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[JohnR]

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Murphyx;1079770 wrote: Speak for yourself. I'm vegetarian and I believe in cake.

:H

[Greg]

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Thanks again coalfire, interesting stuff. A doctor told me years ago that he regarded personality disorders as something that wouldn't likely be treatable within our lifetime. You hit a nail on the head by pointing out the need to accept such a disorder, which I have hated and resented all my life because of its prevention of me having a normal social life. It is indeed hard to be a shy man in most situations, especially dating...I used to sit in our local club hoping to break the ice with girls but probably only ended up making them think I'm a rude unsociable snob, weird loner, or gay guy!

I am thinking about creating a sort of 'outpatient rehab' for myself by driving to various meetings that are within an hour and a half of my home. Most are 12-step but I have found some much needed social contact in AA over the years. I would be honest about my situation to a degree, by admitting I still have issues with substances other than alcohol, but I wouldn't roll out the alcohol-substitute idea with them. I've heard that people have enough trouble trying to talk about baclofen at AA! I will check the holistic section too as suggested, and emotional freedom technique (new to me).

Like Tracy and bleep, I am also a deliberate loner a lot of the time. I'm not into hanging out with friends 24/7 like some of my friends want, and it annoys me when people expect this. The same goes for the work environment, and luckily my current job doesn't require a lot of socialising or office politics. I hate being forced into any situation that's outside my control basically, so I could add 'control freak' to my list of possible diagnoses! Thanks also for the social anxiety-baclofen link.

[JohnR]

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coalfire;1079782 wrote: This article deals with the whole issue of kava and liver damage. There are meetings taking place this year to try and have the kava ban lifted in various places.

This is not exactly what I was looking for but still worth a read:

Hepatocellular toxicity of kava leaf and root extract... [Phytomedicine. 2008]

[redhead77]

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My question is, what comes first the chicken or the egg? I know Greg, you stated that you have had social anxiety since your teens, so for you maybe it's always been there. How about you Tracy? I have recently become avoidant of people, after I started drinking. I am hiding from them, but have stopped liking being around people. That's interesting because I have always been extroverted, made friends easily, and needed people around me to feel whole. Although, I too Greg have always had anxiety in the dating scene. I don't know why, but those are the first times I would drink too much.

I wonder if drinking damages the part of our brain that helps us want to be sociable creatures?

The good news is, I feel that part of me coming back slowly. I kind of have to push it, make myself call people back, invite people over, or meet people out.

Sorry, I don't think this is nearly as profound as what you've all written. I am so spaced out at the moment on bac, but I really enjoyed reading it, and wanted to chime in.

[TracyA]

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Greg;1080396 wrote: It is indeed hard to be a shy man in most situations, especially dating...I used to sit in our local club hoping to break the ice with girls but probably only ended up making them think I'm a rude unsociable snob . . .

Isn't it odd that "quiet" translates as "snob"?

Great idea about designing your own outpatient rehab! I think AA can go a long way to providing a fairly safe place for social interaction. If you are done, you just leave. Definitely not a place to float the "alcohol substitute" idea. But, you've always got us for that.

From what I've seen, of my own experience and from the experience of others, "honest to a degree" is the way to go anyway. If someone becomes important enough that you want to share more, "more will be revealed." Otherwise, "need to know" ain't a bad way to go.

I was going to make a joke about not drinking the Kool-aid, but it's probably just as important to avoid the coffee. I don't know what it is about AA, but meetings consistently have the worst coffee on the planet! :yukko:

[TracyA]

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redhead77;1080400 wrote: I know Greg, you stated that you have had social anxiety since your teens, so for you maybe it's always been there. How about you Tracy?

Certainly by the seventh grade, I was feeling it very intensely. I was okay with my own established friends though. And dating . . . YIKES. I'm surprised my husband wanted anything to do with me. I was such a flake and such a fake.

I can do things like speak in front of groups, teach classes, that sort of thing. The first 60 seconds are hard, but it's easy after that. It's the forging a relationship stuff that I have little desire for.

I remember also feeling almost panicked if someone tall was standing behind me, even if it was someone whom I knew and liked. I was okay if they were where I could see them though. Who I found appealing had a lot to do with their height. The Tom Selleck types never did anything for me. But Michal J. Fox - :h I eventually outgrew that, but not until I was in my 30s. My husband is exactly one and half inches taller than me.

Maybe "social anxiety" isn't just one thing.

[Bruunhilde]

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TracyA;1080371 wrote: One of the reasons I left my job is because I just couldn't stand feeling manipulated, the gaminess, the backstabbing, the games that people play in the workplace. [] Anymore, that kind of stuff just sucks the life right outta me.

It's a two-part thing. Part one is that I'd always suspected that there were secret rules about getting along with people. I didn't understand the rules. When I finally got around to sussing out the rules, I realized that I don't want to deal with all that crap. If I can't be who I really am, what's the point of friendships?

