Today will be a good day…. Christmas day no less!

Although I woke with very low spirit this morning, full of fears and anxious for where my life is going I seemed to be doing a little better as my morning progresses. It could all be very depressing if I let it. It is Christmas Day and for the second year in a row I am completely alone, just me and the dog, the pair of us sprawled on the sofa. It’s snowing and the outside world is very beautiful, radio 3 is playing carols and the fridge is full of food. What more could I need. People will arrive tomorrow, so I have today to reflect on where I am in my life and what needs to be done to keep it from falling apart in the way my low spirited mind imagined it would when I woke.
I find that when I pray in the morning it helps. My prayer is simple, I ask for the guidance to do the things that will give me the strength to keep my life together. That’s all. I don’t have to ask for anything apart from the guidance as I know everything else will follow and fall into place, and the people around me will be fine.
I poked around on the net looking for a little insight into what “Zen” behaviour might help me make a better job of my life. What I was looking for was something very simple that I could do that should help me break my habit of drinking everyday. I would like today to be the first day of my life without alcohol. I know I have written a million words about how I’m giving it up but why can’t it just happen quietly and simply? As if I was just moving into another phase of my life, another chapter in the book, the one that has me leading a booze free life. Why can’t it happen that way? I guess that would be the third step. . . .
Anyway the thing that I found suggested that in order to break a habit I should “keep it simple”, I should write down my plan, I should identify my “triggers” and “replacement habits” and I should focus on doing the replacement habit every time a trigger goes off for thirty days. Simple eh?

My plan is: Give up drinking, start training more seriously. . . . . and maybe loose 10lbs. Not a lot to ask really.

Triggers: Hmmm… Well I guess the first real trigger is my responding to the actual physical craving for alcohol. The addiction part of my disease. Next trigger would be when those around me have a drink I seem to forget that I can’t. I seem to want to blend in and drink normally like those around me. I think that sort of covers the triggers, I know the physical craving leaves me after a while, normally two or three weeks and it is here when I become the most vulnerable.

So the replacement habit will be what? What will I do when I need that drink? I like the idea of simply replacing the booze with green tea, but it sounds too simple.
As for the training part of the plan, I will write a new schedule today and try to stick to it! Easier said than done .. . .

So that is me today . . . I will read a little more, then I will move into the mechanics of the day, go through my routine and try to remain mindful of the words I have just typed. It’s worth nothing if I simply get up and repeat yesterday’s failed day.

It’s probably also worth noting that I like the idea of Christmas day being the anniversary of giving up .. . . But that is getting ahead of oneself just a little.

I didn’t make that call…

Why didn’t I make that call? Why didn’t I go to that meeting? What is stopping me from going back to the beginning and embracing the program? Why am I scared?
It would be a very simple thing to do, to change the way I live now, to give up the way I live now for a life that is based on the fellowship. At the moment I have very few people in my life and very little contact with others, I would be going to meetings and being with people like myself. Why am I scared to make that switch? My last few attempts have been failures. I go to a meeting, I go through the motions, I have shared my AA past and it’s like I know it all already. I leave the meeting and I close the door to that world and go back into my life, my life where I am simply waiting for the moment when I can drink.
I need to get back in, and stay in…. I need to not close the door as I leave meeting I need to make the fellowship part of my daily life, I think I had this before but it’s long gone.

So why not have the day that I was planning last time I came here? I can get through my day without a drink and then drive into town and find a meeting.

So . . . I go for a long run with my girlfriend and my dog and all the way my mind is full of AA. My body gets a huge dose of endorphins and my mood changes to positive. I ponder all of the serendipity that has brought me to where I am, I am blessed in so many ways and I have such an urge to give back in some way. I can think of exactly one act that would bring all of these things together

Later that day . . . . .

.. . . I shared my fears, I told another human being how scared I am. How afraid of loosing her I am and how afraid of hurting her I really am.

I had prayed for strength this morning when I woke, I asked for guidance, I think I was given some. The more I thought about it the more I know that I have to tell her about what I am feeling, she has a full load of her own problems and I don’t want to unload mine on her as well, but if I don’t share this it will turn into an even greater problem for her when I fall apart and take her down with me. She has to deal with an ex who wants nothing but revenge and children that are manipulated by him to cause her nothing but pain. But her worrying for me is way more damaging than being asked to help me.

The other thing that is becoming more and more clear is my need to embrace the program, to give up my need to control where exactly I fit into it, I need to go right back to the beginning. My failure to stay sober proves that I have not got past the first two steps, I get he first two steps. Then I get to the third and I want to hang on to something, something that has not worked something that brings me back to point of failure. I must let go completely. I am not in control of this, there is something about this disease that comes around from behind, when I am at my best is when I fail. When I am feeling the most confident it is when I am the most vulnerable, I know it, it always happens that way.

