Thread: Alcoholism, the scourge of friendships

Bill

There are a lot of people praying for you.
Won't be easy.
Won't be fun.
people are here 24/7

Dave

Pix, We are behind you! And some of us beside you! Email, call, or post.
~Richard
PS, that goes for others with problem addictions. PMs best!

To all the members here who think they might have an alcohol problem, I and many others understand. Luckily, I can control my drinking and in fact have gotten better at it as I age. However, my habits have been enabling for my wife, whom I love dearly, and she can't control it.

In the last year she began AA and I went along as support. I was always a skeptic, but I no longer am. In the collection of small towns where we live, with a population of 6,000 or so, there are at least 10 meetings going on a day, and the people involved are everyone from the court ordered 18 year old beach bunny who got a DUI to 80+ year olds who are the towns' founding fathers. Everyone fits in because everyone there has an issue in common.

The program and the way she and her "friends" have worked it has changed my wife, mentally and physically for the better, it has put our 35 year marriage back on track, and it has leveled life out and gave both of us a new connection with God and each other.

I still drink, because I like it. But she hasn't and if she asked me not to I wouldn't either. I encourage everyone who has or is around an alcohol problem to try an AA meeting. You'll be surprised what you find.

God or a Higher Power, is whatever you understand that to be, AA is a spiritual program, not a religious one.

From the founders of Alcoholics Anonymous, 1935 by Bill Wilson and Dr. Bob Smith in Akron, Ohio.

Rarely have we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path. Those who do not recover are people who cannot or will not completely give themselves to this simple program, usually men and women who are constitutionally incapable of being honest with themselves. There are such unfortunates. They are not at fault; they seem to have been born that way. They are naturally incapable of grasping and developing a manner of living which demands rigorous honesty. Their chances are less than average. There are those, too, who suffer from grave emotional and mental disorders, but many of them do recover if they have the capacity to be honest.

Our stories disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now. If you have decided you want what we have and are willing to go to any length to get it-then you are ready to take certain steps.

At some of these we balked. We thought we could find an easier, softer way. But we could not. With all the earnestness at our command, we beg of you to be fearless and thorough from the very start. Some of us have tried to hold on to our old ideas and the result was nil until we let go absolutely.

Remember that we deal with alcohol-cunning, baffling, powerful! Without help it is too much for us. But there is One who has all power-that One is God. May you find Him now!

Half measures availed us nothing. We stood at the turning point. We asked His protection and care with complete abandon.

Here are the steps we took, which are suggested as a program of recovery:

1. We admitted we were powerless over alcohol — that our lives had become unmanageable.

2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.

3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.

4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.

5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.

6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.

7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.

8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.

9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.

10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.

11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.

12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to alcoholics, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

Many of us exclaimed, "What an order! I can't go through with it." Do not be discouraged. No one among us has been able to maintain anything like perfect adherence to these principles. We are not saints. The point is, that we are willing to grow along spiritual lines. The principles we have set down are guides to progress. We claim spiritual progress rather than spiritual perfection.

Our description of the alcoholic, the chapter to the agnostic, and our personal adventures before and after make clear three pertinent ideas:

(a) That we were alcoholic and could not manage our own lives.
(b) That probably no human power could have relieved our alcoholism.
(c) That God could and would if He were sought.

To all posters Thank-you for sharing and bearing your private lives. I am among you as someone who has lost my only brother to Alcohol. That third person stole from my family what is irreplaceable. Every time my brother goes to prison for DUI (x8) he finds God. Within 6 months of Parole he is showing up to report drunk. The person I once knew is gone left is the shell of loss, grief, and many sad memories. To the OP sorry about that, yet it seems so shallow of an apology or a "I feel your pain". doesn't reach the depth of loss.
I felt infinitely sad reading this entire post, yet uplifted in the sense that I an all of you are not alone in our loss.

Sadness when shared is halved, joys when shared are doubled. Look forward to good things from all of you.

Originally Posted by ultrasoundguy2003

To all posters Thank-you for sharing and bearing your private lives. I am among you as someone who has lost my only brother to Alcohol. That third person stole from my family what is irreplaceable. Every time my brother goes to prison for DUI (x8) he finds God. Within 6 months of Parole he is showing up to report drunk. The person I once knew is gone left is the shell of loss, grief, and many sad memories. To the OP sorry about that, yet it seems so shallow of an apology or a "I feel your pain". doesn't reach the depth of loss.
I felt infinitely sad reading this entire post, yet uplifted in the sense that I an all of you are not alone in our loss.

Sadness when shared is halved, joys when shared are doubled. Look forward to good things from all of you.

My Bro died at the age of 32,his truck went over a 1500 ft. cliff outside of Jackson Calif (thank god nobody else was envolved) his Blood alcohol level was the highest ever recorded in Calif at the time at 4.2.

Alcohol never played much of a role in any of my family member's lives, but drugs destroyed my family,,, between the sales, using & killings done by my family members on drugs,,,,addiction in any form, is a force to be reckoned with.

Many lifes are destroyed everyday by alcoholism and the biggest problem (in my humble point of view) is the alcoohol is a social accepted drug but many can't control it.
The husband of a friend of my has the problem and his going to AA meeting, but i'm not sure how long he will keep the meetings. He has tried before and some time after he left the AA and started to drink again.
The third person is really accurate description.
Sad to read about, but important to talk about it.
Thanks for the post.

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

My Bro died at the age of 32,his truck went over a 1500 ft. cliff outside of Jackson Calif (thank god nobody else was envolved) his Blood alcohol level was the highest ever recorded in Calif at the time at 4.2.

Firstly I/We are all pulling for you pixel.
Second isnt it sad when family members can only say " Well at least they didnt......"
I know your sentiments and feelings so poignantly it hurts to type these admissions of guilt and despair,"How could someone from my tribe and with part of my DNA do such things?"
Choices my friend . We all need to make good ones. We all fall many times. Its what you do next that counts.
If you had a good razor you couldnt hone would you give up?? After many tries would you cowboy up and send it to a honemeister to save??

You are worth more than many razors, and there is no shame in getting help to get things put right.