Brave babes are still here: sping / summer / autumn / winter There is always someone around

[venusandmars]

This topic had being going for years and years and years. Maybe almost as long as some people have been struggling with drinking.

We are still here. Supporting, encouraging, helping. Never judging, never minimising our problems.

If you want to catch up, our last thread is HERE

And if you want to follow everything from the start, the very first thread from 9 years ago is RIGHT HERE

You can join in anytime. Everyone is welcome. Whether you are trying to cut down, abstain completely , or are simply acknowledging that you might have a problem... Post what you want.

ma thanks for suggesting the Angostura Bitters. I rummaged in the cupboard and found a bottle almost full, and also a bottle of orange bitters. I've got my soda stream in action again, so no plastic waste. Ice cold soda with a few drops of both types of bitters - lovely!

ma it doesn't matter if you are going off to bed, do whatever it takes. By tomorrow you'll be more than half way through!

Hello all brave lads

bit of good news I have completed 2 full weeks without alcohol. The daytimes have been no bother because (for a long time) I've not been fond of drinking during the day and never fancy one at lunchtime etc.

The difficulty has been: feeling deprived of looking forward to a pre-dinner beer/cider/wine/gin (not all at once) and the early evenings have been dull because of this.

No matter , nearly halfway to my initial goal: and me experience so far has been not quite as bad as expected.
In fact some days have been sort of OK.

Sending strength and gratitude to other posters.

my [facepalm] 🙊

Hi bleary. I've been on this bloody bus forever, I'm a real old timer. My HALTT analysis yesterday told me I was tired and stressed. Today has been better. Lost another half pound, someone i havent seen in a while told me i looked well, and dh is at work tonight so no football, sniffing or just being fucking annoying. Also..no cravings. Hmmmm...

Morning lads, time for another weekend! Thank fook January is ebbing away! Anyway, what’s your plans?

Musical tomorrow
Shopping on Sunday, hopefully it’ll be dry and get a nice walk in somewhere too!

Hi all, as mentioned I’m cutting down not quitting. It’s going fairly well. No drinking Mon-Wed and then 3 small glasses of wine in pub last night - only 5.5 units. When I got home I was so tempted to have more but I resisted.

Last week I drank 26 units in total which is still too much but so much better than when drinking a bottle a night!

Well done deadliest
Another Day done and dusted. Boring but done.

It amazing how the day of the week can dictate my drinking habits?

Friday, generally isn't too bad (I can be easily swayed to drink but equally I can be happily dry!!) Saturday's are a different league.

Saturday's I drink.

Tomorrow is going to be particularly hard

• its Saturday (and I drink on Saturday's... except I don't any more??)
• it's my youngest DC birthday. I always toast my children's birthday, to celebrate all the hard work I did... and still do.
• we're having a family gathering. Everyone will drink (No one to excess of course.... except moi. Everyone else will have a glass or two. I'll have the same and then a bottle when I get home )
• It's Saturday

I won't drink. I will want to but I won't!!!!

I've got this!!

Happy belated birthday Ma. Waves to all the babes (aka the Lads) old and new. I’m just buggering on really. Had an unsettling experience today that was - horribly over-used word- triggering. Not as in it left me wanting to drink, but it illuminated once again the impact alcohol has had on my life. Hm!

Hey lads! It's the weekend. The choice is to get out in the cold, fresh winter sunshine, stomp around frosty woods, or mooch around charity shops and enjoy a mug of hot chocolate in a cosy café. Listen to your dc running outside (or bickering), and smile. Make something good for tea or buy a pizza and watch family TV.

OR...

Lose another weekend to semi oblivion, that yucky hungover feeling, poor sleep.

Today I know which choice I've making (bar the dc because they've left home and don't generally run around playing outside!)

Even if it's just a little choice, at ONE point of the day, go on, do it. I've filled 2 bottles from the soda stream, and put them in the fridge, so this evening I can easily have ice-cold soda with double bitters (orange bitters and angostura). I've planned chicken and prawn laksa for dinner (lemongrass, ginger, garlic, curry paste, coconut milk) with green beans and red peppers in it. Warming, soothing, and not something that goes with wine!

I'm ok with the weekends or going out. Its the week days that are hard. Getting in from work tired and stressed, and wanting a gin or a glass of wine. Next week will be tough, a few nights at my sisters in London, but will deal with that when it comes round. ODAAT.

boring but done

Are you in my head, dementedma ?

The sheer dullness of this month ...

At least we're nearer the end than the start of January , just.
Courage , lads

Another weekend nearly over.

Hasn't been too bad.

