re: On this day 13 years ago...

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A little of 6 weeks for me now. Had been drinking myself to a brown out for longer than I can recall. Woke up one morning with a gut wrenching feeling that my 26yr old son and I had gotten in a fight. Turned out it was a lot worse. I had just screamed at him about being stupid and a loser. Same shite that my mother did to me growing up. Had promised myself that I would never do that to my children. Said there and then that I had to stop. Didn't want my grands to see me like that. The first couple of weeks were rough while withdrawing.

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This is the kind of shite that gives me chills. Congrats to you, brother. I mean this more seriously than you can imagine, if you ever need to vent or talk about this, I'll be here.

Some of the things that helped me was...

1. Cutting ties with anyone associated with it.

2. Find something to occupy your time that includes a goal. For me it was exercising and losing weight. Literally saved my life.

- I used to keep a desk calendar on the back of my bedroom door so that I could put a big X over each day that I completed sober. Those x's started to really mean something to me after a while.

3. Avoid any triggers that make you want to drink again.

4. Counseling. I did more anger management type of counseling but it helped so many thinking errors for me.

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Some of the things that helped me was..

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5. Swap addictions. I can't tell you how many cops I got off the sauce but now they are coffee and Krispy Kreme addicts. Every time I see cops eating coffee and doughnuts my mind kicks to recovering booze hounds.

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Those x's started to really mean something to me after a while

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I'm fortunate to not be born with that gene (as we've discussed), but this overall motivational concept certainly helps me with other things, like eating healthy, not smoking, etc.

Once you've stuck it out for a while, it's hard to look back at something like that and not think, "Man, why would I screw up all of that progress for one extremely brief moment?"

That is, the farther I successfully move away, the more I don't want to waste the pain of what I've already accomplished.

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Harry Rex

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T rex had hair?