Hi Spidey, my name is Martin and I am an alcoholic.

I will gladly share my condensed story with you to where you can relate to me.

I drank for 40 years, in the beginning it was mainly binge drinking on weekends, not every weekend, but whenever an opportunity arose. As time went by and I got a bit older I progressed to what some call a maintenance drinker, the longer I drank the more it took for me to get a buzz on and even more to get drunk.

After about 30 years alcohol was no longer my friend, I would try and quit, sometimes I would not drink for a couple of weeks, all I would do then is think about drinking, when I was not drinking I was miserable and every one around me was too!!! Well I would decide I deserved a 6 pack, which of course I drank and really got nothing from it except it took the edge off, that 6 pack led to more the next day I would buy a 12 pack, then the next day I would be right back drinking as much if not more then I was drinking before.

I repeated the above quit & try to stop pattern for about 5 years, then I had crossed the invisible line in alcoholism, I could no longer stop, I had to drink EVERY DAY just to feel normal!

The last year or two I drank things started to really get crazy, one day I would drink 6-8 and start slurring my speech and stumbling around and then the very next day I could drink one right after another all day long and never even feel it!!!!

I did not know it at the time, but I had entered the early final stage of alcoholism where my tolerance went hay wire, my body could no longer handle the abuse I had heaped on it all those years.

Long story short, I had a moment of clarity where I was able to see my future if I kept drinking, my future was I would lose everything I owned and would no longer have my family, all that would be left would be the booze and a long slow painful death from alcoholism.

Well being a chicken crap I did not want to die a long slow painful lonely death, but I had no idea what to do, so I went to a doctor who specialized in alcoholism and drug addiction and told him the total truth about how much I drank, how long I had drank, and how it was affecting me. I thought I was smart because I had a list of medicines that helped with cravings. The doctor told me he would prescribe me what ever I wished, but he told me flat out that it would be wasting my time and his, he told me I needed to go through medical detox because if I tried to detox myself it could kill me.

In a nutshell:

Saw doctor who told me detox

Detox told me if I wanted a chance at staying sober to go to at least 90 AA meetings in 90 days and get a sponsor.

I went to over 90 AA meetings in 90 days and got a sponsor.

In AA they told me if I wanted a chance to stay sober I needed to work the steps with my sponsor.

I worked the steps with my sponsor and he told me if I wanted a chance to stay sober I needed to live the steps the best I could and work at helping other alcoholics get and stay sober.

Spidey I know that sounds like a lot of stuff, but if you are an alcoholic of our variety you have to be willing to do what ever it takes to get and stay sober. In reality doing all of the above did not take as much time as it sounds, but the freedom and happiness I have gained have made the effort more then worth it.

I pray that if you are an alcoholic that you have not progressed in oyur disease as far as I did, the sooner one decides to quit the easier it is, but trust me when I say it is possible, there are folks who were far worse then me that have recovered from their alcoholism.

There is a solution I found for my alcoholism, millions of others have found the same solution I did in AA.

Keep in mind always that you are not alone, one crucial thing in recovering from alcoholism is to end the isolationism and to keep on trying, there are millions of people throughout the world in AA that would be more then happy to help you.

Remember that AA is not the only solution for alcoholism, there are other recovery programs out there, the secret is to keep trying them until you find one that works for you. Just keep in mind that none of them will work if you do not work them.


Thanks,

Martin