Hi i am 34 years old my name is fletch. I wanted to introduce myself to the forum and say Hi to everyone and am so pleased to find this site.
I have been using drinking as a boost for self esteem, confidence and courage it also makes me feel good baout myself, or it did. My first drink was around 14 and i would say i became a binge drinker from the age of 16. In 2001 i first asked for help. I had one to one councilling,self help from everywhere and tried AA ,decided it was not for me and many other things to help me. My binge drinking is going to kill me if i carry on and i am finding it hard to stop. I dont like who i have become. I hate it and it,s a nightmare. I feel i let others down , myself too, i am missing out on life, my life and worrying people. I am getting into debt and on my last chance, at a job i did once enjoy. I am young and allways was a happy healthy person, i feel this is all slipping away fast and it,s like i am just watching and it hurts as i try and try.
I went back to AA last week and have been to 4 meetings. I know this is going to be the place for me i just need to work at it and it will take time. So far i have not really spoken out as i get embarressed find it ackward i am not good at asking for help either. Also i am gay and i wont to be 100 % honest to myself in the meetings but i cant as i find it ackward as what others will think and it stresses me. I have looked for AA gay meeting though they dont have them.
I still go out to pubs as this is one of the only places really in the uk to meet other gay freinds. It, s so hard as the drink is allways there. I managed to go out last wednesday and not drink i felt great then this sunday i went clubbing and have just come back from a 48 hr binge. I have spent 200.00 or more and drank stupidly stayed with someone i hardly know and feel down and rubbish. I am lost and i dont know who i am. I will keep working at it. I just wanted to introdcude myself and share. I find it nice to be able to just get it all out like this.
Hi There Fletch. Welcome to the boards, My names Kate I'm having real trouble at the moment too and feel some of the things you posted. You'll get the help you need here.
Welcome to MIP. It really adds a lot to my sobriety and I pop by here every day and read and post as much as I want. I do hope that you will, too.
This is my second time in AA and this time I was ready to accept my alcoholism. I can honestly say that I can't believe just how good my life is now compared with when I was drinking. I was loosing my friends and loved ones and was getting ever closer to hitting my rock bottom.
I came back to AA in November 2005 and it's the best thing that I could have done. I now have so many wonderful people that I can call real friends. I am so lucky. I just wish that I had gone to AA years and years ago.
I know several gay people who go to some of my local meetings. Nobody is judged in AA, so please relax and just be honest to yourself.
In the very early days of my sobriety, I never went near pubs or anywhere where alcohol was sold. There's an old-timer at one of my meetings who says If I don't want to slip, then I don't go where it is slippery. That one always worked for me.
Just hang in there and it really will get better.
Thanks for your share. I do hope that you'll keep coming back. Please let us know how things are going for you, won't you?
Take care,
Carol
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Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. ~Dr. Seuss
Welcome to mip Fletch. I'm glad to see you here and posting. I hope you'll be back. I could barely get my first name out the first year or so at meetings. Severe social anxiety.(sure wasn't shy when I was high, tho.) AA is all about helping eachother stay sober, and working the steps. It's about supporting eachother on our journeys, on our new lives. I don't believe our sexuality is even an issue.
I agree with Carol, I didn't go to "slippery" places for quite some time. I understand that it can be socially inhibiting, but perhaps right now it's okay to just concentrate on your sobriety? Your social life will still be there. Just getting a good foundation down, the rest will follow naturally.
Find the folks you can connect with; it'll be ok. Keep coming back, and again, welcome. warmly, Chris
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"Never argue with an idiot... They'll drag you down to their level and beat you with experience..."
I was so painfully shy, and so full of shame when I first started attending AA that I just hung my head and could barely squeak out my name when it was my turn.
I have to echo the sentiments of the others sharing that slippery places like pubs, clubs, and bars are NOT the place to be when seeking recovery.
At some point you need to decide whether you will put recovery first and foremost, and that includes staying away from those places.
I see so many people still not quite willing to jump in feet first and give sobriety 100%, fists up in the air, trying to do it their way. God knows I went through that myself.
I always say why walk when you can drive?! We can make sobriety as difficult or as easy as we want it to.
For me, to this day, if I go to the barbershop often enough, I WILL get a haircut! I chose to put my sobriety first.
Keep coming back!
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"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguements and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
~Herbert Spencer
Thanks for all your shares everyone had something that helped. Quetzal you said about excepting your alcoholism. It made me realise i have not excepted it. I am fine when going to AA, at home reading,on here or doing something that i know is good for me. I except it then. My social life i am finding hard to except has to change though i can see why and understand why. It,s dam annoying as i feel i am going to loose something, my life, a chance of meeting someone and it,s that which gets in the way.
Wren thanks for your share about the anxiety. I think the booze has made me worse for that, not when on the high but after as i think god i cant believe i said that or did that and then i start having to try go through everything to remember.
It,s funny just in a couple of weeks since starting AA how much you have to start facing up to or changing. I realise how selfish and controlling i have and can be. How much easier it will be dropping it and excepting what is. Who r true friends and who just want you to go out for a drink. I could go on and on and probably will.
I don't know what life was like for you growing up, but for me, I was painfully shy, never comfortable in my own skin, and always looking for happiness outside of self.
God almighty, was I ever 'happy' when I discovered alcohol! It WAS a social lubricant for me. Once I got enough in my system, my shyness disappeared, I was comfortable in a social setting, and I thought alcohol was THE answer.
I can so relate to the fear of losing a situation where I could 'find someone'. For years into my recovery, I was still looking for that someone because I still hadn't truly started working on self, and discovering who I am. That is a daunting task!
I continued to hop from one relationship to another after I got out of rehab, and the end result was throwing 4 years of sobriety out the window because once again I had chosen a relationship unhealthy for me (I rationalized that he didn't drink, he was in the program, and it was okay).
The last relationship I had was 98-99, and it was just too good to be true. There were red flags I chose to ignore.
This fellow didn't drink either, but he was simply a dry drunk, who had left a relationship where he did drink heavily, came to my house to live, and had a nice honeymoon for 15 months to recoup and avoid the issues/baggage he needed to deal with.
His two girls came to spend a month with us, and all the old issues he had never dealt with came to the surface. After his girls left, he did a complete turnaround.
He started disappearing for long periods of time (my bank account was drained by then as the courts were taking most of his wages for child support from a nasty divorce that still wasn't finalized). He ended up moving out, leaving me and my youngest high and dry. Shortly thereafter he lost his job, hooked up with a woman who drank heavily, and he went back to drinking.
I thank God I had stuck around in the program long enough that time that I made it through the pain. It was then that the light bulb came on and I realized that in spite of being sober 9 years the second time around, I have never really gotten to that point I was comfortable in my own skin, and still sought outside approval.
I'ts been a glorious journey the ensuing 8 years. I have learned to love myself, to take care of myself, to be comfortable in my own skin.
AA provides me with ample opportunity for social settings, and I can have fun in a healthy environment.
I've gotten to the point I am happy being by myself, and if no one ever comes along to share my life, that's okay. The point is, I'm not looking anymore, I'm working on myself, and taking advantage of what each day brings me. I can sit in this house alone, and be okay.
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"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguements and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance-that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
~Herbert Spencer
Thank you for your reply it really helps. I have started to realsie over the last few days that now would be the wrong time to go into a relationship. It,s time to have one with me. I could not handle all that extra emotional stuff when i have bags of my own.
