Ladies on a Mission: The Official Site

[j-vo]

:heartbeat: NS

[patrice]

Hi all,
First- congratulations on all the successes here, it's fantastic to see.. Wow to everyone!
I'm back after an absence .. I last got to about 70 days then started drinking again, not ferociously as before, but steadily. Over the hols it became more habitual - a bottle of wine a day, no more no less. A week ago I decided to stop because I was feeling so sluggish.
Yep..it's taken me a week to put it down, I seemed to have got to the same place I was 2 years ago.. No shit Sherlock! It's progressive .
I'm back on day 1 today.. I hope I can join your group again
Take care
Patrice

[j-vo]

Hi Patrice and welcome back. So glad to see you and I bet Ava will be beside herself with excitement!
I've just come back after a nasty fall. I'm glad you're back and we can all beat this together. :yay:

[treetops]

Kia ora Patrice - I don't post here regularly but as a fellow Lady who used to lavish her AL I think I can lurk! Besides there are so few Kiwis on the Boards. Welcome back and I know you will be able to get to where you want. PM me if you need to - or just want to have a chat. How is your son? Are you still teaching in the same place?

[scottish lass]

Hi Patrice!!! Well done for coming back!

[narilly]

Patrice, so glad you are back, stick with us. It's amazing how quickly we go back to drinking the same amount. I guess the brain has a memory of how much we used to drink and does not forget.

LilB I will give you a tour of our skywalks.

Ava, I can't believe our temp difference. Pretty crazy.

I am so sleepy, talk to you Gloamers tomorrow.

[Pavati]

Hi,

WAY TO GO JANE. I wish I could find you a pool boy, but I guess those are for 200 days. So happy for you!

Welcome back, Patrice. Glad you returned. Sober life is GOOD.

Off to bed after an extremely busy day at work and home.

xo
Pav

[available]

Pat, Pat, Pat so glad to have you back, our chats really got me through when i first stopped drinking. I think you were the only one awake and i do appreciate them immensely now. I am here for you if ever you need a chat to fill in time.

Tree, the reason there are so few kiwi's and Aussies on here is that we dont have many alkies! Ha ha. Lovely to see you popping in.

[treetops]

Ava - there is of course the Thread for Aussies on MWO - but its always nice to chat to a fellow Kiwi - we have special insights and secrets you know (and we are better bakers)! And you are right - the time difference can be a bit of an issue. You can always send me a PM - although some days I don't look so much at MWO. I bet its really hot where you are. Windy as hell here but warmish.

[jane27]

Patrice, I'm glad to see you back. My early quits were 5 days, 27, and 52. Of course there were a lot of days when I said I wouldn't drink and did anyway- in varying degrees of feeling badly about myself. Wine + always won. 70 days is a lot of time. I never had 70 days before this quit.

One of my biggest sources of strength is the fat bank of memories of times when I thought I could moderate. There were so many attempts. 75% of the time I knew I was full of shit anyway- I just used the idea to usher myself away from feeling guilty.

While consciously and subconsciously reflecting about my 1 year milestone over the weekend- a valuable analogy came to life for me.

Most of you know I’m a big seashell collector- it’s become a bit more complicated a hobby than it started out to be- in particular with regard to the cleaning process. Initially, I’d just give my days haul a good sift & rinse to remove any remaining sand, then throw them in a jar. With time, I noticed that in a dry state, the shells appeared dried out and chalky. Looking into it, I learned that the chalky coating is actually the outer most layer of the shell. It’s called the periostracum & it’s not that easy to see, because like skin, its fibrous, transparent and well adhered. Its purpose is to protect the inner layers of shell from erosion.



As the quality of my collection grew, so did my curiosity about other peoples cleaning techniques. I tried boiling, scrubbing, sanding, and bleaching; STILL I couldn’t seem to get the darn periostracum to peel away as promised. The only thing that made a dent was my thumbnail - and I didn’t have enough thumb nail to get the job done. (it was also gross). THEN a funny thing happened.

Last weekend I had a particularly great haul of fighting conches. I was talking on the phone as I was rinsing the shells and absent mindedly began using one shell to scrape the stubborn outer layer away from another, and I couldn’t believe my eyes. I had finally discovered the correct tool for this job! (That and a pinch of Neutrogena Sesame oil...babies look so shiny!)



The aesop to this fable (point of this story), is in line with the expression, 'fight fire with fire' . The only thing abrasive enough to clean one of these damn shells was one of the damn shells.

In the same vein, I am a first hand witness to the fact that the very same magical thinking / creativity / hocus pocus/self brainwashing that allowed me to pretend I could moderate & look the other way (when I was the only one looking at all) was the same magical thinking (etc etc )that I used a day at a time to not drink. Whatever it took.
When I drove passed the liquor store during week 3, and felt wobbly, I said NO (out loud in my car). I DO NOT SHOOT HEROIN. I DO NOT TAKE NEEDLES AND INJECT HEROIN INTO MY VEINS BECAUSE SHOOTING HEROIN IS NOT ACCEPTABLE.

