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Alcohol concerns - September
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Message 1.Â
Posted by What larks (U14260755) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Welcome to the September thread.
This is for anyone whose life is affected by alcohol or other drugs; a chance to talk about problems, get support and share ideas.
It is for people worried about their own consumption, for people in recovery, and for anyone concerned about friends or family members. It is for people hoping to cut down a bit on social drinking as well as those of us facing a crisis or heading towards despair.
Though some people have been posting on here a long time, newcomers are specially welcome. This isn't a formal dinner party so as Basia explained in her excellent introduction last month, your post doesn't have to relate to the previous ones.
I've taken the liberty of copying some useful links from last month's thread:
If you're the drinker:
www.alcoholics-anony... (AA UK, every country has one)
www.drinkaware.co.uk... (includes advice on cutting down*)
www.smartrecovery.or... (non 12 step)
www.giveupdrinking.c...
If drugs are your problem:
If overeating is your problem:
www.oagb.org.uk/?pag...
For those whose lives are affected by someone drinking heavily or using drugs heavily:
www.al-anonuk.org.uk...
alanon.activeboard.c... (an online discussion group for those who have problem drinkers in their lives)
www.adfam.org.uk/... (non-12 step AnAnon)
And here is where the August thread left off.
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Message 2
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Thanks for opening up September Skylark - in response to your plea about the links at the end of August, unfortunately you can't just cut and paste them from the last thread as the full links don't copy across - I keep them in a word document from which I cut and paste when I open the thread but unfortunately it's on a computer a hundred miles away at the moment. In the meantime, here's the link the the first post of last month which contains all the links
It was good to see the thread get livelier again last month after a period in the doldrums (although not good that people have troubles that they want to share on the thread - but people do also use it to talk about how they have come through and out the other side as well. I'll come back and post something for the beginning of the month later today. -
Message 3
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
I'm back at the computer with the links document - so I'll paste them into this post (it doesn't have quite all of them but it's easy enough to go back through the link to last month for the others):
Good starting points for deciding if there is a problem
Sources of help for the drinker
Sources of help for those affected by a drinker
For the benefit of anyone new to these threads, I used to live with a very functioning alcoholic (didn't drink in the morning, very far from the park bench stereotype etc etc - I refer anyone who thinks that alcoholics all live in unemployed, homeless squalor etc etc to the posts following this one in last month's thread . He is now sober (has been for five years and I think that is partly due to things I learned here and passed on to him) but I don't live with him any more. Al Anon (and, in particular, the Al Anon principles) have helped me to become a very different person from the one I was six or seven years ago. I wish I'd known about it sooner - although I know that it does not suit everyone. -
Message 4
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Apologies for three in a row - I failed to check the link to the bit about stereotypes in last month's thread - I actually meant to link to 228 further down the page.
Whilst I wait for the flea, I shall indulge myself [this post may only make any sense to people with a knowledge of 12 step programmes like Al Anon - apologies to others and please scroll on by] by posting a bit about my surprise when reading Oliver Burkeman's "The Antidote: Happiness for people who can't stand positive thinking" earlier today to find his account of the Roman Stoics (particularly Epictetus, Seneca and Marcus Aurelius) reading like an extract from Al Anon literature. According to Burkeman, their "ideal state of mind was tranquility, not the excitable cheer that positive thinkers usually seem to mean when they use the word 'happiness'. And tranquillity was to be achieved not be strenuously chasing after enjoyable experiences but by cultivating a kind of calm indifference towards one's circumstances" ......" "For Stoics tranquillity entails confronting the reality of your limited control"
Sounds very like "the serenity to accept the things I cannot change".
He also refers to Marcus Aurelius' conviction that there was a grand plan and that "whatever happens at all, happens as it should". That's a notion in Al Anon literature which I trip up over so I was amused to read of Burkeman's conversation with a modern-day follower of Stoicism who explained "with a sigh, he was always having to quell fractious arguments between atheist Stoics and theist Stoics on the International Stoic Forum" - the atheists accepting that you don't need to embrace the notion of a "grand plan" in order to accept the flipside that each of us has very little individual control (the Forum exists, I just googled it and am off to investigate further).