But yes it's fucking boring. I don't think I've been up past 10pm since NYE

Feel like I'm just coming through a bad break up. I'm really missing "someone" (or something = wine), I feel vulnerable and naked without it in my life I don't know how to be myself as I've been involved with wine for so long. Yet I'm putting one foot in front of the other, I'm coping and I'm even having moments of laughter and fun.

Long may my breakup with Rioja continue!! I don't ever want to get back together with the toxic sod

Yep, Crunchymum well put. It does feel like that. And, just like a nasty break-up, give it time and you’re there wondering what you ever saw in the bastard.

I agree. Feels better to get someone/something toxic out of your life, even though it’s bloody hard work at the time!

Hope it's ok to join this post, I'm 5 and a half years clean/sober now but for the first time in a long time I'm struggling. Really struggling. When I hit rock bottom I lost everything, I went to prison, lost my children then went into rehab, turned it all around, have full custody of the kids again but things just feel shitty at the minute and for the first time in years and years I want to pick up a drink. Sorry, I dont know what I'm hoping to get but I dont really have anyone in real life that understands and I wanted to get it out.

@katie43210 Sorry to hear you're feeling that way. It sounds like you've achieved amazing things. Nothing is worth throwing away for a fleeting feeling that will only give way to shame and regret the next day.

Did you do AA? Do you have a sponsor or someone else you can speak to? How have you made it 5.5 years and who can you reach out to in this moment of need? Hang in there please, it's so not worth it.

I did AA for the first couple of years, then struggled with childcare for meetings and because I felt good and everything came together I suppose I thought I was fixed. I've lost touch with all but 1 friend in recovery and she has her own stuff going on. I know I'll regret it, I know if I drink nothing will have changed but I just can't seem to shake this feeling. I just feel really alone. Especially when the kids go to bed and it's just me. I haven't struggled like this since early recovery.

Katie hang on in there and keep posting. Can you access AA or a support group? Can you afford some counselling? Really low points in our lives trigger those old mechanisms for coping, but it sounds like you’ve come a long way. To continue the relationship analogy, it’s tempting to call an ex when you’re low because the relationship is familiar and you know they make you (temporarily) feel good. Then you recall every reason you parted company.

@katie43210

How are things today?

You have achieved so much and you should be so very proud of yourself.

Do you have any support network at all? Anyone who you can speak to, anyone who can help you make sense of what you are feeling and why?

You say you haven't felt like this since early recovery is there anything you can pinpoint that has set you off?

I am sorry that I cannot be more use but I think the best thing to do is go to a meeting? I am sure your friend who has a lot going on can spare a quick phonecall if you are in need.

Thinking of you!

Hi, thank you for checking on me. Yeah it's been a build up over the last few months, I lost my job and my long term partner left in the middle of the night without a word. I have family but it took a long time to make amends and I suppose I'm scared to tell them I'm struggling in case that sets off mistrust and worry in them. I struggled over new the festive period, it was my first without my partner and I guess I looked at my single friends going out having fun and thought I'm newly single, just turned 30, why can't I do what everyone else my age does. I know I can't, I was in and out of treatment from being 21. I know I don't want to go back but I don't want to stay stuck like this either. It's just a horrible feeling off being stuck. This too shall pass, though.

katie43210 It WILL pass, and you will be on to another place. I don't often think of alcoholism as a 'disease' but I compare my own situation with that of my sibling who has a nut allergy. Sibling can go to a party but can't eat anything from the buffet (often takes own snacks with them), goes to restaurant and has to question the menu, sometimes can't have a favourite dish because it comes with nuts. Sibling does feel like they are missing out but there is no choice. That's how I have to be too. No choice. And then I find that I get over the 'missing out' feeling and enjoy the life I do have.

You've been through a lot recently, I echo other suggestions about finding a few AA meetings to go to, at least you'll be able to rant and to share.

That's a really good comparison, I KNOW that I can't. But I'm obsessing. I didn't think I'd be back to feeling like this after all the years and hard work. I'm going to try and get someone to watch the kids while I get to a meeting, I know that I need it but it's hard to go back. I have an old JFT book from NA that I've just had a look at and done my food shop online because I don't trust myself in the supermarket right now. I'm just focusing on what I could lose, what I WILL lose if I ever go back. One day at a time I suppose.

Had a great weekend lads and didn’t pick up.

Welcome @katie43210

Have you tried some sober Facebook support groups? Also, if you can’t get out to a meeting, try InTheRooms.com. Online AA meetings with video (you don’t have to join in).

I haven't tried Facebook groups, I deactivated it last week, I've been isolating a lot which I know isn't good for me but I'm struggling to face people. Will definitely look at online AA though, I haven't been to a meeting in around 3 years, and I think the fear of walking in the rooms is admitting I need help, which I always struggled with but I think at this point it's either admission or relapse.