Pounding heart definitely one of the worst!

i've gotten them all at some point in my drinking career. the absolute worst for me is the anxiety and insomnia. my solution was always to drink more even though it is the alcohol itself causing both.

i also have a case of alcoholic neuropathy, i have numbness in my legs from the knee down. i can still feel down there, but it is diminished. i did that back when i was drinking 24/7 years ago, and from what i understand it will never go away.......a souvenir of drinking.

lol ahhhh the old reminders of when I would choose to drink and the after effects from a heavy binge. Sometimes I'd get up the next morning and feel like crap of course. Earlier on it was the typical dizziness and headaches. Now 6 months ago it turned into more physical problems. Such as feet cramping up non stop where it hurt so much I would be sweating buckets because one little move and my feet cramped up tightly. I remember once screaming so loud because my feet cramped all together and I couldn't stop it even when I rubbed the muscles. I also got very sick sometimes and would be sick in the toilet. my last hangover I was vomiting all day non stop, it wasn't until the next day I could even eat yet alone drink anything that wasn't alcohol. I'd try to drink water under advisement by SR members and I tried and it would come straight out as soon as it hit my belly inside.it was horrible and scary. So glad I don't have to deal with that pain today :)

Only 21 days sober but....

- Acid reflux and heartburn - had been a permanent fixture for years, even on days when I didn't drink - COMPLETELY gone now.

- Digestion works exactly as it should. I didn't realise my body was even capable of that!

- Nausea - a thing of the past.

Even though I am not necessarily seeing quitting drinking as a permanent thing, reading and contributing to this thread makes me wonder if I should...

Forget all the other posts—just based on what you've written I can't imagine why you'd want to go back to that life, fountainhead.

You know, I'm like many of the others as well here. I DO NOT miss the indigestion!
I remember having horrible HORRIBLE heartburn because I had already had 2 or 3 martinis and yet, sitting down to dinner I would make myself YET ANOTHER one and barely be able to drink it because of the heartburn. I could barely eat and yet I would force myself to keep drinking! CRAZY!!!

I've had the same digestive issues that others have mentioned while drinking. It got so bad that I would actually choose bathrooms farther away from my office (out of embarrassment and hoping not to run into anyone I worked with or knew) and sometimes in different buildings.

I never noticed the "alcohol" smell the day after, but I was a drinking smoker (sense of smell will probably take a while to come back if it does) and wear colon. The first thing in the morning I drink a large bottle of water and then 2-3 more during the day, so I wonder if that negated it some. Of course, that results in an embarrassingly high number of bathroom trips. At some point I am going to discreetly ask if people noticed the alcohol smell. I'll probably be horrified by what I learn.

Someone mentioned that they wouldn't eat if they knew they were going to be drinking, because "food will absorb the alcohol" and waste the drink. I actually would eat a fairly healthy meal, and just drink more. "The veggies and fruit and lean protein will offset the effects of the alcohol". Self-rationalization at it's worst.

I would get blood sugar fluctuations and "anxiety" if I didn't have a snack every 2-3 hours the day after. I self-medicated with a cookie in the morning and string cheese or fruit in the afternoon. Something to keep the carbs pumping into my system. Wow. Fortunately, my blood sugar is within the norm.

I have had dry skin on my face for at least a decade, but just got in the habit of using some Jergens dry skin creme after showering. Self-medicating a symptom.

The shaking hands is a huge embarrassment, but I found I could reduce it some by keeping a regular snack in my routine. The ability of my mind to self-rationalize / self-medicate symptoms away is now only becoming truly, and horrifyingly, obvious to me. I hope the shaking goes away with time.

The worst for me is the insomnia. Not just now, but for a large number of years. I am on day 3, of another try, and have a cold to boot. It got to the point, that I was regularly taking a sleeping pill just before bed, even after all of the drinking, to ensure a "full" night of "sleep". That seems like a horrific idea, now that I type this.

Someone mentioned that their nails would break non-stop. I never had that problem but my cuticles are a mess. I have to push them back and trim them at least a couple of times a week. Has anyone else experience something like that? Maybe the problem will go away.

This thread has been immensely beneficial to me and I have book marked it for weekly reminding of what we do to ourselves just for a drink. Thank you all.

That was me for sure. You know I'd get so drunk and then so drunk the next day I'd smell of booze. Could I smell it? Nope. i didn't think I smelled at all and my landlord kindly asked if I was going to have a shower soon because I smelled bad. I never wore cologne myself because I thought I smelled normal. Of course a hot summers day and I'd be pissed drunk and then go to the bar without a shower and when I sat down I'd order a drink and the manager there would come over and ask if I had anything to drink and I would say no and he wasn't fooled. TOld me to come back tomorrow once I sober up because he couldn't be held responsible to serve me drunk. I'm sure he smelled the booze sweating out of my pores because I was on a 4 day binge with no food or water so the only sweat that came out was alcohol.

