Social Drinking?
I drank to destress. After awhile I think I became stressed just so I could destress. Now my drinking is my stress and I can't even quit drinking to destress. There is definitly nothing social left.
Beer really does taste good to me. So does a rye and 7. So does a dry red wine or rich port. Unfortunatly for me they have become a death sentence that leaves a very bad taste in my mouth.
If I ever quit I will never look back. I will never wonder "if". I am going to write this to myself and frame it on my wall so I never forget the pain and sickness it has cost me. The son and wife I lost 10 yrs ago and have never seen since. The lost years and missed oportunities. At 44 yrs I have nothing. No pention, no savings, no toys. Just nothing.
Please read my wail of self pity and remember. Do not look back and wonder "what if". Not when it comes to drinking.
Beer really does taste good to me. So does a rye and 7. So does a dry red wine or rich port. Unfortunatly for me they have become a death sentence that leaves a very bad taste in my mouth.
If I ever quit I will never look back. I will never wonder "if". I am going to write this to myself and frame it on my wall so I never forget the pain and sickness it has cost me. The son and wife I lost 10 yrs ago and have never seen since. The lost years and missed oportunities. At 44 yrs I have nothing. No pention, no savings, no toys. Just nothing.
Please read my wail of self pity and remember. Do not look back and wonder "what if". Not when it comes to drinking.
I think what the OP is asking is, is it horrible to go out and get drunk occasionallly when there is a social gathering you have to go to. Not about going out and having one beer.
Maybe Big Red will clue us in
As for 'is it so horrible' - well, it would be for me...
I lost 2 years of my life once by deciding I'd been doing really well so I'd go out and get drunk 'just to blow out the cobwebs' one night.
D
Dee hit it. I dont fantasize about having a beer with dinner. I fantasize about being able to go out and get hammered...but just once in a while. This is something i thought i could handle last time i tried to quit. The next time i stayed completely sober and it works way better.
I have never been able to have one beer. For me one is too much and twenty is not enough
I have never been able to have one beer. For me one is too much and twenty is not enough
Not to mention that healthwise, if you're having more than 4-5 drinks in a night you really are harming your brain and liver, even if it's only occasional.
GG
Member
Join Date: Nov 2010
Posts: 48
Dee hit it. I dont fantasize about having a beer with dinner. I fantasize about being able to go out and get hammered...but just once in a while. This is something i thought i could handle last time i tried to quit. The next time i stayed completely sober and it works way better.
I have never been able to have one beer. For me one is too much and twenty is not enough
I have never been able to have one beer. For me one is too much and twenty is not enough
I also couldn't just drink one beer. For me, one beer became six and then twelve. I know I just can't drink in moderation and I accept it.
Member
Join Date: May 2011
Posts: 178
I think, no matter how you cut it, drinking leaves a trail of seeds w/ nothing but negative aftermaths. Anything that affects our body in such way is bad. But of course it does allow us to fit in, again it's a social thing, like cigarettes.
Member
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: UK
Posts: 4,682
Made ma laugh thinking about people who say man i wish i was able to just go out and have a couple of drinks and go home like normal drinkers...why the hell would i want to do that lol The whole point of drinking was to get drunk! My idea of moderation was 10 pints of beer spread over a 4 hour period, that was my 2 drinks and home...
I spent many years trying to control and moderate my drinking, the worst of it was when i went to AA i became friends with a 27 year old, i was 37, who had not tried to control his drinking so there he is 10 years earlier in recovery, all i could think was what a dick i was for trying to moderate for all those years, should have just got on with it...
I've met heavy drinkers that learned, in a year, the concept of moderation wasn't for them and it was either get drunk or don't drink so they quit...being an alcoholic it took 20 years and to the pits of a living hell for me to even just ask for help to maybe consider that i might be better off not drinking at all lol i was one sick puppy!
I spent many years trying to control and moderate my drinking, the worst of it was when i went to AA i became friends with a 27 year old, i was 37, who had not tried to control his drinking so there he is 10 years earlier in recovery, all i could think was what a dick i was for trying to moderate for all those years, should have just got on with it...
I've met heavy drinkers that learned, in a year, the concept of moderation wasn't for them and it was either get drunk or don't drink so they quit...being an alcoholic it took 20 years and to the pits of a living hell for me to even just ask for help to maybe consider that i might be better off not drinking at all lol i was one sick puppy!
