You Can Stop Drinking Now

After you stop drinking you will probably find that you tend to be on overwhelm and your emotions are in high gear. You don’t know what to do first let alone how to go about rebuilding your life, and at the same time you may be critical of yourself for causing such a mess in the first place when in truth you should feel good about the fact that you decided to really do something about your drinking. 

When you stop drinking, you may find that you have a big void in your life. The nights seem longer. Maybe the days seem longer too. This void comes from where the drinking used to be. Drinking is very time consuming.

You will also now experience feelings you haven’t felt in a long time. Drinking helped to chase away those feelings we consider much to big to handle.  All of a sudden the feelings we go to such great lengths to avoid are back, and most of us have fairly limited coping skills when we stop drinking.

You may also find you are a little clumsier when you stop drinking. This is a common side effect, and if you break a few things it is just part of the recovery process.

The idea of taking it “One day at a time”, regardless of the source is a very good way to approach rebuilding your life.  It’s helpful to break it down when you are first starting out because the tasks at hand can seem insurmountable. In fact, it’s good advice for anyone, drinker or not, because when you aren’t worrying about the future and dwelling on the past, keeping your focus in the moment will result in your efforts being that much more effective.

So, where do you start?  Identify the aspects of your life that are most important to you (make a list in order of importance if it is helpful to you) and start there.  After you identify the aspects of your life that are most important to you and have likely been neglected due to drinking, take the next logical step to improve the situation.  You may feel inadequate to the task, but do the best you can to accomplish at least a small step towards your future every day. Some effort in the right direction is better than no effort,  and staying busy is also helpful in keeping your mind off of things that dwelling on would otherwise bring you down.

If you have someone in your life that can help you put your list and next logical steps together, you may want to ask for some help.

Before you know it, with a little consistancy in your efforts, you will be pleasantly surprised at the progress you have made, which will also help you to feel better about yourself, your circumstances, and build up your confidence.

There are days when you may think you will never feel good again, that those days are gone for good, but if you hang in there and keep moving forward, your life and outlook will get much, much brighter.

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