Truth and tough love

I learn much from you, pal. Hoping you are enjoying your sunny holiday. :bird::sun_with_face:

1 Like

Agreed, the human brain has a “stop and go” switch that is controlled by the same part that handles fight or flight. Using creates huge releases of dopamine that activate the go switch and damages the brains ability to flip it back off before the logic parts of the brain can even respond. Doesnt matter what drug it is from alcohol to meth or heroin. MRIs show the same high rate of activity in that part of the brain when addicts are shown even half second flashing images of their doc. Recovery is essentially our best efforts to deny that go response long enough for the logical part of our mind to think it over and realize that by indulgung were really damaging ourselves physically and that requires work. Theres nothing unique about it, every one of us would show the exact same brain activity were we in the machine and just like you arent gonna go in a gym and dead lift 400 lbs without spending time in the gym working out youre also not gonna be able to continuously deny that go switch without doing a lot of mental “working out” ive come to see “were all unique” as a cop out to justify giving in and relapsing or not doing some form of mental workout to to prevent it and leaning on mere hope alone to keep u sober. It took me learning that i was not as unique as id like to think i am to give in and start doing the work

9 Likes

Couldn’t have said better. Fighting the psychological dependance right there. Require a lot of self-awareness and self-reflection to identify the path we’re taking mentally before making a choice of action… in the right direction. Anyways, well said.

1 Like

Expectations. Gotta love em. Quickest way to a drink is having expectations of other people. No one should have to change a damn thing in their life so you can get sober. They didn’t make you an alcoholic so they owe you nothing. Sure, support is nice, but it’s not required. Your spouse doesn’t have to get sober with you. Your friends don’t have to do have sober fun with you. The people on this forum don’t have to give you the advice you want to hear. Hell they don’t have to do anything for you.

Buck-up buttercup, you are the only one that has to put in the work to get yourself sober.

11 Likes

tenor%20(8)

3 Likes

Much this:

12 Likes

Am I taking the wrong approach? Massive relapse

I tried a geographic change a few times. But no matter where I went, there I was. Turns out my alcoholism wasn’t tied to a location, it was tied to my brain. I ended up getting sober in the city where I did most of my fuckin up.

5 Likes

I’ve been saying it for almost a year. It’s served me well

1 Like

That may be where i originally saw it , ive seen 2 or 3 addiction docs on HBO. But yeah i saw it on a documentary and looked into it further bc i thought it was pretty interesting.

If you are working the 12 steps in AA , that doesn’t mean you 1,2 miss a few and hit step 13 like you are something special ,get back to step one because you clearly aren’t working the program correctly . Dumb arse

9 Likes

I have no comment on this lol

4 Likes

Why does this sound familiar?:smile:

4 Likes

Derek was so good at his 13th step, he did it twice :joy::rofl:

5 Likes

If we want to get technical I was 13th stepped on both ocassions. I definitely rushed into the first relationship to soon and wasn’t ready for it. With Shay I was able to do a thorough 4th and 5th step and as a result I am a much better partner

2 Likes

That is me!!! I’m working on it but so far it’s not going well. LOL

1 Like

:joy: :joy: Someone tried to get their groove on with me without permission , he’s in my home group and I work with him in recovery and take survival skills group together ,there are rules in both areas and he has crossed every line going .jerk lol

Why don’t you just cut his ankles off?

2 Likes

In this situation i would just say, “Can ya blame him?” :sunglasses:

But seriously, screw that dude.

1 Like

So I always used to say that dieting wouldn’t work for me to lose weight. Even though I had never actually tried to go on a diet. I sound pretty stupid right?

Well that’s exactly how people sound when they claim AA (or SMART, or therapy, or whatever) won’t work for them, without ever actually going to a meeting. Oh, your internet research told you it won’t work??? Well I can also find websites that claim vaccines cause autism. That shit ain’t right either.

Also, I’m down 25lbs in a 1.5 months on a diet…

12 Likes