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Post by yvan on Nov 7, 2015 17:56:15 GMT -5
Hey Sparrow, as usual your posts are always so real, from the heart. I forget how we all did the minute by minute, hour by hour, day by day. Now we are nearly two years. I don't even think about drinking or not drinking now. It doesn't come up in conversation but occasionally at work I will tell a customer, oh I don't drink. A good glass of coke does me fine. i see so many that are giving up smoking take up smoking again because they had a few drinks and thought oh just one smoke. And before they know it they smoked a whole packet while having a few drinks. i also see a few on the smoking forum who are drinking more to get stress relief since they don't get it from the smoking. I can see the writing on the wall. i remember icon use to write about the drinking and the smoking and it all being an inside job. Maybe that's why giving up the smoking hasn't been as hard for me as I have done the inside job. i truly enjoy reading your posts. Your such a writer, love it and you.:-)) its a a pity that some of the old timers don't write something. I'm sure it would be benefit to a lot who just lurk and read. anyway keep posting, I love to read them. love ya ang/tutu
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Post by yvan on Nov 7, 2015 18:37:26 GMT -5
Just found some time to catch up. Hi everyone. I agree with everything that has been said lately. Sorted. Lol. I have time to write a post, I'd like to write more but I am going out soon. This post is for Kim, J and the new members. I don't know where to put it. This forum is still weird to me. Thinking of a drink in early recovery, especially when we are dealing with stress is quite normal, and until we don't think of alcohol as an escape, it can be exhausting, but slowly we forget about it and we get more energy to focus on other things. We don't realise how much strength we gain each time we learn to cope with stress without drinking, but this strength grows, it becomes part of us and the obsession finally starts to fade. Yes Kim, nearly two years, just a week before Christmas, that's easy to remember. To me, it has been two long years, but the most important for me was to learn, learning and growing especially in difficult times because it's during those times I fought hard to stay committed to a new life as Brett says, believe in it and keep moving. Believe in you and in your own strength, we are much stronger then we think. Believing in you is believing in your future. It's when we live sober for a while that we really know who we are, and I can say today that even during the worst days, I always believed that by staying sober I will find peace. I never had a doubt that sobriety was going to bring me some happiness and it could only be a better ending. Kim, you say it's hard to accept that you can't drink anymore. I remember having those thoughts, but today I am happy because I don't drink anymore, my life is good because I don't drink anymore. I don't miss anything about drinking. Getting up happy and going to bed happy is not comparable with feeling happy for a few hours because we are drunk, without talking about the day after. It's not hard after all to go to that conclusion, it's much harder to understand why we drunk for so long, made our life miserable and didn't wake up earlier. Keep going strong in your journey, it's today that counts. By staying sober today you are changing your future. You don't know it but you are making it already better. Trust me on that one but time will tell you better than me or anyone else that sobriety is the answer to become happy again. We can't rush. When the time is right, right things happen, I believe nothing happens by chance and when I stopped drinking, if my life has changed for the better in one day, or I would be back to drinking, or I wouldn't have learnt anything about myself, about others and about life. I am a different person, I am not anymore the one I was last year, I keep growing, I love the changes in me and that's another positive side of being an alcoholic. We think a lot, we reflect a lot, we had to and it becomes a second nature. I find it tiring sometimes to keep analysing everything when I see people who just live, have nothing to say, to share, to talk about, just following the herd, but, are they happy? I know the first months can be tough, but I remember as well how wonderful it is to become free of the obsession. You are getting your freedom back, that's great. One day not drinking at a time, you can be very happy and proud. No drinking anymore is one of the hardest thing to do when we are alcoholics. The rest will follow because life is fair when we do the right choices. I am happy for you. A Mark said and he made me laugh loud, there is a light at the end of the tunnel, not a train. I thought of a bar full of bottles, but that was my reptile brain that was talking, not me. Lol. Hugs to all.
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Post by angelina1512 on Nov 7, 2015 18:44:38 GMT -5
Hey Yvan,
so good to see you post and do such a wonderful post as well! always from the heart! beautiful. How far you have come in two years, it really is so good to see.
there is a time where we just don't think about drinking or not drinking, how wonderful is that.
i hope you try and post more often, this place need some positive stories of how we did it, that yes we are alcoholics but that we don't think of wanting or needing a drink anymore.
