Binge

Hi all!

I'm 25 years old and have been binge drinking heavily for the past 3-4 years on a weekly basis. It started off as a fun thing to do and a way to overcome my social ineptitude. I've always been somewhat shy and quiet, but I am capable of being an entertaining and appealing guy. The alcohol allowed for that and completely changed my social life.

I did plenty of stupid things while drunk, but my drinking never struck me as something that should concern me. It seemed to be the norm for a college-aged male. Having the term alcoholic applied to myself was laughable. I was just a young guy looking to party with friends, meet girls, and create future memories. If I was an alcoholic, I would be drinking daily all by myself (logic at the time).

As time progressed, I began to see more and more of the consequences of my actions. I still didn't think I had a problem, but I figured abstaining from alcohol would be a good personal challenge and help me reach my fitness goals. My abstinence period lasted for a few weeks until I gave into the pressure from friends to go out and drink. I soon fell back into the same routine of getting wasted at least once per week.

After a few extremely rough nights of getting passed-out drunk, I decided that I was going to only drink in moderation from then on. I did this successfully for 3-4 times, but I was miserable. I had to constantly fight back the personal urge and the pressure from others to drink more. I gradually gave in and fell back into the routine. I've made the moderation attempt multiple times and proved that I'm incapable of succeeding at it. While I may be able to resist for a few weeks or while around those who don't pressure me, I'll eventually find myself in a situation where I give in.

This brings me to where I'm at now. I can tell that being completely sober is the only way that I'll be able to stop the binge drinking. It seems like my mind always finds a way to justify drinking, though. As soon as I commit to sobriety, I began to wonder if I'm overreacting. It feels like I'm the only person who isn't drinking. I look at other respectable members of society who drink often, other cultures with much worse drinking habits, and older people who still operate normally despite drinking heavy on a consistent basis. It makes me wonder what I would progress into over the next 10 years. Would I gradually become more responsible as I mature or would I go downhill and get to the point where I'm craving alcohol daily instead of weekly?

Let me know if you have any advice.

artsoul

Hi Binge and welcome to SR! I commend you for wanting to look at your drinking. There are alot of people here who have a similar pattern of drinking and others (like myself) who went from binge drinking to almost daily drinking.

Looking back I know I had problems from the beginning because I never wanted to stop and often couldn't control how many drinks I had, even if I set a "goal" for that night. The problem with alcoholism is that it's hard to tell when we've crossed that invisible line.

It's true, however, that binge drinking does alot of harm to our bodies and can result in some pretty dire consequences.

Glad you're here - there's alot to read, and you'll get more input on this, I'm sure!

Binge

Thanks!

What do you recommend for the first few weeks of sobriety? It has been 6 days since I last had alcohol, but the weekends are when my will power is tested.

I agreed on attending a few activities over the weekend, but they involve places where drinking will be taking place. Should I still attend and avoid the alcohol or stay at home since I'm easily prone to relapse this early in my recovery process?

artsoul

I think most people will tell you that if you want to stay sober, it's best to stay away from alcohol-related occassions altogether, at least until you have more sobriety. I know I was pretty fragile at 6 days. I've gotten alot stronger as time has gone on.

A general rule of thumb is to follow your gut - if you think it might be a problem, chances are it will be. I know it's hard to miss out on things, but you can think of it like having a contagious disease.... it's best to stay home for a while until you get better.

Just my two cents worth!

Draciack

Hi, Binge, Welcome to SR

As I college-aged male, I can definitely relate to the confusion surrounding heavy alcohol use during that time period. I will say alcoholism is progressive and my drinking went from just binging during the weekends to daily drinking to daily binge drinking. Not so much fun.

It's not really my place to say if you're an alcoholic or not; that's your decision. But I can ask: do you really want to risk the next ten years finding out if you're "really" an alkie? See, social drinkers can just take alcohol or leave it. No big deal, right? Generally, social drinkers don't lie awake at night wondering if they are alcoholics or not.

Either way, welcome to SR. You'll find a lot of good information here.

Krodos

can't believe how much this sounds like me at your age(I'm 30 now) I am 6 months sober now..... But I wish I stopped sooner, it only gets progressively worse over time, I highly recomned quitting now.

endlesspatience

Many of us can relate to what you say about the weekend and the difficulties of finding things to do with friends which don't involve going to a drinking environment. A key decision for me was to commit to attending an AA meeting every Saturday evening between six and seven. Even if I go home alone after that, I am unlikely to want to drink after hearing from others the consequences of alcoholism or hearing their stories of how their lives have been enriched by sobriety. I often go shopping for food ingredients before my Saturday meeting and then cook myself a great supper when it's finished. I thought I would feel lonely but in fact, I rarely do. It's also a great feeling to get up on Sunday and enjoy a WHOLE day without work and without a hangover.

MelindaFlowers

Hello Binge!

I am 28 so my 25 year old self is still fresh in my memory. I enjoyed drinking and drank most nights socially in college. I moved out of state and found myself drinking more and more. By 28 I was drinking every night from 5 pm to sleep and was hungover every morning. It progresses quickly.

I also always thought of all the successful people who drink, different cultures that celebrate drinking even more than the USA, etc. By the end I started wishing I lived in Russia so I could continue my nightly vodka binges (1/2 liter Monday night through Sunday night) without my friends, family, or me worrying about it. Thinking about it now I guess I still would felt terrible every morning, even if I lived in the heart of Moscow.


Thanks again for your post and get control of this now. I stopped for a period easily when I was 25. It is much more difficult after the three year progression that led me to where I am now.

