One study found that mutual support groups can be as effective as 12-step programs and may help improve the odds of success for people who are committed to maintaining a lifetime of total abstinence. This memoir tells of her painful descent from depression into drug addiction and, eventually, how she broke free.

Because of this, after two years of college it didn’t work out, and I came home – and my addiction came back with me. Don feels that he relapsed because his spirituality was missing. Don initially rejected the concept of a higher power.

Alcohol: Reward or Saboteur?

The next week, I started outpatient treatment. My boyfriend and I go to AA meetings together to this day and I met my sponsor at a speaker’s meeting. In 2012, I started a job in a deli but lost it due to my drinking. On the day I was fired I showed up wasted and when they told me to go, I stole a bottle of vodka on my way out. Alcohol had turned me into a thief and a liar. When I did stop drinking, I would go through terrible alcohol withdrawal. I was angry, irritable, and anxious and that led me back to drinking.

He suffered a string of material losses as he continued to use — job, car, money, home. But it was something deeper that finally pushed him into recovery. “The amount of support that I’ve received has been really awesome, from my closest friends that I go out with to people that I meet when I go out,” he said. “All the fears that I had were just in my head.” Alexander, who’s gay, used to worry that sobriety would make him an outcast in his community’s social scene at bars and clubs. He’s been pleasantly surprised to find that the opposite is true.

OUR DAY JOBS

How could I relax after work, without sipping my cocktail? In my pre-sober mind, alcohol and happiness were so tightly linked that their connection held me hostage. I believed sober success stories that I absolutely needed to drink to be happy. It was precisely that strong association between booze and happiness that prevented me from exploring a life without alcohol.

• Kate had no interest in becoming sober until she lost everything.
• Once you do return to work, it’s important to create a budget and take steps to safeguard yourself as work stress can be a relapse trigger.
• After promising to never follow the same path, a traumatic event lead her to substance abuse.
• He got sober in 2016 and has since become an advocate for recovery.
• My alcoholism had progressed to the point in which I couldn’t get drunk anymore.

After getting sober in 1991, Jackson has remained so ever since. Whether it’s drugs, alcohol, gambling, or something else, these 15 celebrities have all battled addiction and come out the other side. If you’re struggling with addiction, know that you’re not alone and there is hope for a better future. HSL was hands down one of the best life-changing experiences I have decided to journey through in my life.

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But, these sober celebrities make it a priority to share their recovery stories to inspire others. Your journey toward sobriety can begin the moment you enter the contemplation stage and then move toward the preparation stage, making plans to stop drinking and attend treatment. Once you quit drinking and become sober, sobriety will become a lifelong choice that requires ongoing treatment. Beth and I have the same sobriety date, May 7, 2013, although I had a few more years of drinking and using under my belt because I am older. I call my disease the disease of “more.” Alcohol was my first choice, but throughout my active addiction, I excessively used ecstasy, pain pills, marijuana, and cocaine. I was looking for more of whatever was available at that time in my life. My life changed forever on that day in 2013 when I decided to leave drugs and alcohol behind for good.