Today I am happy to say that I am 103 days sober and very grateful to The Cabin team and the AA Fellowship. It has certainly been a challenging and interesting journey since I left The Cabin. After feeling quite shell shocked and raw when I first came back, I knew I needed to be in action and implement the suggested things I learned at The Cabin to give myself the best shot I could at recovery.
MY PROGRESS
Thankfully I have learned from the AA meetings about ‘Practice not Perfection’ as it has not always been easy. Each day I try and focus on what I ‘can do’ and what action I can take and just put one foot in front of the other especially when I am resisting things or feeling triggered. Key things I have done to support my recovery include:
Fellowship Meetings: I started with attending different meetings and after a few weeks found ones I liked and then got a sponsor to work the Steps. Then I attended meetings daily until I reached 90 days. Now I attend 3-4 times per week or when I feel the need to. There were many times when I did not want to go – however, I can now honestly say – I am very pleased I did.
Exercise: I try to exercise 5-6 times per weeks and I mix that up with Gym, Yoga and long walks although staying motivated can still be a challenge. Over the past 60 days my fitness has increased and my body feels much better every day.
Diet: I recognize how important good nutrition is to recovery, however, balancing my eating is a work in progress and has been a challenge at times. I try and eat healthy meals with plenty of fresh fruit and veggies at regular times. I did struggle with sugar addiction when I first came home which was making me tired and cranky so have now mostly eliminated refined sugars.
Health Care Professionals: I saw a Homeopath who prescribed herbal medicine that helped me sleep properly which was wonderful. She is also helping me with other areas of my health and is making a huge difference.
Daily Plan: I create a daily plan of my activities similar to my one at The Cabin to help me ‘balance my scales’ and keep me on track so that I don’t forget things. It includes: fellowship meetings, exercise, work, reminders for breakfast, lunch, dinner and herbal medicine and other activities. That way if I am organised, it reduces my anxiety although is not easy.
TEMPTATION
The biggest temptation for me was having 2 old friends to stay for 5 days who are both big drinkers. On the first night they both drank 2+ bottles each and I found myself tempted a few times and having ridiculous thoughts about having sips out of the bottle in the fridge or drinking the dregs in the glasses. It became easier each day – however toward the end of their stay I was getting quite annoyed by their drunk behaviors especially when another friend who was also drinking joined us one night. By the last night they had cut their drinking down to less than one bottle each which was interesting.
