smoking and alcohol

[CurledUpInABall]

I've been going through a rough time and I'm getting urges to smoke and drink and...idk anymore...I'm wasting away to nothing.
my family is always fussing, I'm being talked about behind my back, I keep messing stuff up, my grades are failing, my friends are becoming enemies, and everything's just falling apart. Just what do i do?

[.Brittany.]

Hi there,

I'm sorry to hear that you're going through such a rough time. I completely understand where you're coming from. Back a year or so ago, I was going through a really tough time as well. I ended up going to the liquor store almost every day to get a new bottle of alcohol. I would then hide in my room and drink until I passed out. On day's I had to go to school I would still drink as soon as I woke up and text my friend to see if she could drive me in. I became so reliable on other people.

Eventually I realized that I wasn't getting anywhere with drinking everyday. So what I started doing was put the money that I would spend on alcohol into a jar (I live in Canada, so the alcohol is fairly expensive here). Then I would start doing other things in place of drinking, mostly listening to music and going for walks. Eventually I was able to use that money to purchase something that would be more beneficial to me. I still get urges to drink when things are not going my way, but I am stronger then the urges.

I think that you should try doing this to see if it helps you at all. You should also consider going to see a therapist who specializes in addiction.

Now, I can't really offer much insight to smoking as whenever I smoke cigarettes I get sick to my stomach. However, I think that the same solution could work for this.

I hope you start feeling better soon! I'm sure you will come up with some strategies to help you feel better.

Stay Strong,
Brittany

[TheAtomicBlade]

Hey,
I know how you're feeling. I feel the same way. Brittany has given some great ideas with the urges to have alcohol.
I'd add one that when you feel like smoking, what I do is pretend to smoke. I've done reading and it suggests that nicotine has little real effect with stress, rather it is the act of focusing on your breathing that helps. So, when I feel like things are out of control and I want to try smoking, I pretend I'm holding a cigarette and smoking. Therefore, i calm myself by breathing and don't smoke.
Hang in there mate, it does get better.

[Chai.]

Hi there,

I am sorry you are having a hard time. I understand your urges to smoke and drink. I went through a similar phase and turned to alcohol and cigarettes for help. They made me feel better for a while but then it turned into an addiction. I couldn't survive without it, couldn't function but as you know, it is hard to function after alcohol as well. I wanted out, I did not want to live life an addict, so I quit. Sadly, quitting was not as easy as giving in to the urges and then it turns into a vicious cycle, one which I regret having got into.

I agree with what has been said above so I won't repeat it. I can tell you one thing, doing things to distract yourself from negative feelings will help much more than turning to alcohol or smokes. Listening to music, taking up a new hobby, watching a movie or anything else that will help take your mind off things that are bothering you. You could also take up exercising since that helps build positive thoughts and will also tire you so that you will fall asleep without thinking much about alcohol or other things.

You can quit smoking by going cold turkey, which is hard and comes with a whole load of withdrawal symptoms or you can quit slowly. If you consider quitting slowly, I suggest going one cigarette less every day until you reach zero. Personally, I quit cold turkey because I had my list of reasons for quitting. If that is what you decide to do, make a list of reasons why you want to quit and remind yourself every day. You could also do things to distract yourself from the urges of smoking like that with drinking.

One thing I did when I felt the urges were too strong for me was I'd pop a gum or hard candy in my mouth and concentrate on it. It distracted my mind and the taste of the candy actually helped the urges a lot. The truth is that a coping method that works for me might not work for you, so you will have to keep trying different methods until you find something that works.

Urges go away for a while but often come back and it is up to us to come out stronger than these urges. I have faith in you and I am sure you can beat your urges. You already took the first step by accepting this and posting this thread and I am glad you decided to come here for help. Even though life is hard, I want you to know that you have it in you to beat all of this in a healthy manner.

Stay strong. I am here if you need someone to talk to.

Kav.

[CurledUpInABall]

thank you everyone for the comforting replies...it will be hard for me that's for sure but i'm willing to try them...thanks again to all of you. I do feel better.

[Thinking]

Hi!

I will try to help you as much as I can, as you are really having hard time now. I will try to adress each problems you have stated.

>> my family is always fussing.

- It means so much if they are always fussing you. You would really not prefer them to not nag you at all. Your parents just want you to be closer to them: simply means they love you so much! I believe you yourself love them as much as they do, but you might feel akward to show them. Its okay, but maybe you should be more understanding that their fuss is their love to you. Remember that they are fussing you to make you a better person.

