LawMama

Hi all. Hope everyone is having a nice sober Saturday night. I should be studying but I'm not. I'm having some of the same recurring thoughts I have that go something like this: am I really an alcoholic? Maybe I could try controlled drinking again. I only got arrested once, and I'm only 27 so maybe I haven't hit rock bottom. What if I'm not a real alcoholic and I'm just a fraud and I could be out drinking with my friends and not have to work the 12 steps and deal with my problems? What would be so wrong with one drink?

I just struggle sometimes because I hear stories of other alcoholics and well, mine isn't so bad. I have never had a DUI/DWI, have never gotten into a drunk driving accident, have never lost a job over drinking, have never been homeless, or anything that bad, have not drunk during the day (except on vacations, holidays, and when I've gone out to lunch LOL). I mean, I have gotten arrested once after a drunken fight and I have had a lot of drunken fights. I've also been prone to self-abuse when drinking, and I have had to purge alcohol at night so as to attempt to control the hangover the next day.

Now that I'm writing this down I think it is my disease trying to talk me out of sobriety, but it makes so much sense when these thougths are running through my head. I thank God I didn't have a "low bottom," but at the same time it is tough to keep going back to step 1 every few weeks when my mind starts to tell me I can drink like a normal person.

Is this familiar to anyone, or is this some sort of bad sign that I may need to relapse and go further down the destructive road before I can really stay sober?

Thanks for listening.

stellaloella

Well, I hope you can take it seriously that you're having thoughts like this right now. I can't say what your situation is or has been, but I think it's very encouraging that you are taking it seriously now. At 26, I got a DUI and believed I was still okay. I actually went through periods of sobriety after that and had a child at 28. However, I'm almost 34 now and things only have gotten worse. Please take yourself seriously. I can speak from experience that my denial of the situation paved the way for where I am now. I'm an educated, social person so it's been all the easier to pretend that I'm not "one of them" (a.k.a. a DRUNK). I have noticed it getting worse in almost stair-step increments. Every year or two I've had some horrible episode that set the stage for the times to come.

I tend to think that trying to convince yourself that you're able to return to normal drinking is alcoholic thinking. I have certainly had times where, yes, I was able to moderate. Those times are dangerous because they have fooled me into thinking I have the capacity to drink normally. I just don't.

Best wishes to you. Please take care of yourself and your body/mind.

Dee74

Hi Law Mama

I've never had a DUI, have no police record, always paid my bills (although not always on time), only lost a job at the very end...but my drinking still nearly killed me.

I think a lot of people think of a bottom as an event - I think of it as the point where we say 'I cannot live like this anymore'....I know that was my bottom anyway.

I actually drank more and got into far more embarrassing situations a few years earlier than when I actually quit...but I ignored the signs...I started drinking at home to avoid possible public embarrassment, and drinking less cos I was basically permanently ill...but I chose to push on and waste another 4-5 years of my life.

Bad decision. Alcoholism really is progressive - whether we have those consequences or not, they are pretty much inevitable I think.

Listen to what your gut is telling you LM.
D

Mark75

Alcoholics know if they are or not... it's not an external thing, it's not how many drinks or what kind of trouble we've been in. You already know that though. Having a "low bottom" is, of course, relative. Nothing I say will mean anything because that journey to acceptance you have to take alone.

I wouldn't worry, at this point, about the doing all the 12 steps... It sounds to me like you are still struggling with the first one... you've said so...I did too. See, I still have the house, family, car, job... But I also have the picture in my mind of my powerlessness and insanity when it comes to alcohol.

You mentioned some insanity in your post... arrested for fighting, self abuse, hangovers, purging. Did you obsess over alcohol? If not, it seems to me that you are now. That may be the biggest red flag of all

Easy does it... You can always drink, now, tomorrow, next week... but maybe keep going with this recovery thing and get some more time and...work the steps. And, keep posting.

firestorm090

I knew I was alcoholic long before the consequences motivated me.

I discovered I either had to listen to my gut, or life would do the telling for me. I wish I had listened to my gut.

Stang

[QUOTE]I just struggle sometimes because I hear stories of other alcoholics and well, mine isn't so bad. I have never had a DUI/DWI YET, have never gotten into a drunk driving accident YET, have never lost a job over drinking YET, have never been homeless YET, or anything that bad YET, have not drunk during the day (except on vacations, holidays, and when I've gone out to lunch LOL) In other words you've been drinking during the day.

