Struggling

sootie

uggggh. The thing I hated most about drinking was the horrible feeling on a Monday morning and the heightened horrible feeling on a bank holiday Tuesday morning.
This was in the main why I decided to try to kick the habit. EXCEPT I still have it !
so ALONG with struggling to stay off the demon drink all weekend away with pals, I STILL wake up feeling absolutely **** on Tuesday morning.

where is my life going? have I wasted it, I feel so alone, all my friends in relationships, Ive no kids, ill die alone, I'm bitter, angry, tired, late for work, my body hurts AND IM ABSOLUTELY COMPLETLY SOBER AND HANGOVER FREE.

I really thought this 'depression' would lift when I wasn't filling my body with toxins..... but in a way its worse

I'm eating well, getting exercise and fresh air, I do charity work, I'm 7 months off it now....I'm now googling counsellors. I'm totally fed up with myself and my uninvited sympathy seeking, depressing thoughts

I'm looking for advice on what to do next. I'm obviously working very hard to stay sober. but this isn't helping one bit.

Amazingfun

What you describe is commonly referred to as a "dry drunk" or "untreated alcoholism", and a lot of people are surprised to find themselves feeling this way off the drink. Many of us imagined life off of it would be just wonderful, and instead, after a while, it can seem like someone unplugged the colour from our lives, leaving just a big grey "bleh".

At the risk of boring you Sootie, I suggest you come along to an AA meeting sometime.
You really don't have much to lose, it doesn't cost anything and you might even enjoy yourself :-)

Anyhow, I wish ya well and hope you find what you are looking for, because no matter how irritable, restless and discontented you feel now, you are off the drink SEVEN MONTHS, and that is a gift, even if it doesn't feel like it somedays....

Take care.

Lady is a tramp

I know the feeling. It's been said to me that it's like I expected sobriety to be full of fireworks and bells and whistles and all the rest, and then I found it hard to adjust to the fact that you can do all the right things and make all the right choices, and you're left looking around you, thinking, "Is this it?"

My alcoholism was so destructive and chaotic that it's not hard for me to see that any day of mundane or boring sobriety is still better than the alternative. But I'm determined not to end up a dry drunk - I know far, far too many people like that, and it's a waste of life.

To that end I am very careful about the people I spend time with. Early recovery (i.e. minimum two years after stopping drinking) is one time you really can and should be selfish. While I find it good to spend a lot of my time with other recovering alcoholics, I also find it refreshing to be around self-aware people who don't have addiction issues. There is a risk of recovery and recovery-related activities becoming a new sort of addiction. I don't want that for myself.

I have the most wonderful amazing counsellor in the world and she has absolutely changed my life. I was very lucky to have met her. I've often said that I'd have gotten recovery one way or another - I'm very determined - but it's because of her that I'm on track to getting the sort of recovery that I want. The sort of life that I want. She won't let me settle for any less, and I love her for it! So yeah, I'd definitely recommend counselling, but do shop around - I've been to many counsellors over the years, some you click with better than others. Then again, sometimes it's the ones you don't click with that you get most benefit from! Also it may be worth looking into the likes of CBT (although some counsellors will incorporate that into the therapy.)

Well done ... you're doing far better than you probably even realise.

Wesser

I read your post and it really resonated with me.
I am not struggling against alcohol but I am struggling......
I am rooting for you and thinking if you today!!
Well done for how far you've come.

sootie

Awh thanks guys. Ill have to go off now and google dry drunk... jaysus... ya would have a pain in your a** with this sh*t !

petes

Visit your GP and describe your symtoms. Anxiety/depression can manifest themselves many ways. My opinion of couse but this doesn't sound like dry drunk syndrome.

Counselling (on a one to one basis) with a professional could definetley help.

A lot of people would have drank to escape these feelings but end up feeling worse as alcohol is a depressant after all.

These feelings won't just dissappear when you stop drinking, there could be underlying issues you need to deal with.

