I had the clerk at a convenience store look at me with stony eyes and tell me "BE WELL." I was buying a four pack. I used to buy lots of them there. I tended to avoid the hard stuff in the day. She said it with scorn in her voice. She could have been a little more caring!

I had not been drinking either but I guess she knew the look we have. I'm waiting for mine to go away. It is a motivating factor to be honest.

I'm going to be the naive one and say that my spouse did not notice the extent. He is not the type to be shy or avoid confrontation. Even if we were fighting while I was drunk, he would bring up a period in my life where he knew I was drinking too much because I told him. It would be weird because I'd be just as drunk at that moment. He thought that period was over. It hadn't ended, unknown to him. He would also find the occasional stashed bottle. How couldn't he? They were seeping out the walls but he is not observant. Then he would ask if I was drinking the hard stuff again. I know he wasn't playing ignorant.

At work, I'm not sure. No one ever has ever said anything but I work pretty isolated and on the days I would have a shot before going in, I would keep my severe distance from people. I really can't tell other alcoholics, to be honest. I can tell someone who is drop dead drunk but there are rumors about certain people being alcoholics at the office and I guess they are fooling me because I don't notice it.

Wow. The more I read here, the more of an incentive it is to keep sober. That poison was sure pulling the wool over our eyes in so many ways.

I had a lot of different methods I used to "mask" the smell, but a lot of people knew and I think more did and didn't say anything. I was a pretty high functioning drunk for a long time so I think people maybe just figured if I didn't cause a problem they wouldn't make one. I think many people knew sonething was wrong with me they just couldn't figure out what it was.

I must have stunk to high heaven. It even oozed from my pores. I think I got away with it for a few years in the beginning whilst functioning to a degree, I knew every trick in the book. If someone at work said they smelled it on my breath, I would laugh and say it was from the night before, I had a bit of a heavy session etc etc. And I broke my back tooth from chomping on extra strong mints. I would even gargle TCP and the thought of it now makes me gag. But in the end I didn't even care and knocked people for six whenever I went near them.

I remember during a game one of my teammates asked me if I was wasted while we were on the field.
That's how much I was reeking from the night before.
I actually thought that was amusing back then...

What a loser was I.

I also remember attending an outdoor construction meeting one summer with a bunch of Engineers and I was the only one who was sweating so bad I was literally soaked through. It must have been so obvious between the sweat and the stench.
Ouch these are cringing memories...

Oh hon. I deal with the same scares. I have been fired before for drinking many years back and it was awful. We deal with a very mean disease.

I don't know who you are but I like you.

Like what you had to say. Very true in many respects.

I remember my last boss telling me that a few people told our HR rep that I smelled of booze at work. He told me that he thought it was nonsense. Apparently he told HR to drop it because he had never seen any behavior that indicated I drank on the job.

What he missed was that my co-workers smelled the booze from the night before.

By the time I saw him most days it was late in the afternoon, or it was at a crowded meeting in which I sat in the back of the conference room.

So of course he never smelled it. And, as a functional alcoholic I hid things pretty well. Except of course for the tell-tale smell, and blood shot eyes my boss never saw.

Anyway, I of course denied ever drinking on the job, playing along. I knew the truth though. As he spoke I remembered an early morning meeting a few weeks earlier that I showed up for absolutely drunk. I must have reeked of booze. I could barely focus.

Worst of all, I showed up for work drunk or hungover for another two years.

I had a coworker tell me I smell like booze once. I said "yeah I got sh!tfaced last night. What's you're ***$Ing problem?"

He politely walked away. That was this year actually when I didn't give a crap about anything. So excited that part of my life will be in the rear view mirror soon.

This makes me feel like my job is over

It doesn't have to be xxxxx

Yes, most everyone knows. Breath mints and brushing do little. The smell is coming from your lungs. Our bodies sweat constantly regulating our temperature, even though you may not feel sweat on yourself, it is still perspiring. People around you know what it is.

For those that believe they always pulled it off behavior or appearance wise, well for the most part you are kidding yourself just like I always did. I mean if alcohol could make me feel like the baddest, best looking, sexiest guy in the bar surely it could also make me think I'm doing just great in a hungover state.

To autan, just accept that most everyone knew and move forward.

I was always paranoid that people would be ale to smell old, stale alcohol on my breath and coming through my pores at work the morning after drinking. People have told me they could smell it off me, so that in combination with my mindlessness and lethargic actions, I'm sure I wasn't hiding anything, especially at the end.

I would always have to carry around the most powerful mints. I would go through a tin per day. I also showered myself in cologne and took showers often.
And yes, people still knew. I was alright at holding it together but my personality changed. Like my alcoholic/addict brain just took over and I would make decisions that I would never normally do sober.
I was not as quick witted either. Generally slow in the mind.

I went to great lengths to cover it up. I had a morning "routine" (when I wasn't too hungover to do it). It was a LOT of work. I don't know if I smelled or anything. I don't think so... I did go through a lot of trouble after all. Glad I don't have to go through that any more. :-)

in my experience - more people knew or at least suspected than I ever realized.

I'm thinking it's a fair guess that can be said for a lot of us who have struggled with addiction.

I feel that a major give-away was that I was never really "all there" while at work the next day. I had major brain freezing going on.. I was.. well, just really dumb. No short term memory, no ability to concentrate or anything like that. It wasn't normal.. people must have noticed!

I don't know if people could smell me, but I do know that my attitude was completely different and people probably noticed that. I would notice that my entire persona would change even when I decided to drink but had not yet.

When you have a red face do people just assume it's from drinking?

If I had to talked to a loved one, I would not make eye contact and keep my face pointed away from them so they couldn't smell my alcohol breath. I eventually started drinking mouthwash thinking the nauseating amounts of menthol and eucalyptus oil would drown out the alcohol smell, and pretty quickly my loved ones got suspicious from that smell. Even today, with 6 months sober, if I use non-alcoholic mouthwash, I am sure to arouse a little suspicion.

The only way I could assure no one would come near enough to smell the alcohol would be if I chewed a few cloves of raw garlic...YUCK!!!:gaah

But my demeanor, randomly saying things not related to the conversation, and slow movement gave me away pretty quickly.