100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

[Lavande]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

:wd: Congrats on 150 AF days Myluck!
Life is better without AL!

Pav, I am only three hours ahead of you on the east coast here. Sometimes it does feel like a lot more. My brother lives out there & it's hard to know when to call. I usually just wait for him to call - once per year :H

[Byrdlady]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

MyLuck, your life won't be the only thing you are changing! Look what you get for 150 days!!!
:flyingunders:

This is the coveted Flying Undies Award!! Wow...what an outstanding job you have done around here! I am just thrilled for you! Isn't it a blessing NOT to have to fight it every single day??? That's what I preach around here, if folks would stick it out, then the day to day struggle would be gone! Poof! (like these undies!) Anyway, I am so proud of you! Stick around and let us hear what's going on, SpiderCat!

Pav, I felt the same way in the nest with Lav. Whenever she would recognize me I would just beam! Earning her praise was a big deal! (still is!) We are ALL this way, I think...approval is very important to us. Maybe I should do a poll on that! I am in sales, and I've had many bosses over the years. There are those who measure out praise as if they were charged by the ounce. There were those who went overboard (like where everyone on the team gets a ribbon, whether they tried or not). I had those (and I have one now) who points out everything I do wrong. It's nice to keep him busy!! Bwahahaha. But as adults, a little praise goes a long way....it comes less and less, too. I don't know why as we age we don't think that still matters...because it does.

I love the ethic blindness of this site, too. We have no idea what race or political leanings folks have around here, and unless it blows up, not a lot about their religious tendencies. We are all just folks fighting a common demon and that demon doesn't discriminate! Equal opportunity for all!

I was talking to Jane yesterday about this, she was saying that the MWO group isn't a bunch of folks living on the streets...we are educated and participating in society. We have computer skills and internet access. This disease certainly is blind when it comes to who it can affect. It literally can happen to anybody!!

Have a great day, everyone!!
TJ, thank you for getting this conversation started!! XXOO!! Byrdie

[NoSugar]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Byrdlady;1639782 wrote: the MWO group isn't a bunch of folks living on the streets...we are educated and participating in society. We have computer skills and internet access. This disease certainly is blind when it comes to who it can affect.

When I see the stereotypical "drunks" on TV shows and even sometimes in my relatively small city, it makes me think about how the people here are actually amazingly fortunate - even though it doesn't always feel that way. We get to anonymously participate in this forum and at least give ourselves a fighting chance of getting free. So many don't have that opportunity or even know that it exists. Whenever I get completely sick of the internet and being so connected, I stop and think about how I likely wouldn't have the life I have today if this technology hadn't been developed and become so widely accessible when it did. The old WWW actually is high up on my gratitude list.

[K9Lover]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

I'm here Pav! I check in on you guys regularly but still feel a bit embarrassed about my mishap on March 3rd. That date will resonate in my brain from now on. Ugh. Lav, you should really be glad I don't have your phone number, I would have interrupted your granny beauty rest! :H

I don't know if any of you have seen that show Mad Men, but boy does it glamourize drinking. It's set in the 60's so they always have a cocktail and cigarette in hand. They drink ALL day at work. They consider it a successful "meeting" if they've blacked out by the time it's over. It makes my liver hurt just watching that show (and lungs). And they are supposedly the "successful" business people. In reality, nobody could function with that quantity of poison in their blood all the time...but they don't show that. Even if they do wake up hungover, 5 minutes later they are all put together and fresh faced. WE know that's not how it is! Boy do we know.

[Pinecone]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Myluck, congratulations! I'm very happy for you.

[Sunbeam]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Great thoughts about all of us "different" people here. The Internet and this site have certainly been lifesavers for me.

[Lavande]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

I'll bet we all Googled 'how to stop drinking' & that's how we all got here!!!!

[Byrdlady]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Yep, that is exactly what I googled, Lav. That was a life changing day! B

[Myluck]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

All, Byrdlady, Lav, Pincone, k-9 lover. I am still beaming from your praise. Thank you. This means a lot to me. :h

[Pavati]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Way to go, MyLuck! I have been wondering about you. That is my codependent self - I worry when we stop hearing from people. So glad to see you at 150!

K9 - I wonder about that time because people did seem to drink more. One thing I was talking to my father in law about - beers were less than 4% alcohol, a martini was a shot (not three like now), wine glasses weren't goblets. I'm not excusing it, but he said the fact was people DID drink at lunch all the time (he's a journalist), and still got big things done. I guess the average life expectancy was a bit lower then...

[skullbabyland]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

About Mad Men- yeah everything K9 points out is true, but mostly in the first few seasons. In later seasons they progress into showing repercussions for heavy drinking. And they're pretty severe! Later in the series Don's behavior really catches up with him. I may be projecting my own relationship with drinking onto the show, but I wonder if they did it that way partly as a metaphor for how alcoholism is a progressive disease. It seems fun and awesome and we feel amazing and cool and glamorous when drinking in the early stages, but it progresses to a norm, a way of life, and then it progresses to heavy repurcussions that begin to unravel our lives. The show does definitely show you that side, but it makes you wait a while...

Pav- very interesting point about the different measurements back then... sounds like the same deal with weed. Both alcohol and weed are served in much higher potency nowadays. Though in Mad Men's characters case, they do WAY overdo their drinking, even with more rational measurments than we use today...

[K9Lover]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Skull- You are right about Mad Men, I am on the last season and Don is starting to take note of his drinking. There's even one character that peed his pants before a big presentation, then he passed out so they had to cover for him. Plus they all puff away on cigarettes non-stop. Like I said, watching that show makes my liver and lungs hurt! lol

And yes, I was led here when I wanted a magical answer from the Internet...and turns out I got it...who knew all of you lovely people were here? I'm thankful for it every day! :h

[Myluck]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Thanks Pavati for worrying about me. I was hanging out here in 100 dayers club

[Byrdlady]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Well the thing that got me about the Mad Men situation is that the one guy who peed his pants was ostracized for being an Alkie BY alkies!!! Just because they didn't pee their pants didn't make them any less of a alkie than he was, really. Then when the guy finally went to AA and got cleaned up, he still has a stigma attached and by Don and Pete and all of them who are drinking like fish! I think Don is coming to grips with the AL thing, it is starting to take away things...this part is very real (at least to me). First it takes a little something (maybe a deal you were working on) but you can ignore that. Then it takes away a co-worker, you can ignore that, too. Then it takes a little of your self-respect...still turning the other way. Then it takes all of your self respect...(I still don't have a problem)...then it starts taking away the possessions you have worked so hard to acquire....your job, your spouse, your THINGS.....This part of Mad Men is very real to me, because that's just how it happened...over several seasons! Until finally all there was was me and AL. Good ole AL. I HATE AL. I sure wish I had done this back in season 1 (10-15 years ago). It was the best thing I ever did....it's just sad that it came at such a high price, but I guess that's the way it works....otherwise we will just live with it. B

[Lavande]

100 Day Club members/Maintenance Thread

Never got into watching Mad Men. I had enough misery of my own

Quitting is the best thing we can do for ourselves & for those around us even if they don't appreciate our efforts
I am forever grateful for these past 5 years of clear headed living & thinking!!!!