I plan to be at a meeting this evening. I would like to have the courage to ask Mike to be my sponsor, but again I am wondering if he would accept . . . . Which bring me right back to the stalling at step three. Am I simply hanging on to that thing again? Is it the fear of being vulnerable? I read somewhere earlier today that it is in making ourselves vulnerable that we make ourselves stronger. I think I need to do this……

And here we are a little later and no meeting, no drinking but no meeting . . . I tell myself I didn’t need to rush and stress, I need to catch my breath, fold my laundry and listen to an old AA speaker online. It’s close, I’m compromising myself. I should have gone. I’ll make a call tomorrow, I will.

I will not give up trying! I will give up alcohol!

Again I find myself feeling close to defeat. I am on the edge, staring over, knowing exactly what lies ahead. I know how this works or at least I want to think that I do.

What has happened? I have been carrying out the experiment again, using all the same elements, using all the same methods and getting precisely the same results. The illness hasn’t changed, I haven’t changed and the results will always be the same. I had reached a point of some success, I had managed to achieve a goal that I had set a while back, I had managed to gain the confidence of the people I care about most, I had put my life in order to some degree . … . And then I allow myself to be fooled into thinking I can handle alcohol too. I can’t, I’m not sure I ever could, I know how I can’t live feeling this way. I know I cannot take a drink, I know that I will spend my entire day craving a drink, I know there is never just one drink.

Yesterday is a great example of how it goes. It really starts the day before where I managed to fake my way through an evening with my girlfriend, whom I love dearly. We had a friend over for the evening, we ate, we drank some wine, we laughed a lot and had a wonderful evening. I went to bed relatively sober. Honestly, four or five drinks really doesn’t take me to a point where my craving is satisfied but sometimes that’s alright, that evening was just fine. However, the next day I plan to be alone with my illness, I set it up so I will be able to truly satisfy the craving, the obsession. I drink beers as I move through he day, I am alone with the alcohol, with the alcoholism. I function, but barely. I take the risk of driving having had more than enough to put me over the limit, more than enough to put me where I would loose everything. More than enough to make my girlfriend worry, she is the best thing in my life and she is privy to pretty much everything about my illness. She is not privy to it all, who is? Anyway, I went to bed drunk enough to satisfy the obsession, at a point just before the blackout.

So I wake, I hate myself, I worry. My mind is so full of fear for where I might be heading, I am scared. I am here again, searching for a way out. I am reading the steps as I type this, I get it. I truly get it I do understand what is going on, I understand that I am not well, that this is a course for disaster, I have no choice but to change course.

This morning I have prayed. I ask humbly to be shown the way, let me see what I need to do and give me the strength to do it. Give her the strength to find her way too. I pray that is with me beside her. I ask that I can be the man she needs, the man she wants.

Damn I need to get to a meeting, I need a sponsor, I need to do this properly . . . Not my usual half-arsed bullshit, self-deceiving… Faking it doesn’t work. I need to be honest about this, I need to be honest to somebody. Can I go straight to the fourth step?

Day three again

I am sitting here in my car suffering what feels like a terrible mood swing. This morning was going really well, up early, good run withe dog and it was feeling like I was on top of things. Work is very shaky ( at least in my head it is) and I get a phone call from the most important client who brings me up to speed on all the dealings with my boss. This could mean one of two things ( in my head, again) either my boss is leaving me out of the loop deliberately through lack of confidence or he is just too busy and scattered to bring me up to speed. Either way it has sort of taken the wind out of my sails and I am feeling insecure. Does writing this down help any?
What would be the intelligent course of action? Stay calm, no knee jerking …. A thoughtful email recalling the conversation.
This is not an excuse to get stressed out and deviate from the plan. Take a deep breath and try to do the right thing.
How hard can this be? I am sure I have the capacity to stay on top of all this but somehow I am beginning to have this sense that by not trying to control it all I will achieve better results, or at least be happier with the possible outcomes….. Upwards and onwards

Yet again I’ll try again

There’s not to much I can add to all the previous post as I keep trying to shake off the booze again. I keep trying.
This time I am reading the Big Book, I am reading Allen Carrs Easyway(I am a little skeptical of this one although I’ve yet to finish the book), I am listening to all sorts of AA shares ….. I am so ready to stop, I am so ready to loose the obsessive anxiety that nags me all the time. I know how I love to feel free from this curse …. Firing all cylinders. Why can I not just hand it over and stop.
Tomorrow is another day, I’m sure it will be fine….

Another day one .. another start

I’ve just read through the dozen or so posts I mad when I last gave up, well actually it was the time before last. I had hurt my back, I was falling out of love very rapidly .. . and I had put on weight. It was September 2008, I slipped for a couple of days in Jan 2009 and then went on until March 27th 2010, the evening of the 50th birthday party. I had been looking forward to that slip for such a long time, like I needed to sabotage my life . . . or maybe just give it a thorough shaking up. I have achieved exactly that.

My ten year relationship that probably never should have happened is gone, my father is dead and I find myself living in my chalet alone with my dog. The chalet is 100kms from town and is isolated to a point where I can go days without seeing another living soul, the odd moose but humans only athe weekend.

