My tip? Stay active on the MM list!! ************************************ Take money, each day... money that you would normally spend on liquor... put it in a jar or box with "MM" on it. Then, when the mood strikes, go thru it and count how much you've got in it and treat yourself to something special. ************************************ I thought those of you doing it for the first time might appreciate some beverage alternatives. I really found extra ginger ale or beer( the kind with the ginger bite) to be helpful. Mixing juice with 7-up, sprite, or similar sparkely beverage is festive and seems somewhat decadent (not really but you tell yourself that). Aso N/A beers: Buckler, ST.pauli girl NA, Clausthauler, Bitburger drive, Haake Becke, Kaliber-- all good and getting easier to find. They do have calories however but one thing at a time. ************************************ For the 30 to help launch you into moderation, I found it most helpful to try to identify my drinking as to what set me off on those days where I overdid it. If you can see what your triggers are, you can develop a strategy to minimize them or deal with them in non-alcoholic ways. ************************************ "I would like to break the Thurs, Fri, Sat..drinking pattern...I remember that what is important is to come up with alternative activites..." ************************************ During my 30, I found that thinking in terms of "I'm not drinking today" was very helpful in changing my focus from the whole 30 days to the situation I had right in front of me. To some, this sounds too much like AA's "one day at a time." I don't know; I know next to nothing about AA, and I know that breaking up my focus to each day made the whole 30 seem less intimidating. There were some times when I broke it down to "I'm not drinking this hour," and that seemed to help. If your willpower can give you an hour, use the hour to find some other activity you can get involved with that will distract you from drinking. At the same time, it is also very helpful to go thru the other steps in the MM book. The 30 should be more than just a facsimile of what a month in AA would be like. The MM steps will help you look at the consequences of your drinking and help you develop a plan for how you will be spending the time you used to spend drinking, and try to figure out how you will handle moderation. I found the simple act of thinking about what I would rather be doing instead of making an ass out of myself to be a very effective way to stop myself from drinking on a given day. It may sound hard to believe now (if you're doing your first 30), but a lot of us have found that moderating after the 30 is far more challenging than the 30 was. Those who use the 30 to plan for life afterwards seem to have more success than those who just stop drinking for 30 days. ************************************ When drinking every day your complexion suffers greatly. Notice with each passing day of abstinence how your skin feels less dehydrated, your face regains a normal healthy glow that it had lost / Along with the better complexion is losing those 'cute' puff-bags under the eyes... ************************************ I really want to emphasize (especially to the newcomers) that staying with the List, even if you don't post much, can be of great value. And now, having learned how difficult moderating can sometimes be, I realize how important it was over the last year for me to have stayed with the List even when I thought I was on "cruise control" with it. ************************************ Several years ago, I bought (& have read many times!!) Audrey's book, but a few months ago I also bought it on cassette. I prefer books to tapes, but the tape is good to have to play in the car, while doing housework, jogging/walking, etc. It's just another way to keep you FOCUSED on your goal!! ************************************ Whenever I'm abstaining I like to freeze lots of orange juice in plastic cups, then I chew and suck on orange ice all day, it's not a trick or a tip ...just trying to keep my mouth busy. -Oral fixation besides a cocktail? Thats a tip!...ed. ************************************ Can't believe from all the moderation I have done this last month the visa bill just came in and my hubby notice it was all of $26.95 from the liquor store...it usually was $104.00 for a month!! I love the dollar savings as a measure of the outcome of our success here. I've posted this before, but it's worth mentioning again, that I was able to save enough in monthly wine expenses to pay for the therapist I was seeing in conjunction w/ MM! ************************************ Keeping alcohol in the house can be fatal for a 30 dayer. If there's a bottle in your house thats calling you each time you are in earshot, make it go away. Dump it, give it away, ask someone to babysit for it until you are done. If its really a temptation chipping away at you, eradicate the problem and work on your other triggers. ************************************ Something I've done over the past year is to experiment with coffee drinks in the winter & fruit drinks in the warm months. If you don't already have a juicer or espresso/cappuccino machine, treat yourself!! Use the money you're saving by not spending it on alcohol!! You'll not only fix yummy drinks to have in place of alcohol, but it's a fun way to spend an evening now & then. I bought some books with recipes, some different flavorings for the coffees, etc. Play time!!! ************************************ Another suggestion I made some time ago is to keep your commitment to moderation always uppermost in your mind by making a screen saver of it. Decide on a concise sentence that expresses your goal best & then use it as your screen saver. You can make it in big bold letters & it will scroll across your screen. ************************************ I know it sounds silly, but brush your teeth as soon as possible after your evening meal or snack. Alcohol doesn't taste very good with that minty, toothpaste taste in your mouth. Plus, for me, it signifies that I'm DONE ingesting anything for the day. I know I'd feel like a big loser if I drank after brushing my teeth for the night. So, I don't drink. It works well for moderating, too. After you've had your limit for the day, get out that floss and toothbrush. (I tried it