What crisis bought me to recovery?
I knew for a while before I joined BrightEye that I had a drink problem. There was no crisis as such. I tried to rein my drinking in and spent some weeks and months sober before stopping altogether in October 2010. So between 2008 and Oct 2010 I probably spent just over half the time not drinking altough there were several periods within that time of daily heavy drinking in very much the mode that prompted me to seek help in the first place.
I think what got me to finally stop drinking was the despair I felt within myself. I'd drink and cry, then I'd wake up and cry ... I'd cry for no apparent reason sometimes during the day. I started to feel mentally/emotionally unstable and really unwell a lot of the time. I knew my drinking was if not the cause a huge contributory factor. I just found it really difficult to sustain that belief long enough to stay sober. After a few days/weeks/months I'd start feeling like it would be OK to drink again and the merry-go-round would start again.
What situation led me to formally work step one?
I've been going to AA once or twice a week for 6 months now. Very often I hear people say, "get a sponsor, work the steps". The meeting I consider my "home group" is a step meeting in Amesbury. We've been through the first 5 steps a few times and right through the steps once. I guess I just felt it was time to start doing more than just turning up to meetings. At first that felt like enough because I wanted to understand more about the 12 steps and reading them was not enough. I needed to listen to the experience of others to understand that there is more than one way to interpret the steps. This is important to me because I have some reservations about the "God stuff". I want to work the steps because I want to stay sober and I want to be happier.
When did I first recognise my addiction as a problem? Did I try to correct it? If so, how? If not, why not?
I knew I had a problem in my teens. I thought if I stayed away from booze I'd be relatively safe. I preferred the buzz of dope which didn't give me hangovers, so I stopped drinking until I was in my early 30's and had met my husband. Once I started drinking again it didn't seem to be a problem as I didn't drink every night, that happened over time and along with it increased consumption.
I tried to cut back, tried setting rules about when and how much it would be OK to drink. Made declaratations that we'd have a booze free week and then return from work on Monday evening with some tale of woe to justify an exception to the rule ... and off we'd go again.
I joined BrightEye online alcohol support forum in 2008. Spent the next two and a half years sometimes drinking, sometimes not. Stopped drinking in Oct 2010.
