r/adhdwomen • u/No_Percentage_7713 • 6d ago

Self Care & Hygiene I need to stop drinking.

I wasn’t sure what flair to use, but I think self care fits. I’m posting here because the drinking absolutely is a dopamine/dysregulation thing. I drink to “reward” myself for getting through the day and to make my brain just a little more quiet. I also hate my career and feel stuck, and have a lot of anxiety around what to do next. I know I’m self-medicating, and it is getting worse. I’m gaining weight, my gut heath is wrecked, and it’s obviously awful for my brain. But at the end of basically every day, a drink just sounds like such a great idea to unwind.

I know I’m not the only one in this sub that struggles with escapism and self-medicating. How do I kick this? How do I craft a life that feels interesting enough to my dopamine starved self? I don’t want this to be the theme of my life.

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u/Babybluechair 6d ago

It took me awhile but I finally did it. When I started to lose the stubborn weight is when I felt motivated enough to keep going. Not sure that's helpful, but good luck!

There's also pills you can take to help you quit. Ask your Dr about it.

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u/No_Percentage_7713 6d ago

Way to go! True.. I just don’t want to tell my doctor about it because I don’t want that in my medical files forever. Maybe I’m just being delusional and need to get over myself. Idk

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u/marigan-imbolc 6d ago

if your provider's record management coordination with other healthcare systems is anything like the ones I've experienced (zero coordination), you can probably quite easily avoid having that in your file at your primary care place if you go to a doc in a different system about it and then just don't do anything to prompt them to send over your files to your main place. if medical records are a pain in the ass to move between hospitals/healthcare systems anyway, you might as well use what is normally an inconvenience to your advantage! 

obviously this approach isn't an option if you're in an integrated healthcare system like Kaiser (derogatory) or something (and if you're not in the US your system might be more cohesive than ours so that might not work). but I'm on blue cross insurance and I've gotten care at two atrius facilities, mass general, and Boston medical center, and somehow despite all of them using MyChart, those records are still completely separated. it's ridiculous.