I'm An Alcoholic

[InkaUtexas 25289]

9 minutes ago, Texzilla588 said:

This is the biggest issue for post rehab and the primary reason for going into sober living for awhile. Addicts who get sober who return to their drunken environment will usually relapse very quickly. That might be a crackhouse, or a mansion, or parents’ basement or working win a bunch of drinkers. Whatever it was you got to change it. And the biggest factor are people as you describe who want you to relapse to make their drinking problems less in comparison. Get a new social environment. And if family ain’t helping they’re hurting. Put a little cleavage there too.

Family has been great. Just starting to see it with the friends. My house is where they would come to watch a game and I would cook out. Last time got offered a few shots of bourbon, something I never really touched (beer wine dude). This was from someone who knows I stopped. Was odd. So sucks, BBQ's at my house have stopped. And I love cooking for people.

One issue that hinders things is wife has been deployed. She is a large part of my social outlet to go and do things not involving friends or bars. She is back this week after 9 months and I think that will help quite a bit.

 

[BurntEyes 5774]

Just want to express my gratitude for this thread. I don't share much but lurk fairly often. I'm grateful for the last couple of pages as it makes me aware of what an amazingly good post drinking situation I found myself in. 

I'm beyond grateful that I had such a huge surround support system that all were absolutely behind me getting sober. Massive, and I know with certainty I wouldn't have stayed sober with out them. 

Everyone on this thread is a part of that system, so thanks to all of you too for sharing and making me aware of how truly fortunate/blessed (if you prefer) I am in life. 

[Texzilla588 767]

Family has been great. Just starting to see it with the friends. My house is where they would come to watch a game and I would cook out. Last time got offered a few shots of bourbon, something I never really touched (beer wine dude). This was from someone who knows I stopped. Was odd. So sucks, BBQ's at my house have stopped. And I love cooking for people.
One issue that hinders things is wife has been deployed. She is a large part of my social outlet to go and do things not involving friends or bars. She is back this week after 9 months and I think that will help quite a bit.
 

Don’t let one asshole fuck up what you enjoy. Get your wife home and get some quality playtime. Then have cookouts inviting only friends and family you know for sure won’t be dicks. Malignant people deserve same fate in your life as a malignant tumor: cut it out, burn it, poison it. Cooking for folks sounds like it’s a love language for you; share it only with those that deserve it.

And thank you for your service in allowing your bride to serve (thanks to her as well of course). The families sacrifice much in deployments.

[InkaUtexas 25289]

49 minutes ago, Texzilla588 said:

Don’t let one asshole fuck up what you enjoy. Get your wife home and get some quality playtime. Then have cookouts inviting only friends and family you know for sure won’t be dicks. Malignant people deserve same fate in your life as a malignant tumor: cut it out, burn it, poison it. Cooking for folks sounds like it’s a love language for you; share it only with those that deserve it.

And thank you for your service in allowing your bride to serve (thanks to her as well of course). The families sacrifice much in deployments.

Her deployment is not military. State of Texas wildlife field biologist.

And I think my days of going to crappy places are over!

But I do agree. Military brat and yep, it is an interesting life.

 

 

[BearSchlong 8072]

Just want to express my gratitude for this thread. I don't share much but lurk fairly often. I'm grateful for the last couple of pages as it makes me aware of what an amazingly good post drinking situation I found myself in. 
I'm beyond grateful that I had such a huge surround support system that all were absolutely behind me getting sober. Massive, and I know with certainty I wouldn't have stayed sober with out them. 
Everyone on this thread is a part of that system, so thanks to all of you too for sharing and making me aware of how truly fortunate/blessed (if you prefer) I am in life. 

This.

The relapser I mentioned yesterday is a catholic Latino, and for some reason they no comprende “look Tio, I can’t drink”

What? Be a man and control it. It’s Easter and you’re breaking family tradition.

I can envision his male cousins insulting his manhood. Just chipping away at it. “You did an ACTS retreat so you should be good, homie.”

Culturally, it defies logic. And I’m sure that’s not the only ethnic group with similar beliefs.


FFS.

I have a wonderful extended family and if I even detected a HINT of skepticism or criticism I would explain myself and cut them off. My life means too much to me.

[InkaUtexas 25289]

1 minute ago, BearSchlong said:

This.

The relapser I mentioned yesterday is a catholic Latino, and for some reason they no comprende “look Tio, I can’t drink”

What? Be a man and control it. It’s Easter and you’re breaking family tradition.

Culturally, it defies logic. And I’m sure that’s not the only ethnic group with similar beliefs.


FFS.

I have a wonderful extended family and if I even detected a HINT of skepticism or criticism I would explain myself and cut them off. My life means too much to me.

it it very much cultural. To be a man you have to drink. It is not only them. I have seen it in many groups.

One thing that I noticed, and a great professor at UT's ILAS researched was if you wanted to be sober in Latin America, many went away from the Catholic church. AA was sponsored by the "evangelicos" so that is where they went.

