Absolutely none. Total honesty with myself, God and others is a complete commitment or my next drink is in the post.

These people sound like they aren't being honest with themselves or their programme if they are still fantasising about drinking or fearing it.

I avoid topic-style meetings, they make me want to go out and lie down in the middle of a busy road when they are over. All those problems and no solution. Big Book or Step for me, for an energising, spiritual and solution-based meeting.

For me, a happy and meaningful sobriety can only be achieved if all fear and desire of drinking has totally gone. I could only achieve that by going to any lengths - which wasn't much really - in return for what I have been given.

"I avoid topic-style meetings, they make me want to go out and lie down in the middle of a busy road when they are over. All those problems and no solution. Big Book or Step for me, for an energising, spiritual and solution-based meeting. "

Wow. That is such a bad representation of the program. Maybe try some new meetings. We are people with experience, strength, and hope WITH the steps. If you don't want the experience part, why go to meetings at all?

My discussion meetings are excellent. In fact, this was one of the best I have been to. LOTS of solution talk. Lots of applying the program to my life talk.

No, you misunderstand, I love the meetings I go to. The ones I avoid are the topic style ones, maybe I have just had bad luck with them but they are pretty miserable affairs from the ones I have seen.

How come, if this meeting is so good, with experience, strength and hope, this guy has put you on edge and shocked you by sharing that he is still obsessed with drink after 18 years in AA.

Who said I didn't want the experience? Not me! I go to meetings to help the still-suffering alcoholic mainly - and because I have some great friends in AA who I enjoy seeing. It's nice to hear how others have recovered but not if they are still obsessed with drinking...

I would ask the guy if he is working the program as it is set out in the Big Book? lol

If I had to live the way you describe this guy is then I would go out and drink today. Luckily, the good thing, with HP and the program etc I don't have to live that way. Hallelujah for that.

The good thing for me....these shares remind me of the sobriety I don't want. If it is working for him, then so be it.

He didn't put me on edge. I feel sorry for him. IMO, he not getting it if he thinks this way. That said - it's his recovery not mine.

I lived 2 years trying to get sober with reservations. I was in a constant state of white knuckling. I felt paralyzed in my life. I cannot say "if this happens, i can drink" or I will wait for the day. Today, I have no reservations. I will make no excuses because if I do then I am not embracing my sobriety as the only way to be EVER.

In this mtg, I heard a dozen other people talk about how reservations kept them stuck and sick, and how they had to dismiss those reservations in order to have good sobriety. I heard a lot of how to apply the steps to those causes for reservation in the program. I also heard a newcomer share how she could relate and how she is gaining a better understanding of why she is continuing to struggle.

My eyebrows weren't the only ones raised when this guy stated his reservation. Guess I am glad I am not him.

Really glad to hear that there were other shares that were more positive and glad your programme has no reservations. That way it will really work well for you. Good stuff!

No reservations for me.

I also did not quit just for today, I quit for good. I had to think about it this way -- not one day at a time, but forever. If there might be some future date when I could possibly drink, then why not now?

I know other people who are wired differently and they say, "I'm just not going to drink today." It can make it seem less overwhelming. And in reality, we choose to not drink at any moment, and it's those moments that become minutes and hours and days, etc. I just handle it better when I think of it as an ongoing expanse of time with no drinking and no possibility of it.

I actually felt better when I realized I was never going to drink again. What a relief to be done with it!

Drinking had started hurting me. I could lift my blouse and see the tell-tale liver bulge....and still go home and drink dinner.

I can't see alcohol being involved at my passing. Hopefully a Buddhist monk will be there......I want to enter my new life sober and happy

Namaste

I don't have reservations. If I knew today was my last day on earth I'd want to be with my children, sober. Someone shared today in our meeting that her fear that brought her into AA was becoming an old lady drunk in the gutter somewhere. Now that is scary.
I can't think about forever though, I just take it a day at a time. Works better for this alcoholic.

One of the most helpful and wonderful women in AA in So Calif. had her son bring her a martini on her death bed. She had been sober for 18 years at that time.

I personally would have to be in that position - having a terminal disease - to make a decision for this one.

One of the few meetings that I attended a while back was similar to this. A few of the guys had said that the desire to drink never became less, but stayed the same. Some of them had been sober for 3-5-10 and even 20yrs, but the desire has always been just as strong as it was on day one. I would only have to believe that were true....for them. When I have not used illegal drugs/prescription pills for a while the desire tapers off. Alcohol is ALWAYS there and I can always get it. I am sure if Alcohol were as hard to get as pills or other drugs then the desire might taper off for it too and would be alarmingly easier for me to quit.

To each his own I suppose...

i never believed in programs............admittedly i have never been to one....(a) because i figure they preach...and i have been preached too before....secondly through experience in trying to help others i have found that it is a haven for contacts.

i chose to walk my walk with the pebble in my shoe.

But that guy meant what he said . I would imagine . Ive watched all kinds of things in Sobriety that to me, made No sense.

Everyone gets what they put in ... Ive seen Solution based meeting that Created robotic carnivore like people.
Very hi up on food chain as sponsors.

Fall flat on their face Cause their honesty was only skin deep. Life is a funny thing !

I try and stay real close in Contact with the realization that its all really just in the hand played ,through becoming what I hope to be honest with myself. And staying close to reality of what appears real ,could change . No reservations .

My sponsor Bill always said " The verdict is still Out! Live it!:)
Billy

Tara, I love topic meetings. First ones I went to had such an array of characters, and I never knew one word could have so many variations. We'd all put in a word and have one drawn out and everyone would share quickly what they first thought of. We had tolerance, love, respect, abandonment, many words, even rabbit came out lol. I love the variety of meetings and went to a different one each day. They were such great training fields that helped build foundations in my sobriety. I also learned to socialise sober, and laugh again in them. Not at people, but with people.

As for reservations on sobriety. I've never thought I've had any, but there's a lot of living yet to be done. When I got cancer and my odds were stacked against me I did ponder early on whether when the end was closer I'd have a drink. Never eventuated though. I'm pretty stubborn and as far as my not drinking goes, as long as I don't do it today, that's all I need to focus on.