Well Bean, if you're like me, you will either do steps or suffer the consequences. This unease you speak of sounds farmiliar, I remember feeling something like that before many times. For me, it always abated after a while, whether I did steps or not. Every other time, I took less and less action, and soon it wasn't a big deal. I began to wonder if I wasn't making a big deal out of nothing. Sooner or later, I wasn't an alcoholic anymore, and by God, it was time for a beer! This happened 2 or 3 times at different points in my drinking career.
This time I hooked up with a sponsor that insisted I do steps. One of the first things he asked me was "are you willing to do what it takes?". He asked me 3 times in a row and I said yes each time. Really, I wondered if there was something the matter with him! So, I got busy, with him goading me all the way. Probably, I couldn't or wouldnt do the steps on my own (for one thing I couldn't find the step directions on my own). Things didn't start getting better right away either, for a while they seemed to get worse! That period lasted about 6 months, I think. It did end though, and I began to act and see things a little differently. That stress-o-meter that seemed to be pegging out in the red danger zone got back down to acceptable readings too. By the way, I didn't drink either, or since. Soon after that 6 months I began to notice that not drinking was not such a big deal. Still I kept doing the steps, hitting meetings, reading the big book, praying, doing my coffee maker meeting, etc. I also found out that I could go to events like 4th of July parties, even bars, without having to worry about drinking. When I went home on vacation, I stopped to see old buddies that seemed to drink ALMOST as much as I did in the bad old days. As well as being comfortable not drinking in these situations, I noticed things I'd never noticed before. A group of 4 would finish a 12 pack of beer and no one would leave or pass around the hat! It was like they got to where they wanted to be, consumption wise. That was never the case with me when I drank, you might say for me it was the journey, not the destination
! Now, I don't consider their drinking and my drinking to have been the same activity. There ought to be different verbs to describe for those types of drinking! My drinking might have looked similar, but it was fundamentally different.
I had to (do step) work to get to that point of comfort though, it didn't just happen. Had I not done the work and gone into those situations, I might very well have drank.
Good luck whatever you choose to do...