Good to see you so happy. Wonderful news.
tutu
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Post by Pam on Nov 7, 2015 20:06:11 GMT -5
Hi Brett . Thank you for asking about my leg. To tell you the truth, I am scared of more surgery. I broke my leg on Aug. 9 . I was taken to UT and they put an external fixator on my leg to keep it in place while the swelling went down. Then on the 12th they took that contraption off and applied the plates and screws. I am sorry if I am being redundant. I go Tuesday for a CAT scan and they will decide where we go from there. I thank you for your concern. I think you are an awesome assent to this forum ! Beth Hi Beth.
How's your weekend? Hope you enjoyed a quiet day with your dogs.
PT
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Post by Deleted on Nov 8, 2015 2:47:43 GMT -5
Hey Brett, Its great to see you back posting. I didn't realize how much I missed your inspiring words until now. I love the analogy of the Dark Passenger and you wrestling the wheel off him and eventually throwing him out on the dust. That's whats happening to me atm wrestling with the DP. Today I woke up and just felt like giving in. I was thinking 'this is way too hard'. But I didn't. I took it every couple of hours and caught up with cooking nutritious food for myself. One of my strategies with giving up is to go buy healthy food and cook a recipe for the cost of a bottle of wine. It seems to be working and I'm getting healthier at the same time. Sometimes I just buy a sausage roll even as a reward for not drinking.
I'm sorry you're finding things so hard. In time you will look back and the pain of divorce will be behind you.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 8, 2015 3:16:02 GMT -5
Just found some time to catch up. Hi everyone. I agree with everything that has been said lately. Sorted. Lol. I have time to write a post, I'd like to write more but I am going out soon. This post is for Kim, J and the new members. I don't know where to put it. This forum is still weird to me. Thinking of a drink in early recovery, especially when we are dealing with stress is quite normal, and until we don't think of alcohol as an escape, it can be exhausting, but slowly we forget about it and we get more energy to focus on other things. We don't realise how much strength we gain each time we learn to cope with stress without drinking, but this strength grows, it becomes part of us and the obsession finally starts to fade. Yes Kim, nearly two years, just a week before Christmas, that's easy to remember. To me, it has been two long years, but the most important for me was to learn, learning and growing especially in difficult times because it's during those times I fought hard to stay committed to a new life as Brett says, believe in it and keep moving. Believe in you and in your own strength, we are much stronger then we think. Believing in you is believing in your future. It's when we live sober for a while that we really know who we are, and I can say today that even during the worst days, I always believed that by staying sober I will find peace. I never had a doubt that sobriety was going to bring me some happiness and it could only be a better ending. Kim, you say it's hard to accept that you can't drink anymore. I remember having those thoughts, but today I am happy because I don't drink anymore, my life is good because I don't drink anymore. I don't miss anything about drinking. Getting up happy and going to bed happy is not comparable with feeling happy for a few hours because we are drunk, without talking about the day after. It's not hard after all to go to that conclusion, it's much harder to understand why we drunk for so long, made our life miserable and didn't wake up earlier. Keep going strong in your journey, it's today that counts. By staying sober today you are changing your future. You don't know it but you are making it already better. Trust me on that one but time will tell you better than me or anyone else that sobriety is the answer to become happy again. We can't rush. When the time is right, right things happen, I believe nothing happens by chance and when I stopped drinking, if my life has changed for the better in one day, or I would be back to drinking, or I wouldn't have learnt anything about myself, about others and about life. I am a different person, I am not anymore the one I was last year, I keep growing, I love the changes in me and that's another positive side of being an alcoholic. We think a lot, we reflect a lot, we had to and it becomes a second nature. I find it tiring sometimes to keep analysing everything when I see people who just live, have nothing to say, to share, to talk about, just following the herd, but, are they happy? I know the first months can be tough, but I remember as well how wonderful it is to become free of the obsession. You are getting your freedom back, that's great. One day not drinking at a time, you can be very happy and proud. No drinking anymore is one of the hardest thing to do when we are alcoholics. The rest will follow because life is fair when we do the right choices. I am happy for you. A Mark said and he made me laugh loud, there is a light at the end of the tunnel, not a train. I thought of a bar full of bottles, but that was my reptile brain that was talking, not me. Lol. Hugs to all. Hey Yvan, That was such a fantastic post to wake up to this morning and I thank you for writing it. I kind of meditated on it all day as far some reason I found today to be one of the hardest in a while. I think I am still romanticizing the drink and seeing it as an easy escape. So I am constantly fighting those feelings. Its good to know that each time I face stress sober, it will make me that bit stronger. I like what you said about focussing on a happier future. That is my aim atm to get out of the rut I am in and eventually find some sort of work. Sometimes I feel like I have lost too much already but you are giving me hope. I guess I should see today as a victory. A tough day that I got through. Its so great to hear how much your life has changed for the better. Its really inspiring.
