Sometimes I really hesitate to post here. I like to, because it makes me feel like I’m part of a group of friends. But I’m not naive. And I know the rule about not posting while drunk, I’m not. But I’m hungover. I bought a 5th of whiskey last night and even joked with the girl when she asked me why I wasn’t getting just a pint, I said “at least this will last me a couple days”. What a joke, I drank the entire thing the space of 4 hours. I feel like a hypocrite, because I’ve posted things here trying to help others feel better when I’m not anywhere close. I don’t really live what I say to others. I KNOW the things, but I’m a hypocrite for putting in my 2 cents when I’m not even following my own advice.
Anyway I’m not even looking for help or nice words, but I felt like I needed to be honest with my only sober community. I feel like stale dogshit right now. I’m trying to embrace it because I fucking deserve it anyway. It’s cathartic to actually say and admit it.
I understand where you’re coming from. I only have 18 days right now, but this is the longest I’ve been able to stay sober myself usually after two weeks I’m right back at it, and I always felt like crap and shamed and mad at myself probably all the feelings you are feeling yeah, it did help me reaching out to people on this site and a couple others who basically all told me the same thing none of us are perfect for many of us fall. But what makes us better is how we pick ourselves up after we fall take responsibility and move forward. Remember one day at a time and I’m grateful you did post this because this actually helps me to stay sober and I’ve been struggling with that the past few days,
At least you’re honest, that is one of the hardest things to do with this disease, you can start again today you will feel better tomorrow, tomorrow is the first day of the rest of your life, you can do it! Keep coming back!
You’re not an idiot man, you’re lifting some heavy ass weight in the sobriety gym like the rest of us and had a weightlifting injury. Maybe you didn’t stretch, drink enough water, or your form was wrong for a second or something. Bodybuilders get injuries too. Hope you get better man, stay healthy and be good to yourself. Best thing is you return to the gym ASAP! Good thing you said something, you’re not a fraud. A fraud would pretend it never happened. Maybe tell someone irl too. Peace.
Learning to be sober is like learning anything else. I don’t judge anyone for falling. It takes time and confidence to put it all together. I don’t comment often, but this post spoke to me. Getting sober is the best thing I’ve done in my life. It took about a year for me to understand that. I hope you can get to that point. Wish you well.
I would say that the majority of people who relapse on this site just stop participating and fade away. It takes balls to come on here and admit your relapse.
Get back on the ball and come up with some more strategies to stay sober. You can do this. I failed a couple times before ai got it to stick.
I honestly think that this is human. It’s so much easier to see things in others. We ‘use’ them as a mirror. It’s easier to see problematic behaviour in others than in ourselves. And it’s easier working on other behaviours than ourselves. That’s what I catch myself in doing often. We are here for learning. And of course it feels like a fake when you don’t follow your own advice but realising this is already a step forward. Often it feels like 1 step forward and 2 steps back, where realizing this is already another step forward.
I kinda lost my point we are all here coming from the same dark place. We often know how it feels and sometimes (we) forget how it felt in early recovery, how it was back then not knowing how to not drink/use when this was the only coping strategy that we knew this far.
I remember during my first streak of not drinking it was so easy, I couldn’t imagine why I ever was drinking, it was a pink cloud, it was a dangerous mixture of feeling happy neurotransmitters for almost 90 days. Nothing could stop me until I stopped myself. Or reality pulled me off my happy cloud. It took me some months drinking here and then, being stuck in the moderation cycle hating myself for failing my goals most of the times. And now almost 4.5 years later I admit that my memory is fading but there was a point, a night where I drank the last bottle of wine so far. I prayed, I begged, I was on my knees (that’s the story I built in my memory which is now my reality) to please help me. It is a rocky road this journey called life. I have never really regretted that I am doing it now sober. It’s so much easier.
Idk. You ended up not meeting your goal and that sucks but It’s time to stop calling ourselves idiots if we make a mistake. First off it’s no wonder when we feel like idiots we don’t want to admit to something that didn’t go our way and instead hide it.
I would…appreciate your sobriety prior to slipping, learn from what happened and consider that currency for future - some new information to try and apply. I work in IT and sometimes when we’re troubleshooting an error is just trying to get the damn error to at least change so we can learn more about the problem. What can you try next time? Even failing one thing you can get something from it.
