A Short History of my Binge Drinking

I wanted to write something like this for a while. I have no specific goal in mind other than to ruminate on the years when I used to grossly overdo my alcohol consumption. Perhaps it will help somebody, maybe some people can relate, maybe not. I am several years sober at this point, but memories of the drinking years still compel me to look back every once in a while. In any case, here it goes.

I am not going to tell my full life story other than to say that I’ve been generally successful in life; education, work, running a business, getting married, starting a family. You can picture me as a 40-ish guy living an upper middle class existence. I have been drinking since teenage years, but the problematic stuff began around my late 20’s.

As far as I can remember, I always had problems moderating alcoholic drinks. My tolerance was quite high so this fact was generally concealed from everyone, and even I wasn’t aware that people don’t operate in the same way that I do when it comes to spirits. I guess I didn’t want to examine my drinking patterns too closely until the problem became too big to ignore. Like many problem drinkers, I would go on partying for as long as possible once I started. I was usually the one who stuck around until the very end during every social event, became ‘best buddies’ with any random people who were in the same binging boat, overstay my welcome if the hosts were not problem drinkers themselves. Typical stuff.

The real problems started around my mid 30s when the drinking escalated into multi-day binges (I was never a permanent daily drinker), sometimes a week, sometimes a bit longer. I could never sustain more than about 10 days, but those days were literally filled with alcohol. I wouldn’t eat, I would hardly sleep. Everything revolved around procuring more alcohol and staying in a state of bliss, at first, followed by trying to stave off the withdrawals until my body was completely burned out. I usually required a couple of days of medical detox to get myself back to normal. I would then swear off alcohol for a few months, feeling good and doing well all around, until I regained a false sense of security.

This level of binge drinking could not be hidden from everyone around me. My relationships with people suffered, my work suffered, I missed out on opportunities, wasted a lot of money, lost some friendships. Fortunately I did not lose my family, or my job, or ran into any legal problems. It certainly could have been worse. But it was only a matter of time.

One thing that I would like to describe is the ‘false sense of security’ that I already mentioned. I think most people get this feeling once they have been sober for a while that the former problem is gone. It seems that any alcohol moderation issues are a thing of the past. The nightmare cannot possibly come back as I am now fully in control. In a certain way that is true. I am in control and I can trust myself – while I am sober. I can trust my sober self, but unfortunately I cannot trust the drunken version of me. These are two completely different people.

A typical pattern would look something like this. I go several months without drinking. I feel great, I eat well, exercise, do great at my job, spend quality time with my family and friends. Everything is great. One day, on a whim, I would think to myself: ‘why not have a drink?’ I’ll get one bottle of quality liquor and spend a pleasant evening sipping it while I watch sports or a movie or just putter around on the interwebs. So I would do it.

The first evening would usually be pleasant. I might get 0,7L of Brandy or Bourbon, usually my favorite choices, and just casually indulge. I would probably drink about 2/3rds of the bottle and enter the very pleasant, euphoric state that only happens when one hasn’t drank in quite a while. The next day I would recover, perhaps experience some slight withdrawal in the afternoon, but nothing too crazy. It’s easy to return to a normal state that first time. It seems that everything is fine, but it isn’t. The downward spiral has already started, the cycle is in motion.

Once I give myself a ‘permission’ to drink, the floodgates keep opening wider and wider. For the next could of weeks, I might restrict myself to drinking once during the weekends, then any occasion that comes up, I would find an excuse to add a drinking night during the week. Eventually, one of those nights, drink the whole bottle and still not have enough. Somehow find my way to an all-night liquor store and buy a supply big enough for a platoon of soldiers. Then it’s off to the races.

It’s a weird state to be in. For the first few days of a binge I operate almost normal. People can hardly tell that I am drinking. I speak normally, I work normally, the external cues are subtle. I am fine after a night’s sleep, the alcohol nearly out of my system and I wait until the afternoon to perk myself up when the withdrawals start looming in the picture. I am losing it, though. Imperceptibly, my thought patters change. I stop caring about taking care of my responsibilities, important things fall by the wayside, I am annoyed that I need to do this or that, and I can’t simply enjoy drinking in peace. It seems unfair.

The binge continues, getting worse as time goes by. Constant, around the clock drinking becomes the new norm. Not having a drink even for an hour becomes unthinkable. The withdrawal symptoms hit even as I am drunk. The only solution is to get even more wasted to get a brief respite. The body is beginning to protest. I have the misfortune of having a strong stomach. I virtually never vomit after alcohol so my body has to process everything that I drink. My eyes get bloodshot, my blood pressure spikes. Only when I can no longer take it, and I feel that I might die any minute, I throw in the towel and go to detox…

I will stop here for now. There is a lot more to be said about the detox process and the horrors of withdrawal, as well as the process of getting back to normal following a binge, but perhaps that’s a story for another day. If you have made it this far without skipping ahead, congratulations, you are an excellent reader capable of getting through some of the most boring prose ever put to a computer screen.

Have a great day, hopefully a sober one!