Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

[narilly]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

J-Vo- 80? Really? YAY!!!!
Hey J-Vo, I love your posts and you have TONS of good stuff to say. I enjoy your posts and words of wisdom. We ALL have words of wisdom because our experiences are different and we learn from each other, that is the beautiful thing about this thread.
I Know and YOU know that you have great things to say!

xo

[available]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Oh Jvo 80 days woo hoo to you girl, that is fantastic, wonderful and fucking brilliant to say the least. 20 more till that elusive triple digits and i am so proud of you to say the least. Oh have you sat with anyone at lunch now that you dont drink as i know you mentioned before that you always stayed alone. i do the same.

[j-vo]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Thanks Chicks! 80 feels kind of cool. Yeah, have to admit that!
Yes, Ava, dear, I do from time to time. The mortifying red blotchiness doesn't happen like it used to and I always take a benzo if I plan on doing a lunch thing. That's what i have to do so I do it. I know I've gotten better, even in this past school year, so my plan is to start working on reducing benzos and use only with specific situations. One's that really create panic and visible ugliness. But over the years, I've gotten way better. Too bad it's taken me so many years to begin to believe in myself, but hey, it's happening, so I'm going with that.

[little beagle]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Congratulations Pav 200.
And you a wonderful 80 J-vo. :wave::wave:
I've spent the evening upside down scraping dripped paint off the floors. Tomorrow the blinds go back up and we get PAID, YEAH!!

[Pavati]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Hi, All:

Thanks for the 200 day love, and oh. my. goodness. PERFECT pool boy for me as I love the ocean, and will be waiting on my beach towel for him to surf in. Or maybe I'll swim out and join him...

Way to go, J-Vo on 80 days! So amazing how determined you have been and how you have really, really used MWO - posting when you feel wobbly, posting to support others. How is your summer going? I am still working through next week and then will have some time off after the big party.

I have written bits and pieces of the Thanksgiving Massacre - I'll write the whole story sometime. The gist of it is that I joined here and quit for 3 weeks, never having an intention of staying sober forever, just for 90 days while I readjusted my brain. After 3 weeks I was going to a concert and new I would drink, so I started two nights before that. I drank every night that week, and drank in a sort of panic (as Byrdie likes to say). After Thanksgiving, I ended up with a terrible hangover. I was basically under the influence for 48+ hours, and then had a massive panic attack as I was coming off the stuff. Terrible. I thought I was going to have to check myself into a mental hospital. That was the final straw - I came back here while still in a panic and felt such relief that people would understand! I especially felt welcomed in the Nest, and then J-Vo directed me here to the Ladies, and here I've been ever since. I am so grateful to this site and to you all - I don't think I would have had the guts to go to an in-person meeting until it got worse, and it certainly would have gotten worse...

Ava - I look forward to seeing you still here Aug 2016, Day 1000 (and J-Vo will be 880!)

Hope all you wonderful ladies are having a great night.

xo
Pav

[lifechange]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Quick check in my way to work.

J-vo, way to go on getting those 80 days under your belt!! You've openly and honestly shared your journey--done the work on good days and bad days. I am really happy for you.

:l to everyone.

[daisy45]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

J-vo, 80 days now.....so happy for you....I watch how you interact, get on with it and support everyone.....you are an example of how it should be done!
I have mainly stayed between the Newbies Nest and here....I have to say I have been here a long time and this group is getting results! So grateful for all of you!

[patrice]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Jvo I'm so happy for you.. 80 days without booze is just fantastic.. I'm following in your and everyone else's footsteps
Hi all
Xx
Pat

[little beagle]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

This is a wonderful, supportive group. It's what's keeping me going right now.
Have a great day.

[Kailey]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

I agree, LB. Success breeds success, happiness attracts happiness. The best way to be happy and sober is to hang around people who have figured it out. I'm sticking here like glue. I don't always have something to say, but I post as much as I can, knowing that it's one of the tools I need to use on my journey.

[j-vo]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

This is in NoSugar's signature...

Recovery is contagious and recovery is spread by recovery carriers. Bill White

Kailey, glad you're sticking here like glue, as the above statement says it all!!!

Thanks everyone for the congrats on 80. i have to say I got a little excited at that number. I'm so lucky to be in everyone's company here, to learn and grow with a beautiful bunch of ladies. We'll all have our pool boy someday!

Today I'm going on a bike ride with a girlfriend from work. We're riding on a river trail, so we can enjoy the cool sites and people. I'll let you know how it goes. It's a two-hour ride. We'll stop somewhere for lunch, too.

LB, good thing your back is better! You'd never have been able to do this job. Glad it's almost pay day!!!!

Pav, my summer is going great. I'm concentrating on me and that's it. This is a summer of transition. A huge transformation in mind, body and soul. I'm selfishly taking the time to do what's good for all of that. And being a basketball mom, of course!

Have a great AF day ladies. Keep coming back to Loameristas. We need you here.

