Need help from LTA'ers

[Accountable for Me]

Hi LTAs. I am on day 47 and still feeling strong about the not drinking. However I have felt like a total mess emotionally the last couple of days. I spent most of my day today (on and off) just bawling my eyes out and cannot control it. I honestly don't believe it is because it is Valentines Day - never really was a big deal for me. Then last night when I went to bed, I had flashbacks of my last years while drinking, and realized how awful of a person I had become. (I remembered every little mean thing I have done). The drinking had turned me into a hard-shelled, angry person. I really hate this person I have turned out to be. I feel literally sick from all the memories. How does one deal with all of this emotional turmoil?? I have never killed anyone, or physically hurt anyone - but emotionally I have. I am having such a terrible time forgiving myself, and appreciating what I have now like sobriety, hope for the future, my beautiful daughter etc... I even had a few moments the last couple of days of suicide. No lie. I know I wouldn't do it.... just crossed my mind a couple of times. I couldn't do it - my daughter needs me. How come I am going through this huge surge of pain? :upset:

Any advice from any of you who have been through this would really, really help me. I need to understand what this is and if this is part of the healing process? I know we need to come to terms with our past in order to deal with the future. But I feel so emotionally spent right now.

Thanks for listening.

[SKendall]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hi Hilary,

Absolutely, I've done that. After you strip away the alcohol other issues begin to surface, and I think tears are the natural healer so that's a good start. Sometimes a feeling of wanting to die is simply a thought of not wanting to cope. Recognize the mood for what it is, it will make you feel horrible for a little while - not terminal and each time it comes back it will have less impact.

When we were active in our disease I don't imagine many of us were mentally healthy or sensitive to other's emotions. The only thing I take solace in now is the fact that I never have to be that way again and to repair the things that are important.

This is really the hard part of recovery but you will learn more about yourself through this phase, or at least I did. I can still cringe when I think about some things, but I just cringe and move on.

Lots of Luck and meditation.

Hilary:h

[xtexan]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hi AFM:

I can truly sympathize with what you are going through now. I know women are a bit different in the emotional recovery area than men, but the turmoil is just as difficult to weather.

I had great fits of anger and paranoia. Then pits of depression.

I think basically you are going through the throes of a bad depression episode, and this is quite common for anyone going through the longer-term abstinence. Every time I quit cigarettes for example, I had a terrible fit of depression. My doctor said this is quite common.

Alternating anger fits, and depressive suicidal thoughts, and then paranoid fits always hit me upside the head. I would think to myself, ?Geez! Here I have quit my drinking and smoking, and the first wave of good feelings would arrive. Then the descent into the pits of despair. The roller coaster ride of long term sobriety. Of course years and years of binge drinking did their damage to my nerves and brain, but there are helpers for you.

Supplements can help a bit. Try St. Johns Wort and SAM-e. I took 100mg doses of 5-HTP before bed also. The brain chemistry of the recovering drinker goes a bit ballistic in those first months. The supplements will help even out those agonizing spikes, but it won?t make them go away completely.

Are you exercising a bit? A 20 minute aerobic cardio helps with the pits in my case.

If it gets to where you know you need medical help, maybe a visit to the doctor is in order. A good one knows exactly what you are going through, and may prescribe an anti-depressant. I went this route several years ago myself, but I had kept on drinking during the therapy, and got worse. Now days, I am going non-prescription all the way.

It gets less intense for me as the months go by. Right now, I don?t have that much of any depression episodes anymore, but I?m still getting weird anxiety attacks at bizarre times. I try to control the anxiety fits with GABA, phenibut, and l-theanine which work well at shutting down my crazy thoughts. A good long session with my brain machine helps too.

It?s been over a year now, and I?m hanging in there. I can tell you that it is well worth it not to give in, because the healing to the body, mind, and soul are progressive and cumulative. I still need my helpers, but not in the frequency I used to need them.

The supplements are sort of like that numb stuff the dentist rubs on your gums before you get the needle. It helps a bit, but the needle stick still hurts. It just takes a bit of the edge off, if you know what I mean.

Sorry that you are feeling so down and bad. I?ve been there myself, and the main thing is that it will pass if you just hang in there.

Neil

[xtexan]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hi Kate!

It's good to get those different perspectives.

I often think that I kind of take the "engineering" and "mechanistic" approach to staying clean and sober. My background is that of the engineer and the technician. So I found that I had to capitilize on what I knew and did best. Only took me three decades to figure this one out.

You are right about embracing the emotional fires that flare. I tend to want to compartmentalize and categorize things. Analysis and synthesis.

The best thing is whatever works for you!! Find out what your particular strengths and talents are. Just like RJ is a good researcher, and developed MWO based on her findings, others may find a completely spiritual based recovery the best way to go for them. Whatever gets 'er done!

Being deeply depressed is about the worst thing there is that a human can experience. Anything we can find to get away from it (except booze of course) is fair game.

