I am very interested in this dream thing. Are they more prevalent at different times during the progress? I thought I had more 'wakeful' dreams when I first started, then nothing notable for a few weeks. Last two nights the dreams are getting more interesting, but nothing approaching a nightmare. Except for that one where I crunched the hood of my new car.

Seems like this happens to a lot of us at the same time. I had a doozey last night, it lasted for hours as I awoke and went right back to it. I spoke of blood sport, and the definition escapes me at the moment. Ny husband heard me and wondered what the heck I was dreaming about!
Can't remember the dream, but it was violent and I wanted to discuss it but it's gone. There was some symbolism in it. Hell were's the spell check.

Cleaning up signature again -

PRETSM 90 to 100 units Cravings 8
Week/AF day
1 79/1 2 91 3 70/1 4 80/1
5 74/2 6 71/1 7 82 8 80
9 62/3 10 60/2 11 80/1 12 91/2

Wk 13 112
Wk 14 80
Wk 15 80
Wk 16 64
Wk 17 78
Wk 18 60/4
Wk 19 54/3

I am a binge drinker, it appears it's all or nothing with me. Once I start there is no stopping me. I used to drink wine but for the last few months I switched to beer (I have no clue why I hated beer before).

What I am finding lately is that I don't suffer from the shakes anymore, I don't have hangovers, and I find my AF are easy and come without thought. I no longer panic if I don't have Alcohol in the house or wake up on Sunday without some because I can't buy it until noon. If I have to go out or attend something I don't panic that have to stay sober or sneek out to the car to take a drink.

I've noticed a change in my drinking, I truly get to the point where I really don't want to drink anymore instead of pushing it or that I really can't be bothered to drink at all. I still have high craving days, but they are no where near intense as they had been.

My triggers tend to be 1. emotional/stress related things that crop up in my life 2. boredom (which I should find hobbies) 3. social outings. Which is those really are everyones. So I'm going to work on them 1 at a time to get over them. I think that dealing with the triggers will help get to the next stage of the TSM.

I have noticed that last month I had 2 violent outbust to the point that I damaged Mr. Providence's truck. Both incidents happened late on Sunday after a long high volume binge that started on Friday night. This is very much out of my personality. I don't think it's the Nal, I think it's my own rage that is finally coming out, Thank God Mr. Providence endures my mortal faults and flaws.

The other thing is the nightmares - They come quickly after I fall asleep and when I am off Nal and not drinking. At first I thought it was soley the Nal or the lack of Nal and AL in my system, but I was talking to someone (who doesn't know about my drinking) about taking Melatonin since Mr. P has been working the overnight shift and he said he had read on the internet where after a period of time some people start having vivid dreams or nightmares. I did some research and found a lot of information to support this. It doesn't happen to everyone or if you take it on and off, but if you take it everynight over a period of time. This is what I found.
"Some suffer from nightmares after taking melatonin. This can also develop into delusions and hallucinations if the effects are prolonged and very severe; again, common sense goes a long way here. If anything changes in your body after trying melatonin immediately stop usage and speak with a physician."

The great news is that Mr. Providence has quit his job! He has been working for the same company for 11 years and at the end of May they moved all the shifts from 6am to whenever he finished to overnights. He was assigned the starting time of midnight, so a lot of times I wouldn't see him until 10pm for an hour while he got dressed for work. I would come home after work and try to find something quiet to do or find someone to have dinner with. At first it led to a lot of boredom and social drinking, but I started to grow tired of that and I started having more AF days. The shift work made him grumpy and tired and I was unable to sleep and having nightmares to end all nightmares. I don't think it's co-dependencey just us both having our worlds flipped. Since I would only see him on the weekends my drinking started impacting our time together.

He doesn't have a job yet but has 2 or 3 companies that are seriously considering him and I have no doubt he will find something soon. He is in the industry that still has plenty of good jobs.

We have book a trip in mid-september, little nervous about that, but I think I will be ok. He will help me stay in check and he makes sure to remind me to take my Nal because sometimes when I binge drink on the weekends and start drinking in the AM I forget. I give him a few to carry just in case. We had both hoped that I would be further along by now, as I made him promise to support me in this method for at least 20 weeks. He has agreed to continue on with me with this and since it's nothing ventured nothing gained.

I went 2 weeks without posting, mainly because I was feeling a little disappointed in my progress and life at work has been crazy. So that's why the long post.

My drinking units have started to drop 50% lower then the peak I experienced in July which I a great thing!

The thing that sucks about switching to beer is on a normal day I would have 10 units of wine (1 1.5 liter bottle) has turned into 24 units of beer. I know at the end of the day the al content is what I am looking at 11% for wine verse 5.5 for beer, but I hate the number thing.

I have upped my dose to 100mg an hour before drinking on the advice of Dr. E several months ago because I've had gastric bypass and malabsorb and on the advice of my doctor (who doesn't know I'm still drinking and would never approve) on but based on the fact I could have a mild form of bi-polar and the peak change time is coming according to studies.

