Ocean,

That is truly amazing. It is great to hear that you are doing so well.


Keep up the good work and keep posting,

Jaba

I love hearing stories of your success, Ocean! Keep them coming!

Dee

I'm back! Booo! Did I scare ya?

Well, I'm going on 4 months now and still going good. The last two weeks were interesting. A bit different but still went very well. The first week I was at a conference. After that a week off on vacation. Normally when I go to a conference the first thing I do is stock up. Typically a nice top of the shelf bottle of whiskey and then a case of good beer to last as long as it can. This is the first business trip in probably 10 years where I didn't do that. I drank every night and even a little more then normal but still not to excess. On vacation my wife and I went camping and it was quite beautiful I must say. The desert is an amazingly beautiful place.

Again under normal circumstances I have my camping routine. I usually buy a package of 20 vodka airplane bottles, a bottle of vodka (you can refill the airplane bottles if necessary) and a bottle of whiskey and beer of course. I hide the vodka all over the place. Trunks of cars where the spare tire goes is always a good place. The whiskey comes out on the table to sip. But the vodka is strategically located so that I can sneak off to up my levels to please my master so he won't torture me.

I had no desire for any of that... None whatsoever.

We always get a box of wine. You know those Black Boxes? Evil little things LOL. I didn't keep count the whole time I was away. Well not on paper anyway. I did in my head and I definitely drank more then my average of 3 per night. The box of wine flows easily into a glass and you cannot see how much is left. none the less the entire time I never did really get drunk except for maybe one night. One night in particular I felt the affect of the alcohol. Not like in the old days but non the less a bit of drunkenness. Low and behold that was the only of the 16 nights I spent out there that my wife and I had an argument. Imagine that! Just like the good old days.

Even still I didn't wake up with a hang over. So it was probably about a 7 drink night, not sure.

The way I look at everything I do now with TSM is the concept of normal. What is normal? Maybe I am making up excuses, Lord knows I am good at that... We alcoholics are good at that. But I think that even 'normal' people get drunk once in a while especially when going out camping or to the occasional party or whatever. Normal people don't get black out drunk every night of their lives that's all. And that's the way I see that experience for me. And I know there is some truth to it because even after the night I got a bit drunk the next night I only had 3 drinks. That would have been absolutely impossible for me just 4 months ago.

I find myself still thinking back to it. And it makes me want to dance around like a little child. TSM has been an awakening. A grand awakening from a vivid nightmare. When I wake up in the morning feeling great after a night that I had just one glass of wine with dinner and then maybe a nice porter for desert before going to bed I think that maybe I'm still sleeping and will wake up one day back into my nightmare of a reality that I am a prisoner. Not a prisoner to the alcohol molecule like I once thought. Not enslaved by this exterior force that exists outside of me in a bottle but rather to my own mind. To the cruel master that resides in my subconscious. A psychopath that will torture it's victim at all cost even up to death to get what it wants. And what it wants is a numb mindless existence.

That was just four months ago. That's a blink of the eye in a life time. When I first started TSM I thought 4 months would never come. And of course I was very fearful. In fact I put off starting TSM for a month because of the fear. I can't really consider myself to be a fast responder. I was in fact an instant responder. I went from a 4 month binge averaging 15 drinks a night, blackouts every night, hung over every day, withdrawal and submission to drinking every day after work to my first 1/4 tab of Naltrexone and 7 drinks that night to 3 the next night to an average of 3 over the course of the last 4 months.

I wish it worked this way for everyone.

I cannot be thankful and grateful enough. When I think back and remember what it was like just four months ago I just cannot even imagine how I got here today.

I'm not cured. I don't yet believe in that concept. Maybe it's because I'm not there yet. Maybe when I get there I will then know. I don't know. I doubt I ever will put myself on the cured list but the change is there.

Well done Ocean! And well said!

Good to hear Ocean. And yes even normal people sometimes over do it. But your changes are amazing!! So happy for you!! Keep up the good work. Newlife

Ocean,

I am truly amazed by how this process has changed you, and it is a blessing that it came so quick, for how much longer could you have kept up that life style?

I am a little jealous that you did not experienced a hangover. If I have any more than 3 glasses of wine and I know I will pay for it the next day, but maybe that is my body shouting enough already!

When you go camping in the desert do the snakes join you? I couldn't get my husband to go camping because his fear of snakes...

I am happy and proud of how well you are doing,

Jaba

Your post makes me want to dance around like a little child for you! Please keep posting for I love reading your inspiring words.

Yea I love the way Ocean writes. Newlife

Thanks for your replies. It is a blessing that came quickly indeed. How long could I maintain that life style? Good question. I kind of have always seen myself fall into my fathers foot steps. Like him I was also a so called functional alcoholic. Never did the morning eye opener, never went for the lunch time martini or kept a bottle in my desk drawer at work. We are the type that would just rough out the hangover during the day knowing that the reward was there waiting for us when we got home. He's in his mid 70's now and still parties like a rock star so I can only imagine that without TSM I'd probably be there some day. Frankly the doctors are pretty amazed that he's still alive so he must have been gifted with some good genes. But in the end it will get him.

Which reminds me last time they visited I talked to my mom about TSM and need to ask her if she's read the book and see what she thinks. I'd love it if my dad tried it out and was a fast responder like me. It would be almost too incredible to imagine that it's true but after the sucess that I've been through I could see it happening.

But anyway... I'm pretty sure if I go back and read the first few posts of this thread I mentioned that in accordance with the predicted timeline of the book that by my birthday I would be cured. Well Sunday is my birthday and this was by far the very best gift I could ever have asked for. Cured? No. I won't go there. I've got enough experience with friends and especially family to know that there is no cure for alcoholism. I would agree to the cure being something else but not alcoholism. The cure for me at this point is that I no longer obsess over alcohol. I know that this is a big part of what they consider a cure and it's true but I am also very well aware of the fact that if I drink without Naltrexone I'll fall right back into it. But it is true, I no longer wake up sick and brood all day long about how bad this is and that I have to stop and that I promise myself not to drink again tonight only to find myself right back at the store on my way home buying more beer and repeating the cycle again and again. I also feel no compulsion to hide alcohol at all. It's just not necessary anymore. I also am not keenly aware of exactly how much alcohol is left in the house. In the past I'd know the exact beer count in the garage refrigerator, how much wine is in the hutch, how much is hidden around the house and so on. That way I'd know exactly when it was necessary to resupply. Of course then there are the bottles that get lost LOL. My wife found one a couple of weeks ago and asked me if I was hiding again but it was one of those long lost ones. Sometimes I get so clever in where I hide stuff I loose it myself

So that's gone now. If I go to a party now I don't need to bring 12 beers because I'll probably drink them all. If it's a BYOB I'll just bring 3 and not even worry about it. That's a gift and I am grateful for it but it's still not a cure. Even though I've come this far I still every once in a while and ever so slightly get that feeling of more. I notice it when doing habitual things like for example going camping or at my conference and that sort of thing. Those things that I was so used to doing in the company of lots of alcohol tend to make me feel like having more. My normal routine though is pretty much back down to normal drinking. Since I've started TSM 4 months ago I've not had one hangover and can probably say that I only have been drunk once and even that was not black out pass out drunk but rather just a tipsy kind of drunkenness.

I still need to keep on keeping on but I'd have to say from when I started to today the goal has been met.

Well Happy Birthday to you Ocean. You are right, what a present. My success has been rockier than yours, but I still feel truly grateful. I hope you had a great celebration!! xoxo Newlife