[wagmore]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

NoSugar;1673278 wrote:

... I thought about how AL masked everything for us --- it dulled the highs and the lows. We had the regrets and all that from drinking but in terms of experiencing normal human sadness and happiness, I at least, really didn't. ... And if I did feel anything uncomfortable, I knew just how to take care of that.

...Maybe this is one of the uncomfortable (but normal) moods you used to avoid by drinking.

I think this is one of the big keys to keep in mind. Many (most?) people use AL or other substances to relieve or alter some sort of mood or feeling, whether it's to relieve/decrease something uncomfortable or negative or to increase/create/augment something positive. If this becomes a habit, it's easy to lose sight of what the normal ebbs and flows of life really are.

This has definitely been true for me. AL and other substances usually work quickly and that's part of their allure, even though the "payoff" decreases over time and is never really as great as we envision it to be. In tandem, the consequences tend to increase over time.

During my 50 AF days (so far ), I have become acutely aware of feeling uncomfortable many times and wanting desperately to relieve that discomfort. I often do something else (exercise, music, walk the dog, read/post on MWO, etc) to get some relief, but I'm also realizing that at some point I need to develop the skills to just feel whatever I'm feeling.

I guess I'm a work in progress and probably always will be. It's hard sometimes, but now that I'm AF I can see that it's infinitely better than going through life in a numb fog.

[NoSugar]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Here's the link to the article about Recovery Carriers:
Recovery is Contagious Redux | Blog & New Postings | William L. White

In that post, he links to this: http://www.williamwhitepapers.com/pr...20Carriers.pdf.

A couple of his points there seem very relevant to MWO in general and for me, this thread in particular. They address the feeling that many of us have had that something inside us just switched, that something is different this time, etc. It is hard to pinpoint what happens but I think these things are involved:

 Addiction recovery is often caught before it is chosen?meaning that one
can get swept up in recovery in a process as unplanned and as irrational as
how one got caught up in addiction.
 Long-term addiction recovery involves conscious (voluntary) choices, but
that may not be how recovery begins.
 Catching recovery means that one can initiate recovery even while actively
resisting it, e.g., consciously trying to hustle your way through treatment or
peer mutual aid to get people off your back only to ?catch recovery? in spite
of yourself.
 Catching recovery involves exposure to people in recovery with whom one
can identify and who serve as catalysts of personal change.
 What appear to be sudden, dramatic recovery conversion experiences are
often set in motion by exposure to an agent of recovery.
 A central strategy for building community recovery capital is through efforts
that increase the density of recovery carriers.
 The density of recovery carriers exerts a profound influence on community
recovery prevalence (the total number of people in recovery within a defined
catchment area) and community recovery incidence (the number of people
initiating recovery in a defined catchment area within a set period of time?
usually the past 12 months).
 Communities can take action to strategically increase the density of recovery
carriers within the whole community or in particular neighborhoods.

Recovery carriers are people, usually in recovery, who make recovery
infectious to those around them by their openness about their recovery experiences,
their quality of life and character, and the compassion for and service to people still
suffering from alcohol and other drug problems.
The recovery carrier is in many ways the opposing face of the addiction
carrier?the person who defends his or her own drug use by spreading excessive
patterns of use to all those he or she encounters...
So who and what exactly is this recovery carrier? The role is not unique to
a particular pathway of recovery. Recovery carriers can be found in religious,
spiritual, and secular recovery mutual aid societies and those in recovery without
affiliation with any such group. The role is not defined by age?the recovery
carrier is not synonymous with elder status in communities of recovery?nor is it
unique to a particular gender. It is not a role requiring superior intelligence or
academic achievement. I have seen people with advanced degrees inspired into
recovery by those with meager education. Being a recovery carrier does not
require occupational success or social status. In the recovery world, value comes
from much different sources. The personalities and interpersonal styles of
recovery carriers can vary markedly. Some are gifted with great energy and
charismatic speech, others with serene wisdom and quiet dignity, still others with a
self-deprecating, healing humor. What they share in common is three observable
traits: 1) people are almost magnetically drawn to them?even those needing but
not actively seeking recovery, 2) they exude a kinetic energy that elicits confidence
and readiness for action in those around them, and 3) people who spend time with
them and stay connected to them seem to recover and achieve a high quality of life
in recovery.

Let's all be recovery carriers .

[NoSugar]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

wagmore;1673979 wrote:
I guess I'm a work in progress and probably always will be. It's hard sometimes, but now that I'm AF I can see that it's infinitely better than going through life in a numb fog.

I think we're all works in progress, Wags, and I just saw that you've progressed to .

Congratulations! It is great to be on this path with you. :h NS

[narilly]

Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

Wags, I love your post. Living a numb life. I guess that is what we were doing. Losing sight of the normal ebbs and flows of life. Definitely. Wow, that is exactly what I think.
Glad you are here Wags. Like NS said, we are All a work in progress!

Hey NS, thanks (as usual) for another great link. I will read that after work. Friday night reading! I spend my Fridays so differently now that I am not drinking. It is amazing. It is Wonderful!

You ladies are wonderful. YOU are my recovery carriers.
xo