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, numbers are over-rated. No shakes, no hangovers, easy AF days, no fear of not having booze around and stopping sooner than you did before... These quality of life measures are huge! It sounds like it's working for you but you'll have to have more patience than many. This sounds like good progress to me. Congratulations.

Week 23 Update...

Well this was an interesting week on Nal. I am down 12 units but without AF days. I've been watching my numbers and they stay at 60ish but with AF days so really the binges were pretty epic.

This week I drank all 7 days but with fewer units per session and I didn't have a free for all binge weekend. I feel really good about this. I found that I just didn't want to drink anymore and stopped.

Tonight I had dinner with Mr. Providence at the IHOP of crustean (which I hate btw and the service sucked) When we got there I went directly to the restroom and he automatically ordered a beer. I explained to him that I didn't feel like drinking really and to say the least he was shocked.... I pop a Nal and drank it before the hour was up. I made it through 1 beer and the I ordered a second one I took 3 sips and was done with it. Couldn't be bothered to finish it.

I came home had 2 and struggled to get the 3 one down and now I have decided I just need some sleep so I can be well rested for tomorrow at work.

I would say it was a great week!

Still nervous we leave for vacation on Thursday, but I'm hoping I can hold back a little and see the triggers for what they are.

Hi All,

Back from vacation I left on the 17th and returned on the 29th.

It was harder for me to keep track while I was away so I'm est my drinks for the week. The odd thing was given the fact that I was on vacation I drank much less then my last vacation and it came in spurts rather than an all day event. I did have a few days where it was all day but a few through out the day instead of drinking all day and all night. I had one or two days where it got the best of me but most of the days towards the end was wake up sober, stay sober have one drink at lunch do some more stuff and have a few drinks at night. I found myself buying beer in 6 packs instead of 12/24 at a time.

The last day I was there I did a little more 4 beers, 2 small mixed drinks and 2 med ones. The AL content was no more than 5% or less in all my drinks, way down from the 10% content I would have gone for before.

I have been home a few days with no desire to drink, the thought has not crossed my mine. Now I carry the NAL and look at it and say do I really want to wait an hour? The answer is NO and then I just go about my night.

I think I have come to the thought that If I wake up and take it I just gave myself permission and a reason. As a binge drinker it isn't giving me much of a choice. I now need to get into the mode of asking myself if I take it ... Do I really need/want the next one after one or two? Do I really need/want to really drink that much? To me this is my next sign of taking my step to being cured. What if that is what I need to get to the point where I can take it have a few and move on?

I have upped my NAL to 100 on the days where I could drink all day (week-ends, days off, holidays, vacation) and 50 if I'm going to have a short night (afterwork, starting late on a weekend night) I can always take another one when I wake up if I'm going to continue one. May not work for everyone but I think it's working better for me.

Hi Em,

Sounds like things went really well on your vacation - it's always a victory in my mind to survive a vacation without going WAY overboard. That was standard procedure in the old days. Seems like things are still looking good even now that you're back home - good for you!

Week 25

It was a great week 3 1/2 AF days in a row and no major overboard binges! The AF were a walk in the park, cravings were between 0-1 all week. I didn't have a drink until 7:30 Saturday night. I went back and checked my calendar to see when that's happened. Jan - March I was not on TSM so I was trying to stay AF at all times. I white knuckled it (and it sucked) for 8 days once but the average was but the average was 2-3 days I only had one AF weekend in those 90 days.

My reset day is Sunday so I count my units Sunday - Saturday My average unit level for Sat and Sun are 20 to 25 units at day getting so drunk I'd pass out early in the night. I didn't make it past 8:30 and I would wake up in the middle of the night and have more to drink and pass out again. My average for the last 8 weeks are under 20 spread out through out the whole day and I've been able to stay up much later and not passing out. I'm sleep through the night now. Waking up at normal hours and not grabbing a drink. I am drinking coffee in the morning again because I enjoy it not because I need to sober up to get stuff done or to go to work. I'm enjoying food again and not just eating because I have to have something in my body.

I have moved from drinking wine to beer to light beer. Even though my units are about the same through out the last few months my units are at 4 to 5% alcohol by volume verses the 10% with wine.

I haven't had the shakes the next day in months.

Week 26 (it's been 6 months)

My units were up this week but I had 2 social events during the week that involved happy hour but I didn't go overboard as much as I would have in the past. I had 2 AF days spaced apart. Yesterday my numbers were a little higher but I started earlier than normal but they were spaced out over the whole day. I had 6/8 over a few hour period in the morning stopped drinking for 5 hours, 6 in 2 1/2 and then when I got home I had 3 more and couldn't finish the last one.

Even though they were up, I am happy with the way it's going because I wasn't falling down staggering drunk and went to a baby shower sober and I'll remember it.

Keep going Providence, you're almost there! just a little further.