I went to counselling to talk about issues, have been on meds. I got a job promotion, was an employees of the month two months back. That's because I stopped drinking but still manage the other stuff in my head on a daily basis.

My first stop would be with the GP though to have a chat.

sootie

thanks. is it possible to get a recommendation of a counsellor. I know its a personal thing though. I have an image of me going to a few before I get the right one and that feels tiring....

Lady is a tramp

sootie wrote: »

thanks. is it possible to get a recommendation of a counsellor. I know its a personal thing though. I have an image of me going to a few before I get the right one and that feels tiring....

Where in the country are you based?

Amazingfun

lol, no offense intended to any one else, I am just happy for anyone who gets and stays sober as way too many of our kind still end up dead or in jail, so to each their own and all that...

But it never ceases to amaze me the stuff problem drinkers are willing to do before trying AA: medication, counselors, psychiatrists, etc. I was like that too in the early attempts, but when these all failed me AA was all that was left.

I am over 15 years away from my last drink now and haven't had to do any of those things to deal with sobriety.
Lucky I guess :-)

And while I am on it, I disagree with the idea of "having to be selfish" in early sobriety, or at anytime really. Although it sounded ridiculous the first time I heard it, when it was pointed out to me that AA is really a program of self-forgetting, and that my real problem was my being obsessed with ME ME ME all the time,( how I felt, how you felt about me, lol.....no matter what I was always thinking about MEEEEEEE) --things began to change a bit . I got sober and then eventually got the power to think about others, what I could do to help someone else, put something IN to life instead of always worrying about what I was gettin/not getting, etc....then I received what I needed too.

Still how it is today really, and it still works.

sootie

15 years is an amazing achievement and glad you found something that works for you. Im glad you've been lucky :-)

For anyone Ive every known struggle with drinking, AA has always been the first step. Whether it works for you or not is usually the second step.
When people are on the third, fourth and fifth step is when they look to other methods that might work for them.

You cannot put a square peg into a round hold or make that horse drink just because you gave him the water.

For me, Ive tried several AA meetings around the country. Sitting in a community centre drinking weak tea from a plastic cup laughing about antics I got up to when drunk wasn't funny in the least. I don't believe in any higher power, at all. and I don't believe its a disease. I don't believe youre an alcoholic forever and I could go on

so, I guess I'm looking for a group of like minded people or a counsellor to help me find my lust for life that I seem to have lost.

I spent a month in India working with street kids in November and that changed me to the point that I'm not obsessed with ME anymore.

I'm just struggling to see what the point of it all is really. existential crisis if you will I'm sure it will be fine. just put the head down and get on with it I guess.

Amazingfun

Ive tried several AA meetings around the country.

Ah, well I hadn't seen you mention that bit of info anywhere in your posts before

Thing is Sootie, I know a lot of people in AA who had quite a few "kicks at the can" before getting sober for good. I am one of them. I left AA and returned to drinking: one time I thought I was "over my traumas" lol (apologies for the crassness, but that one always makes me laugh---I learned the hard way my love of drinking had f*ck all to do with traumas, real or imagined). Another time I was just so bored of it , etc.

But what happened to me 15 years ago is what happens to the lucky alkies I know, and that is I got the hell beat out of me again via the bottle and all the consequences it brings into my life---I was forced back to AA, because there was really no other option. I wasn't happy about it, in fact I hated the thought of it....but this last time something was different--I locked into the recovery program side of things rather than focusing on attending endless meetings, and I had a new experience, my own experience. And I have not drank since. Sobriety then was not anything I "achieved", it's been a great gift, one that hasn't lost its luster over the years despite how tough life can be at times, as it is for us all. I am grateful I got a second chance, and that I took it.

I knew after that I had missed out on a lot of what AA has to offer by thinking AA was just about meetings:
it isn't.

