Damn Ketch, sounds like you've had a rough few days. Getting spun out is bad news, and I REALLY hope you don't end up getting involved with that again. At the very least, maybe the Nal provided some small level of exinction for any sort of speed craving.

My interpretation of your dream: you were giving a big ol' sapphire middle finger to the following things...

- Jaeger
- Pinot Grigio
- Fisherman-provided Contraband

Just hang in there for four more days, and hopefully a nice change of scenery, some warm weather and familiar faces will get you back on the path to feeling hopeful.

Hope you feel better.

-Hesster

Oh dear Ketch, I know exactly what you feel like today. there is absolutely nothing worse in this world than coming down off of speed and hating yourself and feeling so incredibly terrible that you can't imagine that things will ever be better. BUT THEY WILL!! Bodies are resiliant things, and yours will bounce back soon enough. I don't know if I mentioned this on this board before...but I used to have a drug problem, but managed to kick it through LOTS of therapy and behavior modification. But when I am super drunk, that pull is still occasionally there - I think, sure, I could do it just this one time, etc. Honestly, the only thing that works in those moments is that I have restructured my life so that I CANNOT get drugs, basically. I've cut ties, stopped going to certain places, etc. A move will probably be good for you in that respect.
I think you are right to focus on the fact that you HAVE made progress, and will continue to do so. Maybe when you go on these binges though, the nal stops covering you? Maybe you need to take another dose?
Ketch, I really hope you can work this out. I am just shuddering with empathy at the sort of day you must be having....good luck, take a bath and a xanax if you have any...
EL

Hi Ketch

Sorry to hear you're feeling so bad. It sounds like you need a vacation!! I've never tried speed myself, only marijuana. That can make me paranoid enough so I rarely go there. Rest up and I hope Florida is just what you need. The ring will fit one day soon.

Cheers
Sticky

Good morning Ketch,

I'm sorry you're having a bad week and hope that you can distance yourself from speed. Lucky for me I have also made it impossible to get any kind of drug or I'd most likely be doing what you were doing the other day. In my early years I tried cocaine, speed and pot. I loved cocaine and speed and am grateful I just don't know how to get that stuff anymore. I hope you work it out but certainly under the influence its a tall order to resist that pull. Keep going, you'll be fine. Best of luck to you. Keep letting us know how you are doing.

Holy Hangover!

I have NEVER been so hungover as I am right now. Never.

Here's why. Because TSM is really working. That's a great thing, however, my brain is literally scrambling to feel the invigorating warm fuzzies alcohol has produced in every single drinking episode up until now. So, I am drinking more, more, more to get that rush.

I started last night, actually late afternoon, with three Alaskan White beers and poured a shot of Jaeger-- which totally grossed me out and for the very first time, I actually tasted the dark liquid. My taste buds have never quite wrapped themselves around the stuff until yesterday. I fully detected it's nasty-ass-flavor: Black licorice. Gross. I can no longer stomach it. So the rest of the little bottle will remain in my freezer untouched.

Then I headed to the store and nothing sounded good. Not beer, not the hard stuff, nada. So I opted for a six pack of hard apple cider. And I bought a big ol' bottle o' budweiser. Downed all of that to no avail... still not zooming in my usual rocketing flare. Dammit.

What's a girl to do? But of course, descend the stairs to the Potlatch Bar. I ordered a brew and then a shot. Jaeger is out. So hmmmm... how about a.... Washington Apple? Whiskey, crown and apple schnapps. I couldn't finish it. It too was grody. Criminy!

I am at my wits end. Still having not acheived my desired effect of oblivious abandon. Okay, a lemon drop please. And that did the trick. After 14 units, finally I was in no man's land. Such a familiar place for me to stumble about.....

Let me say this again--I have never been this hungover. And I am boarding a plane in four hours. I am going to drug myself with ambien and sleep. Forgive me my drool.

That's why I sought out speed the other night.... my brain is searching for ways to remain in what was once a guaranteed high that is surely fading quite away.

Good riddence, Mo Fo. Enough already.

This is very interesting to me. Also intriguing because I know what's going on. I mean, I got the memo. I feel for my brain. Poor brain so intent on keeping the old status quo.