Please, what ARE the fucking rules? I understand the survival instinct and that we all don't behave as angels all the time because self-preservation and insecurity sometimes rules the ego. However, I cannot understand creating a very personal, confiding, friendly and caring relationship and then completely trashing it when you change positions or workplaces and no longer "need" someone - so the message I receive is that this "friendship" was based on need and I will 110% ignore you forever more because that friend thing I played you with was FAKE. Oh that's so bad.

The fakeness and games dismay me, because many of my most important relationships came from places I worked, and we HELPED each other and came to love each other, with the best of intentions vs this gaming each other shit. We helped each other survive and succeed, through very tough times. When self-interest is the primary and constant driver, as in "games", all that is built through these experiences is not real. I think of team building exercises as a parallel, that's what life is, a team building or at least a self-building exercise and stepping on each other is not building a better self.

I believe we're here to learn and grow, that our lives have meanings we might not understand, but they're not meaningless - which is precisely how I felt much of my life. I've spent my adulthood searching for the 'meaning of life' because life seems like such a pointless shitty situation. Now I know, in my own heart, that there's a better reason for our interactions no matter where they take place, than climbing over the person in front of you so you can be the Golden Child at a party, at work, here, wherever.

Everyone, bleep, Coal, Red, John, Greg - your comments resonate with me, except I haven't yet figured out if I'm an extrovert or introvert, think I'm definitely the former but the booze and my insecurity due to screwing up social and work politics made me feel safer in my cave. I always laugh about the "man cave" because that's exactly what I feel like I need/have, and it does take me a week to appropriately process stuff, often. There's an interesting book I read about typing people "emotional" or "physical" and I felt like I was born one but all the pain forced me to change to the reverse mold, and thus I'm uncomfortable in my skin, after all these years, which is sad. And I'm one of those people, you may have noticed, that lets it all hang out, honesty is usually right there in all it's dirty shockingness.

Hope this makes sense. In my desperation tonight to remain sober and on the very difficult diet, I took 50 instead of 25mg of bac, and also four tablets of Lithium Orotate, the supplement. So I feel a bit less anxious (although I'm rocking in my chair as I type), I am worried about sleep apnea but hoping for the golden bac sleep instead. (That there was a confession). So it's appropriate that all my blathering is on the AL substitute thread, I suppose.

Okay, I'm going all over the map and I apologize, hopefully you just skimmed past most of the above. I'm going to bed to read about angels and ascended masters now as I aspire to more meaning.... and no, I'm not religious. Just reaching for more. Good night my friends!

:farmer:

p.s.
Tracy, I need to win the Lotto to quit work, and then just think how much fun philantrophy will be!!!

[bleep]

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Bruun, thinking of you in your quest tonight. Good luck friend. You have done it many times in the past.

[TracyA]

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Bruunhilde;1080426 wrote: Please, what ARE the fucking rules? I understand the survival instinct and that we all don't behave as angels all the time because self-preservation and insecurity sometimes rules the ego. However, I cannot understand creating a very personal, confiding, friendly and caring relationship and then completely trashing it when you change positions or workplaces and no longer "need" someone - so the message I receive is that this "friendship" was based on need and I will 110% ignore you forever more because that friend thing I played you with was FAKE. Oh that's so bad.
I so get that. I've got some stories like that myself. But these days, I'm the one most likely to leave. Trust is hard to come by, so making that emotional hook-up with people is very hard too.

It is bad. The accountant where my husband is employed was a trusted friend. Not like the kind heart-sharing friend, but someone we went golfing with, went rafting together, shared holidays work. My husband saw him all day long every work day. One day, my husband pulled in and there were police cars there. The accountant was being escorted out of the building because he had embezzled a few hundred thousand dollars. He wasn't surprised that he got caught. He wasn't embarrassed. He wasn't worried (and had covered his tracks well enough that he never got nailed criminally). He didn't care - we never knew him at all. Trying to trust people again . . . wow, it was really, really hard.


And I agree completely - it's got to be about more then just getting ahead. It's got to be more than a competition.

And I'm one of those people, you may have noticed, that lets it all hang out, honesty is usually right there in all it's dirty shockingness.
YES! And what's the point of having a relationship if you can't do that? That's the part I don't get.

So I feel a bit less anxious (although I'm rocking in my chair as I type),

I post here from a rocking chair, and outside my chair is a swing.

You don't have anything to apologize for. I hope you sleep well. I hope I get to sleep soon too!

p.s.
Tracy, I need to win the Lotto to quit work, and then just think how much fun philantrophy will be!!!

Wouldn't that be a blast? I am envious of Bill Gates for many reasons, but mostly because he gets to do exactly that. That would be a great life. :l

[coalfire]

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I have visitors coming so I am just going to rattle out a few lines.

There is a book on this called distancing by m kantor. Here is an interesting article which gives a negative review of the book and shows the authors very robust defense.