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Post by gwampa69 on Nov 8, 2015 8:51:58 GMT -5
In the past I've talked a little bit about my solitary times in Northern Michigan. In particular at this time of the year. Its deer season and for me, it is the best time of the calendar year by far. Its not about the killing. Its never been about that. In fact, that is my least favorite part of the experience. Deer hunting is a solitary time. A time to sit in the quiet woods and slow everything down. My thoughts, my feelings, my concerns and my fears. Its a time to think and reflect about my life and the people in it. The following was written a year ago. What a difference a year can make.
I drank last night. Not literally. But most definitely figuratively. I came home from my trip to deer camp. And felt trapped and alone like I did while I was drinking. I felt confused and angry. I felt afraid and I felt resentment. I felt ashamed of myself and I felt despair. As I was feeling these things, I let the emotions take over. Like a terrible wave washing over me. For a time I felt no resistance to this wave. I just let it happen. I let it happen like I used to let everything happen to me, with no cares, just numbness, immersed in alcohol. It was a strange occurrence. Near as I can tell, it came out of the blue when I came home and saw my wife and thought this is one of the last times I will come home and find her here. Our divorce will soon be over and she will be leaving. I thought I had moved through these feelings. I thought I had considered all of the moments and the "last time this..." and the "last time that..." I learned that this process has only just begun for me. The wounds are still fresh. So I felt like I did when I was drinking. This is not the same as a craving. This was the opposite of a craving. It was a return to how terrible I felt for so many years. It was another realization of how much worse alcohol made everything in my life. In feeling all of these feelings, I also felt nothing. Empty. Goalless. Depressed. Deflated. And I felt frightened. In the past, these feelings would have driven me back to the bottle. And the pain would have been ongoing and perpetual. The problems would be magnified. My physical ability to pull myself out of the pain would be diminished to the point of being pointless. I would rather drown than fight.
The amazing thing that happened next was another epiphany for me. All of this washed over me, through me and was gone in minutes. I saw it for what it really was. My wife will still be gone soon. My future much different than I had planned. That outcome would not change whether I drink again or not. What has changed is that I realized that I will survive this and hopefully thrive. I could not say the same thing if I was going through this while still drinking.
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Post by bethanne711 on Nov 8, 2015 13:28:09 GMT -5
Hi Brett . Thank you for asking about my leg. To tell you the truth, I am scared of more surgery. I broke my leg on Aug. 9 . I was taken to UT and they put an external fixator on my leg to keep it in place while the swelling went down. Then on the 12th they took that contraption off and applied the plates and screws. I am sorry if I am being redundant. I go Tuesday for a CAT scan and they will decide where we go from there. I thank you for your concern. I think you are an awesome assent to this forum ! Beth Hi Beth.
How's your weekend? Hope you enjoyed a quiet day with your dogs.
PT Hi, PT, I am having a very nice weekend, just enjoying some long overdue sunshine and beautiful fall leaves falling Not a lot is going on. John and I went for groceries yesterday ( in the rain ) but it was nice to get out of the house. John is outside with the leaf blower, as our house is surrounded by tall trees and it is overwhelming. Anyway, I am grateful for another day. Hope all is well with you. BTW,I really enjoy your quotes !!! Very thought provoking. Beth
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Post by Pam on Nov 8, 2015 13:46:17 GMT -5
Beth . . .
