This morning I told my friend I want to stop drinking, over the last few years I have started drinking almost every day. Sometimes half a bottle of wine sometimes 5 glasses. I have about one or 2 nights without drinking on average. It’s weird because when I’m away from home I drink much less and sometimes not at all for a week without even thinking of it. I have been suffering with depression due to being a single mom and feeling unworthy of love and have. A stressful job. I am using wine to drown things out and as a sedative. Things escalate and I make poor choices. It’s affecting my life and I feel it’s getting worse. The idea of putting alcohol down for good is scary and that scares me even more cause it shows I have a dependancy.
Any advice will be appreciated
Welcome back here Ames! Congrats on your choice. When alcohol is having such a negative impact on your life quitting is absolutely the right choice to make. I know it seems scary in the beginning, but be assured that a better life awaits. Being sober opens up a whole new world of opportunities. It does take work but it’s a work of love. No more running from our problems but learning to face and deal with them instead. Wishing you all success Ames!
Thank you so much yes this is a much needed change and something I finally need to face going to focus on gym and work and reading and being a good mum to my son
Welcome back @Ames2
Good decision to put the wine down. Sounds like there is potential in improving your at home situation as you go easy without a drink when away.
If you would like to check it out, I posted my personal shortlist of go-to threads that help(ed) me recently in another thread. Where to go to from here? - #8 by erntedank
Keep us posted how you are and keep going. We are here to support you
Welcome back. As you are experiencing, it’s not the amount of frequency of drinking or stretches of dry time that determine if we’re alcoholic, it’s what drinking does to us in our minds and souls. And good on you for telling someone. That helps us to voice our fear and to hold ourselves accountable for our behavior.
If you look around here, people who concentrate on growing their sobriety as much as staying physically dry, are the ones who are more serene in the long run, better equipped to handle the small and large vagaries of daily living. Here’s a roux to help get you started. Blessings on your house as you begin your journey.
Hi Amy,
Opening up about you want to quit is a good start. It helps a bit if you got support back home as well. If I look back at my own recovery I can say it was difficult at the beginning. I had my ups and downs and worked hard to get where I am today. I learned a lot about myself.
I like myself a lot more then I did in my drinking days. Still growing mentally.
I never would wish for an addiction. But in a strange way it “gave” me a lot. Hope you understand what I try to say
What has helped me a lot in my recovery was making a sober plan. I’ve shared it a few years ago and will share it with you. Maybe you see something you can use yourself too.
Don’t be a stranger and come here often, it really helps you to be here much. It helps you to stay focussed and you will learn a lot about how to become and stay sober.
See you around!
Welcome back
Dont be afraid. Think about the other way around: Be afraid what alcohol is currently doing to you and will be doing to you going forward. Thats far more scary. Congratulations on your decision
I used alcohol to drown everything out. And I mean a lot of alcohol. To the point where I wasn’t even sure I was gonna be able to stop. My advice is don’t worry about putting alcohol down for good. Just concentrate and do everything you have to do, to hit the pillow sober tonight. Then repeat tomorrow. It will get easier
Of course you deserve to be loved, my mum was a single mum with 4 kids and I know how hard and stressful it is especially if you have a stressful job on top, we all have vices we go to, to relax and the first step as corny as it is, to accept your an addict then and only then will you be able to place one foot forward, rather than 4 steps back in denial, I truly hope you find some calm and peace to get you threw this difficult time. I wish you nothing but good luck and a sober future​:+1:
Ah your experience is very familiar to me. To many of us, I bet. It can feel scary deciding not to drink but you’ll find it’s easier to be happy without it.
The self hate you feel, being unworthy of love may not be completely down to alcohol but what I do know is alcohol makes negative feelings worse. It also increases the chance of doing and saying regrettable things - and that in turn damages your self esteem.
So, quitting alcohol won’t automatically fix the way you feel and behave but it will give you a much better chance of being the person you want to be.
I’m 2 years into my sober journey. It’s the best decision I’ve ever made. I wish alcohol didn’t exist and I’d never found it. It twisted my mind for decades.
2 years sober that is awesome news ,