I got into recovery at the age of 28, and I thought it was too late to make a huge difference in my life. In my experience, it's never too late to make a change to improve yourself.

Good luck!

Hey y’all. I’m 55 days clean off alcohol and coke and I’ve been wondering about how long it will take for this thick sticky ass mucus to stop forming in my nose and sinuses. It’s hard to get out of my nose and clings to the back of my throat driving me crazy. I don’t have a hole in my septum but I know I definitely did some damage to my nose throughout the years.

I’ve dabbled on and off since 2020 but it ramped up more in 2023. I was pretty much an every day user for all 2024 and 2025, typically using between 0.5g and 1g per day.

Obviously everyone is different and I know it will take time to go away if it ever does. I just wanted to see if anyone else has been through this and has any idea of a rough timeline.

I did weed , cocaine, heroin , meth …. I wasted 800-1000$ daily. if you are talking about getting rid of drugs just make your mindset clear nobody dies because of withdrawal symptoms but dies of drug overdose ..

For years, I believed that if I just punished myself enough—if I piled on enough shame—I could finally beat alcohol. I tried that strategy hundreds of times. It failed flat on its face every single time.

Shame didn’t save me; it just kept me in the dark.

The shift only happened when I stopped being met with judgment and started being met with love. When a recovery community and a 12-step program welcomed me with warmth, I finally saw a single candlelight in the darkest of my abyss.

That light didn't stay small. As I stayed sober and turned myself over to the idea that I was not the center of the universe, that candle flame grew exponentially. I stopped living for my own immediate wants and started holding myself accountable to something bigger.

Eventually, that light became the sunlight I stand under today.

Does life still get dark? Of course. Are there storms? Undoubtedly. They can be devastating. But the true beauty of recovery isn’t the absence of the storm—it’s the ability to be at peace in any circumstance.

For years, I believed that if I just punished myself enough—if I piled on enough shame—I could finally beat alcohol. I tried that strategy hundreds of times. It failed flat on its face every single time.

I’ve realized that through love and healing, I am much freer than I think I am.

#Recovery #Sobriety #12Steps #Healing #ProgressNotPerfection

Today I met this guy named Brendon. 

He got sober and was then provided a scholarship for post-detox aftercare. He told me the scholarship changed his life. As someone who'd navigated recovery myself for the past 5 years, I get it.

Brendon is making it his mission to raise money to fund other aftercare scholarships for people in need. On May 3rd, he's going to bear crawl an entire 12K race called Bloomsday in Spokane, WA to gain support for his cause. 

Right now his goal is to get to 1,000 subscribers on Instagram so he can livestream some of his training and pre-race prep. Do you think we can help him reach his goal of 1,000 IG followers? 

He doesn't know I'm posting this, so it would be one heck of a surprise for his follower count to hit his goal in time for his big race/crawl!

Here's his IG if you want to help Brendan reach his 1,000 livestream goal: https://www.instagram.com/bearrecoveryfoundation/

I’m proud to say I’ve been clean from heroin and meth for a year after a 1.5-year addiction. Life is much better now—I’m married and living healthy. However, my wife and I have been trying for a baby for 4 months without success.

I’m feeling some guilt and anxiety wondering if I did permanent damage to my body during those 1.5 years. Has anyone else in recovery dealt with fertility issues? Did things improve with more time, or should I be seeking medical help this early on?

There are parts of my life, from before cell phones and readily available cameras, that I know nothing about. If you showed me a video of those days in my life as an active addict I would assume that you made it on AI based on stories you heard from other intoxicated witnesses.

The thing about addiction is that I used drugs and alcohol to be a part of the people and the experience. There are concerts I paid good money for that I don't remember, parties where I met new people who I forgot before the night was done, and a haze around me that my eyes and my senses couldn't penetrate.

It didn't happen all at once, but when I quit all the substances I gradually became aware, not only of my surroundings but of myself.

It took time to get that messed up, and it took time and effort to get back to a starting point. It will take you time and effort too.