Yeah I think that was me who said about not eating. I didn't. I drank straight to keep the effect. I"M SOOOO happy today that I don't do that anymore. Today I went out to a movie and lunch with my brother and we so happened to go into the place I loved to drink which was Boston Pizza and we sat in the bar... under his recommendation because they serve quicker there. I was a bit uncomfortable but held everything together. Not once did I think to drink even in my old drinking hole. Nope. Sat there drank diet pepsi and ate pizza. god bless for being sober :)

This is a great thread - reminders galore.

Be well.

Thanks for bumping this, AO. Some excellent motivators here.

I see that someone mentioned getting cramp in their feet after drinking. I used to have this almost every night - I cursed my shoes so badly! - and I've just realised that it's virtually gone. Yay! I can wear my posh shoes again! :c033:

Constantly phlemy, spitting, hacking.

There were a number for me, but the most alarming was surely regular rather explosive visits to the toilet!

I just subscribed to this thread in case I need something to read to remind me why I quit drinking. I really have nothing unique to add at this point.

But yes, almost all the above.

Overweight, constantly sweating, terrible bowels, stank, alopecia of the beard, bloated face, liver ache, no energy, vomitting, paranoia.

Awful.

Mine is the horrible horrible water weight gain. I would bloat so bad that it hurt to bend my fingers. Also the aching in my kidneys when I kept myself from going to the bathroom when I really needed to.

Red cheeks, having to shower minimum of twice daily and use a lot of deodorant after to cover bad body odour. Eventually digestive problems and heart palpitations accompanied by hand tremors were the ones that scared me most. I'm pretty sure I had some liver damage when I was drinking but fortunately with youth on my side and abstinence there doesn't seem to a problem there anymore...

This post is bitter sweet for me. I had posted on this thread after my first go at sobriety. After reading my post I realize that my symptoms now have truly progressed in just over a year and a half. Alcoholism is definitely progressive in nature. When I quit the first time I had drinking quite a bit more than I have in this last year. One would think that by "cutting back" the symptoms wouldn't progress as much as they did.

I feel the need to update this post now.

Annoying body issues with drinking:
1. Uncontrollable hand tremors after drinking (didn't have that the first time)
2. Diarrhea every day for months until 2 weeks ago. (more severe than before)
3. Horrible anxiety during and after drinking ( I used to only have headaches and hangovers, but no anxiety really.)
4. Alienated more family and friends to the point that they text and ask if I'm o.k. since they hadn't heard from me...and still not calling or texting back until I got annoyed enough to do so, so that they would leave me alone.
5. Felt that I was completely hopeless and that life wasn't worth living.

I haven't posted or mentioned this to anyone. If it's inappropriate and this gets taken down, then that's fine but here goes. The day before I quit this time and got back on SR, I got really drunk and felt the lowest that I had in my entire life. I went into my bedroom and emptied all the shells out of my revolver and just stared at it. I pointed it at myself and pulled the trigger.

For days I didn't think about it again until recently. What if....WHAT IF...I had thought that all the shells were out of the gun but one was left over??? I would have killed myself.

THAT goes far beyond annoying body issues, I know. It's a serious wake up call. I'm not suicidal so don't worry about that. Having a couple of weeks under my belt to process that moment has scared the sh** out of me. I'm thankful that I'm here right now drinking my coffee and typing this.

At least I can look back to this post and see where I was, and subsequently where I went, practically to hell, even though I wasn't drinking a half gallon of rum in 2 days as before over a year and a half ago.

I hope this post doesn't offend anyone, but it's the truth. My post the first time seemed so light and airy, I had no real symptoms to complain about. I'd say almost killing myself is probably the worst of the worst. I haven't told anyone about this or ever written in my journal about it. I guess I just wanted to pretend that I didn't go that far.

I realize that my life IS worth living and that this has to be the end of drinking for me FOREVER. I can't go back to that state of mind again. No moderation possible here, not even a thought that crosses my mind now. I know that I cannot drink no matter what happens. Trying to moderate for a year and this is where it brought me, almost to death.

thank god you are okay!

This thread started right after I quit. After all this time I can say that I felt even worse than I thought. Alcohol really is poison. I can't believe I did that to myself for so long. I'm still a beat up old dude but I feel so much better.

Blackout girl -

**************************{Hugs }}}}}}}}}}}}}}}

Thank you for your brutal honesty.

Please be well.

XO AO