Celebrating sobriety by having a drink

I’m comfortable and confident that I can deal with urges to drink when experiencing hard times. But it’s when dealing with milestones and when I’m generally feeling good that my mind plays tricks on me. I got some good news yesterday and I had to fight the urge to go and get a drink. Apart from the obvious in keeping busy or calling a sponsor, how have you all dealt with this?

I know I’m not alone in feeling like this and I’m thankful that I woke up this morning without a hangover

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I get the same! Bad times it’s easier to grit my teeth and get through but good milestones really let my addiction whisper to me that I’ve prooved I can do it. I don’t have any advice other than to say that I know what you’re going through.

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Cake! When my AA buddies and I celebrate our sober birthdays we started getting cakes. Kind of retraining ourselves to associate cake with a celebration rather than a shot. We even had a friend who worked at a pizza place/bar so after our Sat meeting we’d all meet at the bar (Id drop the cake off there before the meeting) wed have dinner, watch a game and have a piece of cake. We always looked forward to it. We even played Cards Against Humanity there one time. It really seemed to work for us. Hope it helps!

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just be grateful that your sober , every day you wake sober is good news ? if you get a urge to drink phone your sponsor no brainer ,

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All habits that we have established over the years and I was guilty of it too for a long time. Recognizing it was all habit helped me.

Atomic Habits by James Clear really lays out the process.

Luckily, for me I am currently at a point where when something good or bad happens I say …“wow, this would be a time I would have had a drink before” and then I move on.

Good luck and keep at it.

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Yea that has always been how a celebrate stuff too…I just redefined the way I celebrate. Normally a special dinner or other treat of some kind.

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I reward myself with flowers or a take away :grin:

Yes! Anything can be a trigger for me but the 2 most common triggers for me are either having a super shitty day, or having a really great one. Curious to see what others have to say about this. Just know you are not alone in this :slight_smile:

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