Ok…I don’t totally mean that. Because he’s still one of my favourite people in the world.
But…well if anyone noticed (and I can’t imagine why anyone would notice any of my posts except maybe the ones about blow jobs and S&M) i have been talking about stopping drinking. So I turn to my friend (who used to be my SO…now he’s more like my brother.) who i thought would understand…because he spent 7 good years getting off heroin. Most of which he did with me dealing with it.
Well now apparently the fact that whe I went to get help…and am still having problems after A MONTH…there’s something wrong with me.
Apparently he’s mad because I imlplyed he was a lier because he kept saying he was reducing methadone and then all of sudden he wasn’t …because REALLY he never lied he wanted to say on methadone the rest of his life. And It was just a matter of how much his father would pay for.
And he only got off because his father stopped paying for it.
Whereas i’m doing this voluntary.
But he’s upset because I’m hurting myself (ok that part I appreciate) and it’s been a WHOLE MONTH but…what…methadone is healthfood???
And the icing on the cake…he said I’d never go to a meeting. Because i haven’t managed to FOR A WHOLE MONTH. Thanks. Just the kind of SUPPORT I NEED. When you never went to a meeting ever except because you had to to get your “dose”.
I could just use a littlle support till i get the balls up to go to a meeting (and find a decent meeting…a more helpful alcoholic said i needed to fin a “non step” because those are the …errr…religious? doctrinary ? ones so i’m looking for somethng else…something Unitarian maybe)…anyway till i get the balls up beccausse it scares me but which I WILL DO…i could just use a little support from someone who’s been through it and this is what i get.
So screw you.
Although i still love you.
Anyway just had to vent.
(Oh and if I don’t respond it’s just because my computer is screwed and i’m paying rediculous rates at kinkos for the next few days. But anyway…i just had to vent. Thanks for listening.
Um…support you for what? For talking about getting sober? Well, good. I’m glad you’re talking about getting sober. That is definitely a good thing. But it’s hardly even a step.
Maybe he’s not supporting you in the way you want him to because he knows that many addicts can talk and talk for years about getting sober without actually doing anything about it. Maybe he wants you to go to a meeting because that would be an actual action that he could support. It’s very hard to support talk when the actions don’t agree - talk is cheap. Actions speak much louder than…well, you know the rest.
Maybe you should stop throwing stones his way and look to your glass house.
His methadone use has nothing to do with your sobriety. Making this a contest of addiction is not useful. Focus on yourself, get yourself clean and sober and stop looking at his plate.
As WhyNot said, don’t try to compare your additction to your friends. It isn’t helpful and all it is most likely going to do is get you and your friend fighting about old injustices. Worry about yourself, that is all you need to do right now. The other stuff will come later.
Find an AA meeting in your city. Click on that link and call your local intergroup office and ask when/where the meetings are. Tell them you are new and they can guide you to the best meeting. In most places there are usually lots of meetings. Find one and go. Your other friend probably suggested going to a regular meeting and not a step study. I’d agree that a step study is probably not the best for your first meeting.
Once you go to a meeting keep going and find a sponser. Many meetings will identify people who are willing to sponser a new person. Talk to one. If they do not do that talk to someone after the meeting and ask how to get a sponser.
Then keep going and do do what your sponser suggests.
Admitting you have a problem and going to your first meeting is scary as hell. It isn’t easy. But it is also necessary.
The first time I went to a meeting I heard the promises of AA. I did not believe them. Then I did what they said and found out that the promises are true.
These are not the things I thought when I read the OP, but are good points. Personally, I thought maybe he secretly wanted you to fail so he would feel better about being a screw-up himself. He doesn’t sound very together, and expecting support from someone who wouldn’t quit their own addiction voluntarily sounds irrational to me.
Just my $0.02. But comments from others on this matter sound more germane.
Betenoir, AA isn’t too bad. I’m a non-believer myself. You can ignore the ‘religious doctrinary’.
There are people there who were [some still are] in the same situation as you.
It helps a lot to talk and learn from fellow [ex]boozers.
Get sober by saying: “I’ll wait five minutes for my next drink”. Then wait five minutes more. etc. etc.
Go to an AA meeting.
What’s the worst that can happen?
They won’t laugh at you, they won’t throw you out, they won’t force you into anything.
Give it a chance, okay?
One small piece of (unsolicited) advise: lose the drinking buddies.
For the first few years all I could associate my thoughts with was what I did to whom and what they did to me. It was all fucked up, because all my actions while I was drinking were fucked up. Screw somebody…over, under, whatever. I had to get away from my very best friend (she was like an extension of me; we looked alike, sounded alike, fucked alike) because she was so toxic to my recovery. I visited her about when I was about 8 years sober and saw nothing had changed for her. Time warp, if you will. That was very painful.
But I’ve not seen her again, and I’m 15.5 years in now…
They say in AA, “Take what you need and leave the rest behind.” If you listen to everything everyone says about getting sober, you never will. That’s one of the issues with the program, IMO. You have to weed the good from the bad, and that’s hard to do when your own head isn’t screwed on too tight! Only you can keep you from the next drink, and THAT is the important part.
I did the 90 in 90 way back. But I never had a sponsor. After 11+ years, it worked for me.
Everyone is different. I wish you luck. The path can be hard, but I found it was worth it. YMMV.
What they said. It’s a shame that this guy doesn’t seem to be able to support you - but then it’s sometimes better to speak to someone who hasn’t gone through it themselves - that way they can’t assume you’ll experience it the same way they did.
I didn’t use meetings, or a sponsor, or change my lifestyle/friends, although I did use Antabuse (or something similar). It was what worked for me. It’s hard, and a month is not a long time to get over something like this - feels like a long time though! However - it’s easier now than it was at the start of the month, isn’t it? It’ll be easier tomorrow than it is today. Surf down the slope of difficulty (I do talk some crap, don’t I?).
This part: I know lots of people who had sponsors, ( did not do what was suggested but did have a sponsor) actively worked the steps every day. (Impossible to do if you are drinking.) Went to meetings everyday. And still ended up drunk again.
Is so true and many trip up on it because they forget that these things are not all of the program. There is still that ‘don’t drink today’ part. And to not be around playmates and play places, to be helping another stay sober, etc. Simple program, just hard to do because like most addicts:
*My ability to Intellectualize allowed me to Rationalize which got me Institutionalized! *
