Started drinking regularly at 14 years old.
14-15: Friday or Saturday night binges every few weekends. Got in alot of trouble.
15-18: Friday and Saturday night drinking. Excessive but rarely to black out. The occasional mid-week drink or two from 17 onwards. Doing well at school and enjoying life. Didn't see much harm in this at the time.
19-21: 4+ times a week. Still didn't see the harm. Generally enjoyed myself, rarely annoyed anyone, but in retrospect I was quitting jobs and university courses constantly.
22-24: Generally drank all weekend, day and night, then occasionally Monday night too to get rid of the anxiety. The odd week or two off drinking here and there, but never more than 3 weeks. Mental health was really taking a hit now - becoming a moody, introspective drinker, suffering from bad social anxiety when sober.
24-25: 13 months of sobriety from alcohol, after lurching into a 7 day bender. Great period in my life. All of a sudden I was funny and talkative to friends and strangers alike, and generally an optimistic person.
25-26: Started drinking again. The odd brief week or two of 'controlled drinking', alot of Friday and Saturday binging, which spilled into mid-week about once every month or two, and culminated last week in a 6 day binge. Desperately trying to tell myself I was enjoying drinking again, but alot of depressive drinking episodes in there too.
I don't think I've honestly analysed my drinking 'career' like that before. I've always convinced myself that for most of my life my drinking was in control, and I only really lost the plot when I was 22. In reality bar a few years in my late-teens when living at home kept a check on it, its always been excessive. Even then my 'party piece' was sinking a 1 litre bottle of cheap cider to start the night before sipping on beers. That's not normal drinking, much as me and my friends thought it was a riot at the time.
I think I've cloaked my drinking problem behind the fact that binge-drinking is so commonplace among young British and Irish people. Reality is that I've always been teetering on the brink of being a daily drinker.