Wednesday, and it worked great.) ************************************ I don't think I have any tricks... just hate feeling like crap the next day...so that is always an incentive to abstain for a while... Oh yea...one good way to stop is.... JUST DON'T BUY IT if you don't buy it you can't drink it... That's kind of the way I diet too..If you don't buy it you can't eat it!! But most of all I wanted it bad enough to just try going without... When I do drink... to control how much I will allow myself to drink, I put lines on the bottle to where I will stop...many times I looked at that dang line and wanted to do more..I call this my "hangover line" if I go past it...I'm going to feel like crap the next day!.. it just makes me think more about it. That's when I put tons of ice in my glass and just eat the ice... it still feels like I'm drinking.. sounds stupid ...but stupid is as stupid does...now i'm addicted to chomping ice all day... ************************************ - On Friday evening during the cocktail hour, I mentally composed an e-mail to this group describing my cravings and begging for support. Just the process of trying to describe my feelings put the situation in perspective; I then imagined all kinds of encouraging and humorous responses from the nice people on this list. - I took 2 Valerian capsules, which helped take the edge off my grouchiness and anxiety. My wine craving is usually accompanied by EXTREME irritability. - I decided for a change not to worry about calories, and shifted my focus to the abundance of rich food and gooey desserts I would have at dinner. Ordering a rich chocolate dessert made me feel self-indulgent and less sorry for myself. I really admire those of you who've successfully tackled a diet at the same time! Amazingly, I'm losing some weight in spite of (or maybe because of?) not worrying about what I eat. By now I've figured out that the craving will go away on its own, whether I act on it or not. So when it comes I just remind myself that it's only temporary, and sure enough I soon start thinking of something else. ************************************ Here's another idea I just read: Want to be sure you remember your New Year's resolutions? Use Paint to turn them into desktop wallpaper, and you've got an instant reminder Open Paint (select Start, Programs, Accessories, Paint) and select a wallpaper background color by right-clicking any color in the palette. (The default white is a little hard on the eyes.) Select Image, Clear Image, and the new color appears onscreen. Next, select Image, Attributes and set the size of your wallpaper. For example, assuming you plan to tile your resolutions across the desktop, you might set the size to 4 inches by 2 inches. (Or 4 inches by 8 inches if you have a big list in mind!) Click OK, and you're ready to add some text. Click the text tool (the one with the "A" on it), then click anywhere on the canvas to place a text box there. Hold the mouse pointer over the box's edge, and when it changes to a double-pointed arrow, click and drag to enlarge the box to the desired size. Now just start typing your resolutions. When you're finished, you'll probably want to change the text's font and point size. Select View, Text Toolbar, and use the resulting dropdown lists to make your changes. (Tip: Do all your typing and attribute changing at once. Once you deselect the text box, you can't get back inside.) Save your file, then select File, Set As Wallpaper (Tiled)--or (Centered), if that's what you prefer. You'll never forget those resolutions now! ************************************ I wanted to drink, and get drunk, really badly all evening. Seriously considered it. But remembered my commitments not only to this week's 3-dayer, but to 30 days of by the book moderation, as well. Had to pull several defense mechanisms out of my arsenal. Played hookey from the gym. Treated myself to a hot fudge sundae. Went to a movie and ate popcorn. Still wanted to drink when I got home, so I pulled out the big guns and flossed and brushed my teeth. ************************************ On Friday morning I buy only enough wine to last through the weekend (max. 3 glasses a day for me, same for H) and don't buy any more until the next Friday. If the wine should run out before Sunday night, that's it. ************************************ Food makes a huge difference -- after a big meal not only do I not have an urge to drink (follow that double negative?), but the alcohol has minimal effect. I've used food as a regulator for years -- when I have an urge to drink but feel I shouldn't, I eat something filling and the urge usually vanishes ************************************ The ritual is something I've thought about a lot - for me, having my wine glass full of grape juice is a sort of 'practice' also - I never have more than one and a half or two - it 'allows' a 'timeframe' for having the glass in my hand, etc. while also being simply a nice addition to a meal. Not giving up the 'ritual', but sort of helping to 'set' it as that so there's a 'beginning, middle and END'... ************************************ I was reading this and a post about donations to MM and decided to put the money I'd have spent, and I'm using vodka--more costly, maybe a bigger example--, and after a month or so, I'll send it to MM. MM has helped in a great way to change my life, and I can think of no better way to "thank", than to donate funds I'd have probably spent on alcohol to the organization that turned me around. ************************************ I remember being very concerned at social situations..."what will people think if I refuse a drink?" The reality is that very few people notice...or care..I remember being at a business meeting with someone who I knew was a big drinker...he ordered a vodka tonic..I had a club soda...he asked why I wasn't drinking...told him I had an early breakfast meeting and it never came up...he went on to have 4 drinks and after the first round...never noticed that I wasnt drinking. When abstaining at a larger function, I was also surprised at how many other people did not drink...never noticed them when I do drink. I used to be very concerned about making up reasonable excuses for not drinking..not any more...The question.."why are you not drinking?" is a much easier question to answer than..."why DID you drink like THAT last night?"