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 am glad that you found this thread useful, keep in touch!
FReegards, RobFromGa
Congratulations Rob ~ I'm a friend of Bill W ~ I've been clean and sober since 10-26-75 after 30 years of drinking.
Congratulations and many of us here will help if you have a question or just want to talk. I check my computer all day, just ping me! God Be With You and Me.
Wow! I don't have any alcoholics in my immediate family, which is another reason I gave myself for continuing to drink. That along with the "wine is good for the heart" saying. But I scares me to realize that I'm drinking every weekend, and maybe some Thursday's, and maybe even a Wednesday if I have a really good reason. That along with the fact that I do tend to hide it, and I do have a high tolerance. I don't really go overboard, but then I always have an excuse for not stopping. I really should simply stop and I realize I always have another excuse to drink again. It's scary and I need reminders like these. Thanks for sharing.
Recovering alcoholics can take grape seed extract and things like resveritrol and green tea to get their antioxidants. Drink grape juice 100% pure. It's the same thing almost.
As long as you're not a friend of Dorothy ;-)
; < )
bump
Ping
You would think we would know better, but sometimes I guess we are determined to learn the hard way. My mom and father divorced when I was very young. I only have one vague memory of him. She remarried soon after to my (step)dad. My father and the divorce was never talked about...it was like he ceased to exist. Don't get me wrong I love my Dad to pieces, but I always had the desire to know my father. One of the only facts that I knew about him was that he drank...but he was jovial when he did...or he'd disappear for days.
When I married my ex, I knew he had a drinking problem. I was just too stupid to realize the ramifications. My (our) daughter was and continues to be the only wonderful thing that happened. I try to be as honest with her as possible, telling her only age appropriate things hoping that she will learn from my mistakes.
I guess I went the other end of the spectrum than my Mom did. She didn't say a word about him being an alcoholic, and I've told my daughter, that too much drinking causes people to have "fuzzy" brains.
I pray that she is strong enough to break the cycle that family members of alcoholics seem destined to make.
I want to express my gratitude to you for starting this thread.
I haven't been to a meeting in ages and this thread has really brought home to me how much I miss listening and talking to other alcoholics.
I think I've been isolating myself and need to get to a meeting.
There's a young fellow I know that recently got out of rehab, I'm going to suggest going together.
Talking and listening to you all has also helped motivate me to make a change in my work.
I drive as an independent broker for a couple of companies. One of the companies delivers beer and booze. I've never felt entirely comfortable doing this. A lot of the customers have obvious problems with drink. When I first started the job, a couple of years ago, I was climbing out debt and had no savings. I needed work and couldn't afford being too picky. I spoke with someone about my misgivings and he suggested that I might be able to do some good if the occasion arose.
I do get offers to stay and have a beer quite often when I deliver. I always say no thanks and mention how long it has been since I had my last beer. Once in a while the person responds saying how they wish they could do that and it gives me an opportunity to let them know a little of my story and how AA helped me get and stay sober.
But in spite of these occasions I still sense it isn't right for me as a recovering alcoholic to be helping other alcoholics get drunk. Financially I've been able to save enough to give me a small cushion so I can't use that rationalization any longer.
I've been easing myself out of that type of work but still leaving the delivery company the option of calling me when they're short a driver. I have come to see over the past few days that I need to make a clean break. I'm going to write the owners a letter letting them know what my decision is and the reasons for it. One of them knows already that I've been to AA so hopefully they'll understand.
There's other regular courier work I can do for them. I'd rather be an employee of theirs (or not) and do what is right for my spiritual progress than take a chance on sliding and end up being a customer of theirs.
Well, I didn't learn, because I also married an alcoholic too, even his mother warned me before we were married. Just before we divorced,15 years after we married, his drinking had advanced to where he was only making it home from work every two or three days and that was, like the old saying goes, the straw that broke the camel's (mine) back.
Where I am going with this is that my boy's were 13 & 6 and were quite aware of the problem without my telling them. Yet, only one, the youngest, had a problem with alcohol.
Thankfully he realized this himself and stopped drinking 3 years ago. When he first told me about it I ask he what finally made him quit. He said he was afraid his own son would see his weakness like he saw his dads, and he wouldn't want to embarrass he son like his dad did him.
Sometimes children are more aware of what is happening around them then we parents realize.
Thank you for sharing your story, I can certainly understand the idea that you want to make changes in your work that are more in-line with your sobriety.
Re: your letter to your employer explaining your decision, I would caution you to be short and sweet. There is nothing inherently wrong with the alcohol you deliver, and you don't want to give the impression that you are "superior" or too good to be involved in such a morally repugnant business as delivering the demon drink.
Just remember you are doing this to protect yourself from your defect.
You probably would have said it just the right way without my unsolicited advice, but I thought it was a good time to amplify my point earlier that we cannot expect other people to change their behavior to fit our new shape, we must either add some new pieces to fill in the gaps, or find a new puzzle to be part of.
Dorothy is the queen of camel toes. :)
hehe!
Please add me to your ping list too. Just found this thread. Glad to see so many other Friends of Bill W. are also freepers! I've been a grateful member of AA for just about 30 years now...the best thing that ever happened to me.
I hope you are on day four!
I sure am. Going to a meeting tonight. Thanks for asking!
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