Neil

[dilayne]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hillary..the only way through all of the emotions and feelings is feeling them..try to be compassionate and non-judgemental..forgiving, if you will. Unacknowledged feelings can create a hard shell..acknowledging them and feeling them is one way for them to melt and for you to heal...Most people don't want to do that..it is scary, but it is more frightening to live in a shell..if you need some help..or a hand to hold..find one, there are many out there and here. It's a part of recovery, but people go through similar experiences as they transisiton from one phase of life to another..it is a part of the human condition. For some reason, I think that many of us think that we shouldn't have the feelings that we do...where did we ever get that. You are human, and you are going to be OK. Thanks for being here. I dont' know if anything I'm saying is relevant to you or not..if not, well, (((big hugs ))) to you anyway.
Namaste!
Dianne

[Accountable for Me]

Need help from LTA'ers

Thank you all for your words. You have brought so much to me with your own 'feelings and processes'. I cannot express enough how truly grateful I am.

I knew this was going to surface - all the garbage I had buried for years due to drinking. I am just simply horrored at the self-realizations of it. I was a terribly insensitive, super selfish person thanks to my old 'dear friend' alcohol.

I was flying so 'high' up until yesterday. It really hit me hard last night - remembering every single one of the horrible things I have said to people who have loved/love me the most. My brain would not let it stop (these memories) even when I tried to think of something else. It played out the last 6 years of my life up until now. Then of course I had this HUGE anxiety attack. Woke up this morning and the tears started to flow....

This, I am feeling is pure guilt, pain and sadness for those of whom I have lashed my vulgar tongue out at or those of whom I simply cut out of my life.

There is no way I will ever drink again.

This has been an ugly reality.

I am on St. John's Wort and doing very good with the supplements and stuff. I have looked for the HTP5 - can't find it anywhere, although MWO has it as I discovered on Monday. So that is good news. I am also guilty for not getting any exercise lately.

Thanks again everyone. I feel a bit better knowing this too shalll pass. This has been/is pretty brutal and I wouldn't wish it upon my worst enemy.

I commend you all for being so strong and fighting this evil thing we use to love - poison. :l :l

[irishlady]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hi Accountable,
My heart goes out to you at the moment, I can relate to much of what you say....I have suffered with depression several times over the last ten years or so and it is a horrible place to be.....

As we become successful at giving up drinking and we progress further along the path of sobriety, quite naturally, we start to feel proud of our achievements, happy with our new lives, at long last we feel we are getting to grips with this addiction....Yes, all those thoughts and feelings are real.... But, at the start of all this,when we stopped drinking, the toxins slowly started to leave our bodies...Now this was a physical thing and it manifested itself in a variety of ways, bad skin, spots, lanky and greasy hair etc...Well, I'm sure that as well as the physical toxins we also have emotional ones, and that is what is happening to you now...This will be a hard time for you, but don't try to supress these emotions, just let them out, and if you feel like bawling your eyes out several times a day, go right ahead...They say laughter is the best medicine, well, sometimes crying is just as good...

Right now I bet you feel as if you are in some very dark place, but the more you work through these memories and feelings the sooner you will be able to deal with them.....Just keep moving forward towards that light, and you will come out of this a much stronger person...

I wish you all the best,

Love and hugs from,
Louise xxx

[Accountable for Me]

Need help from LTA'ers

Thank you for your words too, Louise. The last couple of days have been a rollercoaster ride from H*ll. Now that I know I am not going completely mental and this is part of the healing process, I feel much better. It is sooooo good to have you all here. I cannot emphasize this enough. Sharing your experiences has really helped me. No straight jacket for me quite yet. LOL!

[capto]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hilary, Neil, Kate, Dianne, and Louise, you all are the reason I love this site. What wisdom, truth, and empathy in this exchange.

And Accountable, thank you for crying out and sparking this conversation. I feel you are going to do just fine. You can do this.

Capto

[mikeupnorth]

Need help from LTA'ers

Hi AFM,

There's not a whole lot I can add to the words of wisdom others have already shared here, but I can also relate to how you feel. There are things I've done while drinking that I can't take back, and can never make amends for.

Part of the process of recovery is recognizing the cycle of guilt, shame, and low self-esteem and how booze just perpetuated the cycle. When we were drinking, we kept the feelings buried deep, and kept ourselves numb whenever they tried to surface -- so it's natural to feel overwhelmed when we start to feel them in sobriety. But this is a normal and natural process... it just hits us a bit hard at first because we're out of practice with feeling and we have lots of 'garbage' to let out.

As others have said, do whatever you have to -- cry when you feel like it, go for a run or a bike ride to get the blood flowing, take the supplements etc. But I think you've done the most important thing you could do -- you reached out to others for help, rather than isolating yourself in your pain.

You're going to be just fine. And as you can see, we are all here for you.

Mike