Whats been the toughest addiction to beat for you?
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New things. I simply can't stay with anything. Makes it basically impossible to have any decent job, because people want and expect you to be an expert at what you do.
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I do red team cybersecurity. Basically I try and break in to systems. Putting blockers up in my place is always a challenge as I break through the, by sheer skill.
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I know it doesn't help you, but weed really helped me curb my alcohol use. I'm in the same boat. I self medicate and drink too much. I'm worried about my liver, but I don't drink and drive and only drink beer.
I stupidly have given myself a nicotine addiction with sachets recently that I need to fucking stop. I noticed nicotine makes me grumpy, which is a drastic change for me.
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I’ve been starting to think that it’s something us older millennials can actually do for our younger friends … remind, demo and teach what a less tech ruled life can look like, how tech can be treated as more humane and not a necessity.
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I can beat the addiction of playing around on my phone very often throughout the day.
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I quit a $240 dollar/day opioid habit, but they ain't takin' my damn nicotine
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Feeding my dog from the table.
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Gonna have to go with alcohol and benzodiazepine abuse for this one, basically because it's the only one that I have beaten (citation needed). Only one relapse in the past 10-ish years or so! Though it took a few relationships with it, and I've gone through multiple hospitalizations (some even voluntarily), and because of that combo and all the other shit that was going on in my head (not to mention the cocktail of SSRIs and eventual SNRIs like Effexor at max dosage combined with stuff like Seroquel at max dosage for literal years, of which Effexor is still the bane of my existence; and stuff like ECT) there's like this hazy quality in my own past for me. As if I'm talking about someone else. I can't even remember most of my life from around 2013-2018 or so.
I'd say the worst part about abusing benzos with alcohol is how good it feels. I still have the cravings. Like even now I'd be up for it. That combined with the fact that it only brings out the worst in me, every narcissistic and sosiopathic tendency is not only brought forth but amplified also. And it's unhealthy in general.
So if you don't happen to die in your sleep; once you wake up and realize just how many people you've hurt, when the full weight of your own actions and the coming consequences descend upon you, you just might hope that you did. Vice, thy name is me
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Sitting down too much. It took four lumbagos in three years to finally get the point.
I don't write as much anymore unfortunately, but the huge upside is that, after two decades of not being able to do so, I can finally squat again with heels planted without tipping over. It has improved my foundational skateboarding skills significantly. And I simply feel more youthful too.
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Caffeine or Zoloft.
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$240/day?! How much were you taking?
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I'm currently trying to quit that too. It's harder than I expected. I'm not severly addicted or anything but I've recently learned a lot about why porn is bad and why we should stop consuming it. The two aspects to it are basically the exploitation of the industry and the effects that watching it has on the viewer. If anyone's interested, I can also go into more detail on that. For the first reason it would be enough to watch porn that's not made using real people, like hentai but the second reason is why we should stop it entirely. It's just that I grew up with phones and the internet, so I've jacked off to porn since I was 11 and it's kinda hard to jack off without it because that's where my mind goes automatically. I should be able to just do it without having to watch anything but I end up just not doing it at all. I don't know if there's any advice or something that could help me there.
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Porn and weed.
I've no doubt there are people that can use it moderately, but my brain just keeps wanting more. I quit cigarettes with no issues. I went from drinking a 6-pack a night to barely drinking at all. But those two really are hard to escape. Every time I kick weed I always have a night where I'm relaxing and I go and get a preroll - then end up getting more and smoking for the next few days before I realize what I'm doing. Same thing with porn. I can smoke a hell of a lot of porn.
But seriously, it's hard to quit. And I think that part of the reason is due to my inability to label either of those things as "real addictions" in my head. Neither of those things are demonstrably decreasing my quality of life, at least not the way cigarettes and alcohol did, so I'm having trouble contextualizing them as harmful. Porn is easier for me in that regard, since it definitely subconsciously affects my views on the human body, and noticing that more is helping me shake the habit.
For the record, I do think weed is a lot less harmful than booze. But there's a right way and a wrong way to use it, and I've been using it the wrong way for so long that I don't think I can use it the right way.
To quote one of the great philosophers of our times:
"Well, Stan, the truth is marijuana probably isn't gonna make you kill people, and it most likely isn't gonna fund terrorism, but, well son, pot makes you feel fine with being bored, and it's when you're bored that you should be learning some new skill or discovering some new science or being creative. If you smoke pot you may grow up to find out that you aren't good at anything."
Now, I don't necessarily think all of that is true. Plenty of people are creative and innovative and also smoke pot, but it does make you content with doing nothing. Very relaxing in the moment, until you realize, after a few years of daily smoking, that all your friends have been learning new things and growing and you've been sitting on the couch watching TV the whole time. It's totally fine to use every now and then, and by no means should be illegal, but we do need to start being realistic about how daily cannabis use quells that burning desire to be active and improve ourselves.
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Since covid, there's been a lot of food in the house. Something about not being able to get it when we wanted made us buy more, more often and stockpile. Of course, food expires and throwing it away means that it was a bad decision to buy so much, so eating it is the only financially responsible thing to do, right?
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Quit drinking and you will crave sugar like crazy. When I was in the navy, I'd start craving sugar about a day and a half after getting underway. Then we'd pull in somewhere, I'd get hella drunk and not crave sugar, go underway, rinse/repeat.
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You and I have extremely similar experiences. Nicotine for me was super easy, though—one day I had my morning cig and I felt like DOGSHIT. The next day I tried again and I just felt horrible, debilitated. Stopped smoking habitually that day, no cravings. I think I got lucky.
Caffeine now makes me feel like an anxious mess. This happened almost overnight.
I miss weed so much, but it ALSO makes me an anxious mess. I still try it occasionally but maybe one in four times it actually is fun. It’s been months since I’ve touched it.
Alcohol… I drink with my partner every evening. It makes everything more fun. We’re trying to cut down/stop, but is it ever damn difficult.
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Absolutely same. I woke up one day and cigarettes felt horrible. Quit easily.
Alcohol… I’m trying. It just makes everything so much more fun. I hate it. I love it.
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Caffeine I have quit a few times and that has the worst physical withdrawal of anything I have quit (hard drugs & alcohol I have never used enough to become physically habituated). Speed probably the most difficult emotionally/psychologically.
I don't worry about caffeine anymore, just maintain the habit.
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It makes everything seem more fun.
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That’s the same thing.
