are not a good mix - Puss is just a kitten, and DS is 12, so they practice stroppy indifference together.

Well, you all intimidate the hell out of me - I think I am shit and have NO professional validation whatsoever. Thank goodness you are all lovely

Welcome get good to have you aboard . I am also secretive/afraid to be really open and I think it is shame, shame of who I am, how I have failed, how weak I am. And so it goes on. I tend to use humour to deflect attention or retreat. I am lucky to have a Dh who doesn't believe any of these things but it doesn't make it go away. Still, I am working on it .

Spanna you are an angel, thank you so much for the glass advice. It pulled all the bits I had been researching together and I am planning my template already. Would you have any recommendations on glue? I keep reading about Mac for glass... 21 day, 21 days!! Get your Friday fandango on, you can do it!!

Posts and runs, (before I can change my mind). Love to all of you xxx

I'm back off into the cold to take DS for his music lesson - back later.

I didn't like Wolf Hall - agree that Mark Rylance wasn't charismatic enough. The reviews were all praising his "stillness" wtf? He wasn't pretending to be a tree!

I've been trying to think of 'stupid things I've done when sober' - most of my stupid things have been when drunk but anyway, here goes

I gave myself an electric shock in the garden cutting through a cable with the secateurs ("gosh, this is ivy is tough!" I thought moments before)

Just popped in to say a quick hi!

Will catch up tomorrow!

Big hugs and love to you beauties!
xxx