soberlicious

idk RQ...it would depend on your goal I guess. We can frame experiences as "failures" or more euphemistically as "minor setbacks"...it doesn't matter what it's called. The question is, what does that experience mean for you in the grand scheme of defining your goals for your life, and in meeting them? Only you can look at the experience itself and decide what it means to you.

Louise82

This is the same for me. If everything is going well and I can have a drink or two and be happy to stop there, well that's all fine and dandy. That's using alcohol responsibly. I can go back to being a drinker again, right? But if I become a drinker again, I have the option of abusing alcohol when things aren't going so well. So for me, if I use alcohol, there's always the chance that use will turn into abuse. So now I'm a non-drinker, which means I don't drink.

If you want to be a non-drinker, RQ, every time you drink you delay your success - a delay to success is not a failure in my book. Looking at my own life, it's not a failure if it's not the end and it's not the end until I say it's the end or I die. As long as I'm alive, I can always have another Day 1 -same goes for you, RQ.

ru12

RQ,

As others have said it is only a failure if your goal was total abstinence. I have no interest in playing around with alcohol. I too can moderate if I am very careful. But that doesn't do it for me.
Some people previous abusive drinkers can learn to moderate. That is fact. And frankly better is better. Moderation is certainly better than crazy drinking. But I just am not going to play with it anymore. Be careful out there!