God, your pre-flight drinking sounds familiar.
I think there are going to be times, especially when we recently quit drinking, that are going to be uncomfortable and terrible and there's not much to be done about it. I have stuff happening that's making me anxious; last night I felt I could barely breath, and this was made worse because the AV was just chanting "DRINK AND MAKE THIS STOP!" over and over again. I had to keep reminding myself that, while this feels terrible, it won't kill me, but drinking just might.