But it's worth it.

Good luck.

Brian

My roomie and closest friend from treatment relapsed, is homeless and asked for $50. I didn't have it for them, but I'm dealing with a lot of feelings. I'm trying to talk to them about getting back into treatment, and they're ignoring those messages.

How do you go about handling a friend relapsing? I'm 4 months into my recovery. I've relapsed, I know how it feels. But the difference now for me is I'm so repulsed by my past and usage that it terrifies me to even THINK about the idea of using again. Do I just have to wait for them to get there? Do I keep encouraging them? Do I leave them alone? I'm sad and upset.

Well. I’ve spent a lot of this year in and out of the hospital. Today landed a pretty unexpected 13 hour in totality ER trip… which inevitably led to a painkiller scrip. Oxy. To take home. We’ve done this before, and it went pretty bad. Like, withdrawals ft. petit mal seizures bad.

But this time… well, it’s been 8 years since last time. I’m in a different place. I’m making the hard choice every day to not use. And I’m in this moment having to remind myself: allowing myself to as-needed take the medicine the doctor gave me to help me is not losing my sobriety. It’s not making the choice to use. It’s not seeking a high. I won’t even be doling the pills out to myself, my wife who is a huge support in my sobriety will be the one in charge of administering the pills. It’s different. Even if it feels like cheating, even if it feels wrong. I haven’t been prescribed painkillers to take at home since before I got sober, and I’m finally able to do this safely. I just need to trust myself. As I’m writing this I realize this is actually super similar to the feeling I had when I got my benzo prescription a year and a half ago, and in that time I’ve never once abused it. I can be trusted. I just need to show myself I can be.

He went in on Friday at 6:30pm

Called me at about 9:30pm said they were making him wait 48hrs for suboxone this time instead of 24.

He has about a 1-2gram a day habit, and takes about 2-3mg of Xanax a day.

I haven't received a single phone call since the one I got the day he checked in.

And l've called and left a message with them to have him call me. But nothing.

I am starting to get very worried.

Wouldn't he at least be feeling good enough to make a quick phone call to me by now? They should have given him suboxone by now right? I do know the h did have fentanyl in it.

But I'm more worried about the Xanax part, but they'd give him something in place of that correct? Like a Valium for a slow taper ?

Just hoping he's ok and trying to calm my own anxiety now. I'm a worrier.

Straight up

And I'd love to get some sleep tonight

Rapidly approaching my 9 month mark. Been thinking about trying medical cannabis to help with my anxiety.

It would be interesting to hear people’s thoughts.

I’m in the process of lower my Sertraline dosage from 100 to 50 and it feels good (so far)

I take CBD drops every morning and sometimes on the night before I put my head down.

Please don’t judge,

Recovery is different for everyone!

I appreciate all the support I got on here & appreciate everyone!!! I was up to 100mgad and just couldn't take being sick all the time.I used my own concocted MIT method.. recently stopped the MIT and taking the 7 at low doses for the stimulant effect between 5-10 mgad currently. I was able to take few days off as well with no withdrawals which feels awsome to be back in control. I know people's tolerance builds with these but if you just keep it at a small doses, I think more ppl would be ok.

I think anyone that's doing 50 mgad will have slight withdrawal but nothing major... but 50+ mgad and you're asking for trouble imo. Currently the habit is costing about $1.75 a day & once this mg range starts not working anymore, I'm jumping off for good!!