Burkeman goes on to say that Stoics distinguish between resignation and acceptance and "using your powers of reason to stop being disturbed by a situation doesn't mean you shouldn't try to change it.... a Stoic who finds herself in an abusive relationship would not be expected to put up with it and would almost certainly be best advised to take action to leave it". Stoicism would oblige her to see the situation for what it was and then take whatever actions were within her power.
So it would seem that the Stoics would completely embrace the serenity prayer - grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.
I find it rather pleasing to find that I am probably in the process of becoming a Stoic. -
Message 5
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
>>So it would seem that the Stoics would completely embrace the serenity prayer <<
maybe the first verse, from what you quoted above a few of them might have an issue with the second (-; -
Message 6
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
But you have just reminded me to get that book ( on kindle I hope).....
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Message 7
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Yes, I've got it on kindle - what do you mean by verses? I only know it as one verse.
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Message 8
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
God, give us grace to accept with serenity
the things that cannot be changed,
Courage to change the things
which should be changed,
and the Wisdom to distinguish
the one from the other.
Living one day at a time,
Enjoying one moment at a time,
Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,
Taking, as Jesus did,
This sinful world as it is,
Not as I would have it,
Trusting that You will make all things right,
If I surrender to Your will,
So that I may be reasonably happy in this life,
And supremely happy with You forever in the next.
Amen. -
Message 9
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Ah. I don't know if that version ever got used in AA/Al Anon - I've certainly never seen it before and the first bit isn't even quite the same as the longer one:
[God - which is lost by quite a lot of people who only start on the second word] grant me the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, the courage to change the things we can and the wisdom to know the difference.
(I don't think Al Anon would encourage the notion of things which "should" be changed - only those which can)
Coming back to what this thread does best - the sharing of experience - I was paying for my shopping in the supermarket this morning (in my old town) when someone came up and said hello - it took me a minute to recognise them as someone who was in my family support group in my ex-husband's treatment centre five years ago - their partner had been in a couple of months before him so we overlapped in the family support group for a good bit of our years support post the drinkers' treatment - and heard quite a lot about each other's histories in the weekly sessions. I don't think their partner stayed sober and I think they had anyway split up by the time I joined the group - they got remarried last year and looked very happy. -
Message 10
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
As a relative newcomer ,how good to discover this corner .
I had been musing on how the excitement of becoming involved in a MB like this could be a bit like the thrill of a new romantic relationship.Up to discovering this thread I wanted it to be one of those relationships that didn't last -addictive or what !!!! (recognising my own tendencies )
I was attending Coda meetings for about two years ,nearly 20 years ago now .My life has gone well since then.I met a lot of recovering alcoholics and now I avoid pubs and drinking socialising .
I was impressed by Marcus A. when I read bits . He is (for me ) spiritual without "belief " -right up my street now .I meditate daily :I think 'acceptance ' is a marvellous pivot to swing the direction from self -loathing to self -love .Acceptance of this moment ,oneself and others .
Thanks for being here . -
Message 11
Posted by ThisLizzie (U5294918) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Hello all,
It's me, ThisLizzie. Haven't posted for ages. Anyhow, OH's seriously out of hand drinking climaxed a few weeks ago. -
Message 12
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Welcome, zenman.
Hello, Lizzie - I'm sorry to hear that - do you want to tell us any more?
(I've just re-read my last post - I got myself tied in knots trying to be as non-specific as possible about my ex-support group peer - I meant that they had found a new partner since that time and are now happily married to them.) -
Message 13
Posted by ThisLizzie (U5294918) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Hello Fee,
Hope you and yours are well. Remembering some of your situation, I know you'll understand. We were talking a couple of bottles of spirits per day/not eating/missing work. On and on like this it went. Finance for the booze became a big issue ( no work, no money, no one prepared to lend to him) and all of this was my fault of course. Resulted in DV/Arrest/18month sentence (I'd kept a diary). He's now staying elsewhere. Just wanted to feel less alone really. It's not the sort of thing you can casually drop into a conversation and to go into details with people who haven't lived like this is just too much for me right now. There are conditions re. attending sessions etc. but I know he's still drinking so we haven't really come to the end, just another chapter. -
Message 14
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
That all sounds horribly difficult for you (and I seem to remember that you have children? but I may be mixing that up in my mind) and as though it has been for some time (not sure I'm quite clear about the chronology). Having people who understand without having to spell it out is invaluable (and even spelling it out doesn't necessarily convey the message to people who haven't been there).
