Dropsie

Sass,

I just wanted to say again how helpful this post is.

I need to remember the crazy. Unlike many here, I would love to be a normal drinker.

But I need to remember things like your post that I am not and never will be a normal drinker (or tall). Over time, we tend to forget the crazy. And it was crazy.

Thanks again,

XX

JungaLungaLay

I did it daily in my final months. I would stop at the liquor store on the way home from work then immediately go into the bathroom at the grocery store next door because I didn't want to wait until I got home.

LarryF

I would walk to the gas station and by a couple 24otz beers. I would go into the bathroom and chug them. Then I went across the streetyt and do the same thing. Then I would go across the street kitty corner from the first gas station. I would grab a couple more and walk to the bathroom in the back corner and drink a couple more. I didn't bother paying for those one. That calmed down the withdrawals until the liquor store opened.

feldknocker

I get you. I loved drinking in my car. After work, straight to the drive through to buy tall boys, turn on the radio to music or sports talk and then drive the streets. I loved the solitude of it. Plus I could through my cans out the window not have to see them piled up in my trash barrel. I did this for so many years and only have one DUI to show for it.

I am beyond grateful I don't have to live this way.

uncle holmes

I loved to drink and drive and just be spontaneous and drive wherever my drunken mind would be headed to for hours on end!

One time I was at a Detroit Tigers baseball game and was drinking but ran out of money! I walked by the concession stand and noticed someone left a beer by the ketchup and mustard table! I needed alcohol so bad that I just walked over there and took that beer and drank it!

One time I dressed as a baby for halloween with a milk bottle so I could put alcohol in the milk bottle!

Yes, the insanity!

froscow

Reminds me of the end of my drinking days. I relapsed, got put in the drunk tank, and when I got out the next morning...I went straight to the store for a pint of vodka which I guzzled down in the bathroom stall of a construction site...right next to the police station where I spent the night. Addiction is unrelenting!

Wasylena

I have hidden bottles a lot in the past. I’m ashamed of that, but the addiction speaks...

Outonthetiles

Casino bathroom. Travel size mouthwash container I preloaded with vodka, chased by liquid marijuana. Legal pot was so new at the time that they didn't even have edibles on the market, but for some reason they had liquid pot. So at a birthday party at a casino I pregamed in the bathroom with all my smuggled in junk. I thought I was so clever. It was right before Halloween and someone at the casino was dressed like Capt. Kangaroo, and the future Mrs. Tiles wanted to get a picture together with him. Later that night we went bowling and I fell over while throwing the ball I was so off balance.
The whole thing seems so embarrassing now. I'm glad I don't have to live like that any more.

Mitra

Love your post Stayingsassy.

I've gone low too - including the ladies room often. I usually started my weekend drinking in the early morning. One Saturday or Sunday, a few hours after I had gotten into it, my husband informs me that he had invited his family over. Normally my 'cover-up' is a BIG coffee mug. But I was mad that my drinking day was interrupted with no notice, so I grabbed my case of beer and hid in the closest when they came. A bunch of kids found me and told everyone where I was and what I was doing.

Congrats on sobriety.

LateBloominCait

I didn't drink in bathroom stalls, but only because I was a bar manager and didn't have to. I still tried to hide it the best I could. I would mix vodka into my vitamin waters before walking into work and take swigs from it all day. By the end of the shift, I would be pretty nicely toasted and then I would sit down after clocking out to have my shift drinks with the staff. I used to kid myself that I wasn't an alcoholic, I was just running an "old school" establishment where the staff was allowed a few drinks here or there. What a mess it was to be my own drug dealer.

007

Yep. Many times I've been in a pub, having a drink and have a bag of some booze that I go to the stall to drink from (to save money) ...
ive drunk small bottles of vodka before going into clubs..almost puking as I chug it to get up before going in...sometimes I was so tanked they didn't even let me in.

I used to get the last bus home and fall asleep and wake up miles from home. I'd sleep under a tree, or something...one time a mcdonald's toilet.

I've gone out for a cheeky beer at lunchtime and come back a little too drunk.

