Hi Sean. I feel like I could have written your first post. I will be 27 in 15 days, too, and I started drinking at a fairly young age (I think I was 12 or 13 when I started stealing alcohol from my parents' stash). I love how alcohol numbs me from the inside out... but I hate how I can't feel even the good things in my life. I am so afraid of facing life sober, but I know that I'm not living being drunk all of the time. I am also quite functional, in that, even though I have been drunk most of this semester at school, I still have a high GPA, and I do well on most assignments and exams. But instead of the A average I know that I can get, I have a B average in most of my classes. Not really a big deal, but it is to me, because I know that I can do better, if only I don't drink.
I definitely find journaling to be helpful. Not that I'm doing well when I journal, but if I don't journal, then it is guaranteed that I'm doing pretty awfully. Looking back and seeing patterns of what triggers me can help with creating plans of actions... if only I were to actually use them.
It is a wondrous thing, connecting with others who have struggled with the darkness that alcohol can bring, but who also can share their experience, strength and hope of coming from that darkness into the light. Even though I haven't still quit, having the hope that I can, because of other's hope, keeps me from the darkness of despair of ever being able to be or live any different.