Dee74

Hi Binge I was you at 15 too...word for word.

Sadly for me, I listened to that little voice that told me 2-3 days after a binge 'if you feel this good so soon, you must be overreacting'...never mind the fact it was taking me 3 days to recover every time!

I ended up making the periods between the drinking shorter and shorter, and ended up an all day everyday drinker.

I wish I'd been adult enough at 25 to know it doesn't matter a damn how it looks or what other people think - my health and my well being should always come first.

I'm glad you're thinking about this now - welcome to SR, Binge

D

Binge

Thank you. All of your responses are very helpful. It helps to have reassurance from others that I'm making the right decision and that my concerns are not baseless. Most of my friends have the opposite effect. Even when I feel convinced that sobriety is right for me, one of my friends will laugh at my concern and share their logic or argument on the situation and it completely throws me off course.

I agree that AA will likely be helpful. It's just hard to accept that I am in a position that requires it. I'm also completely non-religious, so I'm not sure how well that sits with those in the program.

I am glad others can relate with the binge-drinking progression. It makes the binge drinking with friends seem less innocent to hear that this is a common starting point. It is hard to tell if I'm progressing to the worse or not. I don't get puke drunk every time like I did when I first started, but I can still be very inebriated without puking. I am much more responsible with handing over the car keys to a more sober person, but I still find myself in those situations from time to time.

It is definitely much more difficult to stop now, Melinda. Over the first few years of drinking, I could stop for months at a time just to get on a diet or something similar. Over the past year, I haven't been able to stop for more than 2-3 weeks straight. I guess I should have seen that as a tell-tale sign of addiction progression.

Thanks again. I hope to join some chat sessions and threads to keep myself focused.

Binge

I made it through this weekend alcohol-free. As I mentioned in my original post, I tend to use alcohol as a crutch to loosen up in social situations and I think this is one of the reasons why I became so dependent on it. It got to the point where I would often have 3-4 drinks before going out just to arrive with a buzz.

I went out with a girl I had never met before this weekend which put me in an incredibly tempting situation. I thought about canceling, but it seemed rude to do. So, I decided to force myself to go out completely sober and remain that way throughout the night. It was a bit awkward at times to not have the alcohol crutch to smooth things over, but I actually made a good impression and generated attraction. It felt great to know that I presented my true self, I remembered the whole night, I didn't drive drunk, and I'm not hungover.

So, I'm at 9 days sober, now. Considering that my problem is not daily drinking, but excessive binge drinking, it will be a long time before I can let my guard down any. I've relapsed in the past after going 2-3 weeks with no drinking. I start convincing myself that drinking in moderation may work for me since I didn't have trouble stopping for a few weeks. I really want to stay focused, but I know I'll start having these thoughts pop into my head over time.

Another thing is that I really need to distance myself from my current friends. They are a horrible influence when it comes to drinking. Many have drinking problems worse than I do. They binge drink probably twice as often as I do and frequently blackout. Their behavior is what lead me to believe that my drinking was normal and nothing to be concerned about.

NEOMARXIST

If you're an alcoholic then you will be drinking all the time, unless you are unable to because you're in prison, mental institution or dead.

Sounds overly dramatic? I know for me then my drinking would have caused one of those outcomes eventually.

I relate a lot to your post. I got sober at 23 and am approaching 1 year sober in a few weeks time. My drinking and bingeing progressed and also the negative effects as a result of my bingeing got worse. My behaviour got more erraric and bizarre during blackouts.

I know for me that 1 drink is too many and 10000 would never be enough.

The only solution for me was to totally abstain from any alcohol or drugs on a daily basis, get to AA and daily contact with other alcoholics/addicts (SR is great for that).

The most important thing was that I was willing to change people, places and things and dedicate my life to my recovery. I realised that without my sobriety then i was a dead-man walking anyway. I accepted that I was without doubt an alcoholic and this enabled me to move forwards and accept that drinking cannot be an option for an alkie like myself.

All The best

NEOMARXIST

Just to add. Something that has really helped me was the realisation and awareness that alcoholism was predominantly a 'thinking' problem rather than merely a drinking problem.

It was my thinking and how I dealt with life that would ultimately take me back to another drink eventually. So unless I experinced a dramatic change in my thinking and my reaction to life then I would obviously drink again. This is where the real recovery work starts. I am still working on that and it will always be a daily work in progress.

But it's worth it. The satisfaction, pride and strength I gain in my sobriety and recovery is worth more than any drink or drug could give me.

Peace

Binge

Thanks! Your posts are really helpful.

Binge

Just to update everyone...I'm at around 16 days sober now. I'm starting to feel much better. I'm having better workouts and I'm definitely not missing the hangovers.

I've been staying really busy lately on the weekends, so that's helped a lot. I need to make sure my schedule stays that way since the temptation kicks in when I'm bored on a weekend night and my friends are out drinking.

But, now that I've distanced myself from my friends a bit, the stories of what they've done recently while drunk sounds more pathetic than it does funny and exciting. I guess you have to step back to realize what you became part of.

I'm just trying to keep my guard up. I've been at this ~2 week point many times before. I will feel good about not drinking and be proud of myself, but I somehow fall off the wagon once I let my guard down.

One thing I really need to do is make a few new friends who don't drink or at least not regularly. I have a hard time spending an evening alone, so it will really help if I have others to socialize with minus the drinking. Right now, my choices are to stay alone or hang out with a group of guys who drink until they blackout.