Gottalife

The cops came to my work one Tuesday morning to arrest me for something I had done while drunk in another town about six months previously. After a bit of time in the cells, I was interviewed, charged, and taken before the judge in the early afternoon. He finished with me at about 2.00 pm.

I was released on remand. I was a bit shaken up. I should have gone back to work. But I am an alcoholic. I don't react to things like normal people, and I don't have the same sane view of things.

Just across the road from the court was a bar. It was capping day, and there were a lot of festivities in the town. Lots of partying students.

I thought to myself I deserve to have a good time after that court experience. I will just have a couple of drinks and enjoy the fun. Strange how I was only minutes away from the consequences my drinking brings, and yet it does not to come to mind. What should have stopped me from drinking had become the reason to drink. Bad time in court - need a drink to feel better.

I had a great time, for the first couple of hours, then the usual madness returned. I drank more and more and come closing time, some really crazy stuff happened. I will never forget the feeling of despair as I landed face first in that cold cell that night.

How the hell did this happen? It was the furthest thing from my mind when I took the fatal first drink. And why did I take that drink anyway? It was obvious I couldn't drink safely.

I took that drink because my memory let me down, it always did. AA talks about not being able to remember a week or a month ago, I could not even hold a memory of even a few minutes ago.

Wake up, sick as, and get paraded before the same judge. "Weren't you here yesterday" he said.

uncle holmes

Wow Mike that's scary stuff. Alcoholism at its best! Similar stuff happened to me back in the day.

The insanity of taking that first drink, even when I knew I was an alcoholic and not worrying about the outcome but rather just getting that escape that alcohol gave me.

Cunning, baffling, and powerful alcoholism really is!

Gottalife

The scary thing is not somuch what I did and the consequences. That isn't what makes me alcoholic. Plain old non alcoholic bad people pinch cars and vandalise things.

The thing I have in common with the real alcoholic is that inability to bring to mind the sane thoughts that ought to stop me drinking in the first place. Just minutes after trembling in the dock, they had completely gone from my mind.

It really was all about that fatal first drink, and the in inability to leave it alone no matter how great the wish. Our stories differ. Lack of control and choice are the common denominators.

ScottFromWI

That's the true insanity of our condition, right? And it's one of the main reasons I had to find a different way to live vs. reacting to consequences, because it doesn't work obviously ;-)

Poppy79

Can I ask why it took 6 months for the police to come knocking? Did you remember what you did or were you blacked out at the time?
I did something close to a year ago and still worry I will get a knock on the door. No memory of it either, but I saw the damage the next day. A sane person would have stopped that very same day but I kept going for a few months after that night. This addiction really is a nightmare.

Gottalife

I did a geographical after the offense and it took them that long to find me again. I wasn't any special kind of a criminal, just an idiot and a nuisance. They don't put clowns like me on crime watch.

feldknocker

Thanks,for sharing your story. I personally don't believe the "I'm alcoholic and don't react to things like normal people. I don't see things the same way." In my opinion, this is something that gets bantered about in he rooms constantly that is totally false. Alcoholics don't react to alcohol like normal people, sure. But we are human beings. Every one of us trudging the Earth deals with a f-ed up mind at times. The crazy thinking we share is no different from the crazy thinking every single human being has. Our difference is that the drug alcohol has a much different effect on us than non-alcoholics. It's an allergy to a chemical hat sets us apart,

MindfulMan

Addicts/alcoholics have extremely distorted thinking and do things differently than "normal" people while in the grip of their addictions. Sobriety tends to stop these behaviors, as well as a great deal of the distorted thinking. Psychotherapy can deal with the rest.

Gottalife

Im sharing experience rather than opinion, but it might have made more sense of I used the past tense and said I was an active alcoholic and didn't react like a normal sane person would" That is just a fact.

The allergy to the chemical is just one part. If that were all it was, then the problem would be solved by simply not taking the fatal first drink. Alcoholics of my type also have an obsession of the mind which condemns us to keep repeating the mistake of the fatal first drink. That is why, in AA, we say the main problem centers in the mind.

Today, as a recovered alcoholic, I react in much the same way as normal sane people.

SoberTyger

It is amazing how stupid we were when we drank. Once I lost my job because of my drinking - I went home feeling pity for myself and regret for what troubles my drinking caused me. I was also completely broke - so what did I do? Called a friend to ask to loan some money, so I could go to the pub and get wasted.

Another time I was in deep financial troubles because of my drinking, had bills that needed to be paid urgently and had spend all my money on booze. So, in a period of soberity I'd taken up model railroading hoping a new hobby would keep me busy - I'd bough a lot of expensive train models and they were all there in their original boxes and everything.. So i went on ebay and sold all of them, and as they were rare collector's items I got a good amount of money for them. As the money got on my bank account, I though to myself... Got so much I can pay my bils and still have some money left for myself, better enjoy a nice afternoon at the pub. 1,5 weeks later I was dead drunk, sick, all my money spent and not a single bill paid