Fixed that for ya!

Oh yea the addiction is talking to ya. Tell it to go **** it self!!!

yeahgr8

I was the same at 27...add nice house and car, fiancee etc...who knows if you are an alcoholic, only you can tell that and the best way to find out would be to get to a few AA meetings and listen! It might help you to understand whats going on as for years i thought that my addiction was a seperate entity that i could choose to ignore or listen to, kind of like the devil on one shoulder and angel on the other...of course its not, its you and that means if you are an alcoholic, to be able to live a happy and free life, you have to change and be willing to...

LawMama

Thanks all. I have gotten involved in AA and I know I am an alcoholic but sometimes I have these bizarre ideas that I am not a "real" alcoholic and I need to go out and do some more effed up stuff before I can really get sober. I think I have developed interesting ways to talk myself into a drink, is what I think is going on.

But, I'm not going to have a drink, at least not tonight (well, I'll have several drinks of Diet coke and coffee). I'm just going to have to keep on taking it one day at a time, talking to my sponsor, going to mtgs, etc.

Actually my sponsor's response when I told her my little schpeel about how I haven't gotten a DUI, but I got arrested, purged alcohol, etc? "Sounds like a pretty low bottom to me." Lol.

But really thanks to everyone for listening. It helps a lot to get the crazy thoughts out of my brain and talk to other drunks.

tomdecel

I am fairly new here and I have had the same feeling a couple of times this week, but putting labels aside, if I am not an alcoholic, then I am a definitely "problem" drinker.

My issue is that (compared to other people) I can turn the drinking on and off rather easily, usually for months at a time. The reality is that all the track covering I have to do to enable the drinking is just a real pain, one that I rather live without. The lying, the hiding, the pretending.... not a healthy way to live.

WatchTheSky

This is so familiar to me. Thank you for saying exactly what's on my mind. I think our problem is that we're not only young, but high-functioning. From everything I've been told, you can pride yourself on being high-functioning but there's no point because you'll eventually crash. Maybe you won't have a very low bottom, but it will happen. I've questioned whether I "should" relapse as well. I'm pretty addicted to drama (seems to be rather common in alcoholics!) and every day I catch myself thinking I should have more of a "drinking career" before I quit for good. My sobriety is very tentative. I keep thinking I'm overreacting and I can drink socially. I tend to feel guilty asking for support in sobriety because everyone else seems to have struggled so much more. Then I think of my dad, who is high-functioning and only went to a couple of AA meetings because he listed things that others had experienced that he hadn't and decided he was fine. His journey hasn't been as dramatic as many others, but to this day, it's just as sad.

Itchy

Law Mama,
I am glad that you seem to be over the temptation to drink again just to see a lower low.

Isaiah

I get those thoughts too. They don't go away when things get worse.

I've got two DUIs, one smashed car, 3-4 E.R. trips, one suicide attempt drunk, two ended relationships and two lost apartments. But mine's not as bad as a lot of people's either. I never went to rehab, that means I couldn't have gotten too bad since I never had to go someplace to detox. I've thought I could just chalk up my errors to bad luck.

Yeah, it doesn't go away with more disasters.

crisplover

I have achieved amazing things over the last few years (so people keep telling me!!) Ultra triathlons, bringing up 2 kids on my own, overcoming countless personal problems, new jobs, buying a house... BUT I am an alcoholic with massive problems. I believe that as time goes on, I will achieve less and less, until finally I will just be confined to the house, drinking on my own...I'm not that far from it now.

I'm not sure where I'm going with this but I can say to myself 'I just ran a marathon, I don't have a drinking problem' It's really easy to convince myself that I am a functioning adult but it's rubbish and I have proved that this weekend by drinking at breakfast. Something I never thought I would do.

Lilly03

I get those thoughts too. "Maybe I'm not an alcoholic/addict...Maybe I just drank/used too much before because I wasn't as evolved emotionally as I am now...Maybe after a while I'll be emotionally ready to drink again".

Um no. I am an alcoholic and addict. I have all the symptoms of the disease, I'm just young and haven't reached the point of more destruction. My life before I quit was unmanageable. I just remember back to the first few days after I quit...I never want to feel that way again. Those were the worst days of my life. Every time I think about going back to my old life I have to put things in perspective...And the reality of what will happen if I start again isn't good. It's loss of control followed by getting sober again or the disease taking over.