[BearSchlong 8072]

Ironically, the AA meeting I (and my friend) attended was hosted at the Catholic Church and unofficially run by an old timer Irish Catholic from Boston who drank away his PGA tour career many decades ago.

[YGIFS 19447]

Yeah, on my mom's side (Hispanic), it's an unhealthy combination of cultural plus deflection when it came to pressuring one another to keep drinking.  My mom (who doesn't drink) just never realized it.  I didn't realize it until I was in my 30's.  She buried 3 brothers for whom alcohol played a large part as well as two nephews.  That was the cultural part.  The deflection part is she also didn't see the pattern in female family members.  2 nieces and almost her daughter (thank the Lord almost).  It's a big, big family (9 siblings, 23 cousins, 30+ next generation, etc.).  Most of them drink responsibly or not at all.  Thankfully, we are spread out all over the country so we're not constantly getting together to cause either stress/family induced binging or "it's tradition" type of pressure.  I'm kind of an outlier.  I certainly have the disease, but it wasn't really family influenced (kinda left the hive where most of 'em were when I went off to college).  I never felt the need to prove my manhood or overly-celebrate holidays.  It was ten years of just chemical conversation, "I don't like all this shit in my head at 4:00p, I want it to be midnight!  (poof!)"  

Speaking of my wife's family, they are staunch Midwestern Rural Catholics.  Some of them didn't know until I told them years ago at a holiday gathering that Jesus was a Jew.  And they also didn't realize there were a lot more alcoholics in their family than they cared to admit.  I knew of several of them, "A Fisherman Always Sees Another Fisherman from Afar" kinda thing.  But they're just now unpacking that from grandpa to two uncles to several cousins, lotta alcoholics around.  Hardest working and kindest people I'll ever know.  And for several of them, the thought process is simply, "I work hard, if I wanna kick back and imbibe...I'm gonna!"  Not my place to analyze, but I think many others noticed this trait in some of their kin but didn't really know what they were observing, just different.  So many of them for years would just not partake because (their line, not mine), "It's a waste of money.  You spend $20 on alcohol one night, and you got nothing to show for it in the morning."  Valid point, but I noticed when I offer you a beer or a glass of wine, you gladly take and enjoy it.  I think many of them saw what was going on around them growing up and figured that was a good way to softly deflect over-indulging.  

Just like recovery, the way we figure out the equation of why and how much we drank is unique.  But the chemical (both mental and physical) addiction remains the same.  Looking back, I'm glad I was not constantly berated by family to "just be a man, it's how our family has done it for years!"  I had enough excuses in my arsenal as it was.  And this late in life though, I still gotta deal with some relatives who think this is "just a phase."  Don't let it bother us, so long as they don't make a scene in front of your kids and strangers.  I'm starting to realize, not that I have it all figured it out yet, that yeah, It's projection about their own shit guised as "C'mon, this how our family celebrates!"  If it was a glass of champagne at graduation, or a glass of wine with dinner, or a beer by the grill.....that'd be just fine.  But it's not, our "family tradition" is to have that one celebratory drink, followed by 9 more. 

[TwiceHorn 31086]

On 7/30/2024 at 11:51 AM, TwiceHorn said:

True enough.  However, there are some that don't go to rehab exactly, completely willingly that do take to the solution.  I don't mean kicking and screaming, but at least somewhat reluctantly.

One of the more useful aspects of a rehab is that you are "on vacation," so there are fewer distractions and a decent part of it is exercises that help you come to believe that you are indeed powerless over alcohol and your life is unmanageable, because there are usually doubts about that, even among the willing.

It's not something that can't be accomplished outside rehab, but it does require meaningful AA attendance and sponsorship.  

For some reason, I feel I should elaborate on this.  When I first was urged to stop, I went to a short outpatient, but all-day thing.  A part of me knew I wanted to stop, but another part of me wanted to keep drinking, maybe on a more controlled level.  I lasted about six months, maybe nine.

It was an extremely conflicted time.  I knew, pretty well, what I needed to do, but I just fuckin didn't want to do it.

After my relapse, which was quick, but very dirty, I went to a 30-day inpatient.  It was at Charter of all places, before it went busto.  I got the medical director for a psychiatrist and he was a good therapist in addition to physician.  RIP Dr. Nace, you saved my life. https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/coppell-tx/edgar-nace-11474344

More than teaching me anything new, going back through rehab and the experience of the relapse made me willing to do the deal.  There's definitely an advantage to being stuck in it and hammered with it for 30-60-90 days.

So, I think once someone takes a pass through rehab, they know what they need to do.  Whether they do it or not is another question, but I think it nags.  And they tend to know that the solution is right there at AA, with regular attendance and sponsorship and actual interaction with that sponsor and working the steps.  So, that's mostly what there is left to do.

[TwiceHorn 31086]

On 7/30/2024 at 5:57 PM, Texzilla588 said:

This is the biggest issue for post rehab and the primary reason for going into sober living for awhile. Addicts who get sober who return to their drunken environment will usually relapse very quickly. That might be a crackhouse, or a mansion, or parents’ basement or working win a bunch of drinkers. Whatever it was you got to change it. And the biggest factor are people as you describe who want you to relapse to make their drinking problems less in comparison. Get a new social environment. And if family ain’t helping they’re hurting. Put a little cleavage there too.

