Ready for a way out

[Coco-Nut]

Ready for a way out

Margaret345;845758 wrote: Thank you for the support!

Welcome! :welcome::welcome:

[JackieClaire]

Ready for a way out

:welcome: Margaret345,

Just adding my hellos. Glad you came back. If you get a bit confused, remember to shout out and ask any questions.

J x
:l

[mario]

Ready for a way out

Margaret345;846163 wrote: Thank you! The support I have found here in just 24 hours is so wonderful. I was happy to wake up this morning without a hangover. I know it's just one day, but it feels great to start on this AF journey. I'll be back this afternoon when the cravings kick in...

Just like to add my :welcome: margaret345This is a great community with lots of support and non judgemental advice

[Ringing Cedars]

Ready for a way out

Hi Margaret...I am pretty new here too as you may have read my official "STUMBLE" into the forum. There is lots of good information and support here. All the best to you.:welcome:

[Margaret345]

Ready for a way out

Just got into it with the hubby. He is without a job right now and we are together too much sometimes. I normally would start with the wine after a little fight, especially with the time of day (early afternoon) and it being a Friday. ugh! This is tough.

[Doggygirl]

Ready for a way out

Hi Margaret and :welcome:! If I can do this, I know that you can too. I was a daily drinker for over 30 years and so hopeless in the end that all I could see as a "solution" was suicide. Today I have an active and full and most importantly, a FREE life!!

If this were easy, there would be no need for My Way Out, AA, Rational Recovery, SMART Recovery, Alan Carr's Easy (hahaha) Way to Stop Drinking, Baclofen, The Sinclair Method, and on the list goes. Recovery is HARD WORK.

There is no magic pill or magic program that will make this like you never drank and will never think about AL again. Just doesn't exist - (even the meds have side affects!)

So....buckle you seat belt and get ready for a bumpy ride.

YOU ARE NOT ALONE. The great and awesome news is that all of us are just humans, just like you. If we can stay AF one day at a time until a lot of time has gone by, then so can you. If we can rebuild our lives, then so can you.

One of the first things we have to learn is to do something else other than turn to AL every time something that is uncomfortable occurs. (i.e. argument with spouse) Zillions of non-drinkers get through arguments with their spouses without AL every minute of every day. We can too.

Strength and hope,

DG

Saving Grace;845847 wrote: Welcome Margaret345,

I was so surprised when I came here. I was feeling absolute shame at being a woman with this problem. But I found as a woman I was not alone in this. The inspiring stories of women who have gone on with their lives AF without having to continually carry the horrible burden that comes with alcohol each day, night, week, month and even years. The shame we feel from alcohol and our behavior while drinking is possible to rise above and move on. It can be so freeing, a huge weight lifted from our shoulders.

We all support each other and want you to know it is possible to quit!

Saving Grace, what a superb post summarizing the discovery that we are not alone.

[hazeleyes]

Ready for a way out

Hi Margaret
Great that you recognise the trigger, now to take action and find a new way to handle your stress. Here's where you need to experiment with something that will work, take a quiet walk, lay on the bed for 10 mins close your eyes and let the stress pass, have a hot cup of tea or coffee, read some posts on here and help someone else...etc

You can find another way to handle the stress. You don't need AL, it is a trap to avoid in stressful situations.

Be strong, we are all with you
H

[hillsidetime]

Ready for a way out

Margaret345, welcome. The fact that you realise that it is time, is a great first step. The fact that you did not reach for wine after your tiff with your hubby, is also a great sign. Read and write lots here, there are so many awesome people available to give thoughts and advice. As you say, it is tough. If it wasn't, I like you, would have stopped drinking a long time ago. You can do it.
Hill

[KatieB]

Ready for a way out

Hi Margaret,

How are you going today? I also used to drink after a fight with my (now ex) hubby.. it doesn't help things at all - actually it used to be "ammo" for him to have a go at me even more! I hope you are doing ok..
Katie xx

[free at last]

Ready for a way out

Welcome Margaret,
I, too, am new to the site. Today is the start of my 5th day AF. Yesterday was tough, but I walked for several hours and went to bed early. The 30 AF challenge is keeping me motivated right now. Keep coming back to the site for inspiration.

[Guest]

Ready for a way out

This is an amazing group of men and women. As women we face such a social stigma that women alcoholics are low life's. I've been married to and dated successful men who were 'functional' alcoholics and behind closed doors they made their wife and families lives a living hell, but they were generally accepted by society. Women aren't.
I am amazed by how women here are beautiful, loving women from every walk of life, who unfortunately were born with the alcoholic gene. We aren't accepting of our drinking and punish ourselves unmercifully with guilt over how could we be this way!!
Every commercial on tv shows happy crowds of beautiful people celebrating every holiday with alcohol. Every romantic scene in a movie depicts couples toasting their love with wine and dinner out. We feel cheated, and isolated. We want the warm glow we remember alcohol being (at the beginning).
But it never shows the husband flirting with other women later in the night, or you crying in your drink or making a fool of yourself thinking you are so charming, or the divorce after the betrayal alcohol seems to allow some to participate in and then use alcohol as the excuse. Or the horrible fights that are instigated when drinking.
I was never the cheater, but every man I ever loved was.
I'm diverting ......what I am personally going through. I can't drink.

Again , I want the new women to know. We are good people who are, I believe, born with the inability to process alcohol 'normally'. We are here to help each other and in doing so save ourselves. It is the final acceptance we cannot drink.

Join us, we have lives possibly shattered by our drinking or a combination of family drinking. We understand! We want to help.

[Margaret345]

Ready for a way out

I dug up this old thread because after a rough summer of drinking a lot and hating myself every morning, I am back to swearing off alcohol. I am on day 5 AF and feeling better and stronger everyday. I even made a trip to Costco today without buying my usual huge stash of 1.5L bottles of chardonay. I had to head over to the alcohol section to get to the bread area and I kid you not I was salivating at the image of all the bottles of wine. I felt pathetic and told myself, "one day at a time. I just need to worry about today, getting through today without a drink. I can do this!" I felt stronger after that. I started the L-glut on Sunday and I think it is really helping. I am still waking up with headaches though...

Thank you to all that replied to me back in April. When I came here back then I was in denial about how big of a problem I had. I didn't think I was that bad off. lol I was so wrong!

[Popeye]

Ready for a way out

Hi Margaret,
Glad to have you back and I hope you can find what you're looking for.

[Doggygirl]

Ready for a way out

Welcome back Margaret! Boy, I can sure relate to that "I'm not so bad" thinking. Of course back in the day, I thought I was the only one thinking that. My wasn't I surprised when I found out that ALL of us think that at some point! :H

Anyway, I can also relate to the feelings you desribed in the ailes of Costco. I used to buy those HUGE bottles of vodka and boxes of wine at Sam's. :H Doesn't call my name any more. You will get there too.

DG

[Margaret345]

Ready for a way out

Doggygirl;969371 wrote: Anyway, I can also relate to the feelings you desribed in the ailes of Costco. I used to buy those HUGE bottles of vodka and boxes of wine at Sam's. :H Doesn't call my name any more. You will get there too.

DG

Thanks Paul and DG. I really appreciate you saying that above, that they don't call your name anymore. I am having MAJOR cravings right now. Luckily, no wine in the house. I know I can do this and I know it will be hard. I want to say I have a goal of 30 days but really I just want to make it through this evening.