I am struggling to keep my promise to myself. Just like before. I want to stop drinking, and it doesn’t have me spiralling like before but I can’t seem to just say no.
I’ve had a very long history with drinking and never just one or two drinks. It affected my relationships, my work, physically, mentally. All of the things. In early May I said enough was enough and didn’t drink for over a month. Then, it just krept back in again. This past weekend was my birthday and I decided I’d love to “celebrate”. It was ideal, and perfect, and I didn’t get the typical anxiety, and awful “you’re the worst” feelings. But I drank pretty much for three days straight. Then on Monday we went out for dinner and I had two glasses of wine - Something that NOTORIOUSLY gives me the worst anxiety the next day. Then yesterday, we went for a picnic to celebrate again and had more drinks. I don’t know how to disassociate the alcohol from myself. I felt SO good for that month. Admittedly the first few weeks were hard, but I don’t know how to do this again. I keep going through these cycles. I called off work today. Skipped the gym. But tomorrow I will need to face those realities. I don’t feel like I’m at the “end of my rope”, but I so just want to feel good again. Everything is going so well in every aspect of my life, and because I’m hungover today the first thought I have right now is that a drink will make it feel better. I read a few books on sobriety throughout that month: The unexpected joy of being sober, and the alcohol experiment. It got me EXCITED not to drink. Do you have any recommendations? Have you broken out of the pattern? My drinking habits are certainly better than before, but I don’t know how to break the cycle of “happy=celebrate with drinks”. It’s so ingrained in me. I’m 41 and have been drinking since I was 19, pretty consistently and pretty heavily for the past decade.
I am very healthy otherwise but I am consuming poison and I know it. It’s so frustrating.
Welcome to the addiction club 
I can say that my sobriety time has been the time I felt most alive, most present, most like myself (instead of hiding or feeling regret). I love being sober.
There’s lots of good resources about getting healthy (which, for us - people recovering from addiction - means we need to be sober). There’s a thread with lots of groups and podcasts and books here:
And there’s loads of people checking in here (there’s a “Checking in daily” thread - you’ll see it in the list of threads) and supporting each other one day at a time.
You are not alone. It is possible, and you are not alone.
Welcome to Talking Sober! 
I keep thinking that it’s something that I have to do alone. I think that’s the hard part. I’m calm today and facing this head on.
Thank you for the resources. I’ll review right now.
I think the checking in, will help and will make the effort to do it daily. As I’ve just proven to myself, it’s so easy to slip back.
You definitely do not have to do it alone (actually I think it’s safe to say that no one recovers from addiction alone - there are thousands of people here on Talking Sober and all of them participated in some type of group or social space (online or offline) where they could learn and share and grow with other people in recovery).
Recovery is learning. Learning means finding people who know more, and learning what they learned. Then sharing (which we do here at Talking Sober). It’s a community
Also, addiction is alone-ness. All of my addiction time was alone; all of my cravings are about being alone with my addiction; it’s like my addiction wants to dominate my life and keep me isolated.
The opposite of alone is together: it’s about being in a community and learning and being together with other humans. That doesn’t mean you never have time to yourself for quiet reflection and rest, but it means that you’re not isolated; you’re not avoiding people. You’re making choices to spend time with people, and when you do choose to be alone, it’s a conscious choice, not an addiction choice.
I’ve never thought of it that way – But it’s so true. When I started to drink alone, and hide it, that’s when I knew that we are no longer “just a drinker” but instead an addict. Ugh. I know I have to do this. I want to do this. And I know what to do. It’s just now up to me to do it.
Thank you for your guidance Matt. Day 1. And day by day. I just need to keep checking in, and reminding myself how good life can feel without alcohol. <3
Natalia
I have, and many others here. This app and the people in it helped me with that because like @Matt also said: you do not have to do it all alone. I will share you an older thread where I described how I did it:
2 years sober and what helped me to get there: Maybe you see something you can use too 
And congratulations with your day 1 Natalia! 