I will differ some about returning to the old environment in terms of drinkers.  Some people have trouble putting recovery principles into practice in daily life, with all of the various stressors, including, but not limited to, other drunks.  So, they relapse early and often and the relapses seem not to make a lasting impact.

Sober living helps with that because you come home to other people trying to do the same thing until it becomes habit and lifestyle.

Most people can remove themselves fairly easily from the total alcoholic culture, but not everyone.  But, often as not, it's actually something else that causes the relapse.

 

[TwiceHorn 31086]

5 hours ago, BearSchlong said:

Ironically, the AA meeting I (and my friend) attended was hosted at the Catholic Church and unofficially run by an old timer Irish Catholic from Boston who drank away his PGA tour career many decades ago.

I have little doubt that what Inka says is true, particularly among Latin catlicks.  But the RCC has a pretty long history of support and allyship with AA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Dowling_(priest)

The Fr. Martin vids are a good resource for understanding drunks and whether you might be one.

Edited August 1 by TwiceHorn

[BearSchlong 8072]

Oh I love those old timers. The first 10 years of the Lakeside conference featured those guys. Here’s a list - https://lakesideconference.org/past_speakers.php

Lots of fathers and reverends until 1970 when Chuck C. Showed up.

(Also, registration is open and as the resident board member I’d be remiss if I didn’t invite you all to the 2nd oldest AA conference in existence.)


The godfather of AA in Beaumont is an Irish Catholic, sober since 1974, a scion of Spindletop.

Closely followed by an Italian Boston Catholic (I inadvertently classified him as Irish in a previous post).

The great godfather of AA hereabouts is a Puerto Rican by way of Long Island who actually got sober in 1972.

[BottleRocket 644]

On 7/31/2024 at 8:32 PM, TwiceHorn said:

 

So, I think once someone takes a pass through rehab, they know what they need to do.  Whether they do it or not is another question, but I think it nags.  And they tend to know that the solution is right there at AA, with regular attendance and sponsorship and actual interaction with that sponsor and working the steps.  So, that's mostly what there is left to do.

This reminds me of one of the funniest things I heard in a meeting.  This guy that had one foot in and one foot out said (rather seriously) "Nothing fucks with your drinking more than AA." 

[ztejas 43193]

I need some fuckin help, y'all. Missed 3 days of work last week. Lost my job. Bought $200 worth of blow last night. 

I just have no fucking idea what I'm doing with my life. I don't think the job that I had was my purpose but it was a decent job and I had health insurance and now I feel like I'm just floating aimlessly. 

[ztejas 43193]

On 8/4/2024 at 10:01 AM, BottleRocket said:

This reminds me of one of the funniest things I heard in a meeting.  This guy that had one foot in and one foot out said (rather seriously) "Nothing fucks with your drinking more than AA." 

Maybe my favorite line ever from an AA meeting was a middle-aged white lady who was giving her credentials and said "I'm not here because I spilled some sherry at a garden party".

[YGIFS 19447]

16 minutes ago, ztejas said:

I need some fuckin help, y'all. Missed 3 days of work last week. Lost my job. Bought $200 worth of blow last night. 

I just have no fucking idea what I'm doing with my life. I don't think the job that I had was my purpose but it was a decent job and I had health insurance and now I feel like I'm just floating aimlessly. 

Are you going through withdrawals right now?  Or still drunk/high?  Or just hungover and regret seeping in?  First things first, physiology.  Make sure your body is not gonna freak the fuck out on you (sorry to sound alarmist).  If you can drive, go buy a BP monitor, a thermometer, and one of those little deals for your finder that measures the oxygen in your blood (~95+).  Start taking B-complex vitamins to help with the shakes/nerves.  DO NOT TAKE TYLENOL!  If you have a bad headache, cold or hot compress over the eyes, no blue lights, and just ride it out.  Call or meet a friend sometime today to talk it out after that, preferably with some food.

After 24-48 hours if you're feeling okay physically, get to a meeting and go from there.  I think most would agree, make sure your withdrawals don't need/need a hospital visit (no shame in it, they get several of these per day)  Or on a weekend, and Emergent Care Clinic.  There's an OTC diuretic (Diurex).  Take as directed.    It won't make the ride down the cheese-grater any less painful, but it'll speed it up a bit.  As you probably know from this thread, AA not its members (even those that are health care providers themselves) do not provide medical advice.  I don't either, but these are just basic steps condensed from a dozen legit med sites (webmd, Mayo, Cleveland Clinic, NIH, et. al.).  You gotta see where your body is at TODAY, and monitor everything for the next 24-72 hours like a hawk.  Have somebody else with you if possible.  

And then the real work begins.  

