Originally Posted by
rayna87 
This was a great post to read, and it really stuck out to me when you said the more you drink one night, the more you want to drink the next day. I am the EXACT SAME way, which is so opposite of everyone i know. When I would go out with friends and get completely blacked out from partying, I’d wake up in the morning to texts from them about feeling like s***, I’m never drinking again, etc. Me....I’d be up at 9, ready to drink again, and often I would. I’m not sure if it was the hair of the dog thing, or what. Sober, that does not happen to me at all. I wake up in the morning from normal sleep, and just want coffee and a La Croix. I to this day don’t understand why that wasn’t the other way around.
Thank you again for posting this.
Thanks, Rayna. I could be wrong, but I think the feeling of wanting more the next day after drinking heavily while others just want to recover from a big night stems from the addiction part. Their bodies have not adjusted to constantly accommodate alcohol and there is a basic, normal rejection process the next morning and that desire to achieve their normal equilibrium again. Whereas with someone like me, my addiction (as I hesitate to say "body" here) wants me to replenish alcohol in the midst of coming down or immediately after coming down from alcohol. I think it is one of the same reasons why I can't and never will be, able moderate consistently and enjoyably. As soon as I start drinking one night (especially if it's in the midst of a bender), the anxiety and heart ramps up til I drink a certain amount. I am not claiming this is scientifically accurate or anything, but sometimes it FEELS like mild withdrawal, like maybe my body is kind of anticipating based on past experience that I am going to pour 1/2 to a full fifth of a depressant toxin into it and it better start ramping up a bit. That feeling when I first start drinking is what makes me want to slam back the drinks. I have no wisdom at all when it comes to long term recovery, but I am at least convinced now based on my experiences and what I have read from people just like me that it will never change. In my first post a fews days ago, I said something like, "I am lucky I am not the type of alcoholic that is physically addicted." I can see now that that is untrue! I think I am obviously physically addicted, but it is so overpowered by the psychological dependency and the expectation that it's going to give me a certain something that stopped doing a long, long time ago. But, like you said, the physical part wanes dramatically with abstinence of even a day. Thanks for sharing and getting me to think more about this. We are lucky that we don't have to deal with the physical hell that many do...yet, but all this stuff we are talking about progresses to that. Let's not go there. I'm on Day 2 right now and feeling good!