As for believing in a higher Power, no one really gives a crap what anyone else believes, and I even know a few atheists in my group, lol. It's really a non issue, despite the hysteria some whip up around it.

Anyhow, best of luck with your current course of action. Hope it works out for you.

A.

Lady is a tramp

Amazingfun wrote: »

but this last time something was different--I locked into the recovery program side of things rather than focusing on attending endless meetings, and I had a new experience, my own experience. And I have not drank since.

How did you manage to do this? Did you just manage to find the right sponsor at the right time? And if not - would you advise reading the books and attempting the steps yourself? I don't see the alternative really if the right sponsor just doesn't seem to be popping up for me!

I've been doing AA for close to two years now, and it's really starting to frustrate me. Something isn't clicking with me, and it's not for want of trying. My sponsor is perfect on paper, and we got on well on a personal level, and yet we're really not getting anywhere with even Step One - I'm not sure if that's a failing on her part, or mine, or both. I know these things take time, but I feel like I'm making no progress.

I'm tempted to take a step back from AA and focus on other things for a while. Like my counselling, that's the one thing that's made ALL the difference in my recovery. Or even just taking the focus off all things recovery-related for a while. Maybe I'm over-thinking it all. I'm not going to give up meetings altogether, just stop forcing myself to go to daily/twice-daily meetings, even if it's what I'm being advised. Instead I'll go when I feel the need, which will probably still be at least 2-3 a week.

I don't know how much of that is me making a good decision, or how much is my addiction talking!

The other thing I need to consider is whether I need a new sponsor. The waters are muddied a bit because the fact is there's no one in the world I can talk to more openly than my counsellor (who is not a recovering alcoholic) and she says herself that that's probably holding me back a bit in progressing with AA - I don't go into meetings, or to talk with my sponsor, absolutely bursting to talk - and that's because I'll usually have talked it all to death with my counsellor. We did try to cool all that off a bit recently, but it didn't make it any easier to talk to my sponsor or to anyone else in AA because that trust just isn't there yet and won't be for a long time. It's a tough one. She wants the best for me and wants me to keep trying with AA, because she's the first to admit herself that she's lacking that piece of having personal first-hand experience of alcoholism. But from an objective point of view, she can also see that it's not for everyone and she's not totally opposed to me stepping back from AA for a bit - she does want me to talk it through with some AA members first though.

I'm also beginning to think that I need to focus more on spirituality outside of AA meetings, it's something I've lost touch with recently. I'm hoping to meet a priest today who's also an AA member, I'm really hoping he'll have some wonderful new insights or advice that'll get things to make sense for me again!

Amazingfun

Hiya Lady :-)

Thanks for being so honest. Your post is an example of what many of us face these days, a situation quite unlike those in 1939 did, and that is a there is almost too many options for "help" now.
It results in overload, confusion and can be difficult to navigate alright.

I empathize with not being able to find a sponsor who has recovered through this process, but I will say if you are in Dublin especially (but not only) you are in a place where there are now many BB meetings, and people willing to "take you through the Book".

That was not the situation for me all those years ago, I'd never even heard anyone refer to themselves as recovered in a meeting before then, and since I had sponsors in the past and I had drank again, I did not want to risk getting off track again, I really was desperate, I didn't want to end up on jail, or die, and both of those scenarios were looming for me as the blackouts I'd had for many years were just resulting in ever more frightening and frankly repulsive episodes where I could hardly believe I had done the things I was told I did.

My experience is that I made use of online BB studies, followed along with the "precise clear cut directions"---all of it--and I got exactly what was promised: I recovered from active alcoholism. I still went to meetings, because service and fellowship are still something I see as essential, and because once I recovered, I began to enjoy meetings in a way I hadn't previously. I was no longer there to "get", as I had now what I needed to stay on the beam a day at a time. It is an experience of giving, now that I actually had something TO give!
And that has made all the difference for me

I will shoot you a pm with some suggestions, and an offer to help in any way I can. Step one can be deceptively simple at first glance, but when we learn over 43 pages of the Big Book are devoted to it, you can see how maybe it's not as easy to digest as we might think .