I'm glad you don't mind the quotes. I should journal but cutting and pasting are so much simpler.
I do not miss yard work. I am content to plant flowers in containers for my front porch and balcony .. . weather permitting.
I'm glad you're enjoying the weekend. Our weather has been relatively nice. Just finished preparing a bit of spaghetti for dinner.
Take care . . .
PT
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Post by gwampa69 on Nov 9, 2015 14:39:36 GMT -5
Some more thoughts about strength and choices. I think this is from about 10 months ago...
"Slimkim just emailed me. She said some words to me that inspired me to talk about strength. Strength and choices. I will paraphrase. She said she admires my strength. She wasn't sure if she could be this strong under my current circumstances. I think she could. I know she could. That got me thinking. What is strength really? To me, strength and the act of being strong mean all sorts of things depending upon the scenario. In my experience so far, as it relates to how I am somehow managing to cope with this family situation sober, strength has meant making better choices. In fact, the whole process that started for me last June began this way. I realized somehow that I had to start making better choices. I had years of bad ones under my belt. All I had to do was look around me to see the negative consequences that surrounded me as a result of those choices. I suppose its true that at some point, it could be argued that addiction to alcohol took over my decision making to a certain extent. One could say that my bad choices were made under a near constant state of inebriation. That's true. For me, alcoholism induced a sort of horrible autopilot that caused (or allowed) me to screw up nearly every single important worthwhile aspect of my life. Physical and psychological (although I think for me it was more psychological but in the end does it really matter?) addiction to alcohol put me in a position where I could no longer choose whether or not I would drink. It just happened. Like being on autopilot as I said. I began to feel like a victim of something I had no control over any longer. I quit fighting the autopilot and let it run the show. Looking back, I realize that I consciously made that choice too.
I won't talk about rock bottoms here. Its not really my point. My point is one way or another, I was able to turn off the autopilot. I decided to drive this bus as the person I used to be. That was a choice. At first it was hard for one reason. That was the physical addiction part that I had to overcome. That many of us had to overcome. Or hope to overcome. After I made it through that, I had another choice to make. Was I willing to see whether sobriety could allow me to restore my life. To fix the things that I destroyed. To take back what was important to me. To make my family and friends respect and trust me again. Was I willing to give sobriety a chance. See if it was all that others said it could be. I'm not there yet. Not yet. I continue to make these choices. It all started with one. The choices that I have made since the first one are beginning to pay off. That makes it easier to make more good choices. That gives me hope and courage to continue. My eyes are open. They are open because I chose that too. Its difficult to live each day acknowledging my mistakes. Its difficult to ask others to forgive me. Its difficult to forgive myself. That's another choice I have to make. Some choices are harder to make than others. But they are all easy in one way. As long as I can look myself in the eye and ask myself if what I am considering is the right thing to do, and answer affirmatively, then the choice becomes easy. For me, this is strength."
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Post by bethanne711 on Nov 9, 2015 14:58:48 GMT -5
Beth . . . I'm glad you don't mind the quotes. I should journal but cutting and pasting are so much simpler. I do not miss yard work. I am content to plant flowers in containers for my front porch and balcony .. . weather permitting. I'm glad you're enjoying the weekend. Our weather has been relatively nice. Just finished preparing a bit of spaghetti for dinner. Take care . . . PT Hi ! I find your quotes to be thought inspiring and I appreciate you for that. I am about the same way with flowers. I love them but tend to use containers as opposed to digging in the dirt. We live on the lake but have lots and lots of trees that are not conducive to flourishing plants. On the deck they can get lots more sun. Now it's getting colder and the annuals will be dying. I have tried bringing them in during past winters with no success. Oh well. To each it's season.
