T5hlP5

I have always believed that an alcoholic, irregardless of what the Big Book says, could take one drink and stop. Actually, the Big Book contradicts itself by saying there are cases in which someone stops for a long time (25 years) and then drinks and is dead in 4 years and then there is someone who puts whiskey in his milk and goes on a binge and ends up in a sanitarium.
What I contend is that one could take a drink, even feel the effect, and then with a little trickery stop... and still be an alcoholic! Why isn't anyone saying this. Are they really that brainwashed and incapable of thinking?

Impurrfect

I don't know about any brainwashing, but I've yet to meet a true alcoholic who could continuously just have one drink and stop. I've seen several who can do it for a while, then the mind thinks "see? I can have one drink and stop. I'm not an alcoholic" and the one drink turns to two and then more.

FWIW, I'm not an alcoholic. I'm a recovering crack addict. After being locked up for 6 months, thought I was done. Eventually, I'd get some and be done with it. It was about once a month at the most. Then it was every 3 weeks, then it was thinking about it all the time until I finally had a full-blown relapse. It only lasted about 2 weeks, but I did a LOT of damage in that time.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and maybe you CAN stop after one drink. The alcoholics I know can't.

Hugs and prayers,

Amy

Crow3000

Huh? I don't think I get the question...

I suppose if you were afraid of cats, you could climb into a sack of them ... and still be afraid of cats...

Boleo

I did exactly that dozens of times to try and convince myself that I was still a cucumber and not a pickle. It always seem to work, for a few days. However, it would start the ball rolling for a big-fat relapse sometime in the next week or two.

Every time I tried to stop after 1 - 3 drinks I succeeded. Every time I stayed sober for a few days. But then again, every time I was drinking till I blacked out within two weeks.

suki44883

If you think you can do it, then do it. We don't insult or criticize anyone's program here. Do whatever works for you and allow others to do the same. What's so hard about that?

bcboy

I am sure that if I was forced to stop after 1 drink I might be able to stop at that moment.

BUT

The cracks in my will would have started to form and that little voice in my head that I have worked so hard to destroy would be smashing at my door with his mighty sledge hammer of destruction.

It would be only a matter of time before I would break and the flood gates would be wide open.

The only way I will win this game is to never ever play again.

So yeah, I could never drink even 1 drink and be safe.

PaleMale

Who the heck here would want just 1? I think I'll be safe and have none.

Freedom1990

I'm not getting the point of your post, T5...

stugotz

The key word being DEAD. Not much sucess there huh? Just sayin...

PS. Still laughin at the bag of cats analogy. Bag of cats....

HuskyPup

I think it is possible to have just one, but for the alcoholic, this is a pretty horrible feeling, that leaves you all crazy and wishing for more. When I tried this, it just made my mind race, thinking of how I wanted more, but could not, and though I did manage to resist a few times after 'just one' it was typically not a very fun experience, like it set off all this racing anxiety in me. So I find it possible, but painful.

Peter G

Contradicts itself? You're honestly saying that these BB examples have never happened to an alcoholic or 2 in the some 70+ years that the BB has been in publication? I beg to differ.

And just so you know, not one person I've met in the program of AA is brainwashed about anything other than this - DRINKING SUCKS. Some can be over-enthusiastic to a fault, but brainwashed? No bloody way. People working the steps successfully have been the most clear headed and insightful people I've ever come across in my 44 years of life. All are highly capable of "thinking". I dare say most are at the least capable of thinking how ridiculous it would be to make the patently absurd suggestion you've just postulated.

Using your own examples from the BB I can tell you that I believe them entirely true in my own life, because it is my experience with alcohol, certainly not because it's written in any book. Hell, I knew that to be the case for me before ever reading the BB. After extended abstinence, it took me only one 2 week relapse to be placed in critical care and told my blood pressure was at stroke levels and that I had almost died 3 times in my first night there. Pretty much proves to me that extended abstinence doesn't exclude me from potentially dying very rapidly, once I re-introduce alcohol in my system. Also, from trying to sneak drinks, hide it from my family, or offset my drinking with healthy activities I've gone as far to the edge of sanity as humanly possible without becoming a drooling idiot - hence I can relate to the example of putting whiskey in milk. Of course I could once force myself to stop once upon a time. But I did so at the expense of becoming a complete bloody basket case. So the trickery that you think might work for us alcoholics certainly availed me nothing but 2 decades + of sheer misery.

My point is; these things and more have been attempted by me, and as an alcoholic I've failed miserably, and not because a book says so - but because I am a man afflicted with alcoholism. The kind of alcoholism described in the BB, the only kind of alcoholism that the BB ever aspired to provide relief from. Are you an alcoholic? If your answer is yes - yet you believe it feasible to use "trickery" to stop or moderate - then you are definitely of a different ilk than myself, or any of the dozen or so alcoholics I know. Before too long, alcoholism as I've experienced and witnessed doesn't allow for successful moderation. Sure it was once possible for me to stop using via all sorts of ways, but due to the progressive nature of my condition, me along with each and every one of the card carrying drunks I know inevitably ended up falling over, drinking all day/every day, and killing ourselves all over again at an exponential rate.