It was the very same con artist that accepted drinking as essential, that took drinking off the table, at every turn, as needed, in different ways, as called for.

If I can do it, I know that it can be done. Lil B and I often talk about how fear has been a positive thing for us. Fear of what we know we've done before. Fear in the knowledge that the desire to quit may not knock on our door again. Gratitude and respect for the fact that it did knock on the door and that it stuck.

Jvo, you've been on my mind. I see a lower gear as being the ticket to your stick quit. Go slower, do less. Did you ever hear the Katherine Hepburn quote, "If you always do what interests you, at least one person is pleased." You need to soothe yourself before you can soothe anyone else. I know you can do this.

Pav, Welcome home. I cant wait to hear about your vacation.

Wishing everyone a good night. Thanks for the love and support. Team wins beget team wins. xoxoxoxo

[lifechange]

hi Gloamers.
I've been lurking for the past couple of weeks on and off trying to build up the courage to post. The courage to begin another day 1. I decided in November to quit drinking on my own. I thought that if I focussed more on life instead of on not drinking I might be more successful. At 5 weeks the thought of drinking came to mind and the thought of posting here and asking for your help. But I fell into the old trap of thinking that because I hadn't been around to support and congratulate my fellow travellers (though I thought often of you all) I couldn't very well just pop in to ask for support. After years of trying to stop drinking and then starting again, I'm not ready to give up. "Why bother?" has entered my mind during the darker days. But I come back here and am inspired to keep on going. It seems I can get through the "honeymoon" phase quite painlessly-- through desperation. Then around 4-5 weeks a thought enters my mind and I push it away -- don't take it seriously and then at some point I just have a drink without thinking it through. I know what I have to do. I know I've said it a thousand times before. I'm so tired of creating chaos. I'd like to have balance and peace of mind.
Jane, that was a lovely post. Congratulations on 1 year!
and Ava and Pav, I missed your 1 year celebrations. You were both in my mind.
Hello to you all..

[DreamThinkDo]

Elsie! So lovely to see you again! I don't think that anybody here thinks that support has to be earned by supporting others. But, I do understand your thinking. And glad that you are not ready to give up fighting. Welcome back! And pop in in the Army - we've missed you there.

[patrice]

Hi girls,
Thanks for the welcome back. Congrats Jane - you are a winner!
Hi Lifechange , I'm glad to see you and I get what you are saying, I haven't been in a position to give much support so I backed away from here too...
I've just done day 1 - I haven't been drinking enough to have any withdrawal symptoms except grumpy and restless and know sleep will be elusive.. That's ok though

What's not ok is that I think I drink to just get away from myself , zone out, have a different headspace and analyzing my relapses just confirms this. I have started on anti depressants which is helping me a lot. I started those 2 months ago but have been drinking so maybe I haven't seen the full effects of them yet...

I really need to address that desire to get out of it...no matter what my mood. What do you girls think? Meditation? Exercise? I eat really well and take Suppps but that doesn't sem to be enough......
I'm glad to be back
Pat

[little beagle]

Still reading. Jane that was a WONDERFUL post. Brought tears.
Pat I too am glad you are here. I have often thought of you. One of my ladies traveled to Malaysia this past fall.
We have not needed that extra water just yet but we are cold here.

[NoSugar]

Wow, feels like Old Home Week around the Gloamers thread :smile:. Great to see you Pat and LC and to read a good, long, interesting Jane-post!

People who can stop drinking using MWO in various ways but it seems to me that those who I know are successful spend a great deal of time here, especially for the first few months, develop online rituals such as posting in roll call each morning or evening, make connections that sustain them when things are tough, and always come here before drinking. I remember feeling weird about how much I was online the first few months -- like that was something else that was "wrong" with me -- that I was developing an alternative addiction, that I was too dependent on people I didn't really even know, etc. etc. That voice was judging and criticizing me even as I attempted to get myself out of the mess I was in. My advice to you is to try not to second-guess yourself. If it helps to read MWO voraciously and type long posts about how you're feeling - go ahead! Don't worry about whether you "need" it too much. We all need something or we wouldn't have ended up here in the first place. Try to take a long view. At crazily early time points, I kept thinking I "shouldn't" still be feeling a certain way, or I "should" be better by now. I would compare my progress to some people around me and think they were "getting it" faster or "better" than I was. I hope you can let that go. Things progress and unfold for each of us in our own times and our own ways. Don't fight it or rush it. Relax into it, see it as a personal adventure, enjoy the changes, view the obstacles as challenges to meet, and really, it will all work out fine. xx, NS