Posted on 12/11/2004 5:37:20 AM PST by RobFromGa
To Any Person Who Suspects They May Have a Drinking Problem,
I have written this to describe my experiences of the past 14 months as I have worked to resolve my drinking problem. Everyone is different and I do not propose to be an expert on this topic, but I have my own personal experience and I am sharing it in the hope that it might help someone else to solve this problem and change their life.
I have now been sober for 14 months without a drop of alcohol. This is not a long time as compared to over 25 years of heavy drinking, but I also know something else: I am totally confident that I will never drink again.
In that 14 months I have made it through two football tailgating seasons, over a hundred business lunches and dinners, numerous trips to Germany where beer flows like water, parties, picnics, Super Bowls, a Caribbean cruise, several family vacations, ups and down in life, etc. All things that I thought “required” alcohol.
Fortunately, I did not have some event that caused me to hit “rock bottom”. (I could have had many rock bottoms but I was lucky). Some people need to lose their job, lose their family, kill or seriously injure someone in a car accident, end up in prison, or many other horrible things that alcohol (or drugs) can cause in order to gather the will to quit. Some people think that “bottom” is the only thing that can make a drinker quit for good. I have met many people who proved to me that this is false, you can make such a decision without going through the horrors. But in some ways it is tougher to take the first step.
In every other way, it is much easier to skip the “rock bottom” step and I hope that this letter helps at least one other person to avoid the lost job, lost marriage or prison route to sobriety.
Last October, I made a firm decision to quit and I followed through on that commitment. But I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t admit that I had similarly tried to control my drinking or quit at least 100 times before.
Why was I able to quit this time as compared with the previous 100 attempts? This is a very good question. The only answer I have come up with as to is that this time I was really ready to quit for myself alone. I was truly 100% sick and tired of the way alcohol affected me and I wanted a different life. All the other times I was, in some way, not really ready to control my drinking. The bottle was still in charge. I tried many tactics: I’d only drink on weekends, only drink after 5pm, only drink at parties (almost anything can become a party in such a plan), only drink beer, only drink wine, only drink hard liquor, only drink things I didn’t like the taste of (I know it sounds nuts but I was nuts), only drink every other week, quit for a day, quit for a weekend, quit for a week, quit for “this vacation or event”. I tried every way to quit in the world to stop drinking except the way that eventually worked for me.
If you are reading this and you know someone that has a drinking problem and you want to help them, you must understand that you are at a severe disadvantage. This is a condition of the mind more than a condition of the body and it is nearly impossible to bring another person to a mental place where they can admit that alcohol is causing more pain in their life than the pleasure it brings. Because a drinker can hardly imagine life without alcohol. It is with us at many points of our thinking and decision making process. We make plans around alcohol and drinking, not all of the time but enough.
If this does not sound like you at this point but you still think you might have a problem, I am not going to tell you that you are OK with your drinking, I will only say that you don’t have the same problem that I was facing so my experience may be of little value to you. I do know people who can go for long periods with nothing at all, then they “binge” and drink to pass out. This is obviously a problem, but not the problem that I have experience with. For 25 years I drank to excess. I often did not get "drunk" but I was always under the influence. For many of those years I drank daily, sometimes starting at 6am and going till 2am the next night. I am not proud of this but it is the truth.
As a problem drinker, you probably associate most of the “fun” you have in life with alcohol in some portion and are worried that without alcohol you will become a dull, bored person with no joy in life. You probably think that there are some things where you will always have to drink to enjoy. I know I worried about that, and I can assure you it is false. You will enjoy life more when you quit, at least that has been my experience. Even that Caribbean cruise and college football tailgating.
I first started drinking in High School. I don’t feel that it is necessary to recount the whole story but I drank to blackout on a number of incidences. Other times I just got really drunk and did stupid things that put my life at risk. I drove many times when I had no business on the road, and it would not have taken much to have had a series of events happen that would have changed my life for the worse. In college, I made good grades at a top Engineering school, while drinking heavily. It was a joke that I would study with a bottle of Jim Beam next to my desk.