I used to go on dates and be nervous so I'd pack a few miniatures that I would choke down in the stall between drinks to liven up.

I thought people didn't notice...but they must have done.

I used to steal drinks in bars all the time...'oh, a beer sitting on the table...I'll have that!'.

Countless times I've been in the pub...and then I wake up in my bed.

FindingMyNext

Yes, Sassy. Yes. So many bathroom stalls. So many bottles stashed in my purse. So many events, activities, and errands spent feeling fuzzy and looking for a restroom.

Now that I'm sober, I don't even carry a purse. Why bother? My phone, credit card, and key fit in my pocket, and there's no need for a bottle of anything. Every time I leave the house, I'm struck by how light and free I feel, without having to carry the 5000-pound weight of a stashed water bottle filled with vodka.
Thanks for the reminder, Sassy.

Stayingsassy

Thank you.

I mean....I went low, but honestly I was low for about 5-8 years. I drank in the bathroom, hid alcohol, and drank before going anywhere but work for a very long time.

I played games with the addiction (forcing a hard stop every 72 hours with shaking and withdrawal because I knew 72 hours is how long it takes for the liver to clear, switching from whiskey to beer for a long time until I couldn’t stand it and had to have whiskey again, changing diets, changing exercise, only drinking at 5’oclock (and never stopping at cocktail hour of course), using Antabuse then waiting 10 days for it to clear, drinking, then taking Antabuse the next day, changing work schedules, changing jobs, deciding to have children (I think I partly chose to have 3 kids because the only time I got any relief from drinking and the addiction was pregnancy), overhydrating during a drinking episode....)

it was a lot of years of games. I was on a real losing streak at the end, none of my old or new strategies worked any more, it always won, and it got darker, and darker.

but at the end the light of day was thrown onto it somehow, it’s lies lost power, the illusions were gone, and I know today as much as I knew the day I quit that I was done screwing around with alcohol, it was over. I knew none of the good times would come back, and it would be only addiction, the the circular wheel, the sickness, the regret and the fear. I still see it that way today. I’ve thought some dangerous thoughts in the last three years, I’ve done some rationalization and some romanticizing, but ultimately that last drunk I had and those last five years of my alcoholism are my most prominent memory now, so the thoughts lead to that and so far, I haven’t picked up. Just because you have a thought, doesn’t mean an action must follow.

Mitra

Yes, THIS exactly what you just said Sassy! Always trying to outmaneuver my alcoholism. I am organizing my home now and finding remnants of those 'games' hidden throughout the house. I've only been sober for two weeks and I'm actually curious to know how much more is hiding. It's like cleaning up after some stranger has been living in your home.

waynetheking

Great post SS and thank you for reminding me of the insanity of this disease. So many times we have to have these hidden places to "get tight" in order for our lives to be complete. In all reality we were surcomming to the disease. It's sickening. I hope none of us ever have to go back there. Never.
Thanks again.

newhope01

Excellent post Sassy! I too remember drinking shots of mini vodka bottles in the bathroom stall I smuggled in my cute Coach purse at the ballet. Passing out during the performance that I spent hundreds of dollars to see. How much time I spent trying to dress so elegantly to end up a drooling drunk stumbling home in my heels. I always regret that night and now I can’t even imagine going back to the ballet. Too much shame wrapped up in it.

Every time I think of having a drink again, I remember that night at the ballet. Amongst many other nights of horror.

Dropsie

NewHope,

Just a thought, but I wonder if you should go back to the ballet, when we have ballet again that is.

We need to form new memories. They cannot, and indeed should not, replace our past memories, but our new sober selves should see the ballet too.

We got this.

X

BMH

Hiding drinks everywhere. I could write a book on this.

ThatWasTheOldMe

I cringe when I think back on my drinking days.
There are a lot of things that I just don't dwell on any more.
One day at a time - I live for today and the future.
I know what brought me here though.

otter

As Meatball would say; you took the words right out of my mouth.

I cringe thinking how lucky I've been in my drinking days of not killing someone or myself.