NEOMARXIST

Hi there LawMama. I think you should take this post of yours as a positive thing for your recovery in some respects. It's great that you shared what's going on in your head and what you're feeling and thinking. By getting this stuff out of my head allows me to see the insanity of my alkie mind and gives me the clarity and perspective. Reaching out and sharing should serve you well in your recovery, bottling stuff up won't do. So thanks for sharing.

I got sober at 23. I was at a real hardcore AA meeting last night attended only by males who all were much older than me and who all obviously drank for far longer than me and let it progress for far longer than me and lost a lot more in many ways as they had families and children and wives etcetc.

However I don't feel less of an alcoholic and I know that I relate 100% to their drinking and thoughts when drinking and they relate to mine. I just stopped the progression earlier. My bottom was all mental and emotional. I just had enough of the pain and was done with drinking.

When I went to a random AA meeting on my 90 day sober anniversary I remember some bloke saying about attending AA that "You ain't here for eating too many Mars bars!". Basically he as well as many, many others go to AA and then try to convince themselves that they aren't really alcoholics and go back out for years and lose evrything and go down even lower until the pain gets bad enough that they go back into recovery again. Basically only alcoholics really attend AA meetings. It's very likely that if you write on SR which is a forum for alcoholics and addicts and attend AA which is a recovery program for alcoholics then you're more than likely alcoholic. Stands to reason really.

Stick with it and stay sober and once you get through this you will be so grateful that you stuck with it and didn't pick back up again.

All The Best

SSIL75

I can relate to this kind of thinking!

But I have to remember that if I wasn't an alcoholic I wouldn't be that phased by quitting drinking. It reminds me of the occasional time I'd be out with friends to eat and we'd have unexpectedly chosen a place without a liquor license. Nobody else seemed to care. But me?? Gutted! And I'd remain edgy and antsy until we could get to a bar afterwards.

Normal people could take or leave alcohol. I am not a normal person

startingagain

I just struggle sometimes because I hear stories of other alcoholics and well, mine isn't so bad.

Wow, can I relate to this. I voluntarily went to an outpatient rehab (2 days a week of group sessions) and honestly? I spent way too much time feeling "better" than them because I wasn't court-ordered to be there. Getting arrested, losing a job, etc. seemed unthinkable. But you know what else seemed unthinkable? Taking a drink before a work or school presentation, spending all day Saturday drunk, etc...yet, I did it, as recently as a week ago.

I ran a marathon 2 weeks after falling off a chair in my house (drunk, of course) and breaking a rib. I got promoted while drinking, had 2 kids, got a masters with honors...but none of that changes the fact that I relapsed, while the others in my group who had more dire circumstances may not have. I didn't take it seriously enough, and subsequently lost another 2 years to drinking.

I seem "together" (or so I'm told). I'm not, as long as I'm drinking. I hope I remember that, and that you do too.

BEST OF LUCK!!!

least

Yes it is, and ignore that little voice cause it's lying to you and will eventually get you in trouble that's not so easy to get out of.

For me my bottom wasn't a bad event, but, as Dee says, just my admitting to myself that I couldn't go on the way I was going. My bottom was emotional. I was sick and tired of always being sick and tired. And now I'm no longer sick or tired and I feel great. To hell with alcohol and the destruction it brings - I'm doing very well without it, thankyouverymuch!

Murray4x5

The way I see it, it's like a Celiac's intestines cannot digest wheat properly, but an alcoholics brain has an over reaction to alcohol. The brain stem and limbic system create more receptors to receive the "feel good" chemicals the brain produces when alcohol arrives, and it's those empty or unstimulated extra receptors which scream out for more booze that cause people to drink again after they quit. These areas are deep within the brain and are capable of leading the higher functioning, thinking portions of our brains around by the nose...usually by what we call urges. These receptors know only the pleasure of the initial chemical bath, and nothing of the pain and suffering the alcohol creates in our lives.

It takes time to build up those extra receptors, and it will take time for our brains to readjust back into having a "normal" number of them. They will not go without a fight. They will try to use every base emotion at their disposal to cajole the thinking part of your brain to either shut down and run on automatic pilot to pick up that first drink, or put you through an emotional meat grinder to make you just give up and drink.

For alcoholic's, it's progressive, and there's no way to moderate it. The bus is going to go over the cliff. The sooner you jump off, the better!

Yak yak yak yak yak...I need to get up out of this chair and do something!

Murray