I too can see So-much of myself in what you are saying. I am 23 years old and attend AA meetings 3 times a week now. I too am a very heavy binge-drinker, always have been always will be.
When it comes to alcohol this ain't never gonna change. The very nature of the chemical and it's affect means it's impossible to change it which is why it makes it sooooo deadly and illusive. That intitial 'feel-good buzz' luring you into drinking more, and then the loss of willpower and judgement means your sure gonna keep drinking more and more!! why wouldn't you? you feel so chilled, relaxed and contented lets keep making these feelings better and better. Next thing you know your waking up the next morning wondering wtf has happened and wondering how you've ended up in this state again. Repeat cycle over and over again apart from the things that are happening during those hours you can't remember are getting more and more extreme and potential dangerous.
This is the point where I would reach for a can of beer and find to my horror that I must have drank them and cannot remember drinking them! To get more wasted? Hooked line and sinker. This is where I go get a couple of tins of Super-strenghth lager to nip the anxiety/paranoia in the bud and as soon as that hits it's funny how I the thoughts of being an alcoholic quickly evaporate.
It is spot on how alcoholism is a progressive disease and I can totally see that over the 7 years of my regular drinking Binges (the last 2 have been mentally wrestling about my drinking) I used to be out in town 'socialising' every weekend without fail however right before I decided enough is enough I was finding myselof having to drink alone on park benches because I couldn't stand the anxiety caused by me being a drunk in front of people and consequently be labelled as a drunk but I have been banned from drinking in the house but I couldn;'t see how I weren't gonna be able to have my regular binges. Can you see how this was causing me so much stress and hopelessness for the future?
I can tell you it is a weight off my mind since I have been attending AA meetings and saying 'Im Neomarxist and Im an Alcoholic'