Originally Posted by
AlericB 
BillyJean
IMO that can never happen. If drinking is making you unhappy you will always be happier if you quit for freely chosen reasons. I am speaking on the whole and in the long term of course. OTOH there will always be a sense of unhappiness and fear if you quit out of panic because you think you have no choice, whether you really want to really give up drinking forever or not, and don't allow yourself the space to think about why you are quitting in the first place.
I think this is a straw man though because surely anyone who quits is doing so because their life has become or is becoming unhappy and they want it to be better? How, if drinking is detrimental to your life, could quitting not improve it? Expecting positive results from quitting is, to me, the direct opposite of AV because it means you are more likely to succeed in staying quit. If we're not happy that we've quit we're more likely to return to drinking.
I can only speak from my personal experience. I wasn't necessarily that unhappy all the time when I was drinking, I had so many good times that they were literally killing me. In some ways my life is less happy from quitting, it's certainly lonelier. For me personally, my decision to never drink again has nothing to do with my emotions, no matter what means exactly that for me. I've found a greater sense of peace and stability, but I don't know if that's the same thing as happiness. Happiness is a moment, it can be fleeting. And with an unrecognized AV telling you how very boring and meaningless life will be without alcohol, happiness in sobriety can be elusive.