I used to drink to get drunk, not because I particularly enjoyed the taste or that it was refreshing in any way.
I got incredibly frustrated on the odd occasions where I was in the situation where I was out socially but only had time for 2 pints, it used to drive me mad because normally i'd try and make sure I was well 'lubed' up before I even went out.
I got incredibly frustrated on the odd occasions where I was in the situation where I was out socially but only had time for 2 pints, it used to drive me mad because normally i'd try and make sure I was well 'lubed' up before I even went out.
Initially, I drank to get drunk and curiously cocked my head at those who talked about wanting to drink without losing control. Losing control was my goal, and I had a helluva time with it for awhile. That lasted until I realized that my drinking was consistently surpassing my personal safety and that my behaviors while drinking were leading to evermore demoralization. When I tried to moderate my drinking through all the methods I could come up with, things didn't get better -- in fact, after a time, they got much worse. Experience shows that "moderation management" was unmanageable by me.
The following excerpt comes to mind from the chapter "More About Alcoholism" in the Big Book:
MOST OF US have been unwilling to admit we were real alcoholics. No person likes to think he is bodily and mentally different from his fellows. Therefore, it is not surprising that our drinking careers have been characterized by countless vain attempts to prove we could drink like other people. The idea that somehow, someday he will control and enjoy his drinking is the great obsession of every abnormal drinker. The persistence of this illusion is astonishing. Many pursue it into the gates of insanity or death.
We learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics. This is the first step in recovery. The delusion that we are like other people, or presently may be, has to be smashed.
We alcoholics are men and women who have lost the ability to control our drinking. We know that no real alcoholic ever recovers control. All of us felt at times that we were regaining control, but such intervals—usually brief—were inevitably followed by still less control, which led in time to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. We are convinced to a man that alcoholics of our type are in the grip of a progressive illness. Over any considerable period we get worse, never better.
We are like men who have lost their legs; they never grow new ones. Neither does there appear to be any kind of treatment which will make alcoholics of our kind like other men. We have tried every imaginable remedy. In some instances there has been brief recovery, followed always by a still worse relapse. Physicians who are familiar with alcoholism agree there is no such thing a making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic. Science may one day accomplish this, but it hasn’t done so yet.
Despite all we can say, many who are real alcoholics are not going to believe they are in that class. By every form of self-deception and experimentation, they will try to prove themselves exceptions to the rule, therefore nonalcoholic. If anyone who is showing inability to control his drinking can do the right-about-face and drink like a gentleman, our hats are off to him. Heaven knows, we have tried hard enough and long enough to drink like other people!
Here are some of the methods we have tried: Drinking beer only, limiting the number of drinks, never drinking alone, never drinking in the morning, drinking only at home, never having it in the house, never drinking during business hours, drinking only at parties, switching from scotch to brandy, drinking only natural wines, agreeing to resign if ever drunk on the job, taking a trip, not taking a trip, swearing off forever (with and without a solemn oath), taking more physical exercise, reading inspirational books, going to health farms and sanitariums, accepting voluntary commitment to asylums —we could increase the list ad infinitum.
We learned that we had to fully concede to our innermost selves that we were alcoholics. This is the first step in recovery. The delusion that we are like other people, or presently may be, has to be smashed.
We alcoholics are men and women who have lost the ability to control our drinking. We know that no real alcoholic ever recovers control. All of us felt at times that we were regaining control, but such intervals—usually brief—were inevitably followed by still less control, which led in time to pitiful and incomprehensible demoralization. We are convinced to a man that alcoholics of our type are in the grip of a progressive illness. Over any considerable period we get worse, never better.
We are like men who have lost their legs; they never grow new ones. Neither does there appear to be any kind of treatment which will make alcoholics of our kind like other men. We have tried every imaginable remedy. In some instances there has been brief recovery, followed always by a still worse relapse. Physicians who are familiar with alcoholism agree there is no such thing a making a normal drinker out of an alcoholic. Science may one day accomplish this, but it hasn’t done so yet.
Despite all we can say, many who are real alcoholics are not going to believe they are in that class. By every form of self-deception and experimentation, they will try to prove themselves exceptions to the rule, therefore nonalcoholic. If anyone who is showing inability to control his drinking can do the right-about-face and drink like a gentleman, our hats are off to him. Heaven knows, we have tried hard enough and long enough to drink like other people!