As I got into the business world, and specifically into sales, drinking is a daily part of business life. At least that’s what a drinker thinks. And for people who do not have a problem controlling it, drinking is a wonderful part of life. The occasional party or business dinner and a few social drinks to move the business forward are great. But I was never able to do that—for me it was five, ten, fifteen drinks. Into the late hours, with not enough sleep, feeling like crap the next morning when I should have been at my best. Then repeating the same behavior each night. And I was very successful, and I thought drinking was part of the success.
I rationalized that with my talent, the drinking was part of who I am, and that even at 50% I was still more capable than most others so it wasn’t necessary to control myself.
I know this is getting long so I’ll get to the point: One Friday last October I was driving down the road. I hadn’t had a drink in two days and was in one of my “quit drinking the rest of the week” attempts. Rush Limbaugh announced that he was going to a Rehab Center for his drug addiction to resolve his problem. This for some reason got through to me. I called two people that I am close with and told them that I was not going to drink one drop of alcohol until Rush came out of treatment. (Telling these people I had made this decision helped me).
I told myself that after thirty days, I would decide whether I would drink again in a more controlled manner or stop completely. I did not have the luxury of taking the time off from work to enter treatment, but since Rush was going in, he was in there for both of us.
I did not attend AA (although I will talk about AA later) but I was clearly at the first step of their program. It is a very simple concept:
I admitted that I had a drinking problem and that I wanted to do something about it. I can tell you that if you are really at that point then you can fix yourself. If you are not at that step, then there is nothing that anyone can do to help you and I hope that you stay alive, and intact until you reach that point.
After about a week of sobriety, I stopped thinking about alcohol very much. I threw myself into work and tried to start losing weight as well. By the second week I made the decision: “I WILL NEVER DRINK AGAIN” and I wrote that in my journal. I recognized that a bottle of booze is an inanimate object that is simply poison to me and that it cannot force itself into my body. I have the control over whether I use my arms to bring the poison to my lips. And I choose not to allow that to happen ever again.
I have noticed that there is an inner “voice” that I have (he stays fairly silent now) that in the beginning used to put thoughts in my mind like: “surely you can just have one, you’ve been good”, “it’s a beautiful Fall Day, surely you could just do the social drink”, “you’re in the Caribbean for Gods’ sakes, shouldn’t you at least have one Margarita to celebrate your sobriety”. When my mind lets the inner voice talk, I quickly reassert control and think about the serenity that I have found since I quit drinking.
I need to stop writing now, the family is waking up, but I will write another letter tomorrow morning which describes these 14 months and what other tactics I have used in my sobriety.
I hope that this helps at least one other soul out there. Feel free to post questions or suggestions.
FReegards, RobFromGa
I'd say one good indicator is to ask a family member what they think. My dad (may he rest in peace) insisted that he didn't have an alcohol problem and that he just enjoyed drinking. My mother and I could see with our own eyes that he was fooling himself.
I can't relate to "social drinking". I was never in that catagory.
I'm not saying my way is the best way for everyone, but it was the best way for me.
THIS THREAD NEEDS A BUMP!
Congratulations on your winning attitude and your ability and strength to take the first frightful steps. Those first baby steps, in any situation, are the scariest.
I come from an alcoholic family, although in each generation's time, they wouldn't admit it. My mom's dad was a heavy drinker, my birth father (versus my {step})was a heavy drinker, my brother is a heavy drinker and my ex-husband still is a heavy drinker. As far as genetics go, I wonder if rather being pre-disposed to it because of heredity, if people are alcoholics because the need/desire to drink is controlled by addictive personalities. Just a thought because it's not known for sure.
My sibling and I knew from an early age that we best be quiet until our father passed out in the chair. Even then we were careful not to wake the sleeping giant(as we use to call our dad). He was a great dad when he was sober, but a raging bull when he was drunk.