-
Message 15
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Hi Fee and Lizzie.
I'm having memories of 'telephone sharing " ,which was big when I went to
Coda .I still have a little book with pages of names(usually only first) and numbers .Used to ring and say "could you give me 5 minutes " .
This message board is more like sharing at a meeting ,with no anxiety about getting in gracefully ,or time cards .
After family and divorce I live by myself now .If I feel lonely I reach out ,
I still have at least one good friend from recovery,and 1or2 others from a dance process (not sure if ok to name ??) that I still go to which has 12 step roots and is anti addiction .The "freer "I become the more I just want to get on with my own thing .I'm not hooked on TA anymore !!! -
Message 16
Posted by ThisLizzie (U5294918) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
Well said Fee! His family have always insisted he's perfectly entitled to a beer after work. Not sure what they think now. Yes, I do have children but they're young adults and are either left or part time residents here now. This is a blessing but does make for loneliness as well as worrying about how they feel. You don't often hear of a good ending to stories like this and part of me is trying to enjoy the peace which has come to the house before the next storm arrives. I am also systematically working my way through the house to change the way it looks. Not sure if this is normal but it's something I NEED to do. -
Message 17
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
>I am also systematically working my way through the house to change the way it looks. Not sure if this is normal but it's something I NEED to do.<
Oh yes, I did that - and then took it to the complete extreme of moving altogether a hundred miles away (for a different job). We sold the old family home although as well as somewhere here I've still got a small flat in the area which allows my (also grown up) children a way of keeping links with the area where they grew up. It's over a year now since we moved out of the old house and I don't think any of us miss it - too many difficult memories. -
Message 18
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Saturday, 1st September 2012
>This message board is more like sharing at a meeting ,with no anxiety about getting in gracefully ,or time cards <
Yes, indeed - and without having to worry about boring anyone as they can always just scroll on past. I've never been good at the telephone in any context - I can write and I can talk to people face to face but I don't like the telephone.
>from a dance process (not sure if ok to name ??) that I still go to<
Yes, certainly OK to name. This thread may remind you of a 12 step group meeting but it absolutely isn't - there are lots of people who post here who don't have anything to do with AA or Al Anon or any other such group. In the past there have been lively arguments but I think we are pretty tolerant of everyone's views now. -
Message 19
Posted by What larks (U14260755) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
Thanks for popping in those links, Fee. A moment's thought would have told me that they wouldn't copy, but there you go.
I am feeling a bit stressed in my life but won't use that as an excuse. I wasn't looking forward to my friend coming this weekend: we never know what sort of a state he'll be in. So far, so good but anything can change at any time. -
Message 20
Posted by What larks (U14260755) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
We had a good morning. We went to a local show and my friend got a second prize in the "most handsome dog" class with his dog, and did well in the flyball, so is most chuffed.
An old friend was running the flyball and asked me about my friend when he was sitting in the car. She works with adults with special needs and asked me if his learning disabilities were always there or due to drugs. I don't think I've ever spoken to her about his problems so of course asked why she had posed that question. She shrugged and said "Well, it is impossible to tell the difference." -
Message 21
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
I'm glad you had a good morning Skylark. I hope the rest of the weekend goes well and that you can de-stress a bit.
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Message 22
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
I grew up with no telephone ,then there was "the telephone period",
and now just take your digital pick. Nothing quite like face to face tho'.
Thats why a digital "meeting " is different :there is so much conveyed by REAL presence ,body language ,intonation ,the ravages of time ,outer garments -all "messages '. The "message " in just text is in grammar vocabulary etc.
OK ,the dance I go to is "5 rhythms".Google Gabrielle Roth,UK and follow the links .It can be different things for different people:
a meditation
a work out
an emotional/behavioural laboratory
a friendly group
fun !
Dancing without talking---suck it and see!!
Two things I learned at 12 step were the danger of 'Cross talk " ,and the skill of coming from myself when I had a different opinion about something .I was getting the impression on other bits of this MB -eg DTA -that hostile intolerance of other peoples opinions was almost the house style .Thats why finding this corner is so good . -
Message 23
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
Thanks Skylark and Fee for opening up.
