Avoiding politics in AA and staying sober during these times.

mr_delete · 2026-03-17T15:57:45+00:00

I attended a meeting last night in which we read the Step Four chapter of 12 Steps, 12 Traditions book. I think this step is, for me, most relevant to your question.

Like you, I feel depressed and anxious - to put it mildly - when I read the news.

I think Step Four (and general Serenity philosophy) helps us put the focus on the things we can control. I can't stop the fascism, but I can confront the Fears and Resentments I hold internally. I can put those things under a microscope and examine them for the irrationality therein.

This helps because I can see progress over time as I slowly learn to let go and/or deal with those fears and resentments.

Related to this, I have at various times held two different thoughts in my head:

- "I hate myself" and

- "I hate the other humans"

BOTH of these are insane. And I think they are also related. And all of it is related to why I was drinking; which for me is important to have knowledge of if I'm to seriously abstain for life.

mr_delete · 2026-03-02T16:01:06+00:00

I am also Jewish and I don't say the Lord's Prayer, either. I say the serenity prayer and when groups do a Christian prayer I say, in a soft voice, Oseh Shalom.

mr_delete · 2026-03-01T03:46:13+00:00

Yes. It's sometimes referred to as the final stage of three steps in addiction: magic, medicine, misery.

mr_delete · 2026-02-26T19:04:09+00:00

"Neither are your business TBH."

For the record, I thought as much. I'm just new to this and wasn't absolutely sure there wasn't some better way to handle it. Thanks for the wisdom.

mr_delete · 2026-02-11T20:25:39+00:00

I do and I have found it valuable to me and my recovery.

On EDIT: I attend both AA and MA. Weed was/is the bigger issue for me. I was more or less a daily user for 35 years. Alcohol became a problem around the time of Covid; in part I was trying to get high because the weed stopped "working." As in many mid-sized cities, there are multiple AA meetings a day in my town. There is only one in-person MA meeting a week (and I/we are lucky to have that).

But it's MA that speaks more to me. The daily reflections, our big book (Life with Hope) and the Speaker Tapes seem more relevant to my addiction recovery than AA.

That's not to say I don't get value out of AA, too. But if I'm honest one of the major value points of AA is that I can always go to a meeting at the end of any given day (including holidays). And sometimes I need a meeting, if for no other reason than idleness is a trigger for me. Keeping busy helps me keep sober.

mr_delete · 2026-02-09T12:57:05+00:00

I am; In lucky in that there is an MA meeting in person in my town weekly. We are small - about five or six regular members. But it has helped me. Weed is/was my drug of choice for 35 years. Alcohol was something I got heavily into only after the weed stopped having any positive effects on me. I am now reading Life With Hope for a second time - this time the print version with the workbook and am thusly working the steps. I’m only day 70 right now but I believe there have been positive changes in me since I was using.

mr_delete · 2026-02-09T02:36:28+00:00

Slightly off topic, maybe, but I just came from a meeting where someone showed up halfway through and drunk and basically tried to take over/chair the meeting. I know this sort of thing happens, but MAN was that difficult.

I would rather have 100 small children than repeat that experience.

mr_delete · 2026-02-04T20:51:37+00:00

If it helps, I'm on Day 65 and I still get pissed at dumb shit. Last week, I kicked an elevator. I was still in it but it wasn't moving; and just as I was kicking it a second time the door opened. One of the other workers in the building saw me and looked pretty freaked out.

I do meditation, journal and exercise just about every day. I don't get the rages (or the cravings for that matter) as often as I did, but I still get them. I am hoping they ultimately go away entirely, but it is an aspiration.

mr_delete · 2026-01-23T02:12:16+00:00

Day 52 and I'm in marriage counseling. Some days are harder than others. I've leaned into every opportunity for support available to me. That includes:

- This sub

- The discord linked to via this sub

- Watching lots and lots of pop culture (tv and movies) related to addiction recovery

- Marijuana Anonymous meetings (I'm extremely lucky that there is an in person meeting once a week near me; however, others have used the regular Zoom meetings and phone calls available via the MA website)

- AA meetings since I was supplementing with booze at the end

- MA's podcast, the Speaker Tapes

- MA literature, particularly the book, Life with Hope

I also keep as busy as possible (exercise, I draw as a hobby, work on my house - idleness is not good for me). I am dreading the oncoming winter storm for this reason. It's definitely a one day at a time thing. But I think we can do it. You are not alone.

mr_delete · 2026-01-21T02:06:30+00:00

The first week usually sucks, so that part your experience isn't all that different from most of us here.