[ztejas 43193]

8 minutes ago, YGIFS said:

Are you going through withdrawals right now?  Or still drunk/high?  Or just hungover and regret seeping in?  First things first, physiology.  Make sure your body is not gonna freak the fuck out on you (sorry to sound alarmist).  If you can drive, go buy a BP monitor, a thermometer, and one of those little deals for your finder that measures the oxygen in your blood (~95+).  Start taking B-complex vitamins to help with the shakes/nerves.  DO NOT TAKE TYLENOL!  If you have a bad headache, cold or hot compress over the eyes, no blue lights, and just ride it out.  Call or meet a friend sometime today to talk it out after that, preferably with some food.

I'm not that type of alcoholic. Never been a drink hard everyday/go through withdrawals drinker. 

But thanks anyway.

[TwiceHorn 31086]

2 hours ago, YGIFS said:

Are you going through withdrawals right now?  Or still drunk/high?  Or just hungover and regret seeping in?  First things first, physiology.  Make sure your body is not gonna freak the fuck out on you (sorry to sound alarmist).  If you can drive, go buy a BP monitor, a thermometer, and one of those little deals for your finder that measures the oxygen in your blood (~95+).  Start taking B-complex vitamins to help with the shakes/nerves.  DO NOT TAKE TYLENOL!  If you have a bad headache, cold or hot compress over the eyes, no blue lights, and just ride it out.  Call or meet a friend sometime today to talk it out after that, preferably with some food.

After 24-48 hours if you're feeling okay physically, get to a meeting and go from there.  I think most would agree, make sure your withdrawals don't need/need a hospital visit (no shame in it, they get several of these per day)  Or on a weekend, and Emergent Care Clinic.  There's an OTC diuretic (Diurex).  Take as directed.    It won't make the ride down the cheese-grater any less painful, but it'll speed it up a bit.  As you probably know from this thread, AA not its members (even those that are health care providers themselves) do not provide medical advice.  I don't either, but these are just basic steps condensed from a dozen legit med sites (webmd, Mayo, Cleveland Clinic, NIH, et. al.).  You gotta see where your body is at TODAY, and monitor everything for the next 24-72 hours like a hawk.  Have somebody else with you if possible.  

And then the real work begins.  

Pretty good advice.  

How much have you been drinking lately?  If missing three days of work, sounds like a lot, so doing a supervised detox is probably highly advisable.

Also, real talk, this stuff about not knowing what you're doing with your life or the job not being "your calling" is all rationalization bullshit.  You got shitcanned because your substance use is out of control.

You are powerless and your life has become unmanageable.  That's all that matters at this point.  Internalize it.

ETA:  If it's not apparent, I'm not trying to be a dick here.  Even if I am being a dick, it's the best kind of dick as far as intentions go.  Sometimes It's just necessary.

 

Edited August 10 by TwiceHorn

[Basil 742]

I'm not that type of alcoholic. Never been a drink hard everyday/go through withdrawals drinker. 
But thanks anyway.

Sounds like you’re in a fucked up place and need an off ramp. Off ramps are all over the place but you have to be willing and wanting to take it. I spent about ten years driving by them. There’s no magic formula - you’re going to need to get outside your comfort zone.

I feared these worst and thought life was going to be really boring. But I went to my doc. He gave me some meds and the transition was relatively smooth. And after a couple of months some really amazing shit happened inside my head. 10/10 would totally recommend.

[Harrison Stafford 3323]

On 5/22/2024 at 3:54 PM, Harrison Stafford said:

I’ve been drinking a lot on top of taking Lunesta and that combination put me in the ER Saturday morning as I was unresponsive when my wife tried to wake me. So, per the ER doctor and my PCP no more sleeping pills and no more alcohol. I’ve used alcohol as a crutch to deal with chronic pain and as a sedative allowing me to sleep. Then, I’d wake up in the middle of the night, unable to get back to sleep unless I drank more.  My blood alcohol level in the ER was .345.   Something like this had to happen forcing me to modify my behavior, so I don’t wake up dead.  My blood alcohol level in the ER was .345.  I knew this day of reckoning would come.  I’m just glad I’m alive to see it.

It’s been close to three months since I ended up in the ER.  Have had no Lunesta since that time.  For the first two weeks following the ER visit, I had nothing to drink.  Then, I went back to the bottle.  Alcohol has been a way for me to deal with chronic pain for decades….numbing me enough to sleep at night.  Now,  without access to sleeping pills and refusing to consider opioids, alcohol seemed my only option.  Then, my doctor prescribed Duloxetine (a non-opioid) a week ago and I haven’t had a drink since.  The Duloxetine helps mightily enabling me go to sleep and helping with the pain.  Today was huge as my wife took a day trip out of town and I didn’t drink in her absence.  So far, so good.  

[UpperWestside 6081]

On 8/1/2024 at 11:33 PM, BearSchlong said:

The great godfather of AA hereabouts is a Puerto Rican by way of Long Island who actually got sober in 1972.

I just want to say that I am not certain that there is an area of the country that drinks more per person than Long Island. Those folks put that stuff away like Russians with government vodka. I worked out there in some restaurants and they will just drink and drink and drink like no one I’ve ever seen. 

