Just because you want to doesn't mean you have to. Don't pick up the first one, and you won't have to worry about waking up with the guilt, remorse and shame that was haunting you a few days ago.

Make a phone call and get to a meeting. You'll feel better.

Ann All of those feelings,however bad they may be will pass.Your body and mind are detoxing from alcohol.Really it wont last. We just cant feed the disease. This is one of the reasons we have meetings .We can vent if we need to vent and we can learn from others what they did to get sober.We just dont pick up that first drink. Call your local Alcoholics Anonymous Central office and talk to someone.Thats why the're there. Get information about meetings close to your home. Please dont give in to this disease. There is a solution .I found mine in meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous. Keep coming back and let us know how you're doing. We really do care.
Greg

Anne, it will not always feel like this and you will develop the strategies required to parent your kids. I see from your profile that you are going to your first AA meeting - maybe by now you've already been.
You will learn more than you bargained for. Stick with it - do what is suggested to you even if it sounds a bit weird. Stick around here - many of us have recovered in AA and have much to share with you.

Best wishes

Lyn

PS Feel free to private message me if there's anything I can help with!

hugs bill

It will get better. Just don't pick up that first drink in the next hour. Then the next few hours...then (for me ) it was 24 hours. Once I had a few 24 hours behind me it got a little easier. But its still a daily repreive and I need daily reminders that I'm an alcoholic and one glass of wine isnt what it is to other "normies" -- its a trap door that plunks me right back into hell. For me hell was being hungover or drunk, with 3 little kids. I didnt want to drink....but at 5 p.m. almost every day....I did.
Ugh.
Anyway get some time. Get into the recovery.
And for god sakes go get a manicure;)

Hello anned22,

The type of things that you are having difficulty in dealing with now are the very same things that AA will help you to cope with well apart from the nails.

Today, its the kids, tomorrow it could be the car, the day after it will be something else but regardless of what it is you should try to understand one important fact. You have an obsession for alcohol and it will tell you to drink. The journey that you have just started on leads to this obsession being removed and the urge to drink leaving you. The rewards are great, such as being there for your children and watching them grow up. Nothing that is worthwhile in life comes without some work or sacrifice so think of the pain as a form of training for some big goal in your life.

The alternative is pretty horrible for you, for your children and for everyone around you. Do you really want to go back there? This is where the support of the meetings is so vital so my suggestion to you is to get to a meeting and make the most of what you find there. It may not be easy but those negative feelings can be turned off and replaced with a positive attitude that says I can do this.

Thanks all again - again. I ended up fighting with my husband and crying myself to sleep. I haven't cried like that since I was a child. I wanted so badly to call someone, but was afraid. So badly to go to a meeting, but so tired. I'm going to one on Sunday (next avail time I can go!). Lots of reading the BB this AM, and talking it out with my husband. He's not understanding my mood swings, nor my seemingly insane mind right now. But you all do. Thank you.

Great job -- it is a HUGE accomplishment to stop drinking. So glad you did not pick up a drink!

I was nuts for awhile when I quit and not always "in the best mood." (A nicer way of saying I was an overly-emotional bitch.)

Stay with it -- cry through the cravings if you need to, but don't pick up a drink. Good news -- it gets better!