The Daily Check-In for Friday, December 20th: Just for today, I am NOT drinking!
We may be anonymous strangers on the internet, but we have one thing in common. We may be a world apart, but we're here together!
Welcome to the 24 hour pledge!
I'm pledging myself to not drinking today, and invite you to do the same.
Maybe you're new to /r/stopdrinking and have a hard time deciding what to do next. Maybe you're like me and feel you need a daily commitment or maybe you've been sober for a long time and want to inspire others.
It doesn't matter if you're still hung over from a three day bender or been sober for years, if you just woke up or have already completed a sober day. For the next 24 hours, lets not drink alcohol!
This pledge is a statement of intent. Today we don't set out trying not to drink, we make a conscious decision not to drink. It sounds simple, but all of us know it can be hard and sometimes impossible. The group can support and inspire us, yet only one person can decide if we drink today. Give that person the right mindset!
What happens if we can't keep to our pledge? We give up or try again. And since we're here in /r/stopdrinking, we're not ready to give up.
What this is: A simple thread where we commit to not drinking alcohol for the next 24 hours, posting to show others that they're not alone and making a pledge to ourselves. Anybody can join and participate at any time, you do not have to be a regular at /r/stopdrinking or have followed the pledges from the beginning.
What this isn't: A good place for a detailed introduction of yourself, directly seek advice or share lengthy stories. You'll get a more personal response in your own thread.
This post goes up at:
- US - Night/Early Morning
- Europe - Morning
- Asia and Australia - Evening/Night
A link to the current Daily Check-In post can always be found near the top of the sidebar.
Bonjour Stop Drinking! And yaaaay, it’s Friday! Wooooo 😆
Today’s little topic is one I keep very close to me around holiday times, weekends, celebrations…. Nah, who am I kidding, I keep this front and centre almost all of the time. I call it: DON’T FORGET TO REMEMBER.
As time goes on and I gain a little more confidence in my sobriety, I sometimes fall victim to the same thing we all do - which is our brain (steered by our addiction) trying to tell us that everything is fine now, we have it all under control, and it won’t hurt just to have a little drinky.
Because our beautiful brains are wired to help us survive in life, they try to eradicate, or at least use the dimmer switch, on negative past experiences. This is necessary for us to move forward - if we remembered all of the pain, physical and emotional, that we had ever been through and carried it around with us continually, the weight would be too heavy to bear. So our brain tries to help us. Unfortunately, our addiction hijacks this process and allows us to forget just how bad it really was.
We might start to romanticise about the “good times” that we had whilst drinking; how funny everything was; how witty, entertaining and sparklingly conversational we were; how friendly everyone seemed to be. Oh dear, what a shame that we are not permitting ourselves to participate; how sad that we can’t have a little drink with our friends and family. This is when I employ DON’T FORGET TO REMEMBER.
I make myself remember all the times when I ruined relationships because of my drinking. And eventually didn’t really have any at all. I make myself remember, leaning over the toilet, breathing in the smell of literal shit while puke poured out of my nose. The times I was so drunk that I physically injured myself in quite horrible ways; when I drove and could easily have killed another person. The pounding heart and sweating panic of waking up at 3 am with a headache and dizziness that meant I couldn’t even stand up. The days I couldn’t do my job properly or even show up because I was still so drunk from the night before. The embarrassing text messages, the pity in other peoples eyes when I was drunk and buying yet more alcohol; the shame, oh god, the fucking shame. I make myself remember how pathetic I felt to be controlled by this bottle of poison. And how I would have given anything to be where I am now - SOBER.
And so I will not drink poison with any of you today ❣️