Just bookmarking briefly, but wanted to say I too thought "Verse?" when you mentioned the serenity prayer. I have never read that long version, not in 11 years of being in AA, but just googled and I have to say I'm er..surprised. Well I never. Anyway, that's a really good example of take what you want and leave the rest.
-
Message 24
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
Oh Lizzie, I'm sorry things haven't improved, but glad you dropped in.
Fee, thanks so much for that, that's fantastic. Wonderful stuff, am ordering today.
I find it rather pleasing to find that I am probably in the process of becoming a StoicÂ
Ha [Fast Show mode on] suits you Fee [Fast Show mode off].
And tranquillity was to be achieved not be strenuously chasing after enjoyable experiences but by cultivating a kind of calm indifference towards one's circumstances" ......" "For Stoics tranquillity entails confronting the reality of your limited control"Â
Welcome Zen. Oh we can do intolerance in here too, but it more or less manifests itself as frustration.
His family have always insisted he's perfectly entitled to a beer after workÂ
Like that comment for example, brings out the hostile intolerance in me, but of course I've been around for long enough to understand where this sort of remark is coming from, tiresome and unhelpful and ostrich-like though it is.
Anyway, got floors to clan, cats to adopt out, Bx -
Message 25
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
An Ocean of difference ,I think, between " in my opinion" and
"you are wrong" .
and (tongue in cheek ) those will be Scottish floors ?? -
Message 26
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
Och aye Zen.
(Touche btw, and it made me laugh out loud.) -
Message 27
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
Greetings .
-
Message 28
Posted by What larks (U14260755) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
I'm glad you had a good morning Skylark. I hope the rest of the weekend goes well and that you can de-stress a bit.Â
Thank you Fee. My friend was desperately worried about going because he didn't know what to expect; he doesn't cope well in new situations and has lived in the "marginalised" world for so long that he feels like a fish out of water in what you and I would regard as "normal" society. So he has crashed out and is fast asleep....as indeed is his dog!
Am I allowed on here to admit that I am unwinding with a glass of wine? I am one of those lucky people who can't get drunk; I fall asleep if I have more than just a little. -
Message 29
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
>Am I allowed on here to admit that I am unwinding with a glass of wine? <
I'm about to have one myself. I'm past the days when I was phobic about alcohol despite the fact that I'd never been close to having a problem with it myself - I treat it with extreme respect these days but not fear - which I view as part of having retrieved some sort of sanity out of the madness of years gone by. -
Message 30
Posted by superjan3 (U6523409) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
I bought a couple of bottles of my friend's favourite beer for his 80th birthday. He couldn't come on Friday to collect them so they'll st ay here until next week. I'm not bothered about having them in the house but would have done in the not too distant past.
-
Message 31
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Sunday, 2nd September 2012
Hi superjan - it's good when things which once loomed large as difficulties shrink back to their right size.
-
Message 32
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Sad news this morning. I've just had an email from Boots asking me to tell you that the police came round in the early hours of this morning to tell her that her son had been found dead in his flat. Boots say that at least he is now at peace.
Please send thoughts in her direction as she struggles to get through this. She is has always been the best advertisement for Al Anon that I've ever come across so I know that she will be using all its principles and literature and local members to support her.
I can't think of anything else to say. -
Message 33
Posted by What larks (U14260755) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
I don't think I know Boots or her story, but I am very sad for her.
It is good to know she has a support network aroud her. -
Message 34
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Boots used to post on here a lot Skylark a few years ago and I met her once about three years ago when I happened to be in her part of the country. She said on one of her rare recent posts that she did not feel like continuing to post the same things over again.
I will see if I can find an old post in which she told her story. It's not mine to tell.
I've just posted something on the end of last month as there were a lot of people in there who "knew" her and may not yet have caught up with this thread. -
Message 35
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Just looking back at random and found the September thread from three years ago - Boots is at number 4 here -
(that's like a step back in time, looking at that thread) -
Message 36
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Actually, this is a better one from a couple of months earlier - Boots doing the OP:
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Message 37
Posted by Karmic-ish Kris (U14642774) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Oh no, Fee. How terribly, terribly sad.
