Received a two similar questions so decided to combine and answer for this week's episode.
Should I get sober for other people?
You know me, I will always say -- there is no hard and fast rules for anything in life. There are always outliers but for my personal viewpoint. I will say NOPE. Sobriety and recovery should always be a choice for you.
Can you listen to others? Of course. Can they inform your decision? Why not! But it's up to you to decide to pull that trigger and change your life.
It will impact you the most, you need to understand your why and while others can be a motivation -- if you don't come to want to be sober -- it is so quick to back slide. (Speak from personal experience here.)
But I'm trying to save my relationship?!
I get that too. If someone matters to us, we want to keep them in our lives. However, changing yourself for someone else's benefit may open you up to bitterness and resentment, if you don't get the reaction you want. Manipulation can come into play HARDCORE here too.
Also, feelings may change, once you're in recovery. You're going to be rediscovering who you are, what you need versus what you want and you may outgrow people (whether you planned on it or not). Some relationships can weather this, others don't. So, you can't go into recovery with the notion that it's the one thing that will save your relationship.
You can only save you. You need to keep that in mind and hope for the best with the rest.
Gotta question for me? I'm always up to answer. Email, Tweet or DM me and I'll work to always provide the best answer possible!
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Hello, my name is Cynthia. Welcome to the latest episode of getting together a podcast where we discuss what it's like to get it all the way together or at least attempt to one day at a time.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: Hello, everyone, and welcome to the latest episode. Today's episode is going to be a q&a. So I received a question from two different people but around the same thing. So I'm just going to combine it The question was around recovery in the sense that if you have obligations if you have other people that you are either with or taking care of, should you put what they need before you when it comes to staying sober. And I find that question very interesting. I don't think there is like a straight yes or no because everybody's circumstances are different.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: But I will say that why I do believe that you should listen to those closest to you. So if you have a partner, if you have children, if you have parents, you should always listen to them take stock in what they're saying, because more than likely, or they should have your best interests at heart. I don't believe that a person and I'm sure there's outliers everywhere. I'm not going to say this is like a hard and fast black or white thing because like I said, recovery is not necessarily always black and white. But I do believe that when it comes to most forms of recovery, if you don't sign up and do it for yourself, then you're either going to do it for other people.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: And you can keep going or you could end up being resentful and start acting out different ways or be very angry or be very bitter because you're feeling like oh, Why wasn't I good enough? Why do I have to change no one else is changing that pattern and stuff like that can happen. So I would say When I was trying to get sober when I did get sober last year for me, I had to do it for myself. I am very much a selfless person, I am very much like, let me focus on someone else. So I don't have to think about it or think about myself.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: But this is one thing that it didn't really stick until I realized that I was sick and tired of it. And I didn't want to go on this way anymore. I have friends who've told me like, I think you're drinking too much or Don't you think you have a little bit of problem with alcohol? Wow, you're drinking this really fast or you drink like a lot over the weekend. I've had my brother say something to me, and my brother, I love them to death. He can be kind of a selfish person. So for him to take notice of something I was doing was a big deal. But even then, I was still like, I'm good. I would pride myself on never drinking around my dad because he doesn't drink but then when I would go home, I would start hiding it and he would find things but he would never say something. Or he did finally work up just saying something and even then I was like, I'm good. I'm good. It's fine. I'm just having a rough time at work. Also conditional statements or putting conditions around why I was drinking or making excuses for it, because that's basically what the hell I was doing.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: I had people in my life that cared about me that had my best interest at heart that I knew wouldn't or didn't have anything to gain from my being sober, wasn't threatened by it. And I still was like, Nah, I didn't want to do it. I wasn't into it. I didn't think I had a problem. So in my experience, I had a really come to terms with it on my own, and I had to really be ready, because I think sometimes you're forced into being ready. So if you get arrested, or if you have to go on probation, I mean, there's, like I said, there's outliers, things that will force your hand before you feel it's time to go or let it go. So if those are your things, then by all means, you're gonna have to abide by that.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: But for those people that don't necessarily have to buy anything, and there's a choice. I think the best option is always make sure that it's something that you want to do, and maybe something you're not thrilled about, but it's something that you have to do because you're Life is suffering because of it. So that's how I would really frame it. And I think that's what you need to really take into account as you're thinking about being sober or you're currently going are sober and you're just thinking about things and how you feel. And maybe you're just have a lot of downtime now, because of everything that's happening with COVID. And you're just bored, taking stock of what you're doing since you've been in quarantine, and really trying to assess like, is this something that I really do have a problem with, and maybe there you have voices in your head that you remember having conversations with, or maybe someone has brought it to your attention while you've been in quarantine together.