I would say early sobriety for me is defined as the first 2 or 3 years. The amount of growth that happens in the period depends on a number of things.

1. How well the person was functioning prior.
2. How long they spent in active addiction.
3. If they ever had the coping skills before and just lost them
4. How much of a program they work during the early recovery phase
5. If they are immersed in real world or are getting a lot of their first several months within a sheltered environment. (7.5 months in a sheltered facility environment is not going to look like someone with 7 and a half months sober that has been doing it more on their own.
6. How much potential the person has for growth and maturity (some folks are immature and stupid and getting sober doesn't change that).
7. If they really worked the steps with a sponsor that has good sobriety.

After leaving a halfway, a newcomer should make the choice to "stick with the winners" as we say. That means to choose old-timers who "have what you want" and stop only hanging out with other noobies whom half of them are likely to go out and take you with them. Hence, maturity and improved emotional functioning will rub off when a person in AA/NA starts socializing with and referencing peers with YEARS of sobriety rather than months.

Given all that, I would still say there is a part of the addict/alcoholic that remains prone to baby temper tantrums and immaturity when they do not work their program and this can emerge as a dry drunk thing or just behavioral lapses that occur randomly.

I think it took me 3 1/2 years of being sober and working my program to grow up and become a proper adult. The first couple years I was a 'king baby', then gradually grew from there. I think the first year my brain was still very sick and I was on another planet pretty much.

I am about four years sober now and noticed my life was working about six months ago. Also I started noticing things that I had been doing that I thought were normal and ok, were not so I was able to change them. My integrity increased. I started doing things for my own self worth, not for external reasons.

I strongly agree with Mark that it really helps to mix with people who inspire and encourage mature behaviours. For a while, I associated with people that, at the time, I thought were fun but in reality they were holding me back. Part of my journey was to learn to make the choice to be with mature and inspiring people.

Flower, your tittle of your post gave me a laugh. How witty, lol.

 

 

Aloha Flower...you received some very good responses to the condition and I relate though never experienced much change from my alcoholic/addict wife so my experiences are only from my own recovery in the program...both of them.  Watching others recovery gives a lot of ESH and mentoring.  Being a double like some others here my maturing came first in Al-Anon learning how to "just grow up" which was difficult cause I had to let go of a lot of "stuck" thoughts, feelings and behaviors which the program and my sponsorship told me was "learned" and "habitual" and had to be changed.  Some of the good stuff already in me had to be uncovered and much was learned from the fellowship and practiced because if it worked for them it would make change in me.   "King Baby"??  I learned that when an alcoholic starts habitual addictive drinking they stop growing.  Foundation for that came from my own mother who while watching me with a cute favorite kitten at the age of 11 told me, "If you want to keep it a kitten feed it alcohol".  She meant it would not grow up and bigger.  I learned in college that it was true and alcohol stunts maturity.  Many alcoholic display continue to and act out very similar to the age they started drinking alcohol.   Group behaviors reinforce individual behavior and to a degree that is what I did.  Peer influence was a big part of how I acted out and when my sponsor told me I was going to have to get away from all things alcohol I knew intuitively what he was talking about.   Alcohol inhibits on one end and it is chemically depressive (in part zapping energy) and suppresses the desire for change...who wants to work on anything when you're under the influence. "We party, that's what we do...we party"..."They can't be too great just yet..." is suggestive of just letting it happen rather than working at it.  Father Bernie, a very respected Episcopal recovering priest once did a talk on the "Symptoms of Recovery"..."How do you know when your alcoholic is recovered" and a literal tonnage of Ala-Noners were there to listen including yours truly.  He summed up the talk with,  "You know when you recognize the return of the person you lost in the first place".   Sterling speech and awareness only I never knew my alcoholic addict before she started drinking and using and she never knew me before I started drinking alcoholically...we dated and then married as drinkers and that is what I knew.   When she recognized in me a man she that was different than the man she married...quieter, more secure and not threatening, more balanced in temperament she recognized change and she accept it as better than before.  I basically did the same and then we had separated and divorced anyway.

How long does it last?  That isn't up to him ...that is a you solution and for me the solution is found in working the program and learning to self focus and detach and accept and forgive which are mature thoughts, feelings and behaviors I had to learn in my life in spite of living with an alcoholic/addict.  Sponsorship is key because I get to be with and around a person who displays the recovery I want to learn and be around which my spouse doesn't and recovery becomes most acceptable and the norm.  My spouse as long as she is working for her peace of mind and serenity and sanity is both example and mentor for me...she is doing what she needs to do for her.  I try to do the same for me...mind my own business and program, don't judge, kill my resentments and expectations, be supportive without being patronizing or enabling and all of the other values I learn here and in my meetings; both sides of the fence.

My sponsor once told me that a person in program can consider their program balanced if they have as much time in recovery as they did in the addiction.  My have time or half life it that is true will come at 2016.  Still have to work and learn it one day at a time.

Grateful member of MIP, Al-Anon and AA.    (((((hugs)))))  

-- Edited by Jerry F on Monday 1st of December 2014 09:27:58 PM

Flower: Perhaps you are in the process of determining how much more energy and for how long you want to continue this relationship? I don't know? I do know that I've spent a lot of time with folks who are addicts. Even if they stop one drug, they find another to use. They hide it as much as they used to hide the one that got them into trouble. In our locale, pot use has been reduced to a misdemeanor that results in getting a ticket similar to a traffic ticket. It's like the legislature has thrown its hands up in a "I give up" mannerism when it comes to drug use, so even the courts will no longer be a deterrent for that can't be curtailed by the courts. According to a policeman friend of mine, the first time a person uses meth is the last good day they'll have for the rest of their lives. I don't know how true that is and yet considering how dangerous the mix of chemicals are to the user and the people around them, if it were me, I couldn't trust that my beloved wouldn't find yet another drug to replace the one they've used or some strange mix of something that gives them a high - especially when an addict is an addict. That isn't going to change although the drug of choice might be changed? Personally, I'm not sure make good spouse material - at least not in the traditional sense? In all my years of working among addicts, I have known one to get off and stay off any kind of mind altering substance for at least five years. That doesn't mean others haven't and yet one in 27 years is a pretty low recovery rate for addicts to me. Most that I've known just switched addictions.  And that does have to do with their drugs of choice and how badly they damaged their minds and bodies and how long they've used? 

-- Edited by grateful2be on Tuesday 2nd of December 2014 03:09:16 PM

el-cee wrote:

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It could be, at least your aware of it. As far as I believe their addiction stunts their growth so the mind is almost back in time with no or little growth or development of the brain and thought processes, no coping skills, problem solving skills designed to live in the regular old world. I think the cunning skills and lying skills and manipulation skills are spot on though. Its kind of the same for us. I became stunted, immature living with alcoholism, I was also cunning and manipulative and I was sober, just drunk on my addiction to him. Thats what im recovering from too.
if I were you I would work reakky hard on your own recovery, work the steps, work with a sponsor. Get yourself in tip top condition so that you are able to cope with the world as it is.

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 WOW, LC, this is an awesome post....I was stunted for a long time too, didn't think of it like this, but this is very very good food for thought.....b4 recovery, i was like frozen at a certain age...and immature,and i was a cunning manipulator b/c those were my survival skills.....oh yea, i can relate to this.....thanks for such honesty......