Reading this whilst returning home after being away for a couple of weeks, having made a deliberate decision not to look in on my own A's social network site to check he is Ok.
Poor, poor Boots. She often inspired me by her ability to detach with love..am really feeling for her right now.
Thanks for letting us know Fee. -
Message 38
Posted by The Giddy Kipper (U10918464) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
So sorry to hear that, it's very sad and will be thinking about Boots
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Message 39
Posted by BasiainBrooklyn (U505001) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Oh no, oh dear dear Boots, that's so terribly sad. Thank you Fee. It's 4.30 am, can't sleep.
She has always been the best advertisement for Al Anon that I've ever come acrossÂ
Absolutely Fee; I always found her posts inspiring. No hand-wringing, no self-pity although it was distressing at times, just an amazing message of acceptance through her actions after years of coping with this.
so I know that she will be using all its principles and literature and local members to support herÂ
Yes, I'm sure her RL network will be supporting her now as she has supported others.
May you find peace dear Boots, you are much missed,
Basia -
Message 40
Posted by wellyboot (U14279435) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
Oh how dreadful for Boots and her family, I can't begin to imagine what she is going through.
My sincere condolences.
WB -
Message 41
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Monday, 3rd September 2012
My worst fear is that one of my children or grandchildren should die before me .
I wish for Boots that she finds peace here ,one day at a time . -
Message 42
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
I'm not sure if Boots will be lurking or posting here in the near future - I'll cut and paste your messages into an email later this week.
Zenman, I've been turning your post over in my mind. I have all sorts of fears for my children (which I generally manage to keep in proportion) but I think they all relate to ways of living rather than death itself. Death as a result of any of it would be part of it - sudden accidental death would be sad because of the time they would have lost but at least the chances are that the life would have been happy to that point. I noticed a plaque when I was walking beside a stretch of the Thames at the weekend to the memory of someone who was 20 when he died (I don't know the story behind it) which said something along the lines of not counting the years of his life but the love and life with which he had filled them. The saddest thing, I think, is to fail to find a way to live. -
Message 43
Posted by BootsNo7 (U8853924) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Yes, Fee, I am here today and I have read the supportive comments above with tears in my eyes and I can feel the warmth coming through from the posters.
The reason I am here is that this thread gave me such support through my darkest times, although none quite so dark as now and I need that support today. OH and I are going to R's flat to collect some personal items and make sure it is all secured and I am dreading it. Not because I think he will be there - that is something I just have to accept - but because once more it is a step into the unknown as to the state of the place where he had been for some days before being found. I know you will all understand.
The Coroner's report will be forthcoming shortly I suppose but I really have no need to find out exactly why he died - that knowledge is not going to bring him back and I am secure in the knowledge that wherever he is now, he is at peace away from the terrible torments which this addiction brings with it.
Thank you all for being here.
Boots -
Message 44
Posted by Fee (U3534148) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Thanks for posting Boots and I wish you strength for today. I suppose the only thing to be said about it is that by this evening you will have done it.
-
Message 45
Posted by Retired-Rural-Person (U8479978) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Dear Boots, I wish you strength for today and for the days and nights that follow, hoping you will find support and love from those around you
Retired
xx -
Message 46
Posted by zenman003 (U15399333) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
My fears are for myself ,quite selfish :having to live without the love and joy that I am used to (and deeply thankful for ).
I dont want to think about it really.I have had some deeply compassionate moments knowing refugees that have lost their whole families and are making the best of a life, surrounded by unfamiliar strangers .
The last five funerals I've been to have been people younger than me.
One day at time - -with love . -
Message 47
Posted by Karmic-ish Kris (U14642774) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Thinking of you today, Boots xxx
-
Message 48
Posted by What larks (U14260755) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Fee, that post is awesome.
I am glad Boots' son is no longer tormented, but of course what we really want is for our loved ones to find peace in this world. -
Message 49
Posted by whitbyrose (U15069960) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Boots I am so sorry
-
Message 50
Posted by doughy hood (U2352167) on Tuesday, 4th September 2012
Boots, what upsetting news. Take comfort, if possible, from the knowledge that he is at peace now.
Doughy.
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