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: So, I always say, like I said earlier, but you can take what they say in but you really have to do the work with yourself within yourself. It's a personal choice, unless like I said, you have other reasons that are kind of holding your feet hand was at the hand to the fire foot foot to the back. It's pretty gross. Either way. So maybe I shouldn't use that analogy. It's a personal choice. And it's something that you have to feel like that's something that you want to do. You have to be the one that says yes, this, this is the right move. For me. I may not like it, I may not want to do it. But I know that this is the right move for me. Because I know when I got sober, I didn't want to stop really, I knew I just had to because my life wasn't shaping up to be much of anything really. And I would have I was just spiraling and I would have kept spiraling down and I didn't want to feel so low all the time. Drinking wasn't helping me it was harming me. I had to make that choice.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: But the person that pulled the trigger was me, I had to do it. For me, when I tell people, you really will come into your own, you really find out who you are a lot when you are sober. I think a lot of people will actually start on being more empathetic and opening themselves up to like others, the plight of others and what others are going to but I really think you will start to really have a lot of empathy for yourself to really confront this because it's Not easy, and you'll have your moments and you're in a very vulnerable state, it is paramount to really put you first in this and keep yourself there because it's easy to backslide and want to focus on another thing that's I mean, I'm kind of going off a little bit of the of the topic of this, you deciding that this is the right stuff for you, is key to everything, because that's what you need, you're gonna have to fall back on when you're having those moments when you're like, Damn, I really want a drink right now or I'm out with all my friends.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: Everybody seems like they're having a good time socially distanced, hopefully having those these interactions with friends and family. And you're just like, man, just one. I could just have a sip, right? When you realize why you're doing this, like your personal reason saying like, this is the reason why I pulled the trigger. This is why I am doing this for me, this is what you're gonna have to pull on when you're having those moments because you're gonna have to be out in the world eventually, or he ever has to be alone and you're gonna be bored and you're gonna have to pull back like, this is why I'm doing this. This is why it matters. I'm important. I matter, my mind matters, my health matters, I matter what I've had to rely on. And what I had to go back to countless times went through all of this, because I had my moments of weakness, I'm still gonna have my moments of weakness, but I always have to go back to my Why, why did I start this? Why did I stop and put it down?
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: And I feel like you can't really do that. If you're trying to get sober to save a relationship. I don't mean save relationship. But it's I always say like when it comes to anything involving other people, is it really about your drinking? Or is it about all these underlying things and your drinking was part of that problem. So but in order to really even have a chance of saving your relationship, you have to want to be better for yourself, because you're not gonna be able to show up and be your authentic self or be a whole person and be healthy until you really handle your stuff and not put it on another person because you could get sober and he could be like, I'm out, or you could get silver, and you could be like, I'm out. So you can't really put it on something like that. I hope it does work out. But this is the best path for me. Like you need to really put the focus on you. And I think a lot of people have a problem with that. I know I had a problem with that I wasn't in a relationship when I decided to get sober.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: Maybe my perspective on this would change. But I made the choice not to be in anything because I know I had to work on my own shit, the people that are already in things, I think you just have to take stock, where you are and what you want. But you also have to say like, in order for me to be the best version of me, for myself, and in any other relationship that I'm currently in, then I need to really do this for me, like, I have to want this because I want to be a better person. I want to be a better parent, I want to be a better spouse, I want to be a better partner. I want to be a better friend. I became a much better friend being sober, so much more aware of where my friends are and where they are mentally and checking in with them and making sure that I'm not like dumping on them unnecessarily. And vice versa, like boundaries and stuff. I always talk about that. But I really think all that stuff, even if you have another person in the equation, it still comes down to you, because you're the common denominator, what's gonna make you happy.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: And a lot of people don't you can think about what's going to make this other person happy. Because if you're doing it for them, if you don't get the reaction that you want, then you're going to be pissed off because I know I used to be like that. I used to want to do things. And then if someone didn't react the way I thought they should, I was like you and that's like a form of manipulation. my two cents on the matter is, people can inform you of how they feel about your drinking or your addiction or your advice, but it's up to you to determine if go being sober. staying sober is something that you want to do. It's your choice, and it's something that you need to sign up for the good bad, the ugly when it comes to it.
Unknown Speaker :
Cynthia: Yeah. Thank you for the question. My anonymous Well, I mean, they're not anonymous to me, my anonymous question. skirt. I appreciate it. I haven't had a q&a for a while. So I love getting back into the thick of it. If you are listening, please share this out with people you feel would really gain something from this or glean something from this. If you have any questions, always email them, tweet them, send them to me, slide into my DMS. I'm open to all forms of communication and I'm here to help. I don't consider anything a stupid question. It could be about anything around recovery, or just a question about life. I'm here for it. I just want to make sure people feel heard and supported through this process. Again, thank you for listening. If this has helped you, or resonated with you in some kind of way, I would consider it lovely if you would rate this on iTunes or any of the podcasting platforms that you're on. Until next time, my friends, talk soon. Take care.