Hi Brooke,
I’m so grateful for these tools. I have committed to 100 allowed urges to drink and have made it to 80 since February with a lot of mistakes along the way. I feel great, have lost about 17 pounds and am lighter and leaner than I have been in years. I am still struggling with over-drinking occasionally and it usually takes the form of a binge. Yesterday I had an urge, I tried to witness the urge when it arose and pay attention to why it was coming up. I was able to really identify the thought and where the feelings were coming from which was great because it was not obvious to me initially. I tried to sit with the feeling, feel it in my body and repeat my mantra (“I choose light, lean and clear over sluggish, soft and sedated”) and also tried some of the other tools but I don’t think I really felt the feeling, just identified it. I still watched myself go into the store and buy two bottles of wine. I came home and told myself I will wait for 5 minutes and try and feel the feelings. I waited 5 minutes and then another 10 minutes and then I opened the bottle and drank the whole thing. I don’t think the urge was so huge at that point but it was more like I had committed to drinking in my head, and maybe to messing up. My thoughts were “f-this controlled world you are creating, it’s boring, you are boring when you are like this” and then some self pity in the form of “you deserve to have a nice boozy summer afternoon with this wine.” It’s really helpful to identify the “you deserve” thoughts as self pity because they come up a lot when I am considering overdrinking but I still default to them, even after lots of models. I was doing some models this morning and I realized that I think I am blowing my own mind as you say, I am lighter and leaner than I have been in over 20 years and I am starting to be afraid that I won’t be able to maintain this and I think there is some fear in…eh oh..what next? If I can do this there is so much more. I listened to the Upper Limit book on tape and identified some of my upper limit issues..any ideas on next steps. there is a part of me that feels so proud and strong but this binging keeps coming back up, is it because I am white knuckling through the other urges?
thank you.