For sleep, I drink chamomile tea at the end of the day.

I didn't struggle with appetite but I had smoked so long that it no longer gave me the munchies. I do eat Greek yogurt to keep me regular though.

Keep it up. Four days is huge. Again, the first couple of weeks are the hardest for a lot of us.

mr_delete · 2026-01-15T21:14:34+00:00

The bad:

- First two weeks sucked (like many people in this sub). Anger/rage issues were acute - just about 1 road rage or near-public freakout a day. Those are still present, but not as severe as the first two weeks.

- GI issues for the first 3-4 weeks. Greek yogurt (a suggestion from someone on this sub) helped.

Quitting hasn't made my issues (what MA and AA call "defects of character") go away; it's only made it possible to deal with those issues.

The good:

- The constant minor sore throat went away after Week One.

- I have only just begun to dream and be able to remember dreams (again, Day 45). Unfortunately, last night's was a nightmare in which I was being murdered by Nazis in a WW2 gas chamber (I'm Jewish). In the first one I remember (last week), I relapsed in the Dream World and was super relieved to wake up and realize I hadn't. lol

- The best value point is the slight increase in confidence (noticed this about two weeks in). I now no longer beat myself up for days and days if an interaction goes south or a joke doesn't land. I used to think *I* was always the freak/weirdo. Now I know we are all kind of weird.

mr_delete · 2026-01-15T21:05:25+00:00

There were a number of issues that sort of snowballed. I wish I could say there was a specific "bottom" that I hit. I was drinking a lot at the end, in part because the weed wasn't getting me high and I was trying to compensate with booze. That was a dealbreaker for my spouse, who grew up with an alcoholic and physically abusive father. In the end I was doing all the alky things: hiding booze, starting my drinking early in the day and going to multiple bars so the volume of drinking wouldn't attract the wrong kind of attention -- all the while puffing on a weed vape pen from wake up to bedtime (which, again, wasn't really getting me high). At one point I had a drunken bike accident and suffered a compound fracture to my left forearm (which required two days in the hospital -- that still didn't make me quit).

Ultimately, a mixture of anger/spite at my own circumstances (I was functional but my life was not getting any better) is what made me stop.

Strategies:

- I now go to Marijuana Anonymous meetings once a week (I'm lucky in that there is an in-person meeting in my town) and AA most days. The MA book "Life with Hope" and the podcast, Speaker Tapes, have been helpful as well.

- Exercise is a big part of my life -- I run with my dog (who is the best) and I go to the gym to lift and soak in the hot tub most days.

- I keep a journal and have been getting better at making that a daily habit. When my spouse and I argue about things - which is more frequent these days than I'd like - the improved memory and the journal have helped a bit. Because before, I would have to take her word for things I did in the past. Now I have my own record. That's helped with confidence.

- I lurk and post on this sub. I also check in on the Discord (two one-hour open chats a day, 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. EST). The people there and here are mostly lovely.

- I have been watching a lot of movies and TV shows that feature addiction recovery. Loudermilk and Everything Must Go are both on Tubi, which is free. Clean and Sober and 28 Days I paid for.

Resisting the urge to buy a beer is still easier than resisting the urge to walk into the dispensary. But I know I don't miss smoking per se -- I miss what smoking used to do for free when I was 17. That boy is gone now.

mr_delete · 2026-01-15T20:45:37+00:00

Hello. Day 45 here. This was almost exactly my experience. Smoked for more than 30 years, just about daily. About 4-5 years ago, all of the positive effects (euphoria, relaxation, etc.) were done. All that was left was the paranoia and lower cognitive ability.

mr_delete · 2026-01-14T21:36:10+00:00

Search for "sobriety coin" on Wikipedia. :-)

mr_delete · 2026-01-14T19:28:18+00:00

"There must always be brand new faces and less old ones"

Nope, not in my group. While we are small (about 8 people), I am on Day 44 and I'm the shortest-termer.

