me and alcohol have ruined my family

[jesuswhatnext]

title says it all really - i really cocked up last night, dh walked out, i cant remember what i said to him

today i have actually been in touch with AA but i think its all too late, my dd hates me, as does my parents, yes im feeling sorry for myself right now but i also know i have to change and stop drinking but dont know how.

what can i do to put things right? help me!

Hello, just wondering how everyone's day has gone?

JWN - did you have fun with your friend and baby?

venus - did you manage to scout out the meeting location?

I am good. Off to another meeting tonight! Looking forward to it, I missed not going last night. And to be honest anything has to be better than last night's family meeting, ha!

Hello
I have been following this thread for a while - inspired by all of you, especially JWN.
Well done!

Some of you came over to be nice to me on my late night curry sadness thread. Thank you for that.

I am not sure where I am at the moment, or what I am going to do next, but can I come here to chat please?
Hope you are all well.

hi moomin, back in the office now - yes, the baby is adorable you forget how tiny there are, she is only 15 days old and soo beautiful.

tbh i have not had chance to breathe today, let alone have a drink , keeping busy is a huge help to me - btw, i bet if we told a non-alkie that we actively looked forward to the meetings that they would think we were mad

i wont be going to a meeting today, but i will be going tommorow - i have to steal myself for a family get-together on saturday, my mil is an absolute nightmare, the only family member who has been totally unhelpful and actually downright bloody awful, she is a nasty old gossip and has taken great delight in telling as many people as she can. so far i have been able to ignore her, even though i felt like slapping her right in the mush i only put up with her because of dh (she is his stepmother but unfortunatly his df is gutless and NEVER stands up to her
anyway, i shall be with other relatives who have said that the only person she is making look bad is herself

so I AM NOT GOING TO DRINK TODAY!

hello curryeater!!!

of course you can join us for a chat i did read some of your thread but i did'nt feel qualified to comment iyswim - i have a feeling that your cock-up moment was more than similar to mine

anyway, how are doing?

Glad you had fun JWN! And I agree with what you said about the meetings - I was telling a friend that I was aiming for 5 a week at the moment and she asked me whether it was a cult, ha ha! (She was only joking though!) Thing is that I do really enjoy them - and if I am feeling wobbly I feel really 'safe'.

Hello curryeater! Welcome! (Not that it's my thread or anything...) How are you doing?

Hello
I have been drinking - no fights, no dramas at home, just too much drinking.
Parents to stay at weekend. They like to drink (reasonably) and I talked myself into it being fine to drink with them, inhospitable not to, etc. I stashed a bottle of wine in the bedroom both nights to have "a glass" with DP after saying good night to them because they stress me so much. (DP has a glass and goes to sleep, I finish the bottle, "reading".) Spent each day after with with a rampant hangover and having to be all energetic and sociable through it. Celebrated their departure with more drinking and went to work on Monday feeling like sticky chewing gum on a shoe. Went out on Tuesday night for leaving drinks - only the third time ever I have not been back from work for dd's bedtime, and one of those was when I got stuck on a train in the snow - and staggered back, drinking more wine on the train, in the place where I got takeaway, and woke up yesterday morning feeling worse than I can begin to describe. DD didn't want me to go to work, you could tell she remembered that I hadn't done her story the night before, I got up in time to have a few minutes to play with her but had to prise her off me and say good bye when she was crying and then I had left it so late I had to run for the train and was nearly sick.

Sick of the whole thing.
Day off tomorrow and (boozy) picnic planned. I will be taking the car, and a big bottle of fizzy water. there is always some reason to drink.

I am fat, tired and not really in control. I can manage one picnic on the fizzy water but what will I do after that, when my parents next come, next time something else happens?

Sorry this is so long, I don't really talk about this irl.

Ah curryeater, it all seems so hard doesn't it? The best piece of advice I can give is to not drink 'one day at a time'. I go to AA meetings and one of the things we talk about is not 'projecting' - so in your case not worrying about the next time your parents are there, just concentrate on getting through the next 24 hours without alcohol. (Or the next hour if that's easier in the early day.)

Have you thought about AA?

Keep posting though. I really, really understand how you are feeling - a lot of us on this thread do.

Big hugs x

Curryeater - I hope you don't think I am being pushy about AA or anything, obviously I don't know much about your situation. Hope you don't take it the wrong way!

Oh curry, I do feel for you. So much in your post is what I could write, drinking on the train, drinking in the bedroom after everyone had gone to sleep. There always seems to be some reason to drink!

Tbh I think that those of us who have a problem like this are incredibly inventive and clever. We can always find a reason to have a drink. We can always find a way of getting hold of a bottle of our favourite. We can usually always find a way to make sure that whilst it may look as though we are only keeping pace with other drinkers we always have access to a secret stash.

