Hello to you in London; saw the "units" reference and realized I was reading a fellow-Brit - though I've lived in the States for many years. To US friends (some in recovery) I've always somewhat blamed the English culture as well as my own family's for the love of alcohol. Its such a part of life there. I'm aiming for Day 2 today (allright, small beginnings), but can't even picture (so won't) how I'd manage a trip home to family and not just go back to pubs and bottles of wine. Best regards,

Welcome, Watson! We're glad you're here.

Anybody keeping a "stash" is lying... towards the end of my drinking "career", I bought a full bottle of Capt. Morgan 100 as well as a 10 pack of mini's. That way I wouldn't have to necessarily sneak into the kitchen any more and chance getting caught swigging from one of the various bottles in our (heavily depleted) liquor cabinet. All we had to to was go out with friends and have one or two, and then it would be ok to have it on my breath for the remainder of the evening.

My breaking point in June came when after one of these get-togethers we came home and I really hit the sauce. I went in to ask hubby something and he asked, with a mixture of concern and puzzlement, "are you drunk?". I started to well up and said, "hubby, I think I have a problem"... he opened up his arms and hugged me for what felt like an hour.

So- it's not that I ever lied to him or anyone directly, but I was drinking more than anyone knew. On a gig, I'd go inside to get another drink, but have the bartender give me a shot as well which I'd down at the bar before coming back out with my drink.

The night I talked to my husband about it, I threw away 90% of that bottle, as well as all 10 mini's. He has never asked me about what I did, or how/if I sneaked drinks... so I have not had to lie to him either. If the question does come up, I'm not sure I can come up with an exact figure, but I will be honest about the fact that I was sneaking drinks at the house and while we were out.

I lied about and hid my drinking. To have something that huge in my life.....and lie (deny) about it....is just amazing to me, now.

Life has become so much simpler.

Thanks for sharing everyone!

To me, being honest about my boozing was a little shocking when the survey said I consumed more booze than 96% of the general adult American population. Holy smokes!

It used to be a point of pride for me. A Marine buddy and I once figured up how much money we spent on booze one night while getting drunk. We figured at post exchange prices, over our 4 year enlistment, we would drink at least $7,280 worth of beer. We came up with that figure by assuming $5.00 for a 12 pack of Budwieser, 7 days per week, 52 weeks per year for 4 years. Add in the bar drinking on weekends and the occaisional blow outs, we likely spent closer to $10,000 over those 4 years.

In actual cans and bottles of beer, that came out to 12 beers a day times 7 days a week wich is 84 beers, times 52 weeks per year, is 4,368 beers a year times 4 years equals 17,472 beers. America's finest indeed! LOL!

Imagine how many drinks and dollars the heavy boozer adds up over a lifetime!

I think I only lied to my doctor. But I did always try (yes try) to hide the empties.
When asked how many of those are you going to drink, my response was always "all of em"
Fred

watsonc....:wavey:
Welcome to SR and our Alcoholism Forum

You will find a lot of information and support here
I'm glad you shared and decided to join us.

I think surveys are almost always flawed, because people don't often tell the truth on those things. I was a statistics major in college. I studied surveys and they are often skewed depending on how questions are asked, the conditions, the population, the response rate, etc. I have always heard people saying "a glass of wine or two" as a general expression, where they really mean more. Even non-alcoholics do it. A general tendency to downplay anything we know is not good for us.

However, I am ashamed to say I did some lying. One time when my Mom came to visit (this was when I was in rather heavy drinking phase), I would try to be extra vigilent to make sure she did not think I had a drinking problem. So I tried, like her, to have only one glass of wine with dinner every night. One night I let myself slip and managed to drink almost a full bottle while she was here. When I saw that, I was horrified, so put some water in the bottle so she wouldn't think I drank so much. Now that I type this, this is really and truly sad.

Thank goodness I don't have to worry about this anymore.

I lied all the time about how much I drank always halved it, and I used too get breathilised after I lied so they basically knew I was lying so honesty is the best policy if you want help.

Whether or not I lie about it depends on who is doing the asking. I learned years ago that if you don't lie to your doctor that she will immediately order liver tests and try to get you to go to rehab for professional detoxing. It was easier after that just to lie. Same with coworkers, cops and relatives. I don't lie to friends because they don't judge.

I'm British but have lived in the US for most of my adult life and know that the stigma here in the workplace and with health insurance makes it almost mandatory to hide things from your doctor. Also true of mental health disorders - having a health insurance company tag you as an alcoholic seems to be fraught with danger. So much for the helping nature of the medical world! I've no doubt if annonymity could be had, many many more people would see non-judgmental help. Myself included.

I lied to my parents by trying to mask the amounts I was drinking...but otherwise anyone who cared to look would know. Mostly the subject of 'how much' never came up. I was totally honest with my doctor when I first went (I cried :)).

I have never been as honest as I am now that I'm sober.

Towards the bitter end, I was doing most of my drinking by hiding the fact that I was even drinking.. a life of lies that I will never want to go back to.

However many drinks you get out of a 5th, that is it for me... Every Fri $ Sat. unless there was a holiday & we had a day off.

I never really lied about it. There were times I just didn't broadcast it, sort of keeping the glass out of sight when my daughter was visiting.

But by the time I was drunk, she was in the bed.

yeah I have and am currently...
I bought vodka so I could dump it in my sprite zero and pretend I was just drinking sprite while watching a movie with my daughter.
I hid beer in my bathroom and went upstairs and pounded them about every half hour when my sister was in town because she thinks I got sober.
I ponded some beer in the basement before my bf came over because we went to a halloween thing and it was supposed to be a sober night for us.
Gee, my problem is getting worse and worse. Seeing this in black and white sucks.
I need to get back on the wagon...