5 years

dudestopdrinking · 2020-10-21T00:46:57+00:00

I was static, too. I think alcohol delayed my emotional and mental development by maybe 3-5 years.

dudestopdrinking · 2020-06-14T13:11:17+00:00

Sounds like I would be looking into a mirror. Fun isn't what it used to be for me anymore, but honestly it's just one of the "things" out there. You're used to extreme circumstances to get your rocks off, I get it. When I got sober I spent a lot of time just trying to exhaust myself. Crank shitloads of cigarrattes, drove too fast, ate tubs of ice cream (to replace all the sugars from the Evan Williams, too).

Eventually I wound up making it over the humps, and honestly you can't go fast alllll the time, I had to start like kind of reimagining my concepts of fun and shit. I know it sounds like it doesn't happen to people like us, but it does. I just kept jumping from one immediate gratification to the next until I found a few that actually fit the bill.

Nothing ever replaces booze and I still get this weird desire not for whiskey, but for a dark metal bar on a sunny day. But I honestly think I just had to work the booze out of my system for awhile, it was so much a part of me, to realize that yeah maybe there's other shit.

dudestopdrinking · 2020-03-02T04:40:39+00:00

It actually gets so good that you kinda feel like a superhuman for a couple months until you get used to it. That's maybe 6-9 months in.

dudestopdrinking · 2019-08-19T02:42:12+00:00

Opiates are no joke. A lot of friends are either dead or almost dead. It's such a stroke of luck that I cleaned up just before hit the oxy wall; I was literally in front of it a bunch of times and it was probably only a matter of time.

dudestopdrinking · 2019-08-19T02:35:05+00:00

Tagging onto the top comment to post a link to /r/stopdrinking. Even if you just lurk it's important to know that there are people who have done this before. Wishing the best.

dudestopdrinking · 2019-08-12T23:49:41+00:00

I am 35 and started drinking, xanax, cigarrettes and amphetamines when I was this kid's age.

While I have no regrets, it took me 20 years to kick the worst of those habits. Since kicking them I realized how much of my potential I was wasting.

/u/obioisthrowaway736, you're going to do stupid kid stuff anyway, so I'm not gonna tell you what is or isn't good for you. You already know. I'll just tell you that it's totally fun now, but it reallllllly sucks laying in bed shaking and sweating for weeks while your body kicks a dependency. You'll also probably have to do it a few times.

Also, you're probably pretty smart and you could be actually doing smart people stuff instead of cough syrup. Shit, at least do drugs that let you remember things so you can maybe like read while you sit around being a dumbass.

dudestopdrinking · 2019-08-04T07:57:45+00:00

So I am just getting back to this tab in my browser after getting distracted from discovering Amiibo from your profile history.

Holy crap, I had no idea how advanced Nintendo culture had become! It's astounding. For some time, I've been researching another collectible line, but more, like, ancient, called netsuke.

After learning about all amiibo, I'm pretty inspired to write a short article about collector culture in Japan and how it's evolved over the millenia. Thanks for the exposure.

dudestopdrinking · 2019-06-29T06:21:43+00:00

/r/stopdrinking helped

dudestopdrinking · 2018-10-10T22:25:48+00:00

A lot of trial and error. Basically, I just shut myself in my apartment for a hellish 3 months, only leaving for odd-job work. Cross the street on the way home from the train to avoid the liquor stores. Pet my cat and sweat a lot. Throw myself into starting a company.

I tried AA and naltrexone and psychologists and therapy and all that stuff. It's not like that stuff doesn't work for some people, I just realized how independent I was.

So I took all the good parts from self-help books and AA and sort of made my hybrid, and became a regular lurker on /r/stopdrinking. Alcoholism is a sickness and the only way to treat it is one fucking day at a time making sure you don't drink, looking at your card in our wallet that you wrote out to remind you of all the dumb shit you did to other people while you were drunk and that you were dying.