[Celery Man 20832]

On 8/10/2024 at 11:47 AM, ztejas said:

I need some fuckin help, y'all. Missed 3 days of work last week. Lost my job. Bought $200 worth of blow last night. 

I just have no fucking idea what I'm doing with my life. I don't think the job that I had was my purpose but it was a decent job and I had health insurance and now I feel like I'm just floating aimlessly. 

I missed this. Quoting so maybe you'll see it. You need to do the fucking thing, man.

You're floating aimlessly because you're fucked up on substances and nobody can really aim all that well when they're fucked up on substances.

I'd love to talk at length about the purpose thing but really - there's no purpose dude. As a homo sapien your purpose is to get loved, make more, try and stay alive. As a tiny little speck of dust in the galaxy, if you think that there is a special purpose with your name stamped on it, you really shouldn't have any issue with the whole God thing in AA just so long as you can admit you ain't him. As someone who dreamed of being a rockstar and then wasn't, I'll tell you that the trap is not knowing what your new dream is and so doing nothing at all. Pay less attention to the destination and make sure you're going on a journey - move your feet, take the fork, keep moving, you'll get somewhere worthwhile. But not if you're all fucked up.

I'm spoilering the next bit because it's just a tired crazy longcat thing, like some guy giving a talk at a meeting with no prep or even narrative planned. I probably shouldn't even post it, I'm just kinda letting it out. 

Spoiler

I've had a rough... I don't know how long, it's been a hard fucking year, I don't know how long I've been this tired. For sure since 12/10. I had just bathed the 2 year old daughter and put her to bed, I was putting her bike together to get that "before christmas/before the new baby" thing off the list, I was going to sit on the couch for an hour watching old episodes of The Office and not responding to external stimuli. I finished the bike, checked the monitor, daughter was up, I go to see what was happening, and she had thrown up in bed. Fuck, so now the wife is helping bathe her and I'm changing sheets and throwing the old sheets in the wash, and then I'm putting her back down to sleep, and I'm going into the bedroom thinking I can lay down in bed and still just turn off for a minute and watch an episode of the office before I have to go to sleep, and then my wife says that she thinks her water broke and it's just been grueling ever since then. Obviously two little kids is tough, but we miscalculated having two kids with our work obligations in a way where it was just a beating until we finally made the choice for the wife to work full time and the kids to do full time daycare.

I don't think I ever managed to watch an episode of the office. I think I could count on one hand the number of breaks I've had for longer than 2 hours since then - in June I was really excited because I had a work trip to Minneapolis and I couldn't wait to put on noise cancelling headphones and just spend some hours moving my body around an airport or sitting in a tube staring straight ahead where nobody would ask me to do anything. But on the last day of the trip, when I was trying to track down my new boss at this industry conference because our company had just gone through a merger and our group had been moved to a new org and the old director of that org who I had a great relationship with had been shitcanned and I *knew* that this new lady had no idea what the fuck my team was about and that I had to make her understand and where the fuck is she she's supposed to be here I've been trying to find her all week - my phone rang and it was her definitely not at the conference, definitely back at headquarters informing me that cuts were being made and my team was part of those cuts.

And so instead of sitting peacefully in an airport on my way back home to my life's new structure where my wife had just started full time work for lots and lots more money and we had another $3k/mo in daycare bills but it didn't matter because now we have two incomes and can maybe start to feel something like wealthy or at least what upper middle class is supposed to feel like... instead of that, crisis, sickness in the stomach, job market is shit specifically people in my position are not getting hired all the fucking FAANG people have been laid off and are slumming it down here with the rest of us schlubs taking our jobs what am I going to do.

The industry conference I had attended was at the convention center in Minneapolis. I was staying at whatever the shittier Hyatt is - Hyatt Place or something. A little bit of a walk. I got laid off at the convention center. I had The Replacements pulled up on my spotify all week because Minneapolis. I'm just fucking walking back to the hotel, fired, listening to Skyway on my airpods, thinking what the fuck am I going to do. Or even more than that, holy shit I am so tired and i have to do a job search now and it's going to take months.

And I've just kept listening to The Replacements and especially Skyway. It wasn't a special song to me before, but now it's kinda burned in there. I have something of a relationship with The Replacements and especially Bob Stinson. I love alcoholic musicians who died sadly. I was a drunk guitar player who got kicked out of a hard drinking band for drinking too hard, I could have died at 35 or however old he was. And I've just been kinda sitting with that soundtrack as I continue moving onward through the fog despite having no energy reserves whatsoever. I think there's some low key emotional work happening back there in the quiet parts of my brain beyond the fact that I was just in Minneapolis when this latest professional crisis happened.

It sucks being out of work and yet not being able to relax even a little bit. It used to be I had a trick, I would wake up feeling overwhelming anxiety every single day and I could do a thing and after a while I wouldn't care anymore and I'd feel relaxed or even good. But honestly, it never even occurred to me to pick up a bottle.

