Did you lose friends when you stopped drinking alcohol or using drugs?
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By my own choice I did. The people who stayed around that were supportive were uncomfortable for the first few months because they didn’t really know how to “act” when I was around and not drinking. Now it is all back to the way it was. The only exception is I have a soda instead of a bottle of bourbon when we hang out.
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Yes by my choice. Just felt we had nothing in common anymore.
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My true friends knew I had a problem but, they were social drinkers unlike me. They are happy that I’m sober. That is true friendship.
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Absolutely! What I thought were good friends at the time. What good was I to them sober and working a program of recovery? We were all daily, heavy drinkers. I start working on myself and they were forced (internally) to consider their own problematic drinking. My therapist is who pointed all this out to me at the time because I didn’t have the clarity to do so. I’m not friends w any of them now. No love lost because I understand their own unhealthy relationships w alcohol and drugs. So I empathize w them. I know the pain that goes along w consuming intoxicants so recklessly. I don’t ever want to feel the unhappiness, dread and daily hangovers that were part of my old life. Their disapproval of my sobriety was actually a positive. I shouldn’t have been trying to hang out at bars in early recovery. And I would have never stayed sober if I had continued to try and sustain what I believed were friendships.
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Try hiking as an alternative social activity
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Nope! I can hang around people who drink. I sit have cravings anymore. I’m just aware that it’s poison for me so I stay away.
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wow, that's cool
Nice
All of them. It’s been me, myself, and I for nine months now. It was very, very hard at first. It gets easier with time but there are still days I can barely handle how lonely and behind in life I feel. Accepting those feelings instead of running from them is how we grow.
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No. They were never really true “friends” to begin with.
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None. I graduated in 1996 and left town and joined the military in 1997; I got sober in 2001. By that time almost of my high school buddies were either dead or grew up. In the military, I moved to new duty stations across the country every few years. So for me, no real friends were lost through my sobriety. Rather, I gained friendships and relationships within (and outside) of the fellowship of AA - the fellowship is always present… regardless of what city I’m living in.
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Yea but we’re they really friends. Because the ones that I lost as friends only hung out with me to get high or drunk with. I stopped messaging them and they all stopped contacting me. Now that I’m clean 7 months and moved 2 hrs away I feel way better than before. So was it worth it losing them as friends? Yes. Because they were toxic friends that enabled me to be destructive. If I could I would have done this 9 years ago. So now I have new friends who surround me with nothing but a positive atmosphere.
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I most definitely lost friends but quickly learned that they weren’t true friends. It was hard at first. I now have true friendship and a close group that cheer me on and support my sobriety.
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Never were real friends.
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Where they ever really friends or just someone you shared an addiction with? I swear once my husband and I told everyone we were done, they all scattered but one couple we hung out with. 73 days sober and we have had 2 days where that one couple has visited. Otherwise it's been crickets.
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I've had to completely rearrange my group of friends. All of my old friends were addicts and I was told the only true way to stay clean was to "clean house" so to speak. So that's what I did. I now have 18 months clean and I'm happy!
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You don't lose friends when you stop drinking. You lose people who only valued you as a drinking partner. Your true friends are gonna be riding alongside you through thick and thin. Everyone who left when you quit showing up to the party were just as toxic as the booze or drugs and did you a huge favor by not trying to chase you back into a life you deemed bad for yourself.
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Yea I only lost the leaches who gravitated on my partying/drukness scoring free booze ect from me. No love lost on my part.
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Of my high schools friends that I ran with, three suicides, one in jail, one threw away his talent for playing guitar for speed, and one actually grew up and has a family (but still smokes weed).
But it was a point well taken… where they real friends or just drug buddies? In high school everything seemed to be magnified by 10. Seemed like friends at the time but looking back, we were all just a bunch of kids on drugs that drank & didn’t know better or cared. I better use an “I” statement here… Well at least I sure never learned how to grow up and deal with life - until I got sober in AA. Still, it’s a shame that some of my HS buddies never will because of their choice to end their life(s).
I’m grateful I made it and thankful to my higher power for my sobriety today.
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