Review - Distancing - Personality Disorders

Bleep-it is possible to be an extroverted avoidant. Some avoidants are quite outgoing around people for short periods of time but scratch the surface and you will find an an avoidant feeling uncomfortable and planning his or her escape route.

Redhead I know what you mean about the chicken and the egg thing. I read somewhere that long term substance abuse can be a differential diagnosis for AVPD. I know that this wouldnt apply in situations like Gregs. There is more than a touch of me in this one.I dont believe that I am a true AVPD.Almost a decade of substance abuse has taught me how to do a hell of a good impression of one.My diagnosis of alcoholism devastated me. The grief,the stigma and the fear of inflicting my anti social drinking behaviour on others has led me to mimic many of the characteristics of someone with AVPD.They are fully ingrained in me now. Others have raised some interesting points here too. Laters.I have to pretend that my house is always clean for my visitors. Gotta fly.

[Kimberley]

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What an interesting turn this thread this has taken. Now I partly understand the whole point of the thread.

I did have social anxiety disorder - read DID - and there is no way on earth I would've stopped drinking at all if I hadn't found a solution to it. SAD was really the reason I started my all-day every day drinking. As part of my illness, I was agoraphobic and couldn't do anything where I considered people might be looking at me or judging me (shopping, eating in public, you name it). Ah, UNLESS I had a drink. Alcohol allowed me to function in day-to-day life. Without it I couldn't even leave the house because i was too scared.

This is why even though I was well aware I was an alkie, I was not prepared to stop drinking until i had a solution to this thing. After trying EVERYTHING under the sun I found it in an NLP Hypnotherapist - he also used EFT. Within 90 minutes I was as 'cured' as I'll ever be. I still get a little anxious with some situations, but NOTHING LIKE the crippling terror i expereinced on a daily basis before that. It was only at this point that I was willing to try and address my drinking.

I should mention I have also been disgnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder - and I believe that only now I have started to try and manage this can i ever be sure that long-term sobriety might be an option for me. Before i had kinda ignored my diagnosis just hoping it would go away! An incident renewed my interest in my diagnosis and I googled it constntly trying to find out as much as I could about it. Eventually I found that Dialectical behavioural therapy is supposed to work best to manage it (yes, untreatable as such), so I bought some self-help books and signed up to an online class via yahoo groups where you learn and do homework. I now also see a therapist, but there are free resources out there if you look hard enough for them.

I would never have tried to give up drinking without sorting out or managing the other things that were fundamentally wrong with me - no way. I would've been unable to function at all without some kind of bubble to cushion me a bit from the terror of everyday life.

But even though it took me years to find the right treatments and I despaired I ever would to be honest, I have found things that have worked. I hope you can too - and then it will be possible to consider a life with no intoxicants needed. I couldn't have considered that unless the other things were dealt with to some extent.

If anyone wants any more info, please just ask.
Good luck,
K x

[Greg]

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Personally, I think about various drugs because other ways of addressing problems haven't worked out very well. I believe this could be the case with two alcoholic friends of mine aswell, but it certainly doesn't apply to all alcoholics. That's why I think that controversial drug treatments (not meaning baclofen) should only ever be used by alcoholics who have tried all other treatments without success.

I'm interested in this therapy you are talking about, I'll check it out. I know some things besides medications would have to be helpful, I just haven't come across anything yet. I did try CBT with a couple of people around here but it didn't prove beneficial at the time.

Great to hear your story.

[coalfire]

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Bruunhilde;1080426 wrote: [SIZE=4]

Everyone, bleep, Coal, Red, John, Greg - your comments resonate with me, except I haven't yet figured out if I'm an extrovert or introvert, think I'm definitely the former but the booze and my insecurity due to screwing up social and work politics made me feel safer in my cave. I always laugh about the "man cave" because that's exactly what I feel like I need/have, and it does take me a week to appropriately process stuff, often. There's an interesting book I read about typing people "emotional" or "physical" and I felt like I was born one but all the pain forced me to change to the reverse mold, and thus I'm uncomfortable in my skin, after all these years, which is sad.confession).

Ditto.

[coalfire]

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redhead77;1080400 wrote: I have recently become avoidant of people, after I started drinking. I am hiding from them, but have stopped liking being around people. That's interesting because I have always been extroverted, made friends easily, and needed people around me to feel whole.

I wonder if drinking damages the part of our brain that helps us want to be sociable creatures?

The good news is, I feel that part of me coming back slowly. I kind of have to push it, make myself call people back, invite people over, or meet people out.

Double ditto.

[bleep]

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coalfire;1080517 wrote: ...

Bleep-it is possible to be an extroverted avoidant. Some avoidants are quite outgoing around people for short periods of time but scratch the surface and you will find an an avoidant feeling uncomfortable and planning his or her escape route.

...

VERY interesting, thanks. I'll have to look into this further.