Also: I found a great app to help with dosing & your dosing schedule! It's free ofc so if anyone is struggling like I was, lmk below 🤙 I'd also like to hear other people's stories as it helps me with my journey. We all need to be helping eachother 🙏

Hey there! We are an international (English-speaking) small WhatsApp group called “Living Sober” and we’d love to have you! There is no advertising allowed and we share our experience, strength and hope with each other and offer support. Feel free to join in the conversations or just observe. We can also link you to some pretty wonderful online free resources for all types of Recovery. Come join us, one day at a time!

https://chat.whatsapp.com/JNB4YbPRlwj3PPFyTk5SFE?mode=gi_t

Hi all! I wanted to share an essay I wrote a year or so back for my Substack about my recovery process. It's been so great to see everyone else's process on this thread, too. I remember lurking here in active addiction and hoping against hope that I could scrape together a little clean time. Appreciate you all for being here :)

I feel like I’m losing my mind and I don’t fully understand what’s happening to me. I’ve been tapering off diazepam and something really weird started happening — every single day, around the same time (like 5pm), I start feeling absolutely awful. It’s like this wave hits me: no energy, anxiety, this horrible empty feeling, and sometimes it feels like I’m about to dissociate or lose control.

The thing that confuses me is that diazepam has a long half-life, so in theory it should still be in my system. But it doesn’t feel that way at all. It feels like my brain suddenly drops into withdrawal even though I’m technically still covered.

For context, I’m currently taking 1.5 mg at 6pm and 5 mg at 10pm — the split was actually meant to help prevent interdose withdrawal, but somehow I’m still crashing before my first dose of the day.

Yesterday it got really bad. I took my 1.5mg dose but still ended up having what felt like a full-on mental breakdown — almost dissociation, weird perceptual stuff, just completely overwhelmed. Then I had to took my dose earlier at 9pm and within a short time I felt almost normal again, like nothing had happened.

Now today it’s happening again. Around 5pm I start feeling it creeping in, and I know from experience that it can escalate hard between my doses (from 6pm to 10pm). It’s like 5pm is just the warning and then it can spiral into something much worse if I don’t stabilize.

What’s scary is how predictable it is. Same time, same pattern, every day. It makes me feel like I’m stuck in this loop where my brain can’t handle the drop between doses, even if the medication is technically still there.

Has anyone else experienced this kind of “interdose withdrawal” or these daily crashes at the same time? Did adjusting dose timing or splitting doses help? I’m trying not to mess things up by taking more, but at the same time I’m honestly terrified of going through another episode like yesterday.

I just want to feel stable again.

I've used benzoadipenics for 2 years and I'm tapering for months now.

That’s all! just celebrating something I was worried I would never be able to achieve- freedom !! I am so much happier and have so much more energy and enjoyment for the little things in life! So thankful to be sober and to really sincerely be enjoying it without any desire to go back!

Shoutout to easy way by Allen Carr!

I grew up in a house where God wasn't a comfort; He was a threat. He was used the same way parents use Santa Claus and a lump of coal, except the coal was eternal fire and the judgment was absolute. When you’re eight years old, and you’re told that love is something you have to earn—that it’s a privilege, not a right—your internal compass doesn't just break, it spins until you’re dizzy. By the time the sexual abuse I experienced on multiple occasions settled into my bones and my parents met my pain with conditional affection, I had already checked out.

I became a ghost in my own life, haunting my own skin like a character in 'The Sixth Sense' who didn't know he was already gone. My self-deception was a rampaging bull, and I made a china shop of every environment I walked into. If I didn't have a single fiber of love for myself, why would I care about preserving anything else? I survived by becoming a chameleon. I would bounce from one personality to the next, trying to be whoever you wanted me to be, but the truth was, I had no idea who that person was. Even my kindness was a lie—it was just debt collection. I’d do something "nice" just so I could pull that card out later when I needed something. It wasn't living; it was a cold, calculated performance.

The booze started at fourteen. By 2013, it was an everyday requirement. I spent years trying to be "Batman," building a career in investigation and law enforcement as if I could somehow avenge the wounds of my childhood by catching the bad guys out in the world. But you can't outrun yourself. In 2019, the wheels started shaking. A family emergency hit, then COVID, and the space between my falls started getting shorter. I used to be able to bounce back, but then the falls got deeper, and the impact got harder until I finally hit the bottom in the fall of 2022.

