Week 21: This was a surprisingly low-consumption week. Part of it was because I was on the road traveling so it was much easier to skip drinking than if at home. Still, pre TSM I would have picked up a bottle at my way-points and drunk myself to sleep each night. Instead I had dinner and a lemonade. On Thanksgiving day - at a potentially tense family reunion - I had a single glass of wine with dinner. From not having a single AF day in years (possibly a decade) I had four of them this week, with a couple one-drink nights. For what it's worth, wine is as delicious as ever. It's just I now can say 'no more' and have it stick. Still can't quite believe it. Hope it lasts!

Week 22: A new record - 5 AF. Wife was traveling late last week and the time alone was a big test of being able to do something other than just drink to keep myself occupied. Last two nights a single glass of wine - as I finished tonight's glass I had a brief powerful flash of wanting a second one, but I just stayed in my seat for a bit to reflect on how I'd feel after I had a second glass (unpleasantly buzzed and disappointed in myself, most likely) and truly, in five minutes at most the desire had passed and I was content with my one glass and mild buzz. I happily poured a sparkling water into my wine glass instead.

Much like AJ posted elsewhere, my goal isn't really abstinence. I feel great that I was able to go five days AF and see my weekly number drop to 2 - two! I think I'll feel a little sorry to see my curve bend back up to more regular drinking, just because I'm so amazed at the steady decline over the past few months. I believe a little drinking is fine and might even be beneficial. But I can see the attraction of just skipping it altogether. I'll have to ponder a bit on where I really want to be long-term. How lucky I am to have a problem like this. What an astonishing change from the helplessness I started with.

Wow PV, this is really great. What a classy set of problems And even if you do bounce back up a little, it's no cause for alarm. I believe that knowing where you want to be is essential to getting there. Wherever "there" is for you, good luck on the journey.

Fire

Congratulatoins PV!

How funny to think it might make the graph "look bad" if you just have a drink now and then after being AF like that! Those graphs can do wonders when you're doubting yourself along the way - showing a downward trend (however slight in my case), even when numbers bounce around like a ping pong ball along the way. When the numbers have become so low, and abstinence isn't the goal, I wonder if the graph has outlived its useful life? That's how I would look at it unless you just want to track a "normal range" of moderate drinking now. But I would think a definite curve is pointless now - looks like you're already there! I'm SO happy for you!

I still want ice cream every time I think of you, but REALLY, that's not why you make me happy! Thanks for making me smile!

Thanks! I have lately been treating myself to some lovely ice cream, as a self-reward for my progress with TSM. I'm somewhat of a chart-junkie, but I do agree it's probably silly to plot daily drinks at this level (although good to keep tracking them to monitor the overall picture).

In another thread, pisces7378 said

I'm wrestling with this very question at the moment. I look at my weekly graph and wonder what I'm waiting for. I'm going to a party tonight and I will probably feel like I'm going wild if I have two drinks. I'm dragging my feet on "calling it" but for all intents and purposes, I have been cured by TSM and the evidence is staring me in the face. I guess there can always be "one more week" to prove I'm holding steady, but that will be true forever. But as of today, I no longer fear alcohol. Best birthday EVAR.

Congratulations! It looks like you made it. Keep charting though, if it's your nature. The data passed this point is somewhat sparse among the cured. I'm interested if you'll level off at some number per week, or decrease to nothing, or have a duration where the level rises then falls again. We'll see.

I see we have the same reward - ice cream. I have really developed a love for it since the AL addiction is gone.

If you enjoy graphing and curve fitting, you may want to get Eureqa from Cornell University. It is a software tool for detecting equations and hidden mathematical relationships in your data. Its primary goal is to identify the simplest mathematical formulas which could describe the underlying mechanisms that produced the data. It utilizes genetic programming (GP) which is an evolutionary algorithm-based methodology (self modifying programming). I ran my data through it and after 34 hours of using 3 of my networked computers and 1.5 trillion iterations, it found a nearly perfect fit that extrapolated into the future another year. It shows that I should be around 1 unit per week after 2 years of TSM. Of course, I take all of this with a grain of salt, but I love this open ended program structure that starts with no preconceived "idea" of what the solution should look like and tests different relationship until it finds ones that work. Normally most programs will fir the data with a polynomial of increasing complexity. In the case of my date, it abandoned that early in the iteration and settled on a multiple component exponential decay, just as we would expect.

Anyway, I gotta do something with all this extra time now. Congrats again!

Bob

Thanks bob3d. I just installed Eureqa on a virtual machine and it's grinding away... I just pasted in my weekly numbers and used the default settings. Fun to watch.

Today was my birthday and somewhat ironically my wife gave me a particularly nice bottle of single-malt scotch (it's a birthday tradition). It will be interesting to see what that tastes like, whenever I get around to it. We went to a club social function this afternoon and I had to decide whether to take a Nal or not. I decided I just didn't want to drink today, so I haven't. Probably the first AF birthday in my adult life, and I'm in my fifties.

Now that's some impressive progress!

Bob

Happy Belated Birthday PV!

Amazing you didn't even have a birthday drink! Tha'ts something I'm sure I'll never want to give up, but no longer seeing a birthday as a "free" reason to smashed is a gift in and of itself. Congratulations - just imagine what this year will be like compared to your last. Enjoy!

HEY PV,

That's incredible.

It seems as though a bunch of members are really having some success. I would be ecstatic in your shoes. And the best part, I think I feel glimmers and am going to try an AF day tonight. Congrads, Jim.

Happy Birthday too!