wizard00

I have the feeling that alcohol is the most depressant and at the same time the most anti-depressant drug.

I struggle with depression since several years. I'm 29, male.

When I stay sober my mood automatically becomes stable. Not good, not bad. It's simply stable and neutral.

When I drink alcohol, my mood very quickly changes to become very positive. My depressive thoughts vanish immediately. It works like magic.

When I drink I can't moderate, because I crave this positive feeling so bad. I drink 1 beer and quickly drink 4-9 beers. I can't stop, because I love feeling so "alive" and happy. I drink 1 beer, I want more and more until I feel the buzz.

The next day I always experience a deep depression. Everything turned to ****. I'm a complete wreck for 1-2 days. I always swear to myself I won't touch this poison anymore. I last for maximum 1 week until I drink again, cause I miss the positive feeling so much. This is going on for like 4 years now. I usually drink 5 out of 7 days a week.

I'm the happiest, non-depressive person when I'm drunk, but the next day I'm full of anxiety and suicidal thoughts.

Am I doomed to stay sober for the rest of my life? How did you manage that? It's so hard to stay sober. I crave the feeling almost everyday and in society it's so widespread everywhere.

Is there a chemical/scientific explanation for this? How can it be that alcohol affects depressive people so bad? What is the scientific explanation for this? I don't understand how this chemical can affect my entire brain so quickly and so efficiently?

How is it possible that the majority of people seem to just be able to drink regurlarly and moderately without falling into a depressive despair while I'm not able to? How did you cope with it?

Thank you for every advice.

ClearPath64

Hi wizard, there is a book that I would highly recommend for you called Alcohol Explained by William Porter. It addresses all of the questions that you have posed. You’ll get some of the answers here, as more people respond to your post, but that book is an excellent resource. The short answer is that alcohol is affecting you exactly the same way that it does all of us here. And continuing to drink for people like us always has a bad ending. You’re young and I would recommend that you educate yourself as much as possible. Coming here was a great step. I wish that I would have been that wise at your age.

Dee74

Hi and welcome Wizard
I'll leave the science stuff to others.

I can only share my experience - I've had a life long depression that alcohol exacerbated.

If something makes me feel bad, it stands to reason I stop doing it.

If you can't stop doing it you might be an alcoholic like me, and alcoholics like me have better lives not drinking at all.

I'm not doomed to sobriety. Sobriety has open many doors for me.

How do I do it? I had to change a lot of things in my life - how I socialised, how I celebrated, how I solved problems - but I can honestly tell you I don't feel I lost on on the deal.

It takes longer than a week for your mindset to change tho - I had to run on faith for a while when the people said I would not regret giving up alcohol but they were 100% incontrovertibly right

I hope you'll stick around and find that for yourself too

D

Farrier

My depression loved it when I drank alcohol. So did anxiety and panic. Weird thing is since I quit drinking alcohol, my friend 3 friends rarely come over to visit anymore.

Hodd

Hi wizard, a lot of people say alcohol is a depressant, which it is, but it’s the wrong term in this context. A depressant just slows down brain and nervous system activity. A depressant doesn’t cause depression as we see with occasional/very light drinkers. But none of us here are/were light drinkers and any benefits of alcohol long since vanished when we over used day in day out. We then needed more and more alcohol to feel the “benefits”.


Anecdotally I feel way more positive having stopped drinking for 3.5 years now. I was a nasty piece of work as a drinker.

I know where you’re coming from here. We all had an almost heartbreaking realisation choice to make: (a) continue letting alcohol control us, be an alcoholic for life (b) give up drinking forever. There is no option (c), no middle ground. I’m sorry. But doomed? Read your opening post again, wizard. Alcohol is doing you absolutely no favours, is it? Rather than feel doomed, read some of the posts here from those who’ve been sober for a few months or years. There’s no doom in those posts, just positives. I hope you give it lots of thought. All the best for now, wizard 🙂

Nonsensical

I am privileged to stay sober for the rest of my life.
Those few hours of euphoria I once experienced when drinking were fleeting and costing me everything else.
I won the lottery. The price of the ticket is inconsequential.

Best of Luck on Your Journey!

DriGuy

Stable and neutral sounds like a positive thing to me. I used to have extreme highs and lows. I don't know if it was caused by alcohol or my emotional state at the time. But there is nothing wrong with steady and level. I see it as a goal. Humans often confuse euphoria with good. Reality is better. I doubt that most successful people, be they Corporate CEOs or Zen Masters, are emotional yo yos. Leave that to the teenagers.

Anna

I was also depressed for decades before I began drinking. Drinking also made me feel better, very briefly, before I'd plummet into anxiety and depression. Stopping drinking is likely the answer for you. But, you will need to give it some time. Be patient with your mood for a few months until things settle.

Radix

It's true that alcohol (and many other substances) can quickly induce a happy state. In fact, that's what all addictive substances have in common: whether opiates, amphetamines, or cannabis, they can quickly erase an unhappy or bored mood and replace it with a transient intoxicated buzz.