OK . .. so today is day one. I have had enough, I am fed up with the lack of clean edges in my life, Fed up with doing everything half-arse through a beery haze. Fed up with constantly wondering about my next drink .. . time, flavour & location. So I’m off the booze again.

Something that is very different this time is that I am sharing the whole thing very openly with Kate. In the past I think I may have minced about the facts of my sadness, fudged the degree to which I feel broken when I am drinking . .. I have never had anybody this close to me. I probably have never known anybody who loves me for what I am, doesn’t judge me and will listen to talk of how fragile I am feeling. I do feel vulnerable.

Later that day

Here’s an idea…. as I move through this day, this rainy Sunday I’m going note how I feel and maybe jot down a few of my thoughts as I deal with a whole day without a drink. It’s not too awful, so far… I have made a point of eating, eating well, bacon and eggs and two big mugs of tea. When I open the fridge I see the beer and the wine, I should take the temptation away but I don’t. It’s either I am already planning my next drink or I am trying to prove to myself that I am strong enough to work around it. I really should get rid of it but I don’t, why is that?
Physically, I don’t feel to bad, a little shaky but nothing serious. I keep busy, I have plenty of important things to do, work things…. things that I know I will let slide if I drink, things that I can’t afford to let slide.
Maybe I need to be having this conversation with another human being and not with my stupid phone …. it worries me that I am trying to do this the wrong way, I know that I can’t do it on my own, but I still keep trying. Having said that, I am very tempted to get through the first few days alone and then find a meeting.

here we go again .. . .. ..

It’s Sunday morning, a gentle rain falling and I am alone with only my faithful hound for company.

My life right at this point in time is not quite an unholy mess but it could be with just a tiny bit of a push from any one of a few factors which are spinning at near out of control speed. Not wishing to be cryptic, I am now out of a relationship which just wasn’t even close to where I wanted to be and I am embarking on another with somebody that if you had asked me to write my wish list six months ago, it would have seemed like I was writing her description. I am so so lucky.

A strange period in my life, one of transition more than anything else. The loss of my father brought a few things into perspective, mainly my own fallibility. Life is just too short, I have no time to loose. None. If I were to think about it in these terms it all become quite clear as to what I should, I need to give up alcohol again, maybe this time it will be for good.

On March the 27th I threw myself a fiftieth birthday party, I am not a great party person but I needed to mark time I guess .. .. . so I gathered up all my friends, bought loads of booze and gave up 15 months of sobriety. A sobriety that had brought me a certain amount of happiness, got me back to a reasonable level of fitness, lost around 15lbs  .. ..  but honestly I don’t think it was a sobriety that had any real depth to it. I was still pretty empty on a spiritual level, there really didn’t seem much point to it, maybe that was why it was so easy to give it up, so easy to go back to my old ways. And that’s where I am now. I am very definitely starting to get set back into the alcoholic routine of always looking for the next drink.

Yesterday I got drunk. Drunk enough to not remember all my words but not drunk enough to have a total blackout. Drunk enough to wake up this morning feeling less than well but not hungover enough to feel like total shit. For the past two Sunday morning I have felt pretty much like this, I have written the date on yellow stickies and stuck them on the fridge kidding myself that this might be the date of my last drink. Today I will not write that sticky but I will go without alcohol. This morning I sat on the sofa and made a tiny tiny step in that direction, I told Kate that I would have a beer free day, she agreed that this was a really good idea and it did make her happy. I told her I was fed up with the constant routine of drinking every day and that I was due to give the booze a break. What I didn’t say was that I am scared, scared of where the drinking might take me. What I didn’t say was that I know where this leads, I know what the outcome is  . . …  and as  somebody who has had a few years (maybe 12 in total) I know how good I feel when I am sober. What she didn’t say was probably how it scares her too. She has been warned, my ex-girlfriend of 9 years, warned her that I am  a lying, cheating, freeloading alcoholic and that I will hurt her too in time, the way that I have hurt them women in my two previous relationships. I cannot let this happen, she is just too beautiful, too wonderful and she cares so deeply for me. Please God give me the strength to do the right thing, the strength to keep my life together when there seem to be so many forces pulling it apart.

I know that these forces are all out of proportion, they are situations that I can deal with .. .. . although lately they just seem to baffle me, I barely stay on top of the mechanics of my life. The obligations of work are barely covered, the physical needs of day to day life a barely covered and the energy that I put into getting to my next drink is needed elsewhere. Today I will put that energy in the right place.

Mothballs…..

How do I recognise the craving? During my last experiment with booze, not this one but the one before that lasted nearly 2 years, I found that half way through my morning I would get a faint taste of yeast, or my mouth would salivate just a tiny bit. The taste in my mouth would be kind of bitter an odd flavour which would come and go and let me know that my body wanted a drink. I call it the taste of mothballs…. mothballs. And generally with the taste comes a little game that my mind will play with itself, it sort of explains away the crap feeling, the obvious physical need and dismisses the problems that drinking causes me. The game can happen on a very small scale or in the full length version. Kind of like arm wrestling, I invariably loose.
At least I know what the sensation feels like, but I can’t remember how long it lasts