Who am I after quitting?

Life in Recovery
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I’ve been clean for a month now, done this before, and I’m at the time when one wonders about oneself - who am I now? Alcohol was an integrant part of my life and gave me endless stories and memories of great moments. A large parte of my identity, sadly.

But it also overwhelmed me.

Sometimes I think about myself in the future, “he never drank again, aside a few relapses” and I don’t see quite a reward in such existence. I can rationalize, but from the bottom of my heart and guts, it doesn’t sound… exciting, because of the supposed excitement alcohol used to bring. It’s an identity crisis? Maybe. And reason without affection (in a sense of feeling) is just a bunch of empty words. A parrot’s speech.

Have you ever spent time contemplating who the f**k are you being sober?

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I look at this question from the total opposite viewpoint. I started using drugs and booze at such a young age, that I never gave myself a chance to develop a real ‘self’. I always wondered who I was, but forgot to go and look for an answer to that question. I just used some more and forgot.
Now I am sober for some time. Now I have the chance to get to know myself. I work on myself, I’m in therapy, I’m making progress.
I don’t call it recovery for myself, I call it discovery. Finally getting to know myself. It’s great. Not easy but great. And I can honestly say, the longer I’m removed from using and all that happened when I was under the influence, the emptier and hollower it all becomes. There’s nothing that has been made better by using. In fact the opposite is true. I think if you hang in there and make serious work of your recovery you will find out.

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Totally. My first real go at sobriety left me sad and depressed because I was losing myself.

My second go was different, I realized there was two people in me, the clown and a lump of clay that was ready to be molded into whatever I want.

I am happy to lose the clown in me.

Who am I without alcohol? The real question is, who do I want to be?

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Elvis Presley
When I think of how He came so far from glory
Came to dwell among the lowly such as I
To suffer shame and such disgrace
On mount calvary take my place
Then I ask myself this question
Who am I?
You are very special my friend in the eyes of God, Keep fighting these horrible disease and all your battles will be won
Stay Bless.

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Give it some time.

For me getting drunk was about forgetting. At seven and a half years sober, I marvel at how much time I wasted being wasted. The memories I have are blurred and distorted with my blackouts and the things I wish I could forget. I spent my days recovering from a binge or counting the days for the next. What I do remember is waking up at noon and feeling like death, looking for my car keys or for my car or for my wallet or trying to figure out why someone was so angry at me because of something I said or did the night before.

Since I stopped drinking, I lost 40 pounds and became healthy. I’ve started writing fiction, I go to see plays and the ballet, I go hiking. My friendships are stronger and aren’t challenged or tanked anymore by me being a drunken asshole.

The nights I thought were so funny are the ones I can’t remember. A few months after I got sober, I went to a friend’s bday party at a bar. I listened to my friends repeating the same things over and over and screaming with laughter. There was nothing funny about it. They were just drunk.That used to be me.

Now I have a life.

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It’s a great and philosophical question, and I often think of this generally…

It makes me think of the bit in Alice in Wonderland where she meets the smoking Caterpillar…

“Whooo arree yoouu!!??”

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The Who also famously asked this question. :upside_down_face:

So far, it has taken my entire adulthood to begin answering this question. I do know that who I am now, 5 years into sobriety, is infinitely more at peace, confident and self loving than I ever was the previous 40+ years of drinking.

If we are blessed with the opportunity to age and are able to shed the yoke of alcohol, we can begin the process of finding our true self…unfettered by alcohol and drugs. :heart:

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I’m 70 days in.

Good days, bad days, emotional days, estatic days… its an interesting rollercoaster seeing and feeling it through sober eyes. It’s a whole new experience.

I can’t answer who I will be either but It sure is interesting watching it unfold.

I guess it’s like watching ourselves in our own personal movie. I’m not looking for immediate answers on who I will be, I think it will just come in time. Overthinking on the early stage isn’t always a good thing anyway.

I’ve started feeling gratitude this last week. Not just saying it over in my head or pondering it because for a while there I had limited gratitude which I’m embarrassed to admit but I felt… lost.

These last two weeks I feel it. It’s worth persevering even when it’s hard at times. The light comes when we least expect it I guess.

Stick with it xxx

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Thank you for your honesty on this. I’ve felt the same way. For decades. It was so hard for me to accept living without my DOC… forever? Sure. Sobriety has it’s benefits, but what could possibly make me feel better than porn? (which I confused with sex) That’s what I felt at the time. And it played a big role in my chronic relapsing over the decades of my recovery.

But I’m telling you the truth. I was falling for a lie. My drug was not providing me excitement and pleasure. But I sure felt like it was. Again, it’s all a lie; an illusion. I was confused. And I was placing a huge amount of value on porn. And despite all the gifts of sobriety that came, many times my soul, my subconscious self, placed so much value on porn that the balance would often tip in favor of using.

But the truth is that my drug has no value. It’s completely worthless. It doesn’t relieve stress. It creates it. It doesn’t cure anxiety. It dumps more anxiety on me. And pleasure and excitement? The only pleasure and excitement I got was the pleasure of relieving the withdrawal pangs that were caused by the drug to begin with. The truth is that non-users get more pleasure from life than I. Furthermore, it continues to bring all sorts of problems to my life.

If I want to feel the same amount of pleasure and excitement as a non-user, all I need to do is stop, and stay stopped… Forever. By choosing to do that, I’m not missing out. I’m not depriving myself. Because my drug doesn’t have any value. It offers me nothing. Why mope about quitting something that has no value?

This statement assigns value to alcohol. Truthfully, there’s no way something that has no value, alcohol, can offer anything great.

