Less Alcohol - FEBRUARY 2021 - One Day At A Time

Stockholm_Andy wrote: »

Lilylady3k wrote: »

Watched news this evening and really wanted a glass of the bottle of wine DH opened. But it is Tuesday and not a good enough excuse. So AF again.

@Lilylady3k I was in a similar position last night when my wife opened a bottle of wine. She even got out a glass for me and asked if I wanted to taste, as it was one we haven't tried before. I declined. But for the rest of the night I had a little nagging demon in my head thinking about a drink. Even more so when she poured herself a whisky while we watched TV.

However, I just focused on my goals and made some tea. I'm so rock&roll

4 x AF in February

Thank you for helping me feel not so alone!
It is hard but seems our willpower was strong last night. Congrats on your success. 🎉

DH finished 1-3 bourbon & 7up after the full bottles of wine last week. This week he is resisting that urge and sticking to the wine only. But he is opening all that lovely $24-40 bottles of wine we bought for Saturday night

MissMay wrote: »

Darn this skin that looses elasticity.
And then I just had to come across this bit of information:
Be mindful of your sugar intake too: excessive amounts can age skin prematurely as sugar in the bloodstream forms harmful molecules (known as AGEs: advanced glycation end products) which attack collagen and elastin.

What a perfect acronym for what too much sugar does to our skin! Age indeed!

Day10 AF here and feeling confident. Managed what seemed to be a 4 hour long intense craving. Happened after I applied for a job I wasn't sure I wanted so I suspect stress set it off. Lunch was also mostly raw vegetables and soup, I should've eaten more whole grain carb and protein, so I set myself up for trouble there.

I removed myself to another room and read to distract myself then decided to snack on some tortilla chips and diet soda, all garbage.

In retrospect, I should have done some deep breathing, 3 sets of 10, each time, counting each breath starting from 10, then 9, then 8, etc, focusing each time on relaxing deeper and deeper.

I was reading the main reason people fail at reducing or eliminating alcohol long term, is succumbing to STRESS. Hence, it is imperative for me to practice a stress reduction technique that I can do anywhere and do it automatically.

I hope you all have a relaxing and productive day........

@globalhiker First, Congrats on hitting that 10 day AF mark!! I love your retrospection! I need to try your deep breathing technique to get to sleep as I suspect my insomnia is stress-induced. Listening to "sleep" youtube helps somewhat, but hit and miss. When I was drinking daily, going to sleep (passing out) was no problem. Staying asleep was the hard part.
Stress is an interesting thing. Stress is the trigger I often used as an excuse to drink daily. So in staying AF, I had to ask myself: "how does vodka help alleviate my stress?" In my case, I discovered it didn't help.at.all. In fact it got to the point where drinking added to my stress because I felt I had to sneak my drink. That was because my hubs became concerned with my habit. (Bless his heart.) I think it was @womana a few months past that asked it anyone felt less pressure when not drinking because you don't have to plan your drinks. That insightful question was like "self-exposure". Instead of stress causing me to drink, I was stressed trying to plan when/how to sneak-drink. @CryingBlue, I lied to my hubs several times, denying that I was drinking when he suspected I was but he couldn't prove it because I was that sneaky. I think my brain justified what came out of my mouth differently in that period of time. Don't beat yourself up--just keep moving forward with what works for you. Which leads me to a meme I wanted to post like you all do, but couldn't figure out how to attach it. Instead I'll share these words from that post:
ADDICTION is giving up EVERYTHING for ONE thing. RECOVERY is giving up ONE thing for EVERYTHING.
While I know this is a drinking-less post not a AF post, the words above have me appreciating my EVERYTHING right now in my journey. It's a good feeling.

Thank you @MissMay for keeping this going.
I am starting over again this week. I have 2 AF days so far. I have to take sleeping pills just to doze off at a decent hour.
Karen

@lmlmrn You have a plan--You are doing great! I wish I knew whose words "ADDICTION is giving up EVERYTHING for ONE thing. RECOVERY is giving up ONE thing for EVERYTHING." are to give appropriate credit. Glad they hit home with you as they did with me. Whomever said them first must have had some similar experiences to those of us on this thread.