The Lord of the Rings Challenge

Day 117: Grey Wizard

I had a dream last night that I relapsed. It was not a great feeling. I am very glad it was only a dream and now even more determined to stay on the true path.

 

1 day clean. Sunday is my dedicated off-day where I usually do nothing but play video games all day but I want to try working on my side projects for at least some of today. Doesn't mean I have to be productive 24/7 because that kind of makes "off-day" meaningless but it would be nice to get a little done at least. Would also help me to feel more accomplished at the end of the day, although after two relapses back to back I'm so exhausted I don't really need to tire myself out today - little blessings I guess

 

Day 1
Usually the days I fail I tend to do it a couple or three times, but yesterday i did it just once and it was on a state where I wasn't totally in controll of my action so that's something.

I feel confident and motivated.

 

Day 2.
Feeling good and determined.

 

Orc
Day zero

Felt frustrated at life situations and relapsed, getting ready for solving problems

@RiseToGreatness

 

Day 2

 

Day five is today for me. One more day and I will be Uruk-Hai.

 

Sign me up please!
Like Frodo, I will take the ring to Mordor, though I do not know the way.

 

Apologies for the late reply, I completely missed your post at first, but I appreciate it! I already know about HALT, but I've never thought about it in that way before. I think recognising your weaknesses is an important aspect of emotional maturity and implementing it like you're saying here makes so much sense. If I'm able to recognise I'm in a state where I'm more susceptible to urges it should be a no-brainer that I need to back off (but so far wasn't). Focusing on recovery is the important thing, and if that means I'm not able to put in a herculean effort 24/7, or having to stop whatever I'm doing to be around people or outside, so be it; as long as I stay sober.

What I've found is when I'm in the middle of an urge part of me is trying to pull me away from doing anything difficult - yet those same difficult things are what makes the urge go away. The longer I leave it the harder it becomes to convince myself to do the things that will alleviate the urge. So it makes sense to have an intermediate action that is easy to convince myself to do but provides some kickback against the urge, too. Texting a friend is a good one, but often I find even that to be "too hard", so what I've taken to doing overnight is leaving a chocolate bar by my bed. It might sound odd, but sugar is proven to improve willpower in the short term, so although it isn't the healthiest solution it often gives me the kick I need to properly deal with a late night or early morning urge.

As for avoiding HALT altogether, I'm getting there but taking baby steps. I know if I try and live a perfectly healthy life from zero to hero I'll give up and rebound even worse than before, so I'm working on habituating healthy habits in increments. My sleep is good already, and I'm working on my diet in baby steps. Right now staving off loneliness is hard but this forum and discord are helping. Anger is rarely an issue for me since I'm mostly a calm person, but when I do get angry it's usually due to some underlying cause as opposed to any event in itself. So hopefully by staying mentally healthy and physically healthy I can limit that too.

 

Relapse again.
Back to day 0

 

Day 12: It’s a new week! Let’s all stay strong and destroy that ring!

 

Day 2
It is possible that I cant find new thing to write here every day Today was same as yesterday. I know how it will go. First 3-4 days I will feel no urge. After that, I will feel strong urges occasionaly in 10-15 days. I am ready for it.

 

Day 7

 

day 1

 

Day 3 checking in.