I can completely identify with where you are right now. It's that line I've heard so many times-- "alcohol-- can't live with it, can't live without it." I want you to know how much I understand just how horribly brutal your situation is right now-- the mental gymnastics, the physical distress.
Throwing away the bottle of wine is a good step, but we all know you can go to a liquor store. Generally when we get to the point of having no defense against alcohol, we don't let a little thing like a trip to the store get in our way.
I would really encourage you to think about how you feel right now in the context of your first step. Let me tell you about my first step.
I had been in a cycle of getting a few months sober, then drinking (usually on business trips, or when I could "get away with it.") My wife went away for a weekend to visit her sick father, and I was left in charge of my daughters. I proceeded to drink both Friday night and Saturday night, and Sunday, took the girls to Toys R Us out of guilt. While in Toys R Us, I was thinking about what I'd do to get straightened out-- how I would reapply myself to sobriety and AA. It was a thought process I'd been through a thousand times-- trying to make myself feel better and create hope.
Problem was, I could not lie to myself that morning. For some reason, all I kept thinking was: this is not going to change. I will keep doing this over and over and over again. I believe I had a moment of clarity, and it was the most hopeless feeling I've ever had. I knew my life was going to unravel.
So, for the first time, I was unable to cleverly construct how my life was going to be different. I was slammed with the undeniable fact that it was going to be exactly the same.
I remember watching my daughters shop for dolls and almost having to grab the shelf for balance. I felt dizzy.
This was followed with a very clear thought: you are in serious trouble.
No amount of effort on my part was going to change this. There, in Toys R Us, I conceded to my innermost self that I was powerless over alcohol. And it terrified me.
And it made me understand what I'd heard a recent speaker in AA say:
"The first step is not that you just can't drink. It's that you can't help but drink."
It completely reoriented me. I knew that I needed to find something that would give me power, and my misgivings about religion and God and all that mumbo-jumbo suddenly got small. So I also had a very quick 2nd step experience, which was this:
I stopped wondering if there was anything greater than me, and began hoping there was.
I picked up the phone and called the guy from AA who I'd been avoiding. And we began the work.