A.

Ps: For anyone lurking, this is but one channel where a variety of Big Book studies are offered, all for free.
Take a wander around, there's surely nothing to lose at this stage:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuSJRom1_4kAATzDRPILGQAikcCuxqiad

aabarnes1

Lady is a tramp wrote: »

How did you manage to do this? Did you just manage to find the right sponsor at the right time? And if not - would you advise reading the books and attempting the steps yourself? I don't see the alternative really if the right sponsor just doesn't seem to be popping up for me!

I've been doing AA for close to two years now, and it's really starting to frustrate me. Something isn't clicking with me, and it's not for want of trying. My sponsor is perfect on paper, and we got on well on a personal level, and yet we're really not getting anywhere with even Step One - I'm not sure if that's a failing on her part, or mine, or both. I know these things take time, but I feel like I'm making no progress.

I'm tempted to take a step back from AA and focus on other things for a while. Like my counselling, that's the one thing that's made ALL the difference in my recovery. Or even just taking the focus off all things recovery-related for a while. Maybe I'm over-thinking it all. I'm not going to give up meetings altogether, just stop forcing myself to go to daily/twice-daily meetings, even if it's what I'm being advised. Instead I'll go when I feel the need, which will probably still be at least 2-3 a week.

I don't know how much of that is me making a good decision, or how much is my addiction talking!

The other thing I need to consider is whether I need a new sponsor. The waters are muddied a bit because the fact is there's no one in the world I can talk to more openly than my counsellor (who is not a recovering alcoholic) and she says herself that that's probably holding me back a bit in progressing with AA - I don't go into meetings, or to talk with my sponsor, absolutely bursting to talk - and that's because I'll usually have talked it all to death with my counsellor. We did try to cool all that off a bit recently, but it didn't make it any easier to talk to my sponsor or to anyone else in AA because that trust just isn't there yet and won't be for a long time. It's a tough one. She wants the best for me and wants me to keep trying with AA, because she's the first to admit herself that she's lacking that piece of having personal first-hand experience of alcoholism. But from an objective point of view, she can also see that it's not for everyone and she's not totally opposed to me stepping back from AA for a bit - she does want me to talk it through with some AA members first though.

I'm also beginning to think that I need to focus more on spirituality outside of AA meetings, it's something I've lost touch with recently. I'm hoping to meet a priest today who's also an AA member, I'm really hoping he'll have some wonderful new insights or advice that'll get things to make sense for me again!

Hi lady,

From what you have written in that post- get a new sponsor/mentor to help you with the BB and the program of recovery.
2 years and still on step 1 FFS, you are lucky to be not drinking again. Seriously, that's bad sh1t from your current 'sponsor'.
Remember, you AA sponsor is for bringing you through the 1st 164 pages of the Book and helping you with the program of action. They are not a shoulder to cry on or a counsellor. people get the impression they need to call their sponsor if they so much as have a row with their partner or argue with a shop assistant etc. Not the case, AA sponsorship is for AA matters.
So judge who you choose for help, on their ability to help you, not on how well you get on with them or how they dress.
Meetings alone will not keep you sober.You can go to 5 meetings a day, but if you are a real alcoholic you will drink again. It's what you do before , after and in-between the meetings that matters. This is a a spiritual program for alcoholics of the type described in the book.
Read the first 3 chapters of the Big Book and the doctors opinion and decide from there on if AA is for you.
There is an open meeting( There is a solution group), at 11am every Saturday in Clonsilla community centre, they talk about recovery in a way which is far from the general 'war story' recovery you hear in the rooms. It is based on how the first 100 recovered and centres only on the Big Book of AA.
It may be worth a visit for you, if not just to clear up the muddy waters of recovery in relation to alcoholism.
Keep going to your counselling.