How did you overcome an addiction?

[hisen22]

It can be any kind of addiction, from smoking to food, from corn to drinking etc, I'm in a situation where it feels like I'm not making any changes and if I stop it's temporary and not long term, i Always go back to it. I just wanted to hear or to know how your life changed? Ty stranger.

Lots of hard work I'm afraid. Many many different avenues tried, lots failed (AA, CA etc not for me but I needed to try to find that out and to gain new perspectives and ways to help myself). Lots of reading up. Connecting with like minded people. Stubbornness. Willingness to try again every single time I failed over and over again.

I just stopped and I built a better life in its place that I didn’t want to escape from. It was truly just making the commitment to myself that I was done, and however boring or shit life became, at least I wasn’t drinking 3 bottles of wine a day anymore. A bit of it was also just coming to accept that life isn’t always fun or exciting or happy. Sometimes I’m bored as shit or irritated or would rather be doing something else, but I have to just carry on. I go to bed sometimes when I really don’t want to life anymore. 😂

So I think a lot of it is just commitment and acceptance, but community is also important to. I know a lot of sober people and it’s part of my identity now. If I wasn’t sober, it would be hard to imagine who I’d be, if that makes sense.

It can be any kind of addiction, from smoking to food, from corn to drinking etc, I'm in a situation where it feels like I'm not making any changes and if I stop it's temporary and not long term, i Always go back to it. I just wanted to hear or to know how your life changed? Ty stranger. https://routerlogin.uno/

I got this,....

Social media helped me no end

For some reason TickTock read my mind and started showing me sobriety videos and I must have engaged enough for them to be repeated endlessly. Then when mindlessly scrolling MN, I came across the sober October thread. I had thought of giving it a try previously but it all seemed to click at once. I didn’t tell anyone and still don’t talk about it. I drink AF beer or Guinness when out. I had reduced my drinking significantly over the post pandemic years anyway but it was still daily annd way over guidelines and it was actually a relief in an odd way. I’m a clean eating, weight training 10k+ steps type of gal anyway so it didn’t fit well with that.
I stopped drinking last October. I don’t know if I will drink again and frankly it’s not important right this minute now so I don’t allow myself to mull it over. I just go on day to day.

I stopped vaping about 3 years ago. A sudden decision after hearing a DOAC podcast about sugar that said that vaping increases insulin resistance. I watched TT videos about its harms, quitting etc. Made th decision on a Tuesday and stopped on the Friday after getting the stuff I needed - sugar free mints and nicotine patches. None since. I didn’t tell anyone about that either. I’m not interested in other people’s opinions when I know myself that what I’m doing is right.

I’ve stopped all sorts in the last year. Smoking, vaping, drinking and even nail biting. For me, it had to be the right time. I’d tried before and failed but this year it was like something clicked in my head and I just stopped.

For the drinking I head to AA sometimes to remind me of why I’ve stopped.

For the smoking and vaping it just took bare knuckling it until the physical addiction lessened. I chose to stop while I was on holiday so the stress was as low as possible and I had other distractions.

For the nails, I just said ‘that’s enough now’ and my inner self heard and said ‘I agree’. Haven’t bitten since - and I was a biter for 30 years.