Alcoholism Support Group
Alcoholism is the continued consumption of alcoholic beverages, even when it is negatively affecting your health, work, relationships and life. If you think alcohol is causing you to lose control, it's time to seek help. Our group is a safe place to vent, check in, get back up if you fall, and reach sobriety.
I’ve notice several posts in recent days from those concerned about relapsing during the holiday season with it’s abundance of Christmas parties and celebrations, including New Years Eve. For some of us, it will be the ultimate challenge since making a life-changing decision to embrace sobriety during the last year and we are anxious about this test of will and perhaps what our family, friends, and colleagues may think of our decision. In effect, the anxiety may surface from one of two sources, the temptation to drink or the exposure of our sobriety.
The temptation to drink
Whether attending the annual company Christmas party or sitting down with the in-laws for a holiday dinner, it’s very possible that alcohol will be in present. The question to ask yourself now, weeks before most of these events, is how strong is your commitment to your recovery and how is it supported? AA suggests that a life of sobriety left to our own volition will be rather vulnerable, but one supported with a higher power is likely to have a stronger likelihood of continued success.
For years I got hung up on the higher power thing until I finally understood the underlying precept: I couldn’t live a sober life when left to my own devices. I needed help. Higher power, higher wisdom or whatever you prefer to call it, is that source of knowledge and support that lays a foundation amidst the rubble of our past and guides our walk through recovery and into a sustainable life choice.
I’m Buddhist and my higher power is the dharma, yours might be the Bible, the Koran, the Tao, or your hippy neighbor Moonbeam. It doesn’t really matter as long as you’ve found a reliable source of wisdom that you can identify with that will help you successfully navigate your journey here on Earth. I think of it like using GPS the first time I’m driving in a major city as opposed to using my intuition as I go. I tried the latter for many years and it just didn’t work for me. I was hopelessly lost most of the time.
If you’re heading into the fray of Holiday celebrations armed with only your resolve and good intentions, there may be good reason to be anxious. I’m not saying to rush out to Target and pick up your Higher Power ASAP, but you might give it some thought or decline party invitations.
The fear of exposure
For some of us, the Holiday parties will be a coming out opportunity to share our new alcohol-free life choice, but for others it will be a stressful time concealing the secret of our alcoholism. I get it. Who wants to admit our addiction to colleagues, friends or family members during the holidays? And you don’t have to. Sharing that we no longer drink alcohol and getting into specific reasons why are two entirely different things. Only about six of my closest friends and family members know why I quit drinking, other than my acquaintances at AA and Refuge Recovery. For anyone else, it’s suffice for them to only know that I now live an alcohol and drug-free life. Period. If pushed, I’ll say I quit for health reasons, which is true. That usually ends the inquiry.
Think about it, when you meet a friend who has suddenly become vegetarian or vegan, how long do you probe them about their reasons? Not very long.
These are just my thoughts as one of 7.4 billion earthlings trying to figure out life during my brief time on this planet, the third rock from the Sun wedged between Venus and Mars in the Milky Way Galaxy. What do you think?
Thank you for sharing your thoughts and as you know I am one of the ones worried about the upcoming holiday season and I have already declined some invitations. I have also quit cold turkey on my own and I hear what you're saying about realising you need help. I have a lot to learn still and asking for help and letting people or my higher power help me is something I am gradually warming up to. Right now I am doing this one step and one day at a time and whereas I now understand the concept of a higher power I am yet to embrace and trust it.
That is an excellent post and one that will give food for thought to many.
It is such a pity that labels and words such as Higher Power and God tend to arouse such difficulty and hostility for many and cause them to lose out on such an important part of life. If you strip away the label, I suspect that the idea is much the same whether you are dealing with ‘A God of your own understanding’ of the AA Big Book, the various spiritual movements down through the ages, a Spirit of the Universe or simply your own gut feeling of what is right or wrong. Maybe a ‘Higher Wisdom’ would have been a more widely acceptable label.
Anyway, here is my own experience of the festival dilemma.
I would not seek out parties etc. as I never liked them much at any time but neither would I avoid such occasions through fear of drinking. However, I will make an important distinction here between the early months of sobriety and the post Twelve Steps period. In the weeks and months after I stopped drinking, I would avoid such occasions of temptation as sobriety had to come before everything else.
Whatever people’s views may be regarding AA and the Twelve Steps, and people are entitled to their own opinions, my own experience is that the Steps have transformed my attitude to alcohol. For someone like me who was drawn to alcohol like iron to a magnet, it is truly amazing to go into a bar or a hotel and not even notice the bottles on the wall. That is not to say that I could not end up back at that torturous old way of life again, but today I have the tools that I can use to avoid that potential disaster. It is up to me whether I choose to use or to foolishly disregard that toolkit for living.
For those alcoholics venturing into the lion’s den over the holiday period, I would offer the following suggestions. Before you consider such a hazardous journey, there are some things that you should fix firmly in your mind.
1. Learn about the reasons why you cannot drink safely.
2. Come to fully accept that you are an alcoholic and cannot drink.
3. Put sobriety above everything else, so no matter what happens you will not drink.
4. Most people are too busy getting drunk and don’t actually care that much about the reasons why you are not drinking, so don’t bother with complicated explanations.
5. Being sober can be great fun so draw a line under the ‘poor me’ and have a great time.