It’s so hard to feel this way. You just have to go on blind faith that you are valuable and life is going to get better. Easier said than done, I know. Have you tried DBT to help you cope with the pain? I’m starting DBT soon as I’ve heard it’s good. I hope it works. Treatment doesn’t work if you’re not ready. I get it, no judgment.

Rehab worked for me because I couldn’t take the pain of alcoholism anymore. I couldn’t stand my life. I knew my drinking was ruining my family. I saw my future as either drink myself to death like others in my family, or get sober and go from there. I had no idea what recovery would be like, and it felt like I was jumping off a cliff. It has been really hard and confusing at times, but I’ve always hung onto it because I know my other option is horrible for everyone. Being in recovery has got to be better than being drunk for the rest of my life while my body slowly shuts down.

Sometimes you just have to reach into the unknown and grab onto the first thing you find – rehab, therapy, AA, whatever. Just go with it, and go hard. But you have to be ready, whatever that means for you.

I know what you mean about delaying treatment, feeling like you have to get things straightened out, just right, before you will be strong enough. In the weeks before I finally agreed to go to rehab, I knew I needed treatment, but I felt like I had to get everything under control first. That meant cleaning the house, and I cleaned obsessively, trying to get it perfect. I finally broke when I was cracking open a smoke detector to see if there was any dust inside. It would never be clean enough. I had to give in.

Giving up my will and submitting myself to treatment was absolutely the most humbling experience of my life. I was broken and afraid I’d never be fixed. But I did what they told me, and slowly it got better. Today I still have pain and problems, but I also know I have other options when I feel like drinking or dying. I'll be starting DBT soon, which has been offered to me for years, because I've been suffering, and I'm finally ready.

Can you identify what didn’t feel right for you when you tried rehab? What was it about it that you needed to resist at the time?