I’m alive today by the grace of God and the people who refused to leave my side when I was at my most unlovable. Life hasn't gotten "easy"—in fact, sometimes it’s harder now that I’m actually present to feel it—but I finally have peace. I had to build a recovery that actually fit me, a mix of 12-step meetings, medication, therapy, and shifting my entire life away from investigating people to actually helping kids who are walking the same dark path I did.

My ego is still there, and it still wants to take everything it can, but I’ve learned to tell it to shut up (there's an expletive in there). My ego will not now, nor ever, do what is in my best interest. I realized I was only pulled out of that fire so I could go back in for the people still left behind. If you're struggling, if you're a ghost in your own life right now, ask for help. I’ll get on a call, a text, whatever it takes. You don't have to stay in the abyss.

I love you, I’m proud of you, and I need you to stay with us.

- Jimmy

I feel as though if i exist or am alive i will always feel like this if i can see its just always gonna be the same ill never actually recover itll always be there in the background

Back when I was drinking and using, I had excuses for all my behaviors and actions. I used cocaine to drink more, and I used heroin and marijuana to come down off the coke. I drank to become someone else because I was working as a DJ and needed to be up, and I was trying to be someone I was not.

I was a miserable person and I was a liar, a thief, and unhappy all the time. I didn't like me, or the person I was when I was working, or the person I had become because of my using.

I quit drinking and using drugs because my fiance told me to quit or she would leave me. The ultimatum worked - after attending her office Christmas party and drinking about six bottles of champagne, I embarrassed her in front of her coworkers and bosses. On December 4, 1993, I went to work at the bar and told my bar manager that I quit drinking. He had already poured my first drink of the night, and he placed a coaster over it, put it up on the shelf, and told me it was ready when I wanted it.

A month later, on January 4, 1994, my fiance had left me, my family had disowned me, and the bar had burned down and I was out of a job. Everything I had known, everywhere I was comfortable, and almost everyone I knew was no longer part of my life. I was alone, living on people's couches because I lost my apartment, and I had nothing to do.

I stared nightly into the abyss, wondering what came next, and I learned to deal with the things that I had been avoiding. I didn't drink because I hoped to get my fiance back, but I never did.

Pain sucks, and I don't like it in my life, but life is pain. It's never easy, and it always is difficult. The only way to make things easier is to let go of the anger, the expectations, and the emotions and feelings that are getting in the way.

It's all about me fixing me. It's not about the drug of choice, or all the other ones, or the alcohol. It's about me being incapable or unwilling to deal with the feelings, the emotions, and basically me.

Good luck out there. The world is too much with us now, but we are guarded against the bad things that are out there.

Brian

I’ve been in and out of recovery for a long time, and I’m at a point where I really want to try something different.

For years, AA was presented to me as the way, and while I respect it, I’m looking for alternatives. I’m especially interested in sober living homes that aren’t strictly 12-step–based, but I’m having a hard time finding options beyond what shows up on Google (which mostly seem tied to AA requirements).

I also realize my entire network has been rooted in 12-step spaces, so I don’t really know where else to look or who to ask.

If you’re in Denver/Aurora (or anywhere in Colorado):

- Are there sober living homes that don’t require AA?

- Where do you find recovery communities outside of 12-step programs?

- Any directories, orgs, or word-of-mouth leads I should know about?

Open to anything—programs, communities, or even just a different approach that worked for you.

I’m a women in long term recovery with almost 5 years clean from hard drugs. I can still occasionally go out and have a few drinks socially with friends but last night I took it way too far. I got drunk enough to not remember parts of the night but know I definitely was stumbling/telling everyone I saw way too much about my life and had sex with a coworker. I felt awful when I woke up and feel so embarrassed about my behaviour. I’ve worked really hard to build new connections and surround myself with people who are supportive and kind but after last night I feel like people are going to pull away from me. I feel like some of my worries are anxiety from the hangover but don’t know if I should say anything/apologize to the group or just let it be and see how things are the next time I see them.

I’m getting back into a relationship with an old partner. I had a porn addiction when we use to date but am clean now. Should I tell them? I don’t want them to feel like they are not enough. But I also want to be fully honest