YOU ARE NOT ALONE - A companion online community discussion board for The Mental Illness Happy Hour podcast with Paul Gilmartin

Hi there. I've got 6 days, and I'm liking being alcohol-free. (It'll be 7 once I lay my head on the pillow tonight.) I found a cool Buddhist meeting I can go to once a week, and I like the way people talk there. Not a lot of histrionics. It includes a 1/2 hour of meditation based on a "seed thought"/shared reading and an hour of sharing around whatever that brings up for you. I'm working through the book Refuge Recovery, by Noah Levine, a Buddhist teacher in recovery from drugs and alcohol. There are a few Refuge Recovery treatment centers in California, and meetings set up sparingly around the U.S. I'm not going to those meetings, but we have a large Buddhist community where I live, and meetings have been set up in the existing community.

I'm finding not drinking to be easier than I thought it would be. Attempting to temper the drinking was much harder and less satisfying than just giving it up all together. It's a certain agony to sit there with one drink trying to pretend I don't want to drink the whole bottle while I socialize with my non-compulsive friends. My brain is split between the conversation and the bottle, always, always until I've killed that anxiety with alcohol and by then I'm far too drunk to be much good for anything. I'm just wondering if maybe there's a honeymoon period I'm in, and it's going to get much harder. I scared the shit out of myself with my drinking at this time last week, and kind of decided that if I wanted to live with myself I really can't do it with alcohol anymore. I jumped into sobriety like a person who's just found an island after being lost at sea. This Friday & Saturday, sober, I actually felt the time pass. It actually felt like I've had a break for the first time in so long, instead of work and self-torture, and then work again. These past few days I was funny without the alcohol, and had genuine laughs without the alcohol. I enjoyed the company of my friends much better, because I'm outside my own head. I really felt the presence of the people I spent time with. And I'm not sick and anxious and disgusted with myself today, or for a few days now. It's really amazing. Anyway, I just wonder for people who have been through this...am I in some honeymoon phase? Is this common? I was fucking exhausted, I have some relief.

Another question I have: How do I tell everyone I'm done? I mean, I know how. You just do. I'm scared I guess. It's really a declaration of self-love to do it. It will mean I think of myself as real and worth something, and that I am asserting that to my friends and family. I like it, I want it, it's just fucking scary.

I was thinking to shroud it to my parents, and potentially my friends by saying: "Hey, I'm giving up drinking until I graduate grad school. I can't afford to be distracted with it right now. I need to excel, to take care of myself and my brother better, and to keep work and life balanced."
But they'll say, "Well great, but why can't you just drink less?"
And I'll be forced to say," Because I can't."

I do think I've got the gene, and the gene is in full swing. It's amazing how much I am like a father who didn't raise me. I guess I could say that. lol

My strategy now has been just saying no thanks. But once or twice more, and people will grow suspicious.

Six days?

Sweet!

Yeah, I've heard about this "honeymoon" phase, ie pink cloud, maybe it is true for others, but it wasn't for me. Happy is happy. Good is good. I know that is a tautology, but sometimes we make stopping drinking so complex when it is plain as day. Why can't happiness just be happiness?

I am sort of jealous of you that you get experience newfound sobriety. It is a lot of fun. It is so much fun. Especially six months in, when my sense of taste and color came back.

Something I found myself doing, without realizing it, was eating more sweets. I have zero scientific proof, but sober people love candy. While don't suggest anyone eat compulsively, I do playfully recommend Swedish Fish.

Speaking for myself, I found any amount of time sober started to clear the cobwebs from my mind. I strung together six months not-drinking a year before I quit for good.

Again, no scientific proof, but I believe alcohol, which is a chemical, changed the chemical makeup of my brain, preventing me from making an objective decision about alcohol. I am not saying that clearly, but I think you see what I am getting at.

Good luck out there. Keep us posted. Keep using your words.

Here is the most valuable advice I learned when stopping: instead of picking up a drink, pick up the phone. Call your Buddhist friends, call an AA intergroup, call 211, call Celebrate Recovery, post here, whatever.

Just keep using your words until you find someone who cares.

Thanks for your reply, Oak.
Funny what you say abut your senses of taste and color coming back. I already feel like my senses are much more piqued. I guess I can look forward to more. At moments it's a little overwhelming, but then I have a tendency to get way too much in my own head.

My uncle told me the thing about sweets, too. He said in rehab everyone is always eating candy. And he's kept himself stocked up when dealing with withdrawals. I think there's something to it, even if it's just that alcohol spikes your blood sugar so much and your body becomes accustomed to that.

I think that alcohol changed the chemical make-up of my brain as well, and that I was more vulnerable to its effects due to psychological troubles, and genetic history, and family history, and even some of the psych meds I ended up on. I think one med exacerbated things, kind of quickened the downward spiral, created more compulsivity. But it was there before too. Basically, to that point, I think the connections in your brain follow the path of least resistance, and if you wore a deep rut into your brain training it in the act of drinking in response to abcdxy&z, then it's going to become easier and easier until the brain's tooooo good at it, and it becomes as thoughtless as hitting the pedals when driving.

In regards to picking up the phone, yikes. I really am not accustomed to talking to people about anything like this. I know that's part of the work, but...you know. They call it work for a reason. I don't want to do the reaching out thing. So, this online thing is comfortable for now.

I did do my first share at my second meeting, and people were encouraging, but the blood all rushed through my ears and I didn't find the opening up thing comfortable at all. I would like to grow, though. So, I hope to try again. Someone tried to reach out to me after the meeting, but I felt panicked and just said thanks and ran out of there.

Still skating by the not drinking thing without having opened up to my friends and family about my choice. 10 days!
Thanks again!

10 days??? Wow! That is the most awesome news I've heard all week.

That is such a huge, huge deal. You should be very proud of yourself.

In honor of you, I would bake you a cake. 10 days is something to really celebrate.

Whether in person or online, whatever you do, keep using your words. Use your words.

Using your words with your uncle is also excellent.

You're doing good, real good.

A few more thoughts: everyone (especially active drunks) has an opinion about how to get/stay sober. Everybody. Don't take anyone's words at face value. But if someone is walking the walk, and/or you hear it from several different viewpoints, then you can weight it.

Nothing is worth drinking over. At least in my experience.

And you may as well hear this now: many/most people have all sorts of hell break loose in their lives after they stop drinking. I got dumped, fired, mocked. None of that had to do with alcohol, but it was okay.

Also, lots of crying. Cleansing, cathartic crying that will be an astringent to the soul.

Again, my experience. YMMV.

For now, everything is going well for you, it sounds like. I encourage you to take five minutes to congratulate yourself.

Lastly, if imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, I've been meaning to post about my friend who recently died of alcoholism. Inspired by your boldness in posting here, I am going to follow your example.