I’ve been aiming at quitting alcohol for awhile now. I had great momentum and succeeded almost 3 months but have not been able to quit for more than a week since then. Good news is I’ve been avoiding hard liquor and in general drinking less.
The 16th is my birthday and marks 7 years that began with stress drinking and turned into an addiction that led to drinking way too much as my tolerance increased. It is my intention to quit again on my birthday and stay sober this time.
I’ve had a lot of turmoil out of my control for the last year, I’m aware it is in my control to not drink and that my willpower had diminished as I’ve been in a “fuck it” state of mind. Most recently, covid-19 causing me to be out of work as a small business owner in the personal care industry. I was allowed to reopen for 3 weeks and got shut down again as of yesterday.
Covid-19 shutdowns did contribute to my increased drinking partly out of boredom. On top of that, my dad has been in the hospital twice now for over a week at a time and of course we could not see him. Plus my favorite aunt had a brain aneurysm which luckily was caught in time and surgery was done. Could have ended terribly and she was preparing for the worst including making me in charge of her affairs and inheritances.
There’s been bad communication with the Dr and nurses regarding my dads condition which has been frustrating. The first time, we find out that he has colon cancer. He’s started treatment, ended up in the hospital again for an unrelated issue. This second time he’s battled a severe uti and blood infection, he has now been moved to a skilled nursing facility to regain his strength and we still can’t see him. He started his radiation treatments after refusing at first. Today he calls me and tells me he doesn’t know if he is going to last doing the radiation… after asking some questions I realize what he means is he thinks he is dying. He’s lost his mobility since being hospitalized, it was already poor due to another disability, and he’s lost a lot of weight.
There’s much more to the story as far as family dynamics that are causing me emotional pain, some have become more of a problem with my dad’s condition. I know so many others are suffering right now in different ways too. My life just feels like such a mess with things out of my control and has made it difficult to be sober. I am going to give it another wholehearted try.
If this resonates with you please reach out to me. I have a lot of free time since I’m not working and I could use someone to talk to as I’m dealing with all of this and trying to be sober again. 
