Hi Brooke.
For about three weeks, I was not drinking at all and doing great. I felt good, was following my eating protocol (no sugar, no flour and vegan, plus intermittent fasting), and everything was rockin’ and rollin’. The only issue I had was I was worried that, if I didn’t allow a Joy drink every now and then, I was going to always have fear in the back of my mind that having one drink would send me in a tailspin back to square one. Historically, I’ve been able to stop drinking for extended periods of time, but as soon as I tried to incorporate it back in, in any way, I was back to my old ways. So, on my 10-minute tutoring call, my tutor told me to give the Joy drink a try so that I could experience it, learn from the results, and not be afraid of it. I created a the drink plan several days in advance and looked forward my first drinks in weeks!
I followed my plan. I had the drinks… And then the chatter started up. I started constantly thinking about drinking again – planning when, how many, how many nights a week was “acceptable,” etc. I absolutely HATE all that chatter and want to be rid of it so badly, but if I quit completely again, I’m worried I’ll still have that exact same fear because there is no reason for me to believe that it won’t be the same scenario I’ve lived over and over again in my adult life.
Would quitting completely actually help me get over the desire? Or would the desire lay there, dormant, under cloak of darkness (like a scary little monster in hiding! haha), ready to come back full force the first time I ever decide to have a drink?
I don’t want to quit drinking and be afraid that it is a delicate situation that can be ruined so easily by one bad decision or one slip-up. So how do I go about this? Do I quit completely again and don’t plan on ever having Joy drinks, and just work on building a new belief that I will no longer desire drinking and won’t want it in the future (and therefore won’t screw it up)? Or do I lessen the chatter by creating more regular drink plans (not just once per week) and sort of “phase out” my drinking over time? Or do I suffer through the incessant chatter and just have one planned Joy drink per week? OR is there some kind of magical fourth option that would help this to be a more everlasting outcome? 😛
I’m so frustrated because my thought downloads go from “I got this! I don’t even need to drink!” … to… “I drank last night and feel like crap; I never want to do that again!”… to… “I want to be able to enjoy drinking from time to time without all this drama; I’m not sure I really want to cut it out.”
I’m all over the place. Thoughts on this??