PDM31

I've had some financial and personal issues over the last couple of years which has increased my anxiety levels.

I'm 40 next month and since the age of 18 i've drank most weekends. Sometimes Friday and Saturday or both.

Lately however i've felt like i'm two people, the one with a drink in me and the one without. The one without the drink has goals, ambitions relating to exercise, finances and developing habits that take me closer to them. Then the nice weather comes or it's Friday and i'm having a drink (never alone - with my wife, friends etc). When i've got a drink inside me I'll organise a night out with my friends for the week after, then wake up feeling rough the next day and regret organising anything. It seemed like a good idea at the time.

Then for a day or two after drinking, the early morning wake up goes out the window, no exercise and I eat very poorly. Then Friday comes around and it starts all over again.

My whole life is based around a drink of a weekend, whether it's time spent with my friends, my wife, my parents, her parents etc. I'm just getting fed up of feeling like two different people. I love socialising (especially as I work from home) but I just hate that anxiety feeling the next day, regretting drinking and then thinking to myself why have i just organised something else now for next week.

Not even sure if i'm explaining myself correctly but I just feel like there's two sides of me and there never used to be. I can handle alcohol and have probably built up a tolerance over the years but the next day I feel awful. Like I'm on deaths door. This Saturday we're all going to a bar in my friends house to celebrate Fathers Day weekend and all that means is everyone drinking. The way i'm feeling now I want to turn up with 12 bottles of 0% beer, but I know come the weekend i'll be raring to go again.

It's time for a month's break i think.

SnazzyDresser

Alcohol never made me a better person, that's for damn sure. And giving it up forever led to what I now view as an authentic existential rebirth for me.

All the best to you as you grapple with this life-or-death issue, PDM. Welcome to SR. You can quit that drinking chapter of your life forever if you take proper sustained action to that end.

nez

Hi PDM31. Welcome to the forums. I am glad you are here. Lots of good people on here and helpful discussions.
I am presently in my 17th year of a break. I have discovered there is nothing wrong with not drinking. What a concept!!! Absolutely no regrets whatsoever.

doggonecarl

Welcome to Sober Recovery. If you haven't already, I hope you take the time to read around the site. See if you recognize yourself in any of the other posts. And while your looking, perhaps ponder the impracticality of this:

You don't need a month's break. You need to quit. You probably can't fathom that now. But you will. And you will get closer to understanding that if you drink this weekend.

For the first couple of months of my sobriety, I had to avoid all events where I knew there was going to be drinking. I knew I'd be too tempted.

As far as you being two people--the person who wants to quit and the person who wants to drink--you should read up on Addictive Voice Recognition Techniques. It leverages the fact that there is the rational mind that wants sobriety, and the addictive mind that want to drink. Two minds, two people.

PDM31

Yes I'm going to take some non alcoholic beers with me instead. Everyone is bringing their own drinks so I'll do that.

At least for now that will feel like I'm still "participating" in the evening and not standing there with a glass of lemonade whilst everyone has beer.

Dee74

Hi and welcome PDM
I was once where you are - felt like I was two people...hated the effect alcohol was having on me and my life - but I was still looking at ways to keep alcohol in my life - or at least not look out of place in a life and social circle geared to drinking.

I tried breaks, I tried drinking drinks I hated, I tried alternating with water, I tried strictly limiting the time when I could have my next beer, I tried shandys (mixing beer with soft drink) I tried light beer and then NA beer....

The one thing that worked at all - and worked hands down - and gave me the real me back - was not drinking at all.

It sounds momentous - and in a way it is - but I don;t regret a single one of the changes that happened in my life.

I got the real me back - for good.

My life now is like Technicolour to my old drinking life's grainy black and white

D

tomls

Welcome! My whole life was drinking.No matter what else I was doing. I had to change everything and everyone I associated with except my wife. She doesn't drink. For the longest time I thought I would never be able to stop the nightmare cause how can you just change your whole life's way of existing? It had to be the most important thing in my life cause if I didn't do it I was going to die and on the way there I was going to be miserable. Best wishes!
And now I know it was the best choice I ever made!

tomls

Your situation is only going to get worse. That's the way this thing works.

PDM31

I don't have a problem with alcohol per se. I'm not addicted. Generally I'll only have a drink if my wife suggests it on a weekend or there's a social occasion. It's just lately I've not liked how I've felt the next day. Anxious. Regretting the night even though I enjoyed it. Then anxious over the next social occasion until my hangover passes. I've set myself some financial and weight goals during the next couple of months and alcohol is the biggest threat to accomplishing them.

Fronting

Sounds like you're drinking more than a drink. Being on edge and hypersensitivity is normal during hangovers. The older you get the more of a deep tiredness will come over you with each hangover.

Your conscience was put there by God. It's like a never ending court session going on in your head and you're on trial and your conscience is telling you what is right and wrong. You either listen to it or face the consequences. Don't disobey your conscience. If you don't listen to your conscience you won't listen to anyone else.

doggonecarl

Great. Then you'll have absolutely no problem quitting. Good luck.

Fallow

I have done this so many times. My drunken mouth making plans that my sober mind doesn't actually want to follow through on. For me 9 times out of 10 I was agreeing to feel like garbage again sometime in the future. Sounded good at the time.

I relate to a lot of what you said. Welcome!

sugarbear1

Alcoholism is about not being able to live without drinking, at some point. Alcohol was my solution until it stopped working and then I needed a new solution. Where is that solution?