slipnslide

I’m just curious about something. I don’t drink often, but when I do I have a hard time not drinking too much. And every time I do drink too much I suffer the next day. Bad. My digestive system dumps everything I eat or drink out, I dry heave, I can’t concentrate, my anxiety is through the roof.....I legit can’t function.

But then I will read posts on here about people who drink until they pass out, get up, go to work the next day, and so the same thing all over again.

But... how? How are some people able to do that while I feel like death is at my doorstep?

tomsteve

some dont sober up long enough to have those symptoms.

August252015

Everyone is different along their path, in some ways, but alcoholism is a progressive disease and the best way to describe things you haven't felt, done, lost, anything is "YET." Many of us endured (self-caused) losses of many kinds before we quit. For some of us, we stopped before the train got to the final destination, death.

Sounds like you might benefit from something like 30 or 90 days sober - can you do it? What do you start to learn from being sober?

Best to you.

JeffreyAK

Yup, heavy every-day drinkers often never get stone sober. That delays and compounds all those symptoms, and when they do sober up they go through a hell called "alcohol withdrawal".

slipnslide

Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t a hangover a smaller scale version of withdrawal?

JeffreyAK

More or less, and some of the symptoms are the same, just far less severe. Serious withdrawal often adds other symptoms, like you can't walk because your balance is gone, sweats, severe shakes, hallucinations. People can die from alcohol withdrawal.

eyes99

There’s a debate about that. From what I’ve read, a hangover is it’s own thing due to dehydration and the build-up of toxic chemicals in the liver (I think it’s called acetaldehyde). The chemicals are by products from processing the alcohol and are toxic in and of themselves.

But some people will swear that a hangover is withdrawal. I never experienced hangovers that way - my symptoms didn’t mirror how folks describe withdrawal symptoms. And people who don’t drink a lot, but then have too much, also get hangovers even though their bodies couldn’t possibly be chemically dependent on alcohol.

Dee74

I used to think that guys who could drink like I did and then get up and resume normal life were proof I could have my cake and eat it too.

I dunno about the other guys but my drinking stole my soul, stole my joy, turned me into someone I detested, caused pain to my loved ones, and ultimately nearly killed me.

Those are the things I have to remember - what other people do or how they drink is immaterial.

The fact is I'm happier and more content now that I have ever been, and certainly more than I was a destructive drinker.

My advice is stop peeking over the fence - tend to your own garden...and make it magnificent

D

TheSoberDude

Well, alcoholics never “feel” well. We may get used to the side effects, while other people who barely drink suffer for several days after drinking. I know my mind and body became accustomed to the feeling. It was the new norm. When you’re sober, you finally realize what it’s like to be human again. Happy, energetic, thoughtful, and well rested.

Gottalife

Will Power. Alcoholics have above average willpower and this is a very good example.

eyes99

This! No matter how bad I felt, the evening seemed like a good time to have another. And another poster mentioned getting used to feeling like crap. That too. And still working, taking care of kids, etc, etc. Alcoholics have above average willpower, are stubborn, and I’d guess that we also have above average pain tolerance. Or, we just soldier through until we can get to the next drink that will make the pain recede. It’s a sad life and cycle.

NYCDoglvr

Binge drinking is part of the progression of alcoholism. I call myself an alcoholic because once I pick up a drink I can't stop and have no control over what happens.

nez

Lots of practice. Half tongue in cheek but also deadly serious at the same time. Early in my drinking, I got hangovers. As time went on, they lessened and my drinking increased. The first time I went cold turkey, I had a seizure from acute alcohol withdrawal and almost impaled myself through my eye socket on a wrought iron fence and got an ambulance ride to the ER, IVs in the arms, the whole nine yards. Those seizures can kill you if you don't get immediate medical assistance.

For a couple of decades, my body knew drunk and alcohol. That was it's normal. I didn't deprieve it of what it knew, so I didn't get hangovers.

eyes99

And I forgot to mention, as a previous poster did, binge drinking can be alcoholic too. If pence you pick up a drink, you have a hard time stopping, you are very likely an alcoholic, no matter the frequency of the events.

Obladi

My daughter when she turned 21 allowed herself to go out and get blasted (normally she has no more than 1 or 2 drinks) "just once to see what it was like." The morning after, dealing with her sick-as-a-dog hangover, she said, "do alcoholics get used to this?" I said, well we don't tend to throw up all day, but the rest of it, yes. On standard drinking days, I'd have no problem, but when I upped the quantity I experienced nausea, diarrhea, sometimes vomiting, shakiness and sweating while living through my day. It's hard work and I don't recommend it.

Get off the train while you still can.