Here are some of the methods we have tried: Drinking beer only, limiting the number of drinks, never drinking alone, never drinking in the morning, drinking only at home, never having it in the house, never drinking during business hours, drinking only at parties, switching from scotch to brandy, drinking only natural wines, agreeing to resign if ever drunk on the job, taking a trip, not taking a trip, swearing off forever (with and without a solemn oath), taking more physical exercise, reading inspirational books, going to health farms and sanitariums, accepting voluntary commitment to asylums —we could increase the list ad infinitum.
I can't speak for everyone; I'm just me. And "me" is an alcoholic. I can *not* drink socially. I have tried to moderate in the past and all it's taught me is that I can't do it.
Why would I play with fire if I don't want to get burned?
Why would I play with fire if I don't want to get burned?
Member
Join Date: Jun 2010
Location: New Jersey
Posts: 82
didnt the person who heads up moderation management, that whole organization, get a dwi not too long ago? What does that tell you about moderation? to me its just too much work to worry about how much I can drink, when I can drink, etc. If I dont drink at all, thats all there is too it.
For what it's worth Audrey Kishline had left MM, and was back in AA when that tragedy occurred.
IMO the real tragedy of the story is not what organisations were involved, but that people died and multiple lives were ruined by addiction....again.
D
IMO the real tragedy of the story is not what organisations were involved, but that people died and multiple lives were ruined by addiction....again.
D
Forward we go...side by side-Rest In Peace
Join Date: Jun 2002
Location: Serene In Dixie
Posts: 36,740
The last I noticed.....the program of MM stated it was not for alcoholics
and it required 30 days of not drinking before beginning their plan.
Ms. K. did finish her prison time and deserves the same privacy as we all do.
and it required 30 days of not drinking before beginning their plan.
Ms. K. did finish her prison time and deserves the same privacy as we all do.
Towards the end of my drinking that was reallllly frustrating me because I hate to feel defeated or hear the words "Neal you can't do that". Tell me a certain plant won't grow in my yard and I'm on the way to the nursery for the seeds. But the idea of being a normal drinker, I just cant. Period. And I tried SO hard to be one for SO long. That was when it became a lot easier for me to stop, when I threw in the towel. I'm done wondering why, the book Under the Influence helps a lot, but it's just the way it is. "A" beer lights a fire that goes bonkers until theres nothing left but ashes, every single time. I can't drink, period.
Member
Join Date: Nov 2009
Posts: 79
I agree. Even before I quit if I was at my dad's and he offered me a beer I'd turn it down. What is the point of drinking one beer? It'd be like taking one hit off a joint or snorting one grain of coke lol! I never drank for the flavor, it was always to get hammered. If I want something cool and refreshing give me a lemonade.
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Join Date: Jul 2011
Location: QLD, Australia
Posts: 16
I have no desire to get hammered, but I just want to be able to have ONE glass of wine with dinner, and not top up my glass two or three times. I understand where the OP is coming from, especially for those of us who are new to recovery. Posters like The End - it honestly kind of irks me when people say they are tired of certain theads and then obviously read and post on them. Isn't that what this forum is for? People, especially newcomers, will certainly be facing similar thigs with slight differences tweaked toward personal experiences and will ask. It doesn't help when we are made to feel like 'Yeah, yeah, it's all been said before...' etc.
I have no desire to get hammered, but I just want to be able to have ONE glass of wine with dinner, and not top up my glass two or three times. I understand where the OP is coming from, especially for those of us who are new to recovery. Posters like The End - it honestly kind of irks me when people say they are tired of certain theads and then obviously read and post on them. Isn't that what this forum is for? People, especially newcomers, will certainly be facing similar thigs with slight differences tweaked toward personal experiences and will ask. It doesn't help when we are made to feel like 'Yeah, yeah, it's all been said before...' etc.
I've tried quitting a few times before and sad to say that every time I relapse I start drinking more than before I quit. If I relapse this time I'm pretty sure I'm screwed. I've tried drinking in moderation and it works for me for a few weeks but always leads to a little more, a little more, a bit more than a little, a lot more, then I'm back to drinking even more daily than I did previously. So for me, I either do it and accept that this is the way I'm going to die, or I don't and I live to see my grandbabies.
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