Now ask me if I'm going to drink today at some overpriced airport pub. Hell to the no....

I'm learning.

Finally,

Ketchikan1

Oh so is that what is happening? Our brain struggles to reach our anticipated high and because it's harder to get there. We drink more? Hmmmm never thought of it that way. I e just been wondering why my units are going up again after that good week two weeks ago. So I guess I have my answer.

Sleep well Ketch and feel better soon.

Best,

Ah, Ketchikan1, sorry to hear of that slight setback...but with only a few days left before kicking off a period of monumental life change and uncertainty, is it any wonder that you sought to escape or deal with what for me would've been sky-high levels of anxiety?

Take care of yourself physically, the rest will follow, and soon this blip will be in the rear view mirror of life...

Ketch I think your analysis is spot on. I have many times had the experience (on TSM) of wanting to drink and get drunk, but everything tasting gross, and eventually resorting to vodka based drinks because they go down so damn easily. Licorce IS the jaeger taste that I loathe so much - anything with anisette is taboo for me, no idea why, always has been since childhood. I suspect that after another one of these horrible binges and hangovers your brain might start to get the message :/

Hello from Beautiful, Sunny Sarasota!

Man, I had forgotton how splendid it really is here! I just wanted to fill you guys in on an occurance that happeneed just last night.

You should know first that when I hit the Ketchikan airport, because of the severity of my hangover, I did indulge in one cocktail: A screwdriver tall. I sipped on it like a normal human being, nursing it for well over a half an hour as I dove into a book I checked out from the library about the highs and lows of crystal meth by Frank Owen. I will be forever a student of drugs, addiction, recovery et al.

I arrived here yesterday at 10:00 a.m. Since I slept the entire time on the red-eye from Seattle to Atlanta, I was pretty energetic. Enough so that I walked all the way around the 4-mile road that loops around my parents' opulent gated community. I actually got some sun on my vampire-white-like legs. For the record, I only heard a couple of landscapers gasp in horror at the unnatural hue of my skin as I walked by.... I am perhaps the palest person in all of Florida!

But the real success story happened last evening. Three doors down, one of my mom's friends was throwing a dinner party to celebrate my mom's 66th birthday. It was a lovely affair, catered for 10 guests. Three courses and any kind of booze you might have a taste for. I opted for an unusual choice-- red wine. Cocktail hour went well and I remember thinking that is was quite the life being here on a sprawling patio with a fountain babbling, watching the sun set in the background of a manicured golf course, sipping cabernet and nibbling on caviar. Not bad.... not bad at all.

Throughout the dinner, I maybe had 4 1/2 glasses of wine total. Both red and white, but mostly red. Mom made emotional toasts as her pinapple upside down cake was served. I held my own. Maintaining a very slow pace of unit intake.

Guess what? My mom got drunker than I did for perhaps the first time in our history! So much so that our hostess asked if I was driving... even though the length of the drive home was 500 yards! Please note that my mom is not alcoholic. The miraculous thing is: Last night I was not an alcoholic either.

I swear to you as surely as I am writing this. The Sinclair Method is working!!!!! Now more than ever. Tonight is a family celebration. My attorney sister is driving down from Tampa with her beau. She is extremely alcoholic. Sardonically so. She gets very sarcastic and not in a nice way when she drinks one too many. My other sister and her daughter are also attending.

I am so excited to see how this night unfolds... if Nal will again make my drinking episode "normal." I will keep you guys posted... because, if truth be told, you are my real family. I love and adore the people with whom I'll be dining this evening. But I am more heard, more understood by the kindred spirits on this board!

I am encouraging you to persevere!!! Keep on keeping on! Because if TSM can alter the behavior of this ol' drunk, by God, it will do the same for you!

Sincerely,

Ketchikan1

Hang in there, Ketch! That normal drinking feeling is a rush in and off itself. The times I have said, "I don't want anymore," and walked away make up for the brutal hangovers!

Sarasota is pretty this time of year. Nice and cool, still warm enough for the beach. Summers are absolutely brutal though!

Take care!