Great and timely post for me Eric!! Today I was really thinking about drinking. (Hey that rhymes!!) Tuesdays are a tough day for me. It always a long day at work. I work at a food pantry and Tuesday is our distribution day. By the end of the day I am pretty shot. I guess I feel like "I deserve" a drink at the end of the day, or more likely the better part of a bottle of rum!
I combated it today by just stopping, taking a deep breath and considering the options. I could have a drink or two. The buzz would feel nice and relaxing. However, experience shows me that I probably wouldn't be satisfied with that. I would continue trying to chase a feeling that I was never going to get no matter how much I drank. I would physically feel like crap in the morning and emotionally feel disappointed with myself. I also purposefully schedule my appointment with my therapist for Wednesday so I have someone to be somewhat accountable to.
Fridays can also be a problem. I don't have to work the next day, so the physical problems aren't such a big deal. However on the weekends that I go visit my son, I don't even really think about it or even miss it. This tells me that with the right kind of thinking I can control it.
I am a binge by myself drinker. I can easily drink socially without going out of control. However, I am choosing not to drink at all. While I will not go out of control drinking socially, what it does do is somehow give me a feeling of permission that maybe it is OK to binge once and awhile. Even if this is true it is still having an overall negative effect on my life. I have piled up enough negativity in my life, I don't want anymore! I want and need positive things in my life now and I can't see any logical way that drinking gives me that.
That is some of the thought process that I go through. I have not had to deal with this while going through a manic episode yet. Being bi-polar, I know that this will someday come. I hope when that day does arrive that I have this though process ingrained enough in my head that it will be more automatic. As it stands now, I still have to think it through.
Hope that provides some insight. Thanks for the interesting and helpful post!!