Another statement that assigns value to alcohol. The brainwashing is evident. A drinker is led to believe that it’s sooooo impossible to life a sober life that a few relapses have to be tolerated. And alcohol rewarding? Another lie of brainwashing. Alcohol has the same amount of value as a piece of moldy bread. Can one imagine being offered a piece of moldy bread as a reward? It sounds comical. But it’s the truth.

I’m glad you used the wording “supposed excitement”. Because I think I’ve made my point. The idea that alcohol, or any of our DOCs, are exciting is a myth.

I wish I learned this truth sooner than I did for choosing sobriety has been a lot easier (and funner too :slightly_smiling_face:).

Reading Allen Carr’s book The Easy Way to Control Alcohol helped me a lot. And I’ve never been drunk. So I’m sure it would be helpful for you to read it too. Some of it’s concepts having completely changed my thinking and my life.

And I’m now glad to call myself a non-user. And I actually look forward to living my life completely without my DOC forever. Yes, my instincts still resort to getting me to think about using again. But those thoughts are short-lived. I usually dispell of them quickly. I stopped envying other users and I’ve stopped white knuckling. And the life of sobriety just keeps getting better for me.

I hope this helps.

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Cheers, Kev. Your post actually helped a lot. The “who am I thing” is more to do about the suppositions and value assignment to alcohol. It’s been with me for so long that it’s hard to think about life itself without it and drive myself elsewhere.

But hope springs eternal - It’ll come good someday.

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I’ve had to contemplate who I was several times in my life after leaving behind something that I really identified with or that was something at my core, and I’ve realized that those things were never actually me but just a box with a label.

For example, I didn’t need religion to be a ‘moral’ person, to be kind, giving, and to know when something was truly right or truly wrong. I never needed drugs or alcohol to do crazy things, but I was too insecure to own those things when others didn’t think they were as cool.

I’m not utterly convinced life is meant to be “exciting” in the way that we are sold that it is supposed to be. But I think when we allow ourselves to be excited by what we really love and enjoy, regardless of if it fits what other people see as "exciting’, then we will actually have an exciting life. If anything, drugs and alcohol stop us from finding out what those things really are.

Removing the filter does let us figure out who we really are, if we’re willing to dig in and accept what we find; but I also think it gives us the opportunity to see that we can actually be whoever we want to be. We just need to decide what that is and if we have the courage to go for it.

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I feel like we get the opportunity to rewrite our story in a sense when we get clean/sober. Well, at least the middle & end part. Drugs and alcohol can only offer so much. We have the opportunity to focus on bigger, better, and more valuable things when we are level headed. I can’t fully say who I am at this point with out drugs or alcohol. But I can say that I like who I am becoming, and I like the opportunities I have now to be successful and spend time exploring hobbies and talents. :slightly_smiling_face:

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This is it right here. For me too.

Who am I now that I’m sober? I’m the person who likes who I’m becoming.

:raised_hands: :innocent:

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I can absolutely relate to all of this. When I stopped drinking I was so scared of what the future would look like. Whether anyone would like the person I felt like without it. I didn’t.

Sobriety gave me the chance to explore different ways of looking at the world and find acceptance in the discomfort. Letting go of the need to know everything and making peace with the uncertainty. Addressing some underlying health issues. I am feeling more comfortable with where I am and respecting my limitations.

And even through the harder bits I have some amazing memories. So much better than the fuzzy ones that have all blurred together from my wreckhead days. They all ended up being kind of the same. Go out, get shit faced. Rinse and repeat!

Since I stopped drinking I’ve seen new places and seen old places in a new way. Same with people I’ve met and connected with. I’ve stopped defining myself by my actions and started to let myself just be. It’s taken me a while to really understand that happiness isn’t euphoria and chasing short-term dopamine hits. And when I think I’ve got to grips with it, something happens that makes me realise I’ve still got some things to learn! :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye: But the more I continue down this path the less I find myself worrying about who I am.

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Yes!

Hands down I questioned the purpose reasoning and rationale behind it.

While I couldn’t fathom my life without alcohol my life was a train wreck with it, your fantasizing about the good times and I did that too, I couldn’t tell you how many stories start with well me and Xxxxxx were fucked up and did this,

But I never told the stories of the dark side of my alcoholism, the black out nights, the suicide attempts, the morning after,

When I got sober it really did mess with me, alcohol was a social lubricant, it helped me overcome stage fright, it calmed me. But it didn’t help me, cause by the end of the night I was so trashed I was short of pissing all over myself and couldn’t hold a conversation.

Now I learned to still have all those experiences without a drink, I can socialize without drinking, and still attend the same social functions without a drink, it took a while but I did it, now I see a drunk person or talk to them, and watch their behavior I’m like damn that was me? I’m happier today without it you can be too

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Just had this talk with my therapist yesterday. I finally realized I dedicated my all to the bar for 6 years (since I was 19) and never really developed a sense of self.

To my friends I am the crazy, funny, caring friend that they love to be around. But will they still see me that way sober? Am I that same person sober? I have no idea. I guess with time it’ll be figured out but I’m right with you on that one!

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I had this exact conversation with one of my besties a while into sobriety, actually about other stuff not drinking. Who am I am without all this stuff? She said you’re just you. And it was exactly what I needed to hear!

So just be you, and don’t worry too much about trying to define yourself. None of us are all good all the time. Your true friends will be there with you whatever :sparkling_heart:

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Ugh I love that!! You’re exactly right. Good ftiends really know you better than you sometimes.

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