How To Survive Your First Year of Sobriety

How To Survive Your First Year of
Sobriety
Published on:
Publication Date
2020-01-31
Some say the first year is the toughest. It doesn’t have to be
You’ve done it. You’ve made the decision and put down the drink, once and for all. Or so you tell
yourself. The key to staying sober for a year is not putting down the bottle but keeping on putting
down the bottle, every day, 365 days in a row.
That may seem overwhelming. Impossible even, if you are a drunk like I was. Twenty-five years old.
Educated. A promising future ahead. I imagined myself to be somehow different from everyone else
who struggled with an addiction to booze. I was ashamed that I couldn’t control my behavior while
drinking. And so I kept trying to make alcohol work until it became so painful that I couldn’t stand it
any longer. The impossible – to stop drinking – had been overshadowed by the truly impossible – to
keep drinking like I was. I was backed into a corner.
The most important thing that I did in my first year of sobriety was to ask for help. In my case, I got
down on my knees and said something that I didn’t even believe in: ”Help!” And help started coming
because I asked from my heart and I was open and willing to a hear the response. If you are
struggling with alcohol, try opening your heart and just say: "Help.” Your answer may not come
overnight, you may have days, weeks, months of darkness ahead, but if you keep that open heart
and expect a response, you will begin to see miracles working in your life.
I couldn’t see it at first. Life just seemed to be doing life’s thing and I, of course, took credit. But
circumstances moved me so that I ended up at just the right place at the right time to hear the
perfect person in recovery say to me he thought I was an alcoholic. Naturally, I didn’t believe him.
But the process of shedding my denial had begun.
So, I got sober, and you will too, if you trust in some power outside yourself to guide you. And
because I was a young, female alcoholic with an eating disorder, I immediately started focusing on
my weight. People in the rooms told me to eat a candy bar every time I felt like taking a drink and in
90 days, I gained 30 pounds. I knew that I was not going to be sober the way people talked about
sobriety if I kept binging on sugar. So, I joined an overeater’s 12 Step program and suffered with
that, albeit very skinny, for 5 years.
The second most important thing I did in my early sobriety was get off my own back.
All of us, if we have an addictive personality, dive into more: more booze, more drugs, more sex,
more food, more cigarettes, more gambling, more shopping, more daytime soaps. You get it? Ours
is a population addicted to more. Now I have been sober almost four decades, and I have learned
through practice and patience to live a moderate life.
That wasn’t always the case. After binging on sex and food and exercise in early sobriety, I flipped
and became abstinent from sex and most foods all the while running 15 miles a day. I should have
just joined a convent. My advice to the newcomer in his or her first year of sobriety is, like the
slogan says, EASY DOES IT. You weren’t blessed with the gift of sobriety to suffer. Enjoy a piece of
pie and coffee after a meeting, make love with the husband you are now speaking to again, buy
yourself some nice little thing to encourage you on your journey. The only way to learn moderation
is to practice it. The only way to stay sober is to enjoy it.
HALT (Hungry Angry Lonely Tired) saved my life many times. The third thing newcomers would be
advised to do to stay sober is to be attuned to what is going on inside them. How often have you
snapped at your partner when really it was just your rumbling stomach that wanted attention? How
many of us have been tempted to reach for the bottle instead of the phone because we can’t quite
identify that ache in us as loneliness? We are told over and over again that alcoholics are selfish
people, and surely we are. We need to be rid of that self-centered bias we clutch so dear. Yes, it
does need to be me first—but not me only. In my first year of sobriety I felt so much guilt, shame
and remorse (before my Fifth Step took some away) that I couldn’t imagine even listening to my
own needs. But we must listen. We must not wallow in self pity and negativity. My job as a sober
woman is to play, to enjoy life and to spread joy into the lives of others. We can’t spread joy unless
we feel joy. We can’t feel joy unless we examine our true feelings, owning them, accepting them,
but not necessarily acting on them.
So, to recap:
ASK FOR HELP
Be OPEN AND WILLING
GET OFF YOUR OWN BACK
EASY DOES IT (but do it)
HALT
ME FIRST, NOT ME ONLY.
Of course, there are other basics that helped me through my first year and taught me many
important lessons, such as attending meetings, listening, identifying (not comparing) and keeping
commitments. None of these attributes was in my toolbox before I got sober. As a woman, I was
especially competitive with other women and did not appreciate the idea that “men stick with men,
women stick with women.” It turns out that was one of the most important suggestion made to me.
Many spiritual programs and religions advocate Service work as the key to personal happiness. And
it is true. In my first year of sobriety, I always had a commitment of some kind – making coffee,
setting up and taking down meetings, brining meetings to other groups, assisting on Twelve Step
calls. Later, when I had more to offer, I would sponsor. Ultimately, I have taken my service work out
into all my affairs – to my family, my friends, work, and everyday life. This makes me so happy. I
truly do feel that I am at last a positive, contributing force in the world.
To those of you in your first year, the best thing you can do is keep coming back. Be patient. It took
you some time to get into the woods, it’s going to take a while to get out of them. But in the
meantime you can grow and change in the program, always on the lookout for the many miracles
and blessings that your Creator has gifted you. My prayer for you is that someday you will know the
exquisite peace and joy that I experience everyday as I continue to practice the 12 Steps of
Alcoholics Anonymous.
Source URL: https://www.aagrapevine.org/magazine/2020/jan/how-survive-your-first-year-sobriety

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Source URL: https://www.aagrapevine.org/magazine/2020/jan/how-survive-your-first-year-sobriety

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