Thankfully he never got physical abusive, but my Irish mom did. I remember many nights that we were sent in bed early and laid there with our covers over our head because mom and pop were screaming at each other while mom was throwing her china at him.Nice thing about that was at least once a month we had pretty new china to set the table with.
One thing we hope would never happen was he would come home drunk the day we brought out report cards home from school and God forbid you got anything lower than a C cause we knew we would get the belt.
Still 4 out of 5 of us became an alcoholics and the other one a drug addict. Wouldn't you think we would have known better????
LOL, that's a pretty good song, even if your lyrics don't rhyme!
Ping. New day, new chance to suit up and show up for life. Any chance this could become a daily thing? There are threads that dicsuss the word of the day for God's sake. Surely this is a worthy use of bandwidth. I've got some ideas for thread topics that could be fun or helpful, but I don't want to hijack your gig.
On the topic of powerlessness, my thinking is more in line with TXcowboy's. My alcoholic self does not like that I've ditched his best friend. He's been quiet for about three years now. Quietly doing pushups that is. Not only am I powerless over how much, when, where, (etc, etc, etc!) I drink if I take a drink, I am powerless over my alcoholic obsession. In a larger sense too, I am powerless over all outcomes in my life - people, places, things and situations. My alcoholic self will use any of these to take me down, and he is patient. To me this is the crystalization of the first step, and deserves much consideration.
In one of your earliest replies in this you thread mentioned developing armor against alcoholism. Early on, I thought similarly, and even used some of the same words. Today, I look at recovery as a process of collecting tools, and an exercise in deepening faith. Thanks again for this thread.
I'd like very much for this to be a daily thread for those suffering to come for encouragement.
I don't think JimRob would have a problem with that.
God bless you, Rob, for getting this started.
"We claim spiritual progress, not spiritual perfection."
This sounds very logical. I have to say though that I enjoy drinking on weekends. I do find myself hiding a little because my husband doesn't drink and he is very extreme in in self-discipline. Of course he expects the same from me and we obviously are all different. I asked my cousin who lives with me and she says I don't have a problem, but she happens to be a compulsive eater and I'm not sure about her judgement. My children are too little and the oldest has commented about the wine glasses in the kitchen, but then again her father has certainly instilled his views on her. I have never had a hang over or any terrible problems but I really do enjoy it too much. I have quit for some time (during pregnancy) and then tell myself I have no problem. I don't really over do it, but I certainly enjoy a few few glasses of wine on the weekends. Sometimes I do get the impression that I could be going down a dangerous slippery slope and this post is a good warning sign that I need to see where I'm going. Thanks.
I was a whiskey drinker. I used to hide mine in my iced tea - same color.
My first wife never did figure out how I could get drunk on iced tea!
So did you have a problem or not?
My two cents.
I, on the other hand, have never had a problem drinking -- I enjoy it greatly and do it as often as possible.
You are kidding right?
If not, find a thread about people dealing with lung cancer and discuss the great taste of cigarettes.
I think even non-addicted/non-alcoholic people should be in a 12-step program. It's totally changed my outlook and how I respond to people, places and things!
The other thing that's convinced me to stop drinking (I was a very, very moderate drinker) is I don't know a single personal that woke up one day and said "hey, I think I want to be a drunk". In fact they were perfectly normal drinkers for many, many years and then one day it was like a switch being turned on.
I finally began to look at it as being the same as an allergy that eventually develops. One day you can eat a peanut with no problem and the next you eat one and swell up like a blimp. Seeing what drinking had done to others I figured I didn't need to play that particular game of chance.
Again, please consider the source and I don't offer it as a substitute for someone who really understands this problem but it might be something to consider.
The cunning thing about alcoholism is that when you're in the problem, you don't recognize the problem. It can only be evaluated in retrospect.
I thought everyone drank like I did. I was the last one to know how serious it was, and it only became serious in stages.
Beware the demon in the bottle!
It is cunning, baffling and powerful!
That really does make sense. I certainly have a smoking problem. I only smoke between 2-5 a day, but I also hide to smoke. Man I have issues.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.