Bruno1979

Hello my sober friends,

Today once again I was thinking about alcoholism and I asked myself the above question again.

The obvious answer is to the question is the word "Addiction" but some recovery methods don't like to work on this as a lot of people aren't physically addicted, just as I wasn't.

Does anyone know the reason why we can't control our drinking?

Bruno

Anna

Alcoholism also involves mental addiction, the obsession of the mind.

Bruno1979

Yeah I agree,

I think that was my problem.

I'd read traffic signs, or any sign in fact and think that I was reading names of alcoholic drinks.

It was bizarre in the end to say the least.

A total obsession.

Soberwolf

1 is too many a thousand is never enough is the saying

Once you have one you will always want more and after a 1000 youl still want more this is why addiction/alcoholism is so deadly destructive & soul destroying

Hence one is too many focus on that & understand it

blueberry2015

That is a really good question! And I don't know why either!

Bruno1979

Yes I get that part of it. I was thinking of the medical reason behind it.

Thinking because I've got nothing else better to do these days, which is good. Very good.

january161992

for me

the little bit of drinking i did for a few years was the symptom

the problem is my emotional and mental disorders, shortcomings, defects of character and that im just a knucklehead

carlingford

Wish I knew Bruno, there has to be a touch of madness in us. As you probably know all the factors like genes, environment, family history, length of time drinking and amount etc. etc.. When I drank over the years it was for the social end of things, like meeting new people and was a devil for chasing the girls. Older and little wiser now and as one elderly man asked me in my home town when I was younger and drinking my head off, " has the drink got a grip yet" I was naieve and shrugged the comment off, but deep down I really knew what he meant and never forgot that comment. To directly answer your question Bruno, we have rewired our brain due to repetitive overuse of an addictive poison, only solution to try and revert back to normal is to abstain forever. Period. Well that's my take on it, and I relapsed last Friday night after 17 days and back on day 3 again, but gotta keep trying as recovery period is getting longer and longer..... probably due to kindling, sorry for going on .... but that's my two cents worth, take care, C

Choicy

To me, I was born this way. I am an addict.

I can choose freedom or I can become enslaved to those thought patterns which become my behavior. "Born this way" used to be an excuse to use..."this is what I am!"

I had a moment when I realized
this is what I am doing,
but
is this WHO I am?

Whatever question you begin with, go with it...I faltered when I thought I had all the answers!

btw, I am still discovering Who I Am!

Thanks for posting, Bruno, You Are Necessary!

Darwinia

A few drinks make one feel so good. More, logically will make one feel even better. And more than more will make one feel best of all.

tomsteve

along with obsession of the mind, theres also the phenomenom on craving, which doc silkworth wrote some about:
Men and women drink essentially because they like the effect produced by alcohol. The sensation is so elusive that, while they admit it is injurious, they cannot after a time differentiate the true from the false. To them, their alcoholic life seems the only normal one. They are restless, irritable and discontented, unless they can again experience the sense of ease and comfort which comes at once by taking a few drinks-drinks which they see others taking with impunity. After they have succumbed to the desire again, as so many do, and the phenomenon of craving develops, they pass through the well-known stages of a spree, emerging remorseful, with a firm resolution not to drink again. This is repeated over and over, and unless this person can experience an entire psychic change there is very little hope of his recovery.

carlingford

Me same same Darwinia, we are probably all like that, sometimes I thought I was given this disease as a punishment for being bold when younger, just saying. Little did I know the fire I was dealing with !!

Bruno1979

Really good answers,

Thank you

Forward12

I believe it's because we think one day we will find that peace we seek by drinking. The more we drink, the closer it seems we get, but it's never enough. So we drink and drink some more.
It's like climbing a wall where we think it's going to be over, "but just another few!" and we keep going, the wall grows, "no, just a few more!" and it's never ending.
Though with not taking a sip, you can just take the elevator to the top.

madgirl

I do not understand people who claim to enjoy one glass of wine. What is the point? I drank to get drunk, lose my inhibitions.

Getting drunk at some point every day is a great way to hurt everyone you love and wreck your life.

So I choose sobriety. I know I can't "moderate" and have no genuine interest in doing so. I have no idea why I am like this but it doesn't matter.

Bruno1979

Yes same here,

I can think of a lot of drinks that taste nicer than alcohol if I was just drinking to drink something nice tasting.

meowychristmas

madgirl, exactly my thoughts.

AnvilheadII

ditto tomsteve's post......

a physical COMPULSION coupled with a mental OBSESSION.

while there are many flavors of alcoholic, at it's core, THIS is the hell of addiction.

totfit

I have no doubt that I am physically different. I even recall early on in my drinking just at the drinking age thinking, "it does not make them feel the way I do". Of course on the other side of the coin I always figured since I was of above average intelligence that surly I could drink like others. But I could not. Once I introduced alcohol it made its print and from there came denial and obsession to stop as much as start. It is now apparent, that I am just different. It will never work for me or work too well depending on how one looks at it........and it is not a big deal. It is just not for my body, so I find other things to do. It is as simple for me today as doing something, most anything else, besides drinking.

EndGameNYC

If there were a "medical explanation" for losing control over our drinking, then medical doctors might be able to treat alcoholism. They can't. And most have little or no knowledge and little or no training about and in alcoholism and other addictions.

It might appear to some of us that you're still searching for a way to drink "normally."