>> I'm being talked about behind my back

- Hmm, you have limited attentions to give. Why care? One thing about anxiety towards other's talk is good because you aware of other's concern about you. But when it affects you mentally, its not good anymore. I will advice you (though its not exactly good in a long run) for now, is to shut down 90% of what you hear. What you deserve now is advice and care, not critics. Critics are for you when you felt better, and critics are for you to improve yourself, so don't treat them too personally and think of it as an encouragement. If a person critize (but not pure demeaning) about you in the back, that might also mean that you need to improve on that, and show them they are wrong!

One thing social anxiety can do is to teach you how to shut yourself down to bad people, although you wont want to miss any of the really kind people in your life! (it will be adressed in the last section.)

>> my grades are failing

- I think I already told you this in the PM. Feel free to ask me if you need.

>> my friends are becoming enemies

- Have you wondered why would this happen? Sorry because I don't have many friends in real life so I might not know how this works. But I guess it got to be a problem with trust. I can understand your struggle of how to trust a person. And it happens to me soooooooo many times. Someone who come forward to comfort me will be considered to be fake nice; someone who come to ask me for help will be thought as trying to selfishly get benefits from me; someone who claims to be busy when I just want to talk and rant to them are horrible friends who dont care about me.

And yes, all these assumptions are very true 99 out of 100 times. But do you think you should also think the same way for the remaining 1%? They are also the same kind and loving person as you are, and they are genuine friends too. I can understand why you don't trust your friend and distanting yourself from them, or maybe you had arguments with them. But sometimes you should reevaluate the whole thing: Are they the 1% that you missed? It will be a regret if you missed them, because they are the rare but kind person who were once there for you. Don't let them go away from you because you deserve them as much they deserve you!


I hope I can make you feel even a bit better. Your life might be better, and definitely can be happier than you think! Everyone here cares for you.

Best Regards,
Ivan.

[Palmolive]

Hi

Thank you for reaching out to us here for some help!

I am a recovering alcoholic. A few years back I became heavily dependent on spirits (mostly vodka) and at the worst points I was drinking up to a good 4/5 litres a day and it made me very vulnerable and a risk to myself and even others to the point that I was admitted a psych ward twice for detox where I had to go on medication to help me manage the withdrawal from alcohol. And even though it may have taken the edge of, staff were constantly fetching paper or towels because I was sweating so much and I had a fit at the very beginning of my first detox because I was leaving my body with out something it had been so badly depending on. Along come the moments were I would faint and ass out, be sick, have headaches etc and then came the moment when all that got better and my body then craved sugar which I have now found out is quite common in recovering alcoholics.

Truth is, I still have lapses. Especially recently which again has left me in very dangerous situations and emergency services dealing with me. I am not telling you all this to scare you, well actually I kind of am. But to scare you in a way to help you see what it can lead too. I think drinking is okay for people who can manage it and do it in social situations etc. But for me, just one sip of alcohol will turn into bottles. I can not drink and doubt I ever will be able to again.

What helped me? When i had been sober for a few months, I realised just how much dignity, capacity etc that I had lost. I would walk around in public drink or laid drunk in alley ways or parks and people would found me passed out from drinking and because of severe self harm. The truth is I now realise that when I am drunk, my thoughts take over and leave me in a very dark and dangerous place. I now attend AA meetings every sunday and they really help me. The people there can relate so much and not only do I support them, they support me and I also have a sponsor who is now more like a mum to me who I see often out of AA.

As for the smoking, I mean, it's not a good behaviour for anyone and I will never encourage you to smoke either. I think you need to find ways to manage with your emotions and thoughts in a healthy way and it might be helpful for you too look at our thread "aternatives to self harm" in the self harm forum for some idea's on what you can do when you feel you want to drink or smoke.

And please remember you are not and never will be alone. There are people you can to talk in "real life" and you always have us here to so don't suffer in silence.

Hope and wishes,
Jessie

[CurledUpInABall]

thx jessie...i will check the alternatives out

[del677]

I am grateful by how many people have come forth with their own story of struggle with addiction, offering their support. These are the people who know better than anyone what it takes to recover, which is, each other.

It's why there are many groups, like AA, NA, etc., because when people feel they are a part of a group, people tend to relax, and that's the whole key to recovery.

Addiction is a stress induced disorder. Life becomes stressful, people seek relief. Drugs, alcohol, smoking, etc. They become learned coping mechanisms. Recovery is replacing that with other things which also reduce stress, like feeling accepted, being a part of a group, mindfulness meditation, which is all about focusing the mind, as a previous poster mentioned, smoking includes focusing one's attention, which is what meditation is all about. Same with yoga. Key is to mitigate stress, take a break from it frequently.

The good news, that makes me shed tears of joy, is you are not alone, as I see so many have already come forward to welcome you in, (because that's step 12 of the twelve steps. You are helping them in their recovery, by allowing them to help you.)

[CurledUpInABall]

thank you everyone for everything...i do appreciate it all. I'll do my best to resist.