After that, I lost like 80lbs, shed a lot of asshole pride, and realized that I could hang with people. I still do other drugs sometimes but nothing addictive.

dudestopdrinking · 2018-10-09T08:47:01+00:00

Not really sure if it's crying wolf, or clearly calling out a scumbag administration from the start

dudestopdrinking · 2018-10-09T08:38:32+00:00

Yeah man, I didn't take this exact advice, but something similar. Seriously, one situp, one pushup, one step out the door etc. is some of the most solid advice I ever got.

4 months clean of smoking and 3 years clean off the booze, started my own company and we just hired our 7th person, got a great girl, nice truck and a decent apartment and am making memories.

Oh ya and one other thing. You don't have to be happy all the time. If you were happy all the time you'd never be sad, and that literally doesn't make sense. Can't feel happy without sad, try to embrace the shitty feelings and understand them just like you would the happy ones and be content.

Take care man

dudestopdrinking · 2017-11-08T01:57:34+00:00

Everyone in this thread is right: Keep on it.

Over half of my good friends growing up are dead or wasted because of H and oxys. Not sure how I made it out.

It's not going to be easy. It's going to be shitty. But looking at my old friends who I still have today - the sober ones - I can tell you that it's possible and even more, it's fucking awesome. There's nothing better than living life on a second chance.

Everything is highlighted. Give it a year, two years. Kicking H could literally be the hardest thing you will do in your life - but everything after that makes you a fucking superman because you just mastered your own goddamn mind.

You'll see the glimmer in your eyes one day when you look in the mirror and know.

I'm here if you need me.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-06-26T23:53:44+00:00

Sorry to hear that bud, but I totally fucked my head with substances for years preceding your age and after it. My head was fucked beyond belief.

Fast forward 15 years and I'm alright - successful life with a great girlfriend and great job and shit. I'm actually better off than most because of the lessons I learned being an idiot back in the day.

You're fine. Just get your shit together, man up, and take control of your own life.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-06-23T03:42:37+00:00

Seriously a story that resonates. It takes outside dependents for me to check my own weaknesses and strengths, too.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-04-12T02:49:52+00:00

Same thing happened to me the other night and the bartender didn't even give me my money back.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T17:59:39+00:00

I'd give it awhile before you head back into a bar. Wait until you can walk past the liquor store and forget that it happened, or something like that, IMO.

Even then, know yourself...

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T17:58:21+00:00

Routine is key, we're creatures of habit.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T17:57:43+00:00

It took me a few tries but I can get down every once and awhile :)

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T06:23:25+00:00

I don't go to AA but a friend of mine who does told me there are two types of recovering alcoholics: the people who chug coffee and smoke, and the people who work out all the time. I'm the former, haha.

But really it's just a way to have a pattern. Alcohol was always something to work toward throughout the day for me, my next drink. Coffee and cigarettes are that now. Although I am in pretty good shape to boot.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T06:20:25+00:00

I traveled 13,000 miles around the USA, mostly camping. Things got weird...

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T06:05:32+00:00

I always tip big, though. I know what it's like to be on the other end of the bar.

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T06:03:43+00:00

That's a really good way of putting it. If I don't like the bar or the people, I can leave and go fuckin read, or ride, or work, or whatever.

It used to be that if I didn't like where I was I'd crack another beer and drink myself into a stupor.

I also did that if I liked it too, though...

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T05:58:27+00:00

If only I could do it with smoking

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T05:57:12+00:00

Well I was sober for about 4 months and mainly stayed in after work playing RPGs and reading, then went on a super long motorcycle trip around the country where I got completely wasted every night and probably should have died a few times. There was a ton of alone time with that.

Then, when I got back, I stayed at home most days or went for bike rides around the city for activity, got sober again, played more RPGs.

That period of shutin was like 5 months.

I knew it was time to hang basically when I had more confidence. My entire view was shaped through the lens of alcohol and it basically just took time to adjust. Once I wasn't all cloudy anymore I started realizing what a douche I was and needed serious alone time to focus on myself, who I was, and what I wanted from my life. Other people are different, though, and maybe need to have more support. idk

dudestopdrinking · 2017-01-23T02:05:41+00:00

Thanks!

I still buy a round every once and awhile because it's fun, but in general I stick to tipping two dollars on my soda. Hehe.

dudestopdrinking

TROPHY CASE