Now that you mention it i'm going to throw my hat in and agree. I wish I spoke up sooner. The cleaning up made me feel a little sick. I don't think any of us acted in a way to warrant that behavior.The thread was fine, warts and all. It's only natural that arguments arise when a topic like this is being discussed, but in the end everybody should be capable to move on all on their own.
Doesn't make any difference now, of course. Just voicing my opinion.
It was clearly not "fine." All of the nonsense drove people away including the creator. If you "feel sick" because I got rid of the childish, disrespectful, flippant comments then you have invested too much emotion in an Internet forum. I was tired of the negativity and returned this thread to what it's meant to be - supportive and positive. That's all.
Iyou.
Again, I disagree. This thread is definitely not the thread to challenge people and their beliefs. The shenanigans that were going on were not in the spirit of the intention of this thread. This thread is to help recovering alcoholics, for support, for encouragement. It's not open for debate. Some of us rely on AA and we don't need people who have negative opinions about AA voicing their opinions. If said persons feel the need to share such emotions, they should take it to DM. This is an extremely sensitive thread that needs to be handled with care. This thread is for people who want to milestone their achievements with the applause of others in the same situation. So this thread welcomes with open arms anyone who wishes to tell their story without the criticisms of others. No judgment. I did this because I care about my fellow ASTers who share the same situation I do.Originally Posted by Don Luzman
I am a moderator and my job is to moderate threads. I am doing what's correct by our official AST Moderator Handbook.
I
Oh yeah, then why does Jay Knox still have an account?
Hey, check me out. I'm a ghost.
DM me about Jay Knox. I don't know anything about that drama.
I
What would you do if I started a thread titled "Non-AA Sobriety"?
If you feel the absolute need to to aid in your recovery, go for it. I am all about positivity. You are welcome to start your own negative thread if you wish.
I
I mostly even agree with what you say, sparklepop. It's just that I believe that ideally people could work things out among themselves.
Note that I am not aware of any comments made during the last few days, since I only stop by here once a week or so, so for all I know, the discussion may have been well beyond repair at this point, and not worth saving after all. I don't know. I was referring to earlier posts that are now gone.
I remember a huge part of my own recovery was spending days and weeks reading through threads like these on the internet, although mostly on forums that were specifically for that purpose. A person who is just days into his/her sobriety, or even still drinking, yet contemplating sobriety, has a whole different opinion on how the whole deal should work, than somebody who has successfully been sober for years, and knows about the misconceptions and trappings about those first days, weeks and months.
The newly sober will often say a lot of things that are, simply put, stupid. Arrogant. Even dangerous. He/she will often want to get sober on his/her own terms, relying on will-power alone, and not seeing the long run, accepting the fact that in order to actually stay sober, some significant changes in one's life will have to be made.
Now I have had that mindset too once, and I understand it. For years I tried to get sober just by "not drinking", and yet always ended up with a beer in my hand. Only after I finally accepted that whatever I was doing wasn't working, I started to listen to what people had to say who had been sober for many years, and seemed to be happy with their lives. That's what I wanted, too.
I started to understand that what I needed to do was not to "resist drinking", but to start enjoying the life without it. And in order to do that, I needed to adjust this life accordingly, and that did include adjusting my environment accordingly. That was the key, and I've been on the right path ever since.
Regarding the forum: The thing is, if it's just the jerk looking for trouble or trying to stir things up, by all means, get rid of him/her, and clean up the mess if necessary. But more often or not there will be somebody with a different "opinion", and then it is up to everybody else to share their experiences relating to that opinion, showing were he/she may be going at it the wrong way, hopefully giving said person something to think about along the way. Note that this often doesn't work out that way, but sometimes it does, but even more to point, in my own case just reading over and over again how the paths of the longer sober were very similar to each other, while the paths of the people who would regularly relapse were similar to mine, was very valuable information for me, and played a major part in my own sobriety.
I hope this was not too dull, or at all inappropriate. It's not even meant as any sort of criticism at this point, so I hope you don't read it that way.
Last edited by Don Luzman; March 12, 2012 at 1:13 AM.
There's as many kinds of meetings as there are kinds of bars. Keep going to different ones. There are some that I don't like, as there were bars I never went back to.
As far as the talkers go, I get it. I go to two meetings where everyone talks a lot. The others, though, are quiet as can be. the court order guys can be obnoxious, but after you see even one of them stick around and genuinely turn his life around, it will give you patience with all the others.
As far as the social stuff goes, I have ten years and occasionally, I still ask in a meeting for people to hang out with after. I just tell the group I'm going through some serious shit and would love to hang out after the meeting. There's usually one group of four or five at every meeting who are going somewhere.
You're doing great with two+ weeks. That first month is critical. Be cautious! you sound like you're on the right track.
The post by TimBuktu is hidden due to low votes. Click expand to view it.
many tine tanies
(that's probably an understatement on my part...)
many tine tanies
I love being sober. The feeling, the clarity, the energy. I love being excited about getting up and starting the day, looking forward to going the gym, working on projects, getting tasks done. I don't feel like a loser in the morning anymore. It's such a lovely way to live.
I
That was the big revelation for me, actually being able to do things. When I was drinking, I always wanted to do things but never seemed to have the time or energy to do them. I'm guessing this was because my time was spent drinking or recovering from drinking. I used to really dread doing anything on week nights, I was just too tired after work. Now I'm home one night a week. I get up on Saturday mornings and actually do things with my day... same with Sundays. I really thought I'd be missing out on so much when I quit drinking, what I didn't realize was how much I was missing out on because I was drinking.
The other thing that surprised me was how most of my problems went away. Things I didn't know how to deal with, or didn't want to deal with, became a lot easier when I wasn't either drunk or battling the exhaustion of a hangover. Problems that seemed insurmountable became easy to deal with. Problems with depression and anxiety became manageable. Problems in my relationship became normal people problems, instead of gigantic blow up fights.
I look back on all of the years I spent confused, angry and exhausted and get genuinely terrified of ending up back there. My life is pretty sweet right now, and I hope I don't fuck it up.
7 days, bitches! That's the longest I've gone in about 8-9 years. I know that doesn't sound like much, but it's better than nothing.
Congrats! Today is day 33 for me, which coincidentally is the longest I've gone in over a decade. (I went 32 days a few years ago. For a girl. We don't talk anymore.)
I'm eating Cheez-Its for dinner.
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Last edited by slothborn; October 7, 2012 at 9:05 AM.
Awesome job on not drinking dudes!
Sloth, AA is open to anyone and I've seen everyone from people who drank themselves to homelessness to people who quit when they were 16 for getting in a fight at a party. Anyone is welcome.
97 days sober today and feeling great and looking forward to 100. To celebrate my wife and I are going to Yosemite to do some hiking. Just want to echo what's already been said - it's amazing how nice and peaceful Saturday and Sunday morning can be when you're not sleeping off a hangover. Those mornings have become my favorite part of the week. Also, my brain actually works all the time lately and my shows have been consistently good. And a benefit nobody talks about much, I haven't had squirty morning-after poo's in a really long time. Everybody I know who sobers up mentions not having to puke, but I never puked much - but I did get some mean cases of diarrhea. My underwear is grateful.
More than anybody wanted to know!
Yeah, the non-diarrhea poos have been pretty cool the past few days.
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