Cunning, baffling, and powerful.
I can only imagine what it must be like to be 20, and in this program. When I first got sober, I too was resentful to the fact that I could not drink like a "normal" person. Many different thoughts came into my head questioning if I was a real alcoholic. It took me some moments to myself to pray to the God of my understanding, begging him to give me a clearing of the mind, so I could rationalize these thoughts of doubt I had. After I prayed, past events during my drinking days resurfaced, and it reminded me how powerful this disease is.
The first time I read the first 164 pages of the Big Book were during Big Book meetings. Like you I was starting to question if I really was an alcoholic, (this happened many times in the first months of sobriety). Just prior to my arrival, I was in a bad mood and was thinking I didn't belong in the room with these real alcoholics. About 15 minutes into the meeting it was my turn to read. We were on chapter 3, More About Alcoholism and I read this section...
We doubt if many of them can do it, because none will really want to stop, and hardly one of them, because of the peculiar mental twist already acquired, will find he can win out. Several of our crowd, men of thirty or less, had been drinking only a few years, but they found themselves as helpless as those who had been drinking twenty years.
To be gravely affected, one does not necessarily have to drink a long time nor take the quantities some of us have. This is particularly true of women. Potential female alcoholics often turn into the real thing and are gone beyond recall in a few years. Certain drinkers, who would be greatly insulted if called alcoholics, are astonished at their inability to stop. We, who are familiar with the symptoms, see large numbers of potential alcoholics among young people everywhere. But try and get them to see it!
This section of the chapter put things in perspective for me that day. Since then I no longer doubt if I am a real alcoholic or not. Hang in there, call your sponsor, and use the tools AA is showing you. They can save your life.
Tom