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.
It seems that a lot of people throw this concept around. The premise being that most people recover from addiction/alcoholism on their own and that the impulse to put the bottle down "just hits them" and then they are done.
I totally agree that most people do recover on their own, more so than through any of the traditional paths of recovery (AA, Rehabs, counseling, etc). I, however, don't really buy that It's all that spontaneous. Granted, at some point you do have to make the DECISION that you are done with it and say "NO MORE". So at that precise moment I guess you could argue that you had an Aha moment; so you could consider that spontaneous.
In reality, in my opinion anyway, a lot of pain, suffering, heartache and negative consequences occurred that made that Aha moment take place. Therefore, there really was nothing all that spontaneous about it.
Hey look, I was in sales most of my life and in order to be successful you have to convince the potential customer that your way of completing the task at hand is better and more efficient, cost effective, etc..., than the way they've been doing it up until now. So another way of looking at that is to say to the potential client that accomplishing what you want and finding satisfaction is less painful if you do it my way than the way you are approaching it now. When the pain of staying the same is greater than that which would be realized by changing, guess what? You become ready and willing to change.
So back to my sales example; Let's say after my sales pitch to Bob, the operations manager, that he decides after weighing the arguments, that he is going to switch to my company. He announces it at the "team meeting" and his top assistant says; "So you're just going to change how we do things JUST LIKE THAT?"
Well NO, it's not "Just like that". It was after weighing the pros and cons of maintaining the status quo or CHANGING the way you do things. So yes the decision may have come about suddenly, but there was a process at work behind it. It didn't just "spontaneously" happen.
What do y'all think?
Peace, Rolf Ankermann
I totally agree that most people do recover on their own, more so than through any of the traditional paths of recovery (AA, Rehabs, counseling, etc). I, however, don't really buy that It's all that spontaneous. Granted, at some point you do have to make the DECISION that you are done with it and say "NO MORE". So at that precise moment I guess you could argue that you had an Aha moment; so you could consider that spontaneous.
In reality, in my opinion anyway, a lot of pain, suffering, heartache and negative consequences occurred that made that Aha moment take place. Therefore, there really was nothing all that spontaneous about it.
Hey look, I was in sales most of my life and in order to be successful you have to convince the potential customer that your way of completing the task at hand is better and more efficient, cost effective, etc..., than the way they've been doing it up until now. So another way of looking at that is to say to the potential client that accomplishing what you want and finding satisfaction is less painful if you do it my way than the way you are approaching it now. When the pain of staying the same is greater than that which would be realized by changing, guess what? You become ready and willing to change.
So back to my sales example; Let's say after my sales pitch to Bob, the operations manager, that he decides after weighing the arguments, that he is going to switch to my company. He announces it at the "team meeting" and his top assistant says; "So you're just going to change how we do things JUST LIKE THAT?"
Well NO, it's not "Just like that". It was after weighing the pros and cons of maintaining the status quo or CHANGING the way you do things. So yes the decision may have come about suddenly, but there was a process at work behind it. It didn't just "spontaneously" happen.
What do y'all think?
Peace, Rolf Ankermann
You can't see what you don't see until you do see. Like one of those optical illusion pictures that only come into focus when you adjust your eyes just right.
Obviously some people need more convincing than that, but I believe that until someone arrives at that "aha" moment, they will have no reason to stop.
We won't change until the pain of change becomes less than the pain of staying the same. It's usually negative results that cause the change - for whatever behavior.
Wehn it comed to drinking I believe it the question is how far down the path of alcoholism you are. Take people like me. There does come a point where it takes a major negative event or outside intervention to make it painful enough for someone to stop drinking. IMO that's not an "Aha" moment, more of an "or else" moment.
If things go as planned (by the outside forces) the "Aha" moment for the alcoholic comes later. If not, then the point becomes moot.
The only spontaneity I found in the process was the overnight removal of my crazy desire for alcohol. That was an "Aha" moment. One that stays with me to this day. For that intervention and the release of that desire I thank God every day...
Hugs,
Dennis
It was a relief to read your post and see you talk about all that leads up to that "ah ha moment" -- that moment of clarity -- that turning point -- where you recognize that you need to reclaim your life.
donttread -- I know many of us who have quit, and seem to do an okay job of staying quit, without getting help.
spirit -- I don't see any mention of a website or any advertising (blatant or suggested) in this discussion thread.
It took multiple relapses, a DUI with a .23 BAC, many AA meetings and other programs before I had that "moment of clarity" that "spontaneous" recovery.
Now on the daily quest to stay sober. Every day gets better-finally.
Its like hitting bottom. When was that? Oh was that the time I was in the pediatric ICU w/ my son and snuck a bottle of wine in? Or was it the time I woke up with my kids 8 hours after just sitting down for a minute to read them a bed time story? No not enough? how about the time I went to a work function and couldnt find my way from the event to the hotel?
My point is that I had numerous "aha" moments, or bottoms, when I knew I sucked as an alcoholic mother, and I still couldnt /didnt stop.
It was a random Sunday I had my last bottle of wine. I went into an AA meeitng with a hang over no worse than 20 other I'd had in the past three months prior. But like someone else said the pain of staying the same, was worse than the fear of change.
Some greater force woke me. And now, I travel a different road.
"Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives." ~ A. Sachs.
Thanks for your post!
Mary.
AAers told me i needed to change and that meant everything. ....Its a process sometimes quickly sometimes slowly....Moments of clarity and moments of rude a wakings and still more to be revealed as we trudge the road to happy destiny .