So new year came around, had a couple drinks, a couple tokes as a last hurrah. 10 days in and feels great. I feel an increase in motivation and am determined to see this through…atleast temporarily. I have a really hard time imagining this lifestyle forever. My main goal is just to straighten my life out, get a carreer (and not more temp agency jobs) that will allow me to move out of my parents house and really start my life (Im 24)
At the moment, I dont miss drinking or doing blow. The pros of a clear head far outweigh the stagnant path I have been on for the last 10 years. I like feeling this way, but also really enjoy goofing off after a couple drinks. Is there anyone else here that started with the same “temporary hiatus” mentallity? Did you end up sticking with it after getting on track? Did you find after straightening out you are able to have a night of drinking without relapsing into depressed slump where your life revolved around drinking?
Hey there! Congrats on the 10 days, thats great!
I have been in your shoes before. 4/5 years ago, i just needed to get my life together! But i just couldnt do it on my own. Opiates, other drugs, and alcohol had ahold of me before i even realized it. Everyone else saw it, but not me. I wasnt “that bad”… Long story short, i ended up in rehab, stayed 90 days. I was doing well but then i met the wrong person and ended up relapsing. Over and over again. Rehab was supposed to cure me, but it didnt. Id go back to rehab, Id get sober, continue doing those same ole things, id relapse. Ive been down pretty low before, lowest of the low in my eyes… I continued down the same path for almost 5 years… Get sober for a little bit then relapse. Id start ofd by having just a couple drinks ar dinner, then boom, the black outs came again. But I knew i wanted to be sober though because life was just hard and shitty for someone in active addiction. I wasnt truely happy. I never had any money, so how was i supposed to get a place? I hung out with the wrong people, bc i honestly couldnt depend on my so called friends. Maybe 1 or 2 but that was it. And i wanted real friends… people who cared and wanted the best for me. I could barely hold down a part time job bc my priorities were always elsewhere, always! So how was i to get a full time job? I needed full time to pay the bills and rent. I wanted to be successful, not just an addict that couldnt get her shit together.
Fast forward to today. I have over a year sober from alcohol and other drugs, almost 3 years off opiates.
So how did i do it right? I had to change! The people i was hanging out with, needed to change. The places i was hanging, i needed to change. The things i was doing, i needed to change. So i started going to AA after 5 years of fighting this disease by myself. And its working! I needed help though… So just something to think about and consider. Not pushing AA on you, just my experience is all…
Good share letting Atom Gee know how AA has worked for you its not for everyone but its there if you need it , life is great sober it brings everything into prospective and there is life after drink and drugs if you really want it , best of luck from this old timer
I started with a “1 year sober challenge” in mind. I have passed the 1 year mark and I am sticking with it for now mainly because I got into a relationship with another sober person but also because it is a good and healthy lifestyle.
What I have found is that it takes longer to “straighten out” than I would have thought. You are younger and don’t have so many years of bad habits to retrain as I did. I would guess with that it will still take a while due to the cocaine use.
My one recommendation is that once you are comfortable being sober that you try to “goof off” but absolutely without the drink or drugs. Do this several times with either the same people or new people. Go out have fun. Even do stupid “hold my beer” stuff but skip the beer.
Honestly…no. I’ve tried and every time I go right back to where I started from. I KNOW in my head that this has to be forever. That doesn’t make it easier to fight off those nasty voices in my head though. They keep tempting me. But lifetime HAS to be my goal.
Agree. 100%. Has definitely gotten more difficult, the older and more “set in my ways” I’ve become. I noticed that the sober periods got shorter, and the relapses tougher to break.