But it comes at a cost, which is that some people start and can't stop. I was like that. I told myself that I couldn't feel happy or normal without drinking, so I drank every day, and when I started, it didn't stop until basically passing out.

Turns out, happiness without alcohol is not only possible, but it's better in the long run than the buzz of intoxication. I don't drink anymore, and on balance I'm much happier. Sure, there are bad days, and sad days, and all the other negative emotions that come with life. I just deal with them.

On balance I'm much happier sober.

brighterday1234

Very strong significant relationship 🙏

wizard00

Thank you a lot for all the kind and encouraging replies.

I always wondered, for many years since my youth about this question:

Is alcohol the main and central cause of my depression or did in fact clinical depression cause my longing for alcohol?

They fuel and feed each other, that's 100% for sure. But what came first, what is the root cause?

I first started having anxious and depressive thoughts during my youth (16 years old) and at the very same time also started drinking alcohol with high school friends basically every weekend. This went on for many years. I don't know anymore what came first, the depressive/suicidal thoughts or the heavy alcohol consumption every weekend. All I know is that already at that young age, alcohol helped me for a brief time. Friday and Saturday all my troubles, worries and fears instantly vanished. Then the next 1-2 days on Sunday/Monday the spiral of anxiety and depression got much worse again.

Then at university everything got worse and now in the last 2 years it became even worse. It took me 10 years to first see a psychiatrist and therapist at age 27. I was prescribed anti-depressants but all they did was giving me really bad side effects. Weight gain, insomnia and extreme sweating. I quit taking them and quit going to a psychiatrist. I still see a therapist every 2-3 weeks, but haven't seen a psychiatrist since 2 years.

Now I don't know what to do as my next step. My therapist strongly suggest me to go to a psychiatrist, but after my bad experience with anti-depressants 2 years ago I'm very reluctant and scared of doing this again.

I just don't know what do to next and would be happy to know what you suggest you to do best now?

RunningScared

I think you should go to a psychiatrist. There are many meds out there and it often takes trial and error to find something that works without horrible side effects. In the US they have genetic tests that can help determine what meds might be most successful. I don't know if they have it there or not. This genetic testing is still in its infancy, though.

Dee74

Hi again Wizard

For me the depression came first.... but drinking alcohol the way I did sure wasn't helping.

Stopping drinking didn't completely cure my depression either but it made it a whole lot easier for me to deal with I think that's true for anyone no matter what they decide came first for them?

I thought I had to know everything about my addiction, including what caused it, before I could quit _ but in fact I found I could just...quit

I'm not anti intellectual by any means - but my intellect, comprehension, self awareness and critical thinking skills were all better served by not drinking

AthensDawgs

it has sent me down a very negative path several times....and yet...I still drank to cover up all my emotions when I knew I shouldn't be drinking.

I wanted to grab a handle and simply disappear for a week and that would have made things a million times worse.

now that I'm a week and a few days removed from alcohol, I have a much much brighter outlook and in a great mental state. As they say in AA, progress not perfection, and the more time I've spent in the program, its extremely true. I've had a few bumps in the road(April and July) but I got back up and re-focused on the positives.

Farrier

This is just a taste of what's to come. Keep going forward and you will reward yourself beyond imaginable.

nez

What difference does it make? That is about the past. We know how to stop the root from proliferating. That is about the present. Taking care of the present will lead to a more promising future. One that is free, rather than doomed. Having to rely on an external source for my mood changes is enslaving. Knowing that I am the ultimate mover and shaker when it comes to my moods, as opposed to some genie in a bottle, now that is freedom!

courage2

I *thought* alcohol made me happier. Turns out it was losing me relationships, peace, success, and a host of other good things. My ability to feel happiness didn't last longer than the drink in my hand, until I put down the drink forever.

Good luck to you, friend!

DriGuy

That's always an interesting question, but I agree with nez. Once alcoholism sets in, it becomes irrelevant. There is only on way out, and that is to stop. If depression still exits, that needs to be dealt with, and in some other way than self medicating with alcohol. If depression is caused by a chemical imbalance, there are meds for that. If it's from negative life experiences, counseling can help.

How many times has it been said in this forum? "Alcohol only makes this worse." If you are an alcoholic, that's a hard fact. If you're a normie, the negative consequences will be short term, and maybe non existent. If you drink because you are depressed, you are not dealing with either one of your problems. If you are depressed because you drink, the answer should seem quite simple.

Farrier

amen!

nez

Was my alcoholism the problem or a problem, either way, still problematic, so I needed to work on resolving it. If other problems still existed once I had resolved the one problem, then at least I would be equipped to deal with to start ticking off and working on the other problems one by one.

Nineteen years later, I am still discovering problems, but because the number of problems has dramatically dropped due to ongoing work, the resolution to new ones as they crop up is far easier because the convoluted corridors of my cranium are far less crowded theses days.