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Black-outs

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 154

Nodrama, so you did knock the old guy down and ended up with a goose egg for days. The English language is so friggin weird! Sometimes I wonder who comes up with certain expressions that become popular sayings? Why do we call it a "goose egg" in the first place? It's not like we have an egg from a goose on our head, or like why can't we just call it an "owl egg" or "hawk egg" or some other bird egg? OK, I'm starting a new expression. I hit my head so hard laughing at my own jokes, that I gave myself a "hawk egg."

I really like the mixture of colors you use, other than "black-out." I never heard of a "blue-out." I think from now on we should use a different color, besides black-out and blue-out which are already taken. Each color of "out" would stand for a certain level of intoxication and stupidity. Like a "green-out" or "brown-out", which could stand for when you ultimately end up waking up face down on your neighbor's front lawn (that would be a "green-out"), or when (and please excuse my crudeness, but I'm just trying to lighten things up, that's all) you wake up and realize that you've crapped your shorts (now that would be a "brown-out"). Puking on your pj's, could be almost any color of "out", depending on what you ate last.

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 421

I know exactly what you mean. Levity does make things easier. If we all sat around beating each other up that would help no one. I think part of forgiving yourself is learning to see the lighter side of something bad. If we can joke about it we can forgive it. That's how I am anyway. Those blackouts though...I hate hearing about what I did. Because I used to think..oh you are making it so much worse wen you tell me what I did...then I had a few "blue outs" where things get really hazy and you remember like flashes or part of it. That's when I knew I was as bad or worse than I was hearing about from others. Those are the ones I remember. Puking all over the bathroom and hall then cleaning it up before anyone woke up...in my underwear because I puked on my pj's!

By the way David-- I did knock the old guy down in the process of knocking off his glasses! And I hit my head so hard I had a goose egg for days and he to catch a 10am flight the next day. Hung over from hell!

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 154

Nodrama those are two classic stories. Well, at least you only knocked off the old gentleman's glasses and didn't knock him out somehow...now that would have been awkward! And how the hell did you black out and find your way to a "haunted house"? Or did you get to the "haunted house" first, and then black out?

SPMW, yes there is a time to laugh and a time to cry and a time to be funny and a time to be serious. On Saturday night, my eldest pet dachshund (of 9 years) succumbed to advanced liver disease and I had to have her put down. I cried like a baby and am still upset and grieving. And yes, i almost died last year in a suicide attempt crashing my vehicle into a solid brick wall at 60 miles per hour. God's grace and mercy are the only reason I am here to write this. But you see, humor is therapeutic for me. I don't intentionally laugh at my or another's misfortune(s); I need to let out my sadness and anger and whatever other pent-up negative emotions. Laughing at stupid moves I've made in my life eases my pain...I can't explain how, but it does.

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 154

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 54

David, it's hard to resist sharing 'drunken exploit' stories because in retrospect they sure can seem hilarious. How about walking into a police station at 2AM and telling them all they should be out hunting vampires instead of sitting around eating doughnuts - then high-tailing it outta there with a couple of them in pursuit. (For the record I got away - I was pretty quick back then - but to be fair I'm not really sure they wanted to be stuck with me on their hands all night...)

So long as we remember it is only funny because we're around to laugh at it, and many of the things we can now laugh at could easily have turned out badly, or even ruined or ended our lives, or other peoples! (But not the one above - that was just harmlessly silly I still think.)

Of course some things just can't be laughed at, even in retrospect. You have mentioned a few tragic episodes in your life that I couldn't even imagine making light of. For my own part I have nothing to compare, but did not always waltz through it without anything going wrong, as I may sometimes give the impression... The pair of DUIs (the 2nd one cost me a year's suspension, a short stint in the slammer, my car which I crashed with only 1-way insurance, and a good job I had to quit because it required driving) the many lost friendships (some due to black-out incidents)... If there were humour to be found in those it wouldn't bother me to share it, but I just don't find any. I guess we just need to be selective and tasteful about what to laugh at.

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 421

Ck-- I agree with you if we can look back with some levity at least we aren't maybe as mortified by our behavior....did I tell you about the time I blacked out and went to a haunted house? Lol, i have a lot of them unfortunately. But thank God I'm here to tell them and I'm thankful all of you are here with yours because I don't feel quite as bad or alone or like a misfit.

One time I got drunk with my 72 year old neighbors. They had to carry me home...I knocked all 3 of us down in the yard losing the husbands glasses. They brought me back home into my house where I found myself on the floor when I woke up...no memory of how I'd gotten there. They told me when I called to apologize. I broke a wine glass when I fell over and they decided it was time for me to go! Omg!

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 154

OK you guys, you're making me smile a lot when I read your own stories about black-out experiences you both have had. And as I wrote earlier to Nodrama, please know that I am not laughing at, but with you, and at my own foibles related to black-out experiences.

Foxman, that was a pretty good one: "One day I remember pulling into the garage and konking out. My wife thought I was doing some cleaning work..." Well, she must have been in for a big surprise when she saw that the only thing you cleaned was an entire bottle of whiskey or whatever (again, not laughing at you, just trying to inject some humour Foxman).

