AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

[ThreeDogNight]

Good morning, AbberDabbers!

Wow, it's kind of amazing to see all the new people here!! It is such a great place to come and be accountable and honest and get support. I know it has been a life saver for me.
Shue, where are you, girl? I am still keeping fingers crossed for the review on Monday.
Lav, LOVE the pic of the beautiful grandson! Must be so nice to be sober for all of his fun days! You are such a good grandma.
DG, Hope your dad will be okay. Glad you are back from the cruise for him.
Pap3--where are you?? Did you get much snow? How about you, Blondie? Woke up to a beautiful winter wonderland, but just about 3 inches, I'd say. I can enjoy it, because I know that it won't hang around long!!
It's our 23rd anniversary today, and Mr TDN wants to go to dinner tonight. I have gotten so comfortable just cooking here that it isn't even a big deal for me. And we are going to dinner at a friend's tomorrow for a birthday celebration and I'm loking forward to that. Have already told everybody that I am okay with them drinking around me. A few of them love good wine, and I am not tempted by it now.
My florist friend took it upon herself to call the hospital pharmacist the other day. He told her that I was at the top of his list, but he probably wouldn't be hiring until closer to summer!! HUH? Never told me that! He did say that the fact that I don't have a license didn't bother him at all. I also had a phone message from the jewelry/ art place I'd applied at. Very cheery voice telling me that they had SO many wonderful candidates and wanted to hire everyone--BUT they did hire somebody else. So I will just wait and see if anything else comes up.
WEll, hope everybody has a great AF day!! Hang in, all you newbies!

TDN

[BlondeAFAmbition]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

OOOP, cross thread 3 Dog...great minds think alike! I took the risk of posting thinking that prolly someone else is doing that very same thing this moment.

Hope you have a great day! Looks like a decent weather day in our neck of the woods...again. Enjoy!

[FlyAway]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Good morning!

Blonde I had to laugh when I saw 2 posts for today. Seems to be the way it goes around here. It's a good feeling waking up without a hangover. Have a great day at work.

Happy Anniversary TDN! And good luck on the job front.

I hope you all have a happy, blessed, and AF day!

[SAUSAGE]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Hi everyone on the AF Daily!
Thanks for the welcome and encouragement you gave me yesterday - coming on here and making myself accountable really helped and I completed my first AF day ina long while yesterday. It was great not to wake up feeling a bit rough and a bit dehydrated this morning.
Tonight is going to be a bit tough particularly as its Sat night, so I'll drop by again a bit later. One of my problems as well as getting into the routine of not drinking is to find a substitute drink - had ginger beer last night but am not mad on soft drinks. I used to drink an alcohol free beer in my dry spell before but can no longer do this as I can't have gluten.
Haves good AF day everyone. And I'll drop by again later.
Onwards and upwards with Day 2 xx

[shueaddict]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Quick post from the ski lift.

AF lunch, later AF apres ski.

FLY, so good to see you again.

Ta ta, gotta keep up with the kids, man, I swear they are getting faster each year.

Big hug from up high

[papmom3]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Hi All, I'm here but have stayed quiet for a few days trying to wrestle with some bad karma and feelings.

I want to give a great big warm :welcome: to all our new avatars/faces on this thread! I'm so glad you are here and looking forward to helping you in any way I can to stay on the light side and learn to love the AF way of life. Yes it is hard in the beginning for all the reasons you've all mentioned but how can anything bad come out of not pouring liters of poison down your throat every night??? Please don't be tempted to follow the siren of the beast-you'll just be on a sickening merry go round of numbness, illness, loathing and regret. Staying AF? No merry go round!!

TDN-no snow really yesterday. It swirled but didn't touch down. Then pouring rain all night. Now we have clouds, a tough of sun and HUGE winds!! I'm so glad I don't have any trees that could be a hazard left in my yard!! I used to be petrified to let the dogs out in winds like this convinced a branch would fall on one of them and kill them.

Lav-great pic from Longwood. Still on my bucketlist!!

DG-are you graduating this spring or fall?????? Has it really been 2 years already??? More pics please!

Blonde-Have fun at the store this weekend. I would dearly love to come up to see it this summer. I feel the need for a road trip to the sea.

