af day Tues 11 Dec

[YoungAtHeart]

af day Tues 11 Dec

Scottish Lass, please don't be so hard on yourself. I am a psychotherapist, and despite what your mother might say, therapy is a gift you can give yourself, not some indication of personal or family failure. Understanding yourself makes life a whole lot easier, and despite regular logic, there is also a "psycho-logic" to everything. You just have to understand what is going on.

Sending you cyber-hugs..... :l :l :l

YahYah

[kuya]

af day Tues 11 Dec

SL ..... There is nothing wrong with therapy. I did 4-5 years and went through 3 therapists till I found the 'right' one.
In fact it was before starting down the therapy road that I made the mantra included below of 'be happy, or die trying'.

Family therapy is also a route I took with my middle son and was priceless in protecting our relationship. We are discussing him doing some individual work after Xmas and he is keen as he knows he needs to cover some more ground.

Stay quit though SL if you can, most therapists would want that and you have already done most of the work. Therapy is easier if you have clear thinking :h

[Kaslo]

af day Tues 11 Dec

Hi everyone, just a note to Scottish Lass, therapy is a great idea, even if its a ticket to some other method but trying it out might help. I dont think you need to be AL free to start either, thats what you hope to achieve is some help with quitting, right? That stiff upper lip thing is one of the reasons why the commonwealth has so many problems with alcohol in the first place, in my opinion. Not allowed to discuss a problem, bully through, head up, no tears, bite the bullet, shove the cause down somewhere it can fester....yeah THAT makes a alot of sense. NOT! Failing to deal with the issues of why we drink is one of the main reasons why people fall of the wagon and dont climb back up. A therapist can really help you see whats going on in a way you never really thought of yourself. Well worth it, IMHO.

Kas

[scottish lass]

af day Tues 11 Dec

Thanks for the replies and sage advice - I will be looking into some avenue to deal with my issues, I can only think that it will help, and since putting the thought in writing to you all here I have felt a sense of ease.
I have also been feeding my hunger and I am not going to worry about the sugar thing so much, I had cut most sugar out and that seems to coincide with my desire to drink again - I want to ensure I maintain my AF being and will work on the sugar problem once I am much more stable with the wine - one vice at a time.
So with a plan to feed my body and my soul, I am feeling better about believing that I can do this...

[kuya]

af day Tues 11 Dec

I had a sugar day yesterday, I felt like crap but I don't worry too much now. It is just harder at the beginning when everything feels alcohol related. A good diet and SOME gummy bears rather than a gummy bear diet with a bit of food

[Determinator]

af day Tues 11 Dec

well, managed to stay DF (donut free) even though I was tasked with providing 2 dozen of the darn things to our demo today. kind of makes me feel like a drug pusher. ick!

Catbuddy, I don't normally choose to debate vegetarianism with vegetarians because they tend to argue from emotions and not logic in my experience which I find to be very frustrating. they can indeed be healthy if they are eliminating simple carbs, industrial seed oils, and don't eat soy. vegetarian sources of B12 are B12 'analogs' and not the molecular equal to animal forms. this is why vegetarians and vegans give birth to children with learning disabilities at a MUCH higher rate than the statistical norm (B12 deficiency). I think that is a terrible thing to do to an infant, but that must my opinion.
there is not a single population of humans that existed without animal foods....period. that says a lot on it's own and needs little embellishment. vegetarianism is a trend of the last 50 years and therefor and extremely recent ideology. Weston A. Price traveled extensively in the late 1800's to find a population of indigenous people that were vegetarian but ended up with a very different conclusion. the most healthy populations of indigenous peoples had (and still have) diets very high in animal products. a good example is the Maasai tribe near Kenya. they eat an almost exclusively red meat diet and have the lowest recorded blood cholesterol on the planet. heart disease, diabetes and stroke are virtually unknown to them and they are not alone. I used to be a strict vegetarian and was convinced I was doing the right thing and felt better even though looking back I see that I was fooling myself terribly. I was skinny as a rake, had horrible eczema all over my body and was sick very often. I also got cold very easily when everyone else felt warm, I had terrible acid reflux and chronic asthma. anyway I think it's what we remove from our diets that is perhaps most critical.
topping the list:

alcohol
sugar
industrial seed oils and trans fats
wheat

I've bored you all enough. to your health!

[Determinator]

af day Tues 11 Dec

to briefly continue my nutritional diatribe (apologies) there are a couple of decent forms of vegetarian protein that I'm aware of:

-algae/plankton sources
-legumes (beans, lentils etc) so long as they are properly prepared by soaking in water for at least 24 hours. this helps to reduce the lectin load. also be sure to cook them very well.

I promise not to be so annoying tomorrow

xxxx

[CanToo]

af day Tues 11 Dec

Hmmm,

oke: KY

MS. SL - if you're not ready to say I don't drink, can you start by saying 'Oh thank you but no, I'm not drinking right now. Trying to get back into shape'.... I've working at the same company for 16 years, 12 months and 9 days and am known to be a drinker. I use the above line. Period.. End of conversation.

Lav - Fork Over Knives, I will check it out?

Det - I know I know, wheat, sugar and even better when they're combined killed me this weekend. There was no excuse with a fridge full of cooked chicken, yams and green lentils. I do feel much better today but still need to work on my sugar slips. When I'm bored I eat (instead of drink) P.S. YOU'RE NOT ANNOYING!

PPQ - :l

Yes I feel better today. Snoeshowing yesterday and Spin class today and only 3 cookies

[Catbuddy]

af day Tues 11 Dec

Hey Det et al,

I love the food dialogues; I learn ever so much from them. I think the more I feel good from no AL and attention to diet, the stronger I want to become. My, the gas. I'm having that, too.

I did buy a "smoking hot dress" a month ago after losing a lot of weight since AF. Tomorrow is the company Christmas party. I'm wearing it. I figure, I'll go out with a bang and give them something other than sobriety to talk about.

Cat