The "I deserve a drink, because I've done so well" puzzled me in a new way as I read the opening post. I've never thought about how irrational that is, even though I had been there years ago. Now this thought comes out of our AV, which is not a paragon of rational thought or critical thinking, and we can't expect anything from our AV to be a source of wisdom.
I usually recognized that aspect of "taking a break from recovery" as pure baloney once I actually got started in recovery, but before that, when I had thoughts of, "I've done so well," the next drink was usually taken with the intent to "just take the edge off my craving." Now this was a little less baloney in that it was an honest attempt to deal with my addiction. The problem was not my AV lying to myself. It was based on an honest lack of knowledge about the mechanism of addiction, and an honest ignorance about the solution. In other words, it made perfect sense. But of course, it was still me making a choice without any actual knowledge or understanding about what I was doing.