Hey HighBottom.
I think I'd class myself as coming in your category. No one ever complained about my drinking, I only drank in the evenings, never had any negative consequences, except a few health problems. The guilt I think I have had for as long as I have been drinking though. At the end my life was unmanageable because the anxiety drinking caused me was taking over and my health was deteriorating fast. I could see that things were going to get much worse if I carried on drinking. But I remember wanting to stop drinking in my early 20s and not doing it. I had no real negative consequences then, my health, weight anxiety levels were fine, and my drinking was just like those around me. But I felt bad about it, guilty?
Now I feel guilty because I haven't relapsed (yet!) and maybe I'm not an alcoholic because I feel like I will never drink again, but then people tell me if I am an alcoholic I will. It's all very depressing.
There is some really good stuff in AA but I don't think you need be just like everyone else to benefit from it. This article helped me to just get on with it:
AA and Terminal Uniqueness - Making 12 Steps Work
And this too...
"the first time vistor is alert and looking for evidence that he is in the wrong place, with the wrong people, and taking the wrong approach to his drinking problem by coming to the meeting. He is, in brief, looking for reasons to justify his desire not to be there and not to return."
(pinched from the 'curious about AA' bit from the stickies on the 12 step forum)
You may be just going through what we all do at some point which is thinking that you're not an alcoholic because of x, y or z and forgetting the bigger picture. Why did you want to quit in the first place? I think about how guilty I felt about drinking all my life and how bad it made me feel in the end. I too was good at not over drinking in social situations (my stepdad he used that as an example of why I wasn't an alcoholic!) but that was me being restrained. If I had it my way I would be sat at home caning it.
If you feel guilty about your drinking, there is probably a reason for it. And if it doesn't fit in with what those around you have experienced, well, that just doesn't matter. What matters is your personal relationship to alcohol. You are lucky to have avoided some of the nastier sides of alcoholism so its best to keep it that way. If your AV is telling you that your not an alcoholic so its okay to have a drink, that is where you will run into problems.
I bet there are other people like you in your AA meeting but they are sat there thinking the same as you and not speaking up. We are rarely alone in our experiences. Have you spoke to your sponsor about the way you feel?
Oh, and well done on the 36 days, that's awesome
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