Addiction issues and think it's time I start somewhere anew.

lemonhead315

Hi, as the title states I have struggling with addiction issues for most of my life. I am 30 and have had problems with drugs and alcohol on and off since I was about 15. I am originally from another country, but have been living in Ireland since 19.

I lived in a small town for the last few years and recently moved back up to Dublin for work. Am staying with family as I cannot afford rent in Dublin. I miss where I was living and go up frequently, but this is also where I do most of my partying. I drink to excess nearly every weekend and smoke weed. Take anything else if it's going around, but not too often. I know this may sound like normal behaviour for a 30 year old single woman, but I assure you that it is scary how much drink I can drink and the situations I could getyself into. If I drank like this in Dublin I would end up getting taken advantage of in some way.

To be honest, I find marihuana is actually a good thing for me. Except when I'm mixing it with alcohol. Alcohol is my issue. It always has been. I can't control it and I am fed up making excuses.

Being a non drinker in Ireland I feel, will not work for me at this stage of my life. Where I am from it is easy to stay off drink and get into a healthy way of living. I will miss Ireland so much, but it is killing me. The drinking culture is too much and I think it's very hard to be a young single person in Ireland if you don't drink.

I am scared my family will not be happy about this decision, but I can't see any other way except to leave and start anew. How can I make them understand?

AnonMouse

I'm the same age as you, and I have battled with addiction for a number of years. I know how hard it is to stop, and to stay off it. Thankfully, I am sober the last 8 months, and leaving it behind was the best decision I have ever made. It is tough at the start, but I really wanted a change in lifestyle. When I stopped drinking, my social life slowed down, I became more introverted etc, but I am now feeling healthier than I ever have in my whole life. Being a non-drinker in Ireland can be difficult, so I found it useful to isolate myself from the pub/club scene for a good while after stopping. Even now, I don't go out that much, and if I do, I only stay a couple of hours. When the pints are staring at me, begging me to drink them, I know it is time to hit the road! The biggest lesson I learned from stopping drinking was that fighting your biggest fears is the thing that will set you free.

The mindset I got myself into when I stopped drinking/partying, was that I had been on the lash a million times, and that I wanted to try other things, new experiences, that drink prevented me from doing. By the time I stopped, I wasn't even enjoying drinking any more, as I was so consumed by the guilt surrounding it, so why put myself through that guilt. When I made the decision to stop, I made sure to actually go and do the things that I put off for years, and I have had so many amazing experiences as a result, which helped heal me a bit from the damage caused by my excessive drink/drug lifestyle.

As for how to make your family understand - it is your life, and you need to do this to help yourself. They should be supportive of your decision. If they are not, they'll just have to accept it. Don't let someone else be the barrier to your recovery. You are the only person that has to live with yourself on a full time basis, so do whatever works best for you at this sensitive time. If they take issue with that, it is their problem not yours.

Wishing you love, light, strength and peace going forward

disengage

Hi OP,

I posted here recently because I'm in a similar situation to you. One thing I can tell you about alcoholism is that no matter where you go your problems will follow you. That's not to say that you're not better off outside of Ireland but as someone that has moved abroad for similar reasons I can tell you that I was pretty much the same person with the same addictions just in a foreign country. Perhaps you need to reassess
your circle of friends.. People who only associate with you because you like to party are probably not real friends.

Forget what other people think do what's right for you.