Beth
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Post by gwampa69 on Nov 11, 2015 13:33:07 GMT -5
Why? I have been thinking about this a lot lately. It’s a simple one word question that when directed at myself, yields some interesting answers. But only if I am honest in my answering. It can be a scary question to ask yourself. In particular, when the question is related to contemplating behavior that we know inside is damaging to ourselves. But sometimes, asking the question and even answering honestly isn’t enough to prevent us from engaging in the behavior. Of course, I’m referring to drinking. But it applies to any other self-destructive choice. It’s a choice. Everything is. Good or bad, right or wrong. Everything we do includes making choices. In the not too distant past, I never asked myself why. I had essentially buried that part of my personality when it came to drinking. I killed that part of myself off and never looked back. Until I couldn’t do it anymore. When I first tried to stop drinking many, many years ago, I remember asking myself “why” after a struggling day or two away from booze. Why do I do this to myself? Why do I hurt so much? Why am I compelled to continue doing something that isn’t fun or pleasurable anymore? Why can’t I stop? These are all good whys to ask yourself. Especially since the answers should be so obvious and yet they can be quite invisible to the addicted brain. Maybe invisible is the wrong word. Maybe the right word is unbearable. Painful to the point that the answer is too much to face, until you can’t hide from it any longer. Oftentimes I would ask myself these whys when I was trying to stop. Unfortunately, the next question I asked myself was, why not?
“Why not” was a killer for me. It was the easier of the two questions by far. The big cop out. It allowed me to return to the mire so to speak. The mire that became increasingly comfortable. My safe haven. Clouded by the fog of alcohol. Numbed until everything seemed ok. The false sense of well-being. A mire that is comfortable? What the hell does that even mean? It doesn’t make a lick of sense does it? Why? It is the definition of addiction. It consumes you and destroys the important things in life. Sometimes this happens rapidly. Other times it takes a lifetime of slow, steady progression in the wrong direction. If we are lucky, the mire eventually becomes decidedly uncomfortable. When I say lucky, I mean when we realize the mire for what it really is. A mire. Being in a mire means you are stuck, sinking, struggling to survive. Losing everything, unable to breath. Choking. Can you imagine falling off a boat, unable to swim, starting to drown only to be pulled from the water, thanking your savior, and then diving back in? Sounds crazy. But that’s what addiction is. Maybe it makes more sense to stay on the boat a while. Give ourselves a chance to ask the all-important question. If we answer ourselves with honesty and without fear, we have a chance.
Why? Because life is better without destructive forces doing what destructive forces do. For me, I finally answered the question with the answer that I aspire to live with every day for the rest of my days. Why sober? Why not?
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Post by gwampa69 on Nov 12, 2015 8:33:00 GMT -5
This is from September 2014. Something unexpected was happening much sooner than I had anticipated. It helped me a lot to put this out there. I had a lot of hope because of what I realized was happening to me.
"Good Morning, Day, Evening, and Night Today marks 60 days of abstinence for me. Two months, Eight Weeksish, etc. I have made a startling observation. It has been happening the whole time. I think I noticed it first when I returned to work after the first week. Its been happening everyday since. Sometimes it was obvious. Sometimes it was subtle. Once it even happened in a restaurant. One time my boss did it. Once it was Samir at the liquor store. Another time it happened over the phone. Mostly, it happens face to face. People in my life notice a difference in me. Most seem very happy to see it. Others seem confused. A few are even uneasy. All see it but not everyone knows what to do or how to act at first. I made no public proclamation that I was done drinking. In the beginning, I think that was on purpose. Too much explaining to do if I fail. Over time, I decided to let my actions speak for themselves. If someone asks me if I want a drink, then I may tell them the story. Or I may just politely decline. This is my business not theirs. Unless my drinking hurt them in some way. Then I will provide full disclosure if it seems that it will help them in some way. It all started at work. Not showing up hung over, sad, and shuffling around can be very obvious to the people that see you everyday. My group leader and close personal friend (and drinking buddy) was the first to tell me something seemed different. I was in his office and closed the door. Told him how my drinking had taken over. That I was drowning. That I couldn't go on this way. So I had to stop. At first he seemed almost offended. Who would he drink with? He had a well stocked bar at his house... That didn't last long. He then began to listen closely to my struggle. He never knew that our after work scotch or two was only the beginning for me most nights. He didn't know about the bottles in my briefcase. About the bottles hidden around the house. He doesn't drink alcoholically. But I do. DID. He has been behind me all the way. He is a true friend. Other coworkers pass me in the hallway. I don't know what it is exactly. An easier smile or springier step. Whatever it is, they are more apt to stop and chat for a bit. I have always been well liked at the office but this is a little different. Maybe I am easier to be around when I don't look like death warmed over.