Honestly, I really don't understand people's need to jump all over/discredit the Big Book or the folks in alcoholics anonymous. I don't slam AVRT - even though it didn't work for me at all. I don't seek out a Behavioral Therapy forum to bitch and moan because finding my inner child 10 years ago availed me nothing but a decade more of drinking. Why don't I, when so many feel entitled enough to drag AA through the muck? I don't slam others because I know these other programs can and do work for people, and that's good enough to earn my respect. So, simply put, if AA is not jiving with you than you're welcome to have at any of a dozen other recovery programs, just stay the he!! off of the one that has worked for me when all else failed. BTW, I'm not just saying that to you T5hlP5, I'm telling anyone reading who seems to have gathered a maligned opinion about AA and continually uses cleverly veiled comments to let us all know about it.

AA has offered me the longest period of sober time I have ever had since puberty, and I've witnessed first hand how much it has helped others. That's a good enough reason for me to respect it, and a good enough reason for the program to deserve the respect of any person who claims to have this affliction/addiction. I really don't mean to come down on you personally, but I'm done sitting quietly while every other person who joins here has fifty different reasons to slam AA, most of the time not even taking the time to understand what it is they are bad-mouthing.

Bottom line? Do your own work and stay sober. If trickery keeps you from bottoming out from alcoholism, become Harry frikin Houdini and I'll dance a jig for ya. Don't like AA, it's all good. Don't get the message? Cool. Find a message you do get. Work your own deal, but stop sniping on mine with comments like "brainwashed" and "incapable of thinking" - especially when you're obviously not standing in the shoes some of us are/were. Use trickery all you like, and if it works for you than perhaps the BB wasn't written with you in mind. It was written with others in mind though. I'm one of those people.

simplyfab

If it were possible to take just one drink and stop, then that would be me and the way I am. I'd be a normal social drinker who knows when to say when and not give it another thought.
But I'm not. I'm an alcoholic. "Just one" isn't normal behavior/thinking for me. The fact that I'd be non stop thinking about it after that first drink was done, tells me I'm not a normal drinker.

Non-alcoholics who have an occasional drink don't need "a little trickery" to make themselves stop after just one.

kiki5711

I agree.

to most alcoholics one drink is like a waste of time. It's eather drink till you're satisfied or none at all.

Terminally Unique

The important question is not whether they can have one drink and stop, but whether or not they will stop at just one drink. This question cuts through all of the circular logic, because in the final analysis, most won't stop at just one drink.

Topic closed.

Sudz No More

What's one drink? I never could have just one. Maybe that's why they make 24 ounce cans. I spent lots of time "controlling" it but it was always at least 3 or 4.

Then it was 5 or 6 with the occasional 10 added in for effect. Never did understand one.

Jfanagle

I too am somewhat confused by the purpose of the question that started this thread. CAN someone stop after one drink; of course they can, if for no other reason than to prove the point in this specific instance.

The underlying reason for THIS alcoholic to drink was much more than an unabated love of drinking; it was what I thought drinking did for my problems. Imagined solutions to many real problems were poured out of those bottles.

Living without alcohol means that I have learned other ways to deal with my life and the ensuing challenges that life gives me. Not drinking means a life change, not a contest to see if I can or cannot have a drink.

Someone who is serious about removing the obstacle of alcohol reliance from their lives will choose to stop drinking because of the problems that drinking causes them, not to see if they can or cannot stop. It runs much deeper than "a little trickery."

As was said previously, do whatever works for you, but it seems rather presumptuous to assert that anyone who has chosen abstinence is "brainwashed and incapable of thinking?"

I honor all people who honor all people, and their choices.

Jon

CarolD

I took the time to go back and read your other post....and here is what you shared to another member..... I sure hope you find peace and get busy takeing your own advice...

I did share earlier with you too...on your first post...I said there were other ways to recover.
I certainly hope you find your way back to living sober. No it does not have to be AA.

yeahgr8

Ok clearly you are correct in your thinking that it is possible for an alcoholic to have one drink and with some trickery stop and still be an alcoholic as much as it is possible for a person to have one binge a month and still be an alcoholic as much as it is possible for someone to stop drinking altogether and still be an alcoholic...

The Big Book does not contradict itself IMO at all, the normal pattern for the alcoholic is to have a fairly quick progression (months/years)in terms of quantity and frequency of drinking so it is obviously written for the masses and not taking into account the very few who can drink one drink and somehow seem to stop at that for long periods of time!

You are inferring in your post that alcoholism is very little to do with the frequency and quantity of drinking which is absolutely true, you are not going to have a great deal of joy however convincing most alcoholics that they are insane without the drink and that the drink actually has very little to do with the unmanageability of their lives...any good alcoholic in denial loves to point out their insane behaviour whilst drunk because it avoids any accountability or responsibility for their insane behaviour whilst not drinking...hence why a lot of people will ssay you can't be one of us because you only drink a single shot a night...

At the end of the day you can be an alcoholic having one drink a night, anyone that says any different is talking crap and you already know where to go to find a solution if you are an alcoholic:-)

unger894

"Irregardless" is not a word my friend.

Aegian

To an alcoholic, 'a drink' is like going to the golf course and playing 'a hole' as opposed to 'a round'. If I couldn't stop at 1 drink before I turned into a full blown alcoholic, why on earth would I think I could do that now?

Doesn't compute.

I wish you the best finding something that works for you. You appear to be seeking something to tell you what you want to hear instead. We've all been there. Just be careful about attacking things that aren't working for you without first taking stock in whether or not you are actually trying to follow the path they are offering.