Like you I feel fat, tired and out of control, and I can manage one event on fizzy water.

However, since last Saturday I have not had a drink and I already feel less fat and tired. It has been a delight to wake in the morning and not have to worry about where I hid my empty bottles from the night before, or whether I topped the bottle up with water and will need to find an exact replacement before anyone else pours a glass from it. I find myself both horrified at what I have been doing, and bizzarely amused at my stupidity.

Whatever stage you are at in your journey please keep posting. I think that you will find on here other people who understand your feelings and your actions. I do not get the impression that they will excuse them, but they will not load you with guilt (you can probably do that well enough yourself).

Take care x

oh bless your heart curry it's a fucker isn't it?

i second everything moomin said, one day at a time! i too 'project' if i'm not careful, i was thinking about christmas the other day, how the hell do i get through it without a baileys! , so, i had to banish that thought straight away! all i can say is that with every passing day of sobriety it gets easier to just not drink.

i know what you mean when you say you feel fat, tired and not in control - i promise all those feeling improve if you can just get through the next few hours without a drink. i really do feel for you!

have a think about going to AA - it really is the best thing i could ever have done, it may just help you too

i agree venus - i can find any reason to drink - and i was ALWAYS at least 2 drinks on from everyone else i have also realised the danger i was putting myself in by being so pissed that i hardly knew what was going on around me at times, particuarly when i was on the last train out of london

i keep thinking of what a guy said to me a couple of weeks ago, sobriety should be enjoyed, not endured. looking back, i was enduring life when i was drinking, now i am really starting to enjoy life, the fog is lifting and the confusion is going.

Honestly, I enjoy sobriety! As venus said waking up in the morning without that, 'Oh my God, what happened last night...' feeling is just a joy!

Agree with venus and JWN - always an excuse to drink: happy, sad, hitting sales targets, missing sales targets, it's sunny, it's raining ARGH! It's total insanity.

Curry

where are you based?

Thank you for all your kind words.
I thought about aa a long time ago, but then I got pregnant and stopped drinking. I seem to have got back there though.
Maybe I need to find a meeting that I can sneak out to on Thursdays when I work from home - otherwise I am always dashing to or from somewhere, there is no leeway in the working day really.

Also I am scared, and in denial, obviously, and don't want to go in case someone knows me locally, etc etc etc etc etc etc

Thanks everyone, I really mean it

venus - what you said about now finding yourself slightly amused by your actions when drinking suggests you would enjoy AA! Most of the time there is a LOT of laughter about the mad things we have done.

Just to add to the others ...

I can honestly say that the worst of my days as a sober person is better than the best of my days as a problem drinker. The difference is night and day, really it is. And, though I cannot say that I never think of a drink, I never want a drink and I certainly NEVER miss the inevitable consequences (for me) of having a drink.

Curry - if you see someone you know at a meeting there is nothing to worry about. They are there for the exact same reason as you. The Anonymous part of the name is taken very seriously. (Being a hypocrite here as I have only just started going to my local meeting in my small town for the same reasons! I was told that I was risking my life for my pride.)

I usually love to laugh at myself but I can't manage to find my tragic boozy behaviour funny! Once I stayed with my sister and confidently spent the evening thinking that once they had all gone to bed I'd help myself to a nip of whiskey because I was staying on the sofa bed downstairs. But there was a lock on the cabinet I didn't know about so I couldn't get at it. I was so fixated on drinking that I took a couple of bottles of ale and drank them in bed and then in the morning wrapped the empty bottles up in my PJs to take them back on the train with no clinking. That makes me cringe, not laugh.

MIFLAW, I live in South London and work in town

There are LOADS of meetings in London, you are lucky that way...

We were in south london when dp stopped drinking and going to AA there are lots of meetings there

curry - right now nothing looks very funny does it? - try a few days of sobriety, i promise your sense of humour will return - we have a bit of a laugh during meetings, sometimes its all you can do, drinking causes such confused thinking that our actions are often hilarious when looked at sober!

Curry - when I lived in London (about 5 or 6 years ago) I had a very half-hearted attempt at AA... I went to lots of good meetings in the SW London area. There are loads to choose from. It wasn't the right time for me but it planted the seed for when it was.

Thanks everyone - I will try and find something.
Have a good evening everyone - I am going to get dd now.

Also, totally agree with you JWN, things that seemed perfectly reasonable when drinking are just so barmy when you sober up that you have got to laugh. And luckily other AA-ers have done the same sort of thing and find it funny too!

Second what Noddy says, you are within spitting distance of at least 10 meetings on any given day- I'm off to one at Oval tonight.