And SPMW, "Arm-wrestling on the roof of a taxi on the freeway, and climbing up and lying on the roof of a subway car trusting there to be enough clearance between stations..." Arm-wrestling is a great sport when you are drinking, but I kind of have to agree with your actions that night. It is much more difficult and challenging and requires a greater skill level when trying to beat your opponent and keep your balance so that you and/or your partner don't roll off the roof onto oncoming cars. (again SPMW, only lightening matters up, no disrespect whatsoever intended).

Those are classics guys. Sad, yet pretty humorous if you allow yourself a few moments of liberty to be able to laugh at yourself. This black-out business is a serious matter, and as I mentioned earlier is not to be taken lightly, but if we can stop beating ourselves up with remorse and guilt over something that is in the past and that we cannot change, and move forward, then by all means let us do it by lightening things up a bit on this forum.

For crying out loud, we're not robots, we're humans with a serious disease. And by the grace of our Heavenly Father or if you prefer a higher power, and taking responsibility for our actions to improve a bit each day (and we will indeed have a few slips on the way, which is completely normal), we will eventually beat this bastard disease. Agreed?

OK, so who's next with another good and humorous "black-out" story to share? And again, I only mean this with the purest of intentions to lighten things up a bit on this forum and this subject in particular, and in no way mean any disrespect or have any desire to laugh at anyone (maybe laugh at the incident, but not you as a person).

****, I just scratched the surface with my two stories below. I could relate other black-out stories (as I am sure you all could) which you would not believe possible. Yet here I am alive and well to tell you they did happen, and when I now look back in retrospect, without feeling guilty, are damn hilarious...

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 1562

I had made a conscious decision well beforehand to allow myself to drink that day.

In that process what I am trying to say is, we don't think of the consequences. If I had that level of awareness I wouldn't have rode the motorbike in the middle of the night, knowing all the dangers given the road conditions.

I agree some people plan their drinking sprees. But not so with me as the drinking career progressed. At the end of it, I would like to have just a drink or two on Fridays and occasional parties. But I could never succeed. The binges periods shorted. And I was back on a daily schedule.

One day I remember, pulling into the garage and konking out. My wife thought I was doing some cleaning work in the garage and later found out I had passed out. At the correctional facility we take meetings, I share that I could have had several DUIs/car wrecks/other stuff but just was lucky. So from 91 till 06 lot of things could have happened. But I just waged the battle thinking that I could one day control and enjoy by drinking on my own.

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 54

Foxman, I'm not sure there is a need to draw a link between black-outs and the mental twist that tricks you into taking that 1st drink. The black-out occasions I mentioned before were all cases where I had made a conscious decision well beforehand to allow myself to drink that day. Not controlling the quantities is another story... you could make the case about the mental twist that keeps you drinking after that 1st, 2nd or 3rd drink (is that what you are referring to?), But honestly on some of those occasions I had no plan on doing any controlling - I set out intending to drink as many as I felt like.

David and ND, I think we can sometimes laugh at things in retrospect if only by looking at ourselves in the third person and marvelling at how lucky that fool was to survive such stupidity. The ones that make me shudder the most were not even black-out incidents... (makes sense, I shudder at them because I remember them). A few examples:

arm-wrestling on the roof of a taxi on the freeway (the driver having fits),
scaling the outside of apartment buildings by the balconies in the middle of the night (lost my keys - did that one a few times - and I actually left the balcony door unlocked in case! Pretty embarrassing though the time I climbed up the wrong column of balconies and tried to get in - there was a hasty climb back down that time...),
climbing up and lying on the roof of a subway car trusting there to be enough clearance between stations (I really shudder at that one - damn! did I have a death-wish? pretty lax safety and security in some cities back in the seventies),
setting out on the Tour de France in the middle of the night (in my head anyhow) with only a bottle of scotch for provisions - that it was the wrong continent didn't seem relevant at the time (I think that was the most physically exhausted I've ever gotten though)...

I could go on and on. Why mention these in a thread about black-outs? Because if I remember these things who knows what kind of stuff I pulled and don't remember! (like if there was no one there I knew to tell me about it later). At least the above were all in the very distant past - I'm no longer such an idiot wild man when drinking. But again the black-outs - as I've recently seen it can still happen to me even though I think I've become a more civilised drunk, and who knows what might go on during one. That is one more factor I have now added to my (long) list of reasons to not drink.

7 years ago 0 +0 / -0 154

Geez Nodrama, I thought my stories were pretty good, but yours are pretty good as well. Please know that I am not laughing at you or your unfortunate black-out incidents, when I write the above and what follows.

I often use humour as my way of ridding myself of stress and bad memories etc., which is why I shared my two (2) stories below.

I may be wrong, and I apologize if I am and am stepping out of line, but when you use the words "...but those are my most cringeworthy...oh yes, and when I wanted to kill myself (which as you know I've already tried twice unsuccessfully) and scared the crap out of my husband......nice," I sense a tad of Monty Python black humor.

You know guys, it is a whole lot better that we can laugh at ourselves in a weird way once in a while, even though these are serious incidents, than remaining negative, feeling guilty and reliving the past, which we cannot change.

I've done enough banging my head against the wall and beating the **** out of myself for wrongs I've done...now I choose to lighten things up.

When a situation or forum member is in real need of encouragement, advice or just needs to have someone to listen to him/her, then I know enough to switch off comedy hour and become more mature and serious to help this person with empathy...having been there done that kind of thing.

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Black-outs