I've had a rough couple of days of gloom and doom. The rising cost of gas and 100% increase in my satellite bill has me back underwater again with my budget just when I was breaking even. I'm panicking and now I have no more options. I already have a 2nd job, can't even think of giving up quilting or I'll go insane, can't give away the dogs or I'll kill myself and have no more time to earn anymore money. My brother isn't that busy and his friend is a nightmare to work with. I'll do the best I can but he is out there on pluto somewhere. Anyway, I know I will get through this as I always do but it got so bad this week that I actually ended up crying as I was confiding in my colleage. She is very concerned as no matter what has been going on in my life, no matter how bad, I've never broken down. I'm just so tired now and feel like I have no fight left. Physically I feel the worst I've ever felt-the excess weight is dragging me down, I can't get up in the mornings but I can't fall asleep at a decent hour at night. The one thing I am grateful for is being AF. All this would be happening whether I was AF or still drinking but how I handle it would be so different. Yes I'm in a dark place right now but I have my wits about me and I don't have to deal with hangovers every morning and can spend my free time trying to figure a way out of this mess rather then scoring my next bottle of wine. The AL doesn't make the problems go away, it just makes everything worse or at best sweeps the severity of the problems under the rug.

Am I envious of everyone on here that says they lost their wine belly, dropped 20 lbs, got a new job, got married, started wonderful exercise routines, found all sorts of new money now that they don't drink yada yada yada? Absolutely. I scream "Why isn't that happening to me????" "Why do things seem to be worse, not better??" I've had my wine belly for 30 years; I put on 20lbs these past 2 years, I can't get a new job to save my life, finances went into the toilet, I have no energy to start exercising blah blah blah! But they aren't worse. They are just being uncovered and for some reason, its taken almost 2 years to peel the onion. But it will be peeled I have no doubt and I'm very anxious to find out what is at the core.

Ok, that is my rant for the weekend. Nothing but positive affirmations for the next few days. For our newcomers, please don't let this scare you! Its important that we all share our journey. I'm probably the anonomly here, the exception on how going AF affected my life but still I have no desire to go back to the beast. I KNOW I will get there. I've always been the last one to the finish line so don't go by me!!

[Lavande]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Good morning Abbers!

Strange gusty wind with peeks of sunshine here this morning - weird.

TDN, Happy Anniversary to you. Sadly I'm not celebrating them anymore - what can you do with a disinterested spouse? Still married though, 39 years in June
The right job will open up for you, hang in there!

Greetings FlyAway, Blondie, Sausage & shue. Posting from a ski lift has got to be a first :H

papmom, I'm sorry you are feeling down
You are indeed peeling the layers of the onion as we all are. I peeled mine completely before I ever found MWO & found unrelieved depression to be at my core. Years & years of built up resentment due to abuse/neglect were causing me to question & abuse myself further.
Is it possible that you'll find something similar?:l
I believe you will find a solution to your financial woes - maybe a talk with a financial planner of some sort will help. Losing weight & beginning an exercise regimen of some sort will certainly help you feel better. It doesn't have to cost you a single cent either.
Sign yourself up at Free Calorie Counter, Diet & Exercise Journal | MyFitnessPal.com
My girls turned me on to that site at the beginning of the month. We're all using it now & have all lost weight - even YB!!!
Feel better

I need to clean up the ton of cookie crumbs & fingerprints around here - that's my plan anyway :H

Have a great AF Saturday!
Lav

[shueaddict]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Closed the skiing day with a coffee and Perrier, my girfriends are into the wine already. Looking forward to having a good sleep without the 3AM lurch, waking up early, clear headed and skiing like crazy.

TND, congrats for 23rd, wish you a happy, special night.

Blonde, FLY and sausage - have a great Sat night.

Papmom, so sorry to hear you feel so low, sending you some super positive vibes, things do not change overnight and it is easy to feel overwhelmed by things at times even when you are "normal". I think wise LAV has a good point (as always).

[Marshy]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Abbers!

Lovely sunshine here today. Feels like spring is on the way. I'm at work but only have about four hours to go and I'm off for three days - hooray! And GF is going away on one night for a work thing so I get let loose to paint the town red! (Or have an early night :H)

Shue - enjoy your AF apres ski!

Lav - EB is growing up fast!

ThreeDog - sounds promising on the job front even if you have to wait a while.

Pap! I hate to "see" you down. I know your finances have been a problem for a while and I have no helpful suggestions at all about that, unfortunately. But, it also took me a while to start improving my life after going AF, and there are still things I'm not happy with. I was also envious of people who seemd to be making progress in areas where I wanted to make progress but wasn't. I remember being quite down at 5-6 months AF because things weren't improving as quickly as I wanted them to. I know you're past that mark but it's an illustration that we're going to have ups and downs even though we're making huge progress with not drinking.
For example, it took me about two years to find someone to have a good relationship with. (OK, I wasn't out there trying every day but it was a goal I had that seemed to keep hitting the buffers).
I only hope that things improve for you soon. In the meantime, you're AF - which is fantastic - and so much better placed to deal with everything than before.

