Hello Forum,
I started drinking in my teens on weekends to help me feel less nervous around my peers, especially girls. people seemed to really gravitate towards me when I was a silly and drunk teenager.
This habit became a regular occurrence on the weekends and steadily increased in the amounts at each and every weeken, throughout my high school years.
When I reached university, I was known as a legend. The proverbial weekend warrior Belushiesque party animal. There were many Friday or Saturday nights that I would consume as much as a 40 ouncer. I would often wake up the next day and recover. At his time I still only abused alcohol on the weekends. One morning however I woke up after 4 years with a hangover and a degree in my hand and hence began my working professional life.
I still managed to restrict my alcohol intake to weekends. I would drink usually both Friday and Saturday nights spending the whole next day on the couch recovering. Eventually, I married my high school sweetheart and we had two children. Things were going along fairly steadily until I received a promotion at work about 8 years ago.
The new job was quite stressful and I was worried about not being able to handle it. It was at this point that my weekend drinking problem started to slowly spill into the week. I realized that I could enjoy a little buzz on week nights as well without too much interference with my life.
Now here I am, drinking every day. I am drinking 10 to 15 drinks a day according to the questionnaire I filled out at this web site. I am truly shocked by the results. I have tried quitting drinking over the past few years but have only been able to remain abstinent for a maximum of 2 months before I relapse and drink even more. I have tried many things such as counselling and even AA, but I seem to always go back. I have also promised myself that I would return to drinking only on the weekends, but I find this very difficult to stick too. I have developed "friendships" with people at my local pub and I frequent the establishment several times a week to my Wife's dismay.
What makes this problem so hard to get control over, is that I have found a place that teeters on the edge of my Alcoholism ruining my whole life. I am still getting positive reviews at work, My family life is doing ok, although my wife wants me to reduce the harm I am doing to my body. I am also a very happy drunk, as I rarely get mood swings that some alcohol abusers get.
I often wake up on workdays very confused, anxious and depressed. Unfortunately, I have also found a way to control this. If I down a stiff 4 ounce drink before I go out the door, I feel like a rock star. I do not have this eye opener every day, just on days where the anxiety is unbearable.
A recent blood test that I had done has shown that my liver is stressed. I was asked to quit for a month by an internist to see if it was my alcoholism that was causing the issue. I was able to abstain for one month, being a dry drunk the whole time and riding the pink cloud. Sure enough after being retested, my liver enzymes had returned to normal.
I think back to how long I have been abusing alcohol and it frankly frightens the hell out of me. I cannot believe that on a weeknight I can drink a micky plus in 3 giant drinks and have the ability to make it into work the next day. When I wake up anxious feeling full of doom, the feeling dissipates as the day progresses and I dream of beers in the pub or giant glasses
