D-6 and Counting

Party

Went to a Family party at the weekend, a cousin’s reunion. Been doing these for a few years now, once or twice a year and they are always a great laugh. Our hosts Lee and Dawn have a great party house and always have at least two fridges full of beer, wine and spirits. Normally at these events I would drink myself pretty much into unconsciousness, knowing when to stop has never been a strong point. With so much at stake I was more than a little worried about the free availability of so much alcohol but I managed to stay roughly on course. No spirits, no wine, not too much beer then back to my RDA on Sunday night. Being at this level of intake is important for the detox to work as the meds are prescribed at a level appropriate for your alcoholic intake.

Also very pleasantly surprised at how ready everybody was to discuss my condition and forthcoming treatment. I`ve always struggled with talking about my addiction and I`m not at all sure why now, strong words of support and a genuine interest from all involved but no pressure to talk at all. If you are in a similar position please speak to people, friends and professionals alike. Don`t, as I did, leave it till its too late for fear of being judged. You WILL be surprised at the level of support available at very close hand.

Facebook

Yes, the F word. I`m normally not a huge fan of Facebook, mainly using it for posting jokes stolen from twitter and pictures of skies and food but I am starting to like it now. When I post a new blog I add a link to Facebook for a couple of reasons. It helps me let people know about my addiction without having to bring it up face to face. Forewarned is forearmed as they say. Get the boring details out of the way first then if you want you can talk to me about it. Also recent posts have been starting a bit of a dialogue. This is good. A few Facebook friends have suggested that they would like to join me in a week’s detox, not necessarily from alcohol, as a way to support me and also challenge themselves. I will write a little more about this tomorrow and include some of the recent Fb replies to my posts.

“Group”

My “group” meeting went very well today. Some new faces, stories and experiences. It’s becoming such a useful tool that I may well be able to remove the quotes soon. I made a few notes at the “group” so I will be talking about that this week at some point, maybe a rough outline of how a meeting works and what is actually involved. We meet again a week today, I will be totally alcohol free for this one so may be interesting to see if my outlook is any different.

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