Hi to Blonde, Flyaway and Sausage. Back to work for me.

[papmom3]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Thank you everyone for the very kind words! I am feeling much better since I got that all out and read your thoughts. I decided to start some decluttering in my bedroom and cleaned it from top to bottom. It feels bigger already (even tho it's tiny). I think I'll sleep better tonite.

I've got that website to work on today and then off to do some food shopping (healthy food shopping!!) so I'm not spending a fortune buying my meals at the caf like i did last week. Baby steps right?

Lav-thanks for the link. I'm going to go explore right now. I've also been a member of Spark People but for some reason don't keep up with it. I'll see what's different about your website.

Shue-congrats on a successful AF ski trip so far. I hope you are having just as much fun today-and I bet you're having more fun than your hungover friends!!

One foot in front of the other and think positively. My mantra for today.

:l and :h to my Fab Friends!!

[Raven.joy]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

I am so glad I came back to this site, In the months I was away i lost touch with the daily recognition that we are really achieving something and bettering ourselves by absaining. The last year I felt cured/fixed of my drink problem but slowly temptation was rearing it's ugly head. I was begining to think maybe I could have the odd blow out. Fortunatley I never did pick but I had certainly lost focus on how important it is I remain sober. I have been back a few weeks and feel totally inspired. Partly to check in with old friends and partly seeing new people where I was. I guess we need our support network. We need to remind each other how bad it was and how great it is to be AF. Thanks guys, love you all.

[Kaslo]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Good day, eh? Thanks for starting us up TDN and Blondie, there is nothing wrong with a parallel universe. i spend a fair amount of time in one...Good job Flyaway and Sausage on making a go of the early days. Sausage, it was oj and club soda that saved my Bacon. Shu, whilst you are ending your skiing day I am starting mine. I have to man the cabin tomorrow, and collect fees, though. Hi Marshy and Lav....I am glad you are on here dispensing with your calm and rational advice, what you are saying applies to everyone.

Pap, darlin' I feel your pain, and I am glad you are trying to cope with it after venting. What Lav says about depression, have you checked that out? I know you probably dont want to hear it but I think the short term solution is walking for exercise. Just do it. Even if you go a short distance once a day, to start, get your self walking and I bet you will start to see some progress. Can you take one of your dogs on a leash...? Not all them at once. Could end up being a goat rodeo, as IJM used to say. Can you downsize your housing situation and free up some funds there? Can you retrain, can you take in contractual editing work, or something related to your own field as a contractor?

Anyway you seemed to have cheered up and you dont need me suggesting myself right up my own hind end, but I bet you will do better with some minor changes

Mr Kaslo is making my breakfast so gotta go. Lottsa snow here. Over 10 inches in one day yesterday. Whoo hooo!

One thing is for sure, I dont miss feeling like a bag o crap this morning.


Kaslo

[Kaslo]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Cross post Raven, happy you are here and doing very well too. Good for you, and keep it up!

Kas

[papmom3]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Thanks Kas-you have some great suggestions-some can't be done right now but the walking certainly can be!! And yes, it would be a major goat rodeo to take all 3 pups at once but one is doable. My goal everyday is to get up one hour early so that I can do just that but then I end up hitting the snooze and all of a sudden I'm late!! Depression? No idea. What determines real depression from the blues or feeling bad about a certain situation? Maybe something to research.
You crack me up with your enthusiasm for 10" of snow in one day!! I would be crying!!

gotta get going with the new website so I'll say bye for now.

[Kaslo]

AF Daily~Saturday, February 25

Hey Pap3, listen to your body, its not wanting to go out for a walk at the crack of dawn, but perhaps when you get home, your little routine could include a SHORT walk, like just around the block to start, before you eat anything, just shake it up a bit. Even if it means changing into a pair of shoes before going into the house at all, w/o a dog, I am talking FIVE minutes thats it. If you start with that, you will be amazed at how good it feels after a couple of cracks at that. Most peoples problems are caused by thinking they have to skii 10 K at top speed (Mr Kaslo), first time out, or run a marathon (first time out the gate) (Mr Kaslo) or walk for an hour up hill (me) first time out, and then we baff out right away. Start small. And when you can do it not when your body is just not into it. You are setting yourself up to fail there, girlie. Exercise is the only way the recovering alkie can fix the damage done to the body, I am convinced of that.

Kaslo

Kas