But, anyways - things have gone better than I expected, I accepted an offer that'll be a decent bump and move me into an industry I'm more interested in and have a lot more opportunities, and with an office right near the little guy's daycare. I like the hiring manager a lot, and his boss was super impressed with my interview which I think is a good starting point. I'm almost out of the woods, just went and pissed in a cup yesterday and found someone to cover a hole in our daycare schedule today. I got laid off in 2020 as well and was not having an easy time getting interviews or moving past initial rounds - i had way better luck this time hitting on like 10% of my applications and not having any disastrous screens or interviews at all. I'm almost on firm ground, I should be coming out of this more confident that I can be who I've been pretending to be this whole time. My severance basically amounted to what I would have been paid since June so we really almost didn't take a financial hit. I didn't have to pull the little guy from daycare which I really didn't want to do. And I'm trying to unclench a bit, but I'm not quite getting there yet. And just like my wife's water breaking when I was going to sit down and watch The Office - I got the offer right before both kids' daycares were closed for a week. So as the unemployed parent I've spent the past week trying to occupy and entertain a 3 year old and 1 year old while not losing my mind, instead of finally kicking back and letting out a huge sigh and allowing myself to feel calm.

Anyways, my wife is tired of listening to me talk and I just wanted to say all of these words to someone somewhere. Someday soon I'll feel rested. Wouldn't change a thing, I'm sure one day I'll look back and etc, I did have a special week with the 3 year old really, but still - I just need to remember how to relax.

thanks for attending my bad AA speaker Ted Talk. If you follow these steps, you too can someday be this exhausted while also being sober.

 

[JohnnyRage 1617]

I listened and heard you.

[MinerProphet 71]

On 8/10/2024 at 10:47 AM, ztejas said:

I need some fuckin help, y'all. Missed 3 days of work last week. Lost my job. Bought $200 worth of blow last night. 

I just have no fucking idea what I'm doing with my life. I don't think the job that I had was my purpose but it was a decent job and I had health insurance and now I feel like I'm just floating aimlessly. 

Hope you are doing better, 9 days later.

I can relate.

[huge 3787]

On 8/13/2024 at 12:11 AM, UpperWestside said:

I just want to say that I am not certain that there is an area of the country that drinks more per person than Long Island. Those folks put that stuff away like Russians with government vodka. I worked out there in some restaurants and they will just drink and drink and drink like no one I’ve ever seen. 

Apparently Wisconsin makes everywhere else blush, if the staggering numbers are to be believed.

[UpperWestside 6081]

2 hours ago, huge said:

Apparently Wisconsin makes everywhere else blush, if the staggering numbers are to be believed.

I have heard before of how heavily folks in that area can drink as well. I have never been there and seen it, but no reason to doubt it, especially with schools like Wisconsin-Madison that is a known party school. I worry for young adults in places like that because it can start a lifelong dependence upon the effects that alcohol give that seem so good at the time, but always later prove to be so disastrous.

[BearSchlong 8072]

Woke up this morning with unlimited options and absolute freedom.

I have a day to myself before getting back on a plane and going to work.

Decided to attend a morning meeting, where I saw a dozen people with around 40 years continuous sobriety that helped me get sober back in 2011, sprinkled in with a few newcomers. Old habits die hard - I remember my first weeks of sobriety when this guy would walk into the meeting and share his quiet, calm confident demeanor and I would immediately think “thank goodness this guy showed up, we finally have some adult supervision in the room.” He showed up today and that popped into my mind, and my hope is that 20 years from now I have the same reaction.

For anyone struggling, we really are here to help - because though it’s been a while since I had a morning like yours, I’m not immune to ending up right back in that place.

I’m going to go eat an omelette, take a boat ride, catch a redfish, take a nap, and pack for my trip. Hope y’all have a swell day.

[Brisketexan 104227]

Thinking about all of you fellas in the struggle.  Those of you doing the work.  Those of you starting the work.  Those of you who need to re-start the work.  Those of you who are deep in the shit.

I'm not one of you.  But we're all in this together, and nobody gets out alive. And giving a shit about each other is about the most meaningful thing I can keep of doing.

Your importance -- your significance AND your insignificance -- are the same thing.  It's kind of breathtaking when you grab onto it.  My wife and I were just on a small island off the Scottish coast, Iona.  It's an important spot in early Christendom, and it remains a site of pilgrimage.  But its significance transcends the relatively recent imprint of modern religion.  It is a rock, and it is one of the oldest exposed rocks in the world.  Through interesting geology and plate movements, older rock has ended up on top of younger rock in western Scotland.  The rock of Iona, including a green marble unique to the area, is 2.7 billion years old.  My wife and I talked about walking on those rocks as we wandered most of the coast of the island (like I said, it's small).  When our feet touched them, those rocks were 2.7 billion years old.  They are coalesced stardust of our universe.  You cannot tell the story of the universe without telling the story of those rocks.  And without telling the story of the time they spent on earth, including the time they spent as a small Scottish island.  And without telling of the time - a few moments as it may have been - that the feet of Brisketexan and his wife walked across them.