Samir at the liquor store almost fell over the first time I felt strong enough to go to the store that I bought countless bottles from. I put a coke on the counter and like a trained poodle, he grabbed a whiskey bottle off the shelf. Years of repetition for the both of us. I simply said not today Samir. He smiled at me. It was a real smile. Not the smile of "you'll be back". It was a warm smile. He saw my decline over the years. I could see that now. That was the kind of smile he had. He is a good man. Last week, I was talking to my fishing partner in Florida. We are planning my next run down there. I hadn't talked to him in the last 3 months. Halfway through the conversation, he asked if I was OK. Something was different. I told him I was fine, never better. I didn't get into the details over the phone. I will do that when we are on the boat in the Gulf of Mexico. He has always suspected something was wrong. Now he can know the truth and worry about that part of me no more. There are so many other examples. I won't get into them all. I just want to illustrate the point. It is quickly and profoundly obvious to the people in our daily lives when we stop killing ourselves."
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Post by gwampa69 on Nov 15, 2015 19:33:49 GMT -5
This was written almost a year ago.
"February 8, 2014 I felt like I was dying. I was frightened about that. My heart hurt, I was drinking everyday starting with the morning drive to work. I'm not proud of this but its true. By the time I rolled back up the driveway around 7 pm each night I was a trembling drunken mess. I would stumble up to the house and go right to the basement. Avoid the family completely. That was the shame part. Total shame. Somehow I was able to find this forum and more miraculously, I was able to sign up. My hands were shaking terribly and I couldn't think straight. I had to write everything down including my member ID so that I wouldn't forget it. Then I started reading. I read periodically for several days. I never stopped drinking but I did keep reading. I felt that it would be hypocritical to post anything about my experience while I was still drinking. I don't feel that way now but back then I did. I read a lot while drinking at my computer. In my mind I felt I was beginning the recovery process even though I was still emptying whiskey bottles and chucking them in the closet. Looking back I guess I had started the process but in reality, I just wasn't ready to stop drinking yet. There were weeks that I didn't visit the forum at all. These were the worst of those days because the forum had begun taking root in my mind and began to signify a solution for me. Yet still I drank and when I avoided the forum, it was out of shame. I hadn't written a word or asked for any help from these people that I had begun to feel like I knew, yet I still felt I was letting them down with the drinking. So I would stay away. But I always came back. I knew if I was going to survive, I would need this place.
June 24, 2014 I wrote my first post. About 4.5 months give or take after finding the forum I finally had the courage. I finally had enough of it all. I think I had about 1.5 day under my belt without booze. It was a huge day for me. That first "dry" spell lasted about 4 days and I started drinking again. It was intense but thankfully a short lived event. And I came back again. I won't go into all the details of the past 5 months. A lot of it is written on this thread already. But suffice it to say, I feel miles down the road from June 24, 2014. February 8, 2014 seems like another lifetime. In a lot of ways it was a different lifetime. A different life.
I'm writing this post for a reason. So I will get right to it. I got a major promotion at work yesterday. When I heard about it I was pretty stunned. Because as I was hearing about it, I was thinking about this forum. About where I was. It wasn't long ago at all. Not according to the calendar anyway. I am still very early on in this change. And some of the things that have happened for me from a positive standpoint are really surprising to me. I owe this place a lot. I want to give back. I try my best to convey this to everyone here because everyone here has really helped me a lot. Everyone. I don't know that people think about how what they write may be helping others too. Its probably not the first motivation for most that first come here because posting here starts as a personal need to share for the sake of helping ourselves. But for me, no matter what the motivation is for each poster, the words always make me think. And that act of thinking is what started the ball rolling for me. It keeps it rolling still and if it wasn't for thinking, I wouldn't have been given the opportunity that I was given yesterday. So there you go. This isn't a pat on my own back. It's a pat on yours." O and U Brett
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Post by Deleted on Nov 15, 2015 20:29:18 GMT -5
Hey Brett, Thanks for putting those posts up there. They are really helping me stay focussed. How are you going?
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