2 weeks tomorrow! Still no gambling, alcohol or marijuana either. Unfortunately still not much sleep, and occasional terrible nightmares. It seems as though the sleep disruption and nightmares are quite common side effects when quitting MJ. I have also had gambling dreams/nightmares at times, which can also be frightening.
I am really looking forward to how my sleep will improve with more clean time in. How “normal” people sleep. I guess it’s not guaranteed that my sleep will improve, but it certainly can’t get worse.
I am already noticing some reductions in feeling anxious and panicky. I believe that I have felt, for many years, that subconsciously that I needed to maintain these addictive behaviors to function at my best in social situations, and that I couldn’t handle those situations without them. That I didn’t “measure up” with others, and was afraid of failure. I am now realizing that the addictions make the social situations even harder to deal with, especially the MJ. In addition, these addictions just make me doubt myself and my own abilities much more. Which made me something that my friends, and especially my kids, didn’t really care for. That made me want to use more, and on and on. Funny how addictions can play with your head like that. Conversely, not using is making me feel more confident in myself, that I’m going to be just fine and in fact much better without my “old friends”.
So it’s feeling great to clear my head, get back to the real me. The more I think about it, there is a lot of truth in “the easy way” by Allen Carr. The addictions are playing me like a fiddle, making me believe that they will cure the exact ills that they create. Now that the fog is clearing a little, I can start to see that.