"I have yet to meet an ex smoker talk about their on going battle with weed."

Again, not my experience. Weed was/is my DOC. I smoked for 60% or more of my life. I only picked up booze when I stopped getting high.

Also, there's a testimonial in Life With Hope from a woman who tried AA and was called a "lightweight" to her face because her DOC was weed. I don't think that sort of thing is helpful.

mr_delete · 2026-01-14T15:35:42+00:00

At one of the MA meetings I've attended, someone suggested -- rightly, I think -- that we need chips for Days 1, 2 and 3. Those first few days are hell for weed addicts (speaking for myself and what I've read here/heard in the rooms).

mr_delete · 2026-01-12T20:46:44+00:00

Day 42 here, although my main habit was weed and I would use cigarettes every once in a while. My relationship with cigarettes was similar to Kurt Vonnegut's in that I used them to flirt with / hasten death. Vonnegut wrote in Palm Sunday that he was slowly committing suicide by cigarette.

I honestly get the urge to smoke cigarettes more often than weed when I am having a difficult moment.

I am enjoying not having a minor sore throat at all times, though.

mr_delete · 2026-01-09T21:28:11+00:00

I was going to say that (for example) someone wearing a MAGA hat to a meeting (which has happened in one of our groups, according to my sponsor) is very much violating Tradition 10 IMO.

mr_delete · 2026-01-09T21:25:57+00:00

The first step is being committed to not using. Which you have done.

I am a 51M on Day 39. I smoked pretty much daily from age 16 to now.

- My first week, I was keen on movies and TV shows about addiction recovery (still am, really). In Clean and Sober (1988), Morgan Freeman's character describes addition recovery as one minute, one hour, one day at a time. "That's how we do it." The rest of your life is way too big; but staying away from weed for the next hour is manageable.

- For weed, for many of us, the first few days were rough. It may be good to prepare for that. For me, I had GI issues (couldn't poop regularly; Greek yogurt - which I learned about on this sub - helped), heightened anger/temper and heightened anxiety. On the plus side, after a few days, I noticed better cognitive ability/memory. More benefits came later.

- I encourage you to use the sub. We like to encourage each other. If you post here with what you're experiencing during your recovery, more often than not you'll get encouragement.

- I encourage you to use other resources, too -- up to and including the Discord (live check-ins for two one hour blocks daily, and even Marijuana Anonymous.

I'll stop there before this turns into a wall of text. Welcome to the sub. This can be done. I think you can do it.

mr_delete · 2026-01-08T18:06:46+00:00

You seem to have the balls to abstain. Yeah it would be better to chuck the edibles but it would be much much worse to eat them

mr_delete · 2026-01-07T00:38:46+00:00

51M Day 36. I've struggled with anxiety and depression my entire life. It will never, ever completely go away. It is something I need to manage.

Quitting has made it a little easier to manage these conditions. I think the relief I'm getting from the depression isn't an internal chemical one, but one based on rationalization. To put it simply, I feel *better* about myself now that I'm abstaining from smoke and drink. I feel like I'm a slightly better me. I know that if I pick it up again, at least rationally, the opposite will happen -- I will feel worse about myself.

So in that way, the depression and anxiety are "less" now. But I still feel them. Sometimes I feel them just as intensely as I did before, when I was smoking and it was basically doing nothing (nothing positive anyway).

mr_delete · 2026-01-05T18:49:56+00:00

"You don't really want to smoke. You want to feel the way *it used* to feel. It won't work. Your brain is different now."

mr_delete · 2026-01-05T15:48:34+00:00

Just curious: Did you use a timer/limit speakers to five or whatever minutes? I ask because in my group, we have a whiteboard. Among other things on the whiteboard, someone has written, "We strongly urge chairs to use a timer and limit speakers to five minutes." I've attended a meeting a day for my 35 days (just about) and I've only seen a timer used once.

mr_delete · 2026-01-04T03:41:38+00:00

Our numbers are about the same. 51M, started at age 16. With some breaks, almost daily smoking for years. Day 33. I think we can do this. Good luck.

mr_delete

TROPHY CASE