Dont beat yourself up too much, it happens. The key is to not make this a long time relapse and to get right back up on the horse again.

Are you just trying to quite cold turkey? Thats a hard nut to crack. I know not everyone is into AA, and I wasnt a big fan at first either, but it does help most people and gives you something to focus on other than alcohol.

I have found the use of Antabuse to be very effective. Again its not for everyone, but it does eliminate the ability to drink, therefore freeing yourself from the mental battle of trying to stay sober early in sobriety.

Good luck and keep us posted!

Hello Righttrack90,

I can certainly understand where you are at as I rarely watched football without drinking. Sometimes I went to the pub supposedly to watch a match but usually I would stay for only one half. I would have a huge amount to drink if I stayed for the whole match and would then drive home. What I came to realize was that the football was only a convenient way to justify drinking and if there was no match, I would find another reason to drink. For me, drinking had become an obsession.

Your wife can stop by using her willpower and normal drinkers can do that, even if they are heavy drinkers. Some alcoholics can also stop on willpower but plenty more, possibly the vast majority cannot, once alcoholism has taken a firm grip. Therefore, although determination is all that it takes for your wife, that approach may be completely useless for you.

You have recognised that you need to stop and that is a good starting point. If you can get it into your mind that you are no longer a drinker that may be all that you need to do. Just be aware that alcoholics who stop drinking but who do not treat the causes are often restless, irritable and discontented unhappy with their sobriety. Some such people will stay sober but life will not be good for those who are around them. For others, emotions such as anger, fear, jealousy etc. will slowly build up until one day they will throw in the towel, blow their top and have a drink. Then the endless misery starts again.

The secret to long term sobriety and a decent life to go with it is to find some way of restoring and maintaining the right balance in your emotional life. There are probably a number of ways that you can do that and one of them is through AA. Keep an open mind and dont rule anything out and you will get there.

Tonight, I will watch a Champions League match on TV and the thought of drinking could not be further from my mind. At one time that would have been an impossible dream.

I had many day ones before I finally made it. One thing that you should try is get rid of the booze in the house.

Nest time that you watch football say to yourself that you are not going to drink for this game. Maybe you will drink at the next game but not for this game. Repeat at the next game.

I just realized lately that my age has a lot to do with my success with leaving alcohol. At nearly 65 I just no longer yearn for the smell of a pub and the game on the big screen. Never really did actually. I always have preferred to watch the game at home with friends and typically get mildly plastered on booze (is that possible?) and eating too much along the way.

You can stop if it really is something you set your mind to accomplish. You just need to evolve to the next level where you truly believe that a life without any alcohol is a better life for you. It is for me.

I used to love to go to the bar and the game was a great reason. Then I just went to the bar. Then I went home and drank more.

It was a habit.

I had to change my routine and the only way I had a chance was to have a daily meeting where I needed to go at 430.

You can do this. Many have. You can

1is2many

I remember when I was in treatment, we learned how to identify our triggers and how to deal with them. This was very important in the beginning when my sobriety was still in a very fragile state.

There was a pretty young lady in my group, who worked as a bartender who was convinced she could keep her job and maintain her sobriety so the counselors had us do some role playing where she was at work and the rest of us were her customers. We all were holding soda cans which we pretended were alcoholic beverages and one at a time, we offered her a drink in some very convincing ways. Long story short, by the end of this exercise, she was in tears as the play struck a chord with reality.

Several months later, I bumped into her at an AA meeting. She had left her bartending job and was working at a different restarant that did not sell alcohol.

Not sure if this helps you any but the first few months I needed an awful lot of support from my sponser and from AA. I had an excellent start in the treatment program I was in which also instructed us on how to use the AA program. We learned that we needed to be vigilant and think about the consequences of our actions. I know I could never have done it alone.

So if I could offer a suggestion, you may need additional help to keep you on the road to recovery.

God Bless!

For me to be free of mental and physical dependency on alcohol the desire to be sober had to override both or it wasn't going work out beyond variable strings of days of mighty determination. I tried to get sober for many years and the cycles of dry and relapse got very heavy and exhausting.

When the desire was strong enough I finally got free with relatively little struggle by going through the 12 Step programme of Alcoholics Anonymous. There are other options out there too that some people here use.

Hey bud -- Thanks for coming on here and being honest with your supporters here -- your teammates in sobriety if you will. That was a huge and important step to take and one you wouldn't have done if you were trying to white knuckle it alone. There are a lot of great responses on here already (no surprise)! For me (and I am only 70 days sober) the switch that finally went on in my head was "I am an alcoholic -- period" Instead of feeling ashamed about it, I felt surprisingly liberated. AA meetings and my sponsor have also helped me a lot. The urge to drink has been lifted (miraculously) as I asked in all sincerity for it to please be lifted from me -- that I could not do that on my own. It is largely because of that phenomenal happening, that I came to believe in a higher power. I don't consider myself a believer in any organized religion. A searcher that leans towards the power of energy and nature and Buddhist meditation might be closest to what I am right now. Thanks for posting and keep coming here. Sending strength, love and warm wishes your way. PG