SIGNS OF ADDICTION OBSESSION
Looking back now at the first time I drank, I should have known I was to become an alcoholic. I remember my first time getting drunk clearly. I remember taking that first shot of vanilla vodka and thinking, this is what I have been looking for all my life, this is what I’ve been missing, this is home. Thinking back after my first drink I became an alcoholic. Why would anyone want to live sober when I have this amazing magical drink that makes your problems disappear, that makes you feel no pain, that makes you happy?
This is what I thought my first year or so of drinking. After that things slowly began going downhill. Just like any drug, NOTHING felt or was the same without alcohol. The world was not as colorful when I was sober. It was this plain, black, boring, painful, cold world that I needed to escape from. I thought I could never be myself without alcohol. People could only get to know the real me when I was drinking. I started drinking whenever I went out of my house. I drank when I went out with friends, to school, at work, everywhere. It was me and my water bottle filled with vodka and juice or tequila and sprite, or maybe even wine. Nothing was real when I was drinking and that’s the way I liked it.
Alcohol started taking over my life, it started taking over me. I was drinking all the time and if I wasn’t I was thinking about it. It consumed my thoughts and my mind. When something terrible happened, I immediately thought “I need a drink”. The biggest problem for me with alcohol was that I didn’t realize how dependent I was on it until I didn’t have it. It was everywhere around me and I couldn’t imagine living without it. Alcohol became a necessity. I wouldn’t go out anywhere if I knew there wouldn’t be alcohol, and if I had to go I would bring some with me. I used up so much energy and money making sure I always had something to drink.
NEGATIVE CONSEQUENCES
Drinking affected my life in so many negative ways, emotionally and physically. I became distant from my family and friends, and when I want we were always fighting about my problem. My family lost trust in me and that made me withdraw to alcohol even more. I drank to feel numb but at the same time I was longing to feel something. I didn’t feel pain when I was drinking, I didn’t feel sadness, excitement, no highs, no lows. Nothing. I felt like my pleasure respecters were dead and my body had no ability to feel pleasure on its own. My liver started causing me problems and my memory was disintegrating. I couldn’t do my schoolwork or keep up with my job, and to deal with this feeling of lack of control I just drank.
In addition to this chaos I put my self in dangerous situations. I’d be blacked out drunk with some guys I didn’t even know, and they would take advantage of me. The next morning everything was blurry and I just blocked out the pain. I was always depressed and miserable. I just wanted to drink so that’s what I did.
LACK OF CONTROL
Most people can drink one drink and then put it down. For the rest of us after one sip, drinking becomes our lives. I am one of those unfortunate people who from my first drink I gave myself to drinking, and I felt like that was outside my control. Alcohol took control over my mind body and soul. I couldn’t run my life and be independent because I was so dependent on alcohol. At the same time I couldn’t run my life when I was drunk either, but for me I was comfortable in my skin when I was drunk, so that’s what I did.
I believe in the saying “Once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic”. There is a part of me that never wants to drink again but the other part is silently screaming for alcohol everyday. There is not one day that goes by where I don’t think about drinking. That is what it makes staying sober so hard. I was a prisoner to alcohol for so many years. It calls for me and that is out of my control, but it is in my control how I react to that call. I can be strong and say no because I have these terrifying memories of how my life was when I was drinking, and I don’t want to live that way anymore.
DENIAL
One of the main reasons why I didn’t stop drinking sooner is because I was in denial about my problem. I had 100 excuses in my head that “proved” that alcohol want a problem for me. For example I would say to myself “I can stop whenever I want, or alcohol is not really a drug”. It was everywhere around me, in stores, movies, books and even my own home. So I thought “this is ok, this is harmless, everybody does it so I can do it”. Meanwhile my family and friends realized there was a problem. They told me I was an alcoholic but I didn’t believe them. I figured that they didn’t know what they were talking about because they didn’t know me, they didn’t understand me. I avoided people who didn’t support my drinking habit so I wouldn’t have to deal with them. But most of all I avoided my real self. I avoided my thoughts and feelings because deep down inside I knew it was wrong and I needed help, but avoiding myself was easier so I just drank.