i need to take the final step

[Alice37]

i was dependant on amphetamines which i used to shoot up for 5 or so years, i was evicted twice, i lost all my possesions. it took me about 3 years to finally get clean and then it was alcohol which i battled with for a few more years. i have reached this point in time where i still drink about once or twice a week. if i go over a certain amount which does still happen, i make bad choices and i am worried about this.

i cannot afford this to happen anymore,last year i relapsed badly for six months, when i go through times like this i find the alcohol is very insidious, creeping back in without my realisation. i am becoming more aware of these times and am able to stop it from going too far.

its like i am scared to make the final descision, i know this is the only answer for me, besides i want to do it for health reasons also. I am very healthy now, i have worked really hard to become healthy, but there is still this blight that obviously needs to be dealt with, i want to stop smoking as well and a few times a week i still smoke a spliff.

my values are important to me but i continue to go against them which causes me pain.

i am very upset because i have wasted my time all these years, i really want to study at uni and am really passionate about learning, i so wish i had felt like this years ago and i would be in such a different place now. I am 38 with not much money, not much education but i am passionate and intelligent.

i would like to do so many things, but i have many problems which have been caused by my lost years, my house is filled with clutter, and lately i have been thinking, if your outer reflects your inner then i must have a lot shoved away in the drawers of my mind. also my garden is really overgrown so my mind is also,

why do i struggle so?

alice:confused:

[smallstar]

..........

[tash28]

Hi Alice I use 2 b addicted to, speed and alcohol. If I didnt have any speed in the mornings I would not be able to get out of bed in the mornings. Then by the afternooon I would have to have a bottle of vodka by 4pm I would not be able to speak or walk as use to be so out of it. Around 1am I use to have a few joints as I would be starting to come round from the speed and the vodka. This was my life 4 many years no 1 could speak to me about it. I can remember walking into a pub to meet some friends and I was wasted and a few of my mates broke down in tears as I had lost so much weight and they hated seeing me like it. I still didnt change as I was not ready.

I have now stopped it all but a have a different addiction now and that is self harming I cut my legs up.

Really all i want to say is u will not give ur addiction up until u r completly ready to. U will know when ur ready and then u will need all ur friends and some support around u as u will find it very hard and u could relapse.

Hope u can do and I wish u all the best.

Take care

[Guest ASchwartz]

Hi Alice,

You did not waste your time all of these years. Those were life experiences, even though they were not happy ones. As to why you struggle, I must say, I have always found my life to be a struggle. Its not just you.

I don't think you can make a promise to not drink again or to take the "final step," because I do not believe there is one. You need to live a day at a time and tell yourself, "I didn't drink today." The reason for ending the drinking is that there is a very high likelihood that it will bring about a relapse.

What about starting to think positively about your life and yourself?

Allan

[marysc]

i have reached this point in time where i still drink about once or twice a week. if i go over a certain amount which does still happen, i make bad choices and i am worried about this.

:

Alice,

Years ago, I couldn't stop my substance abuse until I accepted the fact that I couldn't do like my friends and have "just a little bit" now and then. I had never been able to do this in the past, and I would never be able to do it in the future.

Once I gave up my fairy-tale hopes of doing it "once or twice a week" and stopped kidding myself, I was able to stop for good. (Knock on wood, so far anyway - you still have to do it day by day!)

This is not really a matter of will power. It's more a matter of accepting reality and surrendering to it. I will NEVER be able to do like my friends. Maybe it's not fair, but it's reality. Finally I know that.

Hang in there,

Mary