It is often absolutely necessary to use medication to get off alcohol! Withdrawal messes with your central nervous system so badly that it can kill you. Smh. Not everyone will experience such intensity of cns symptoms, and we can't always predict that.. If you quit drinking and 48 hours later go have some blood drawn, your labs will show that you're a chronic alcohol abuser, even though ZERO alcohol shows up in your blood! It throws everything off AND diminishes the symptoms of the imbalances, they don't show up until you quit drinking.. You could have seizures. If you're in hospital, you're gonna have nurses checking you out every couple hours to gauge your seizure risk and medicate you accordingly. And people just kind of assume that an alcoholic can just white-knuckle it after quitting cold turkey. I digress.