This universe is made of two trillion galaxies.  Not stars, galaxies.  But you cannot tell the story of the universe without telling the story of every speck of stardust in it.  And for some of those specks, that story includes the time they spent being you.  Or the time they spent being someone else, impacted by you.  Are you a mathematically meaningless speck in an incomprehensibly vast and ancient universe?  Absolutely.  Yet....if one tries to tell the story of this universe, the whole story, and they leave out the part where some of that stardust was you, can that person say they have truly told the whole story of the universe?  Nope.

The fact that you mean nothing to the universe, yet the universe wouldn't be what it is without you, are both true facts.  Put your feet on the stones.  Know that you matter.  To yourself.  To some person.  For a moment.  Even if just for a moment.  And know that is everything.

Sorry, I know some of y'all are in the shit right now, and it's got me a bit unsteady.

[Harrison Stafford 3323]

I started drinking again 10 days ago.  Fucking chronic pain.  Was struggling and pretty damned desperate.  When I posted about ending up in the ER due to a combination of sleeping pills and mucho whiskey, both @BearSchlong and @pch said I could message them if I needed help….and I needed help.  Theirs was not an idle offer. Within a day, I’d established a separate relationship with each of these gentlemen.  They shared their experiences, made some absolutely brilliant suggestions to help me get on the path to sobriety, and followed up to check on my progress.  In the middle of this, my wife (who thought I had quit drinking) found my bottle of whiskey.  Instead of kicking me to the curb, which I deserved, she said, “What do we need to do to fix this?”.  I sweater gawd, I won the wife lottery.  My wife knows I’ve reached out to people on Surly and she’s all for it.  If you’re in a bad place because of your alcohol consumption, there are people on this thread who can help you and >want< to help you.  I thought I could beat this by myself and I was wrong.  But, I/WE will beat this!  Now, I’m 5 days sober.  It’s a start.

[Macanudo 12917]

Went to Dallas for a work thing this week.  On Wednesday we went out to dinner.   Our group met up with some other company employees for drinks then moved on to dinner (Mister Charles in Highland Park, and it was fucking fantastic.)  Another guy in the group and I were the sparkling water drinkers.  The booze flowed for the others and I have to admit, I was a tid bit tempted to order something to "fit in."   At dinner, someone asked me about not drinking and I straight up told her that I quit because my drinking had gotten out of control.  That actually felt good to say out loud in that kind of setting.   This is another of those drinking situations from the past where I would have paced myself and kept the drinking to "acceptable" amounts.  But not drinking socially has been one of the most challenging for me.  

After dinner, some of them met up with different work group for drinks at another place.   2 of us (the other sparkling water drinker) went back to the hotel.   I kind of felt like a party pooper but then again, I was in bed getting a good (sober) night's sleep while the others got back almost 2 hours after I had fallen asleep.   I had some work to do as well so knocking that out and not being up late was worth it.  The next morning, the others were all worn out while I was feeling pretty good.  If I had gone out with them, there was a pretty good chance that I would have come back to the hotel for a couple of drinks by myself to finish out the night.  

I'll be traveling for my job off and on so working in this environment will keep up.   But fucking-a was it great to wake up on Thursday morning knowing that I'd made it through another challenge.  

[Basil 742]

Good job. Nice dinners, vacations and football games are the times where I think, “hey, I need to get me some of that.”

[BearSchlong 8072]

I have zero problem buying clients $1k in bespoke bourbon pours, as long as they keep my topo chico topped off.

[Macanudo 12917]

12 hours ago, Basil said:

Good job. Nice dinners, vacations and football games are the times where I think, “hey, I need to get me some of that.”

The funny part is that I watched a shit ton of CFB yesterday and drinking never crossed my mind.  Used to be that Saturday was easily a 6-8 drink day.  

[TwiceHorn 31086]

11 minutes ago, Macanudo said:

Saturday was easily a 6-8 drink day.  

Piker.

[Macanudo 12917]

2 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

Piker.

I was being modest.  I'm mean, it's not like I had a "real" problem like all you other drunks.  

[Celery Man 20832]

a thing that sucks about sobriety is losing people. you inevitably get to know and care about a lot of people that die for one reason or another. and a lot of times there's a bit of mystery around it - I don't know what happened with YGIFS, I'm in shock at the other post from brisket in this forum, I don't care to speculate but it's not unusual as a sober person to sit and take it in that somebody is gone and have to choose not to speculate. fuck.

[BearSchlong 8072]

Yeah, brisket just texted me with the news. It really sucks. I always wanted to get to know that guy in real life.

[BearSchlong 8072]

Unsure if it was related to his alcoholism, but last week he was septic, in ICU, waiting for a liver and kidney transplant. I had a gut feeling something was very wrong since his last post was 8/18. At my urging, Brisket contacted his wife and she shared the news. That’s all I know.

[Kennythetiger 9325]

1 hour ago, BearSchlong said:

Unsure if it was related to his alcoholism, but last week he was septic, in ICU, waiting for a liver and kidney transplant. I had a gut feeling something was very wrong since his last post was 8/18. At my urging, Brisket contacted his wife and she shared the news. That’s all I know.

His final post on this thread was to help someone else. 

