Hey guys, I don’t post often here, and in general I’m a go it alone kind of guy, which is terrible for recovery of course but damn it if that’s just the way I operate… Anyway I definitely feel the need to say something somewhere.
I hit two months sober this week (I’m an alcoholic) and any pink cloud and general motivation seems to be long gone. My mental health has been crashing HARD and the good days are so few and far between. I love to run but that has been stop-start, being plagued with injuries this year, and the drinking thoughts have been creeping in.
The only thing really keeping me sober is knowing the dire consequences that will inevitably follow but I’m struggling to see any carrot in the situation, only the stick. This is in spite of progress with family, other hobbies and losing weight. I made it this far twice last year before falling off (one time was instantly dramatic, the last time was more of a slow burn to rock bottom).
I was kinda hoping things would naturally be getting better by this point. I have been to a couple of AA meetings this year (and many in the past) but I just can’t seem to get behind the programme aspect, aside of course from the fact that I am the lone wolf type, and that I get social anxiety at times too.
Anyway, thanks for letting me vent. Today I’m not drinking.
Good morning @Tetrax hang in there. Its not always butterflies and rainbows in sobriety. Have you checked out alternatives to AA? Like Refuge Recovery or SMART meetings? Keep trying different recovery tools until something brings relief. What helped me get into the mindset was to get curious and approach it like its an experiment
But I hear you, I’m going alone in this battle (other than friends here at TS which has been hugely helpful seeing myself in many), a lone wolf.
I’m simply looking for small things that I am grateful for, a renewed sense of focus on those hobbies, family, weight and inevitably and hopefully better health.
Hopefully you find your way through my friend as it can be a grind for sure but it sounds like you have a lot of carrots as well as maybe an occasional stick…
Sometimes sobriety isnt great just the same as life isnt always great…the reality is sobriety itself doesnt just fix everything…its up to you to work on making your life better…we have good times and bad the only difference is now we dont try to escape when its bad down a bottle…instead we sit in the uncomfortable and find a solution or different way
Thanks for your responses guys. Even just posting this morning steered me towards having a good day today, which was needed and which has helped ground me back in recovery thinking again, how far I’ve come already and all that. I should probably think more about what support outside of here might help me best moving forwards.
Man I see a lot of similarities in your story. Even down to the injuries getting you down, a solid string of injuries definitely added to my downward trend over the past few years.
I’m naturally a bit introverted and do more reading and liking posts than anything here. I try to engage where I can and I feel its a help for me.
Jumping on the daily gratitude thread helped me too
Once, a friend of mine called our DOC a filter. That’s exactly what it is, a filter. At first, it filters out all of the negative things that happened throughout the day and what we’re left with is all good. Eventually, it begins to filter out the things we need, like love from our friends and family, and when that happens, we need to filter even more.
When we quit, we stop filtering. We live life raw. Fortunately for most, we develop our own natural filter to help us adjust, the pink cloud, but that too wears off and we are raw dogging life again. This is why community is so important.
We’ve lived so long with that filter, we never learned to cope without it. Now the pink cloud is gone, we are left to cope with whatever tools we learned, if any at all. This is where community comes in. We have over 100 years of combined sober experience, there’s likely nothing you can experience that one of us hasn’t, we can share our experiences so that you can learn from them and develop the tools to cope with life unfiltered.
I know you prefer to go it alone, and that’s where you’re most comfortable, but it’s also where you’re the most vulnerable; growth comes from discomfort. Do the things that make you uncomfortable, nervous or scared, and you will grow.
Congrats on 2 months pf sobriety, lets get one more day!
