go to meetings and get all wacky religious...I dont want to talk like I'm a helpless victim of some alleged cunning baffling "disease". I dont want to pray to some god I dont believe in and I dont want to feel like I'm obligated to care about or owe anything to a bunch strangers who cant keep their lips offa liquor bottle. It all feels hollow and phony to me.
What I want to do is kick myself in the ass and get it through my think head that I'm a scared neurotic little shit and I drink because I'm lazy and it's quick easy entertainment and it gives me a false sense of security and well being. I want to shame myself into not picking up a bottle by telling myself everyday what a weak, pathetic excuse for a man I am when I get drunk and if I find myself slumped over on a bar stool ever again I deserve whatever I get.
One: you continue to beat the crap out of yourself emotionally because no matter how hard you try or want to, you cannot control your drinking.
Two: You accept the fact that you cannot control your drinking and ask for help. Humility is the hardest pill to swallow. But once you swallow it, you feel so much better. It sure ain't no placebo.
I hope you keep coming back, regardless of your irritation with religion and whatnot.
I tried everything over five years or so to keep myself from picking up that next drink. Nothing worked for me. I so quickly forgot just how bad my last drunk had been. I didn't want to go to AA and accuse myself of being an alcoholic. But, when I reached my bottom, I went along. I was desperate enough by then to pin back my ears and listen to the folks who had years of sobriety behind them. I badly wanted what they had. Now, I'm glad that I go to my meetings and I can honestly say that I am glad that I'm an alcoholic.
Just try a few meetings with an open mind. That's what worked for me.
Take care,
Carol
__________________
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
The shame and blame and self-pity you spoke of are the very things that will keep you drinking, Tip.
AA is not religious. And if you continue to reject spirtual help, you will keep drinking. You said you don't want to be a 'victim' of this disease, well you already are. Try re-reading some of your former posts, from even, say... the past week. (By the way, one of the symptoms of alcoholism is 'forgetting the emotional/physical/social consequences of even a month or a week ago'....)
If you really want to know what it feels like to be a 'victim', keep drinking til you start 'losing things'... sounds like you have not lost relationship, home, job, freedom, license.... Y.E.T. (You're Eligible Too)? The statistics are that if you are an alcoholic, and you sure sound like it (takes one to know one...) then you WILL lose out, in the end.
But no one can get sober and accept spiritual help until he/she is truly READY.... so keep getting beaten into submission by your disease and we shall see you on the road to recovery, if you don't die first!!
Harsh, but true, and spoken from someone who truly DOES give a sh*t about you, Tip. Your 'newfound method' is old-hat, and it is precisely what GETS us to the point where we are willing...
...until then, keep bullsh*tting yourself, because we are great at that. Alcoholism is a mental disease of isolation. We don't want anybody else helping us. But we have to let others in if we are to recover. This kind of insures that we we will be there to help the next guy/gal who comes along.
Just wanted to comment on something you wrote: ---------------------------------------------- I want to shame myself into not picking up a bottle by telling myself everyday what a weak, pathetic excuse for a man I am when I get drunk and if I find myself slumped over on a bar stool ever again I deserve whatever I get. ----------------------------------------------
You have an illness, a medical illness, classified by the American Medical Association, Living with shame that you caused it, and you have to cure it???????????
Name of the illness: Alcoholism Treatment required: Continued Abstinance, asking for and receiving outside help.
Personally, I had the shame of the Disease for so long, I believe it was the primary emotion for keeping me away from treatment.
I do hope that someday that needing treatment will change into wanting treatment, but it has always been "an inside Job".
I feel that if you want this program you have to work it, not have it work for you - it just does not work your way. There must be some sort of hp looking out for you because you are still on this earth? When I say you I mean us/you/me. Just my share at this moment in time.
Later - Jeannie
__________________
You only live once; but if you work it right, once is enough. There is nothing better than the encouragement of a good friend.
go to meetings and get all wacky religious...I dont want to talk like I'm a helpless victim of some alleged cunning baffling "disease". I dont want to pray to some god I dont believe in and I dont want to feel like I'm obligated to care about or owe anything to a bunch strangers who cant keep their lips offa liquor bottle. It all feels hollow and phony to me. What I want to do is kick myself in the ass and get it through my think head that I'm a scared neurotic little shit and I drink because I'm lazy and it's quick easy entertainment and it gives me a false sense of security and well being. I want to shame myself into not picking up a bottle by telling myself everyday what a weak, pathetic excuse for a man I am when I get drunk and if I find myself slumped over on a bar stool ever again I deserve whatever I get. Anyone ever try that method? -- Edited by Tipsy McStagger at 22:31, 2006-07-19
Who said ya had to get religious? Spirituality is all that we have. As far as prayer goes, that's up to you. The only thing you're obligated to,right now, is that bottle you're drinking out of. You don't have to care about me, but that doesn't mean that I won't care about you. I don't do this because I can't keep my "lips offa liquor bottle", I do it so I don't put them back on one. If it all feels phony and hollow to you, that's your problem, not mine! If you can't be true to yourself, then you will be phony and hollow. Chances are you've already tried to shame yourself into not picking up another bottle and (in the words of the immortal Dr. Phil) how did that work out for ya? You say that you drink because you're pathetic, lazy and it's a cheap form entertainment? Hell, you make it sound like it's an excuse! To the rest of us, it was part of the problem! If you think that if you ever find yourself slumped over a barstool again, you should get whatever you deserve, you're right! You should get help! You deserve it!
__________________
"When many hundreds of people are able to say that consciousness of the Presence of God is today the most important fact of their lives, they present a powerful reason why one should have faith."
-We agnostics in the AA book
Good Luck. I tried to fix myself for many years. I turned 40 years in a mental ward in 1991. I realized that I couldn't do it on my own and needed help. It's a disease of the MIND and body.
:)