[TwiceHorn 31086]

In a lot of ways, I had the impression that Lobo was the kind of person that would really take to the program of AA, being as service-oriented as he seemingly was, and apparently quite comfortable with "putting himself out there."

But, things are not always as they seem, especially with us.

I really hope he passed sober.  I think he would have wanted that.

Either way, we will miss you.  

[Celery Man 20832]

I kinda regret the post I made yesterday, which was an honest reflection on the familiar feeling in sobriety of someone dying way too young and not really getting the story, but also in its own way speculating about YGIFS, which is what I regret. It sounds like he went out fighting.

When he first popped into this thread it was a funny mix of feelings - on the one hand, most of us are egomaniacs on some level and that ten thousand percent clicked for me with him. Honestly it made me like him more - I didn't not like him before he started sharing in here, but when I realized that he was an egotistical asshole like me it turned that aspect of his style into a little bit of kinship. And then on the other hand, it's incredible that anyone could have been one of us and typed as many words as he typed without "slurring his words". Maybe I wasn't paying attention closely, but he never struck me as being a drunk poster.

I never caught up with him one on one - I feel bad, we had an interaction early on in his participation here where in this thread I brought up his behavior in another thread as being relevant to his journey here and he took offense. I leaned back at that point and I never really leaned back in. But I was paying attention, and man I thought he was in for a rough time with the "let go" "powerless" type stuff and was impressed with the progress it seemed like he made.

There's so much randomness and chaos all around us. It is tough to not try and understand why some people manage to escape the exploding death star and some just don't make it out. But it's fruitless to try and understand it. I'm so sad for those little girls, I'm so sad for him not getting to see the rest. A lot of sobriety was really clean for me when I was unattached, and having kids makes it hard. My heart breaks.

[BearSchlong 8072]

Good post. If anything, his death has me meditating on life’s fleeting temporary nature.

I’m sitting at the bar eating a pre-golf lunch and ran into a very close sober friend and her BIL who just informed me about their father’s death. This lady and I have been friends for over 50 years; I think if we held a high school election for “most likely to die young from internal demons” she and I would have topped the list. I have a vague recollection of a house party about 35 years ago where she and I “came to” on the floor next to each other and caught each other’s gaze and we both knew our settings were off.

Shortly thereafter I ended up in college, and she ended up in California with a needle in her arm.

It’s really nice that we saw each other today, clear eyed and sober. And that I was able to share my heartfelt condolences on her dad’s passing.

[RubyManJack 47]

R.I.P. my friend Lobo. I just found out. Didn't even know he was an alky. What I remember most was his interesting interpretations of Dostoevsky and his near photographic memory of Seinfeld. I can't help but wonder about that intersection right now.

[BearSchlong 8072]

I’m stepping away from all social media for a month to focus on some challenging professional tasks and opportunities that sobriety and my higher power have presented.

My “ism” includes a general internet dopamine addiction, and I want to see if I can put it down.

Those of you who have my personal info have my blessing to share it with any problem drinkers, as helping alcoholics remains paramount.

See y’all on Oct 9th.

[InkaUtexas 25289]

Yesterday was 6 months. Baby steps, I know.

Was odd going to watch a Texas game, being quite gruntled, and not reaching into the communal bucket of beer.

Bartender noticed this, next bucked had two ice cold topochicos.

Thanks again to all for the support.

[Kennythetiger 9325]

40 minutes ago, InkaUtexas said:

Yesterday was 6 months. Baby steps, I know.

Was odd going to watch a Texas game, being quite gruntled, and not reaching into the communal bucket of beer.

Bartender noticed this, next bucked had two ice cold topochicos.

Thanks again to all for the support.

Bartenders are great. 

[TwiceHorn 31086]

Gonna put this here instead of the other threads, but dammit, I miss YGIFS.  

[Kennythetiger 9325]

4 hours ago, TwiceHorn said:

Gonna put this here instead of the other threads, but dammit, I miss YGIFS.  

I never met El Diablo, but I miss him too. 

[MinerProphet 71]

On 8/10/2024 at 9:22 AM, ztejas said:

I'm not that type of alcoholic. Never been a drink hard everyday/go through withdrawals drinker. 

But thanks anyway.

Hey. How you doing?

[BearSchlong 8072]

I’m stepping away from all social media for a month to focus on some challenging professional tasks and opportunities that sobriety and my higher power have presented.

My “ism” includes a general internet dopamine addiction, and I want to see if I can put it down.

Those of you who have my personal info have my blessing to share it with any problem drinkers, as helping alcoholics remains paramount.

See y’all on Oct 9th.

Ok I lasted til the 4th.

Burying my wife’s mom tomorrow morning, she valiantly fought Glioblastoma for a year. That's some seriously bad cancer.

I had to miss my yearly 4 day AA retreat/conference but was blessed to be with her the last week of her life.

I hope I never again hear the guttural noise that my wife made when her mom shook off this mortal coil.

Anyway, I've got people descending on my house from all parts near and far but wanted to check in with my people. Still not going to be here daily as Ill be taking my wife on a leaf peeping cruise in Canada on Wednesday.

Hope you're all well.