You’re only an idiot if you choose not to recognize the problem and learn from it! You’ve recognized there’s an issue between you and alcohol, now you’ve got to focus on finding the root cause of why you use it. It could be one reason or many. I have many reasons why I drank, stress was a big one, whenever I was stressed I would immediately go to the bottle for relief because I was conditioned to think that way as a kid watching movies and my dad come in and have a few beers at night. My dad didn’t have an issue moderating himself but I do. My grandpa and all his brothers also had a bad relationship with alcohol, so it’s in my genetics to start. I also subconsciously felt pressured to drink without ever realizing it. People always loved being around drunk me because I was funny and loud and the life of the party. Every time I drank I just felt like I had to do it for everyone when inside I was tired and sad and unhappy with my drinking. I also realized, something I found other people had also on here, I have a voice in my head when I drink that immediately calculates if I have enough alcohol wherever I am or where I’ll end up to get loaded enough to pass out.
All these things combined make up the root cause of my drinking. Once I pinpointed them, it became easy to see I don’t need alcohol to be part of my life to deal with stress, and people love me for me not for how much or who I am when I drink. Finally, like my wife always says “genetics loads the gun, but what we choose to do pulls the trigger.” You’re not an idiot, you are in the right place and just need to find your “why” for drinking and learn how to stop it in its tracks!
I’m glad you are here! Thank you for being honest and transparent. You help all of us stay honest and invite others into our struggle. By doing that we he others while helping ourselves. Love you man!
Honesty is so important. I can say that because I admitted to my sponsor today that I lied to her through omission of some facts. This has been going on for almost 3 months and it feels so good to know she did not judge me and she gave me advice on how to work through it. Never lie to someone who’s got your back. That was my lesson learned.
Keep sharing and keep listening.
Sometimes we post advice because we know what we need to do. we hope the person receiving it find strength in our words. Doesn’t mean you are a fraud or incapable of your own advice.
Remember, you can’t get drunk if you don’t take the first drink. It’s the first one that turns into a fifth
You are welcome here, post, share, vent! Honesty is the key to many good things in life. You drank? Well, not the best decision. You are hungover? Shit, that happens when drinking. Take good care of yourself, stay hydrated, have a light meal, rest, allow your body to detox and support yourself. You are ok. Back to day one.
Keep going. When you help others you also help yourself. Find out what helps YOU to stay sober. Knowledge alone is not enough, it’s knowledge put to action in our daily living that does the trick.
And again: Some hugs You sound like you need them.
Edit to add: All the hugs are also for all who read this
3 steps ahead and 2 steps backwards is still going forward.
You haven’t lost everything. Yes, you relapsed but you are still here. You are here because you are still want to be sober.
Opening up here is a brave thing to do and helpfull for yourself as wel. Addiction florish with secrets and in the shade of light. Recovery needs light and air.
Glad you are here and working on that
And if you learn from this relapse so you can avoid a new one it has it’s purpose as well.
Thank you so much, and thank all of you here. It means a lot to me, I don’t often feel like I have people I can talk to. I do have people around, I have 3 sisters who do care but I never tell them when it gets bad because they worry, there’s not much they can do anyway, so it’ll just stress them.
But the virtual internet hugs, made me feel a lot better.I really appreciate it. I appreciate everyone being so kind, the depression and anxiety hit hard when I drink and when coming off of it.
I really am grateful to everyone for being so kind and supportive. It helps.
You are very welcome! You know the first 72 h are hard. It gets better. Stay calm, relax, detox, rest, drink water, take supplements to help your body.
Alcohol causes depression and anxiety, the worst will be over soon. One day at a time, from hour to hour, one minute after another staying sober and present. Read around here, I find it very uplifting as there’s lots of shared experience and information. And there are happy threads to distract me like the cat/pet/meme threads. Music and podcast threads, art and nature threads, even a thread on sober leg selfies (I like it very much allthough I post there rarely).
Keep hanging around here and keep us posted. We are here for you
we are all here coming from the same dark place. We often know how it feels and sometimes (we) forget how it felt in early recovery, how it was back then not knowing how to not drink/use when this was the only coping strategy that we knew this far.
