DOSE:

repeated

oral

Alcohol

(daily)

BODY WEIGHT:

200 lb

I am submitting this report to announce that today, I am officially done with alcohol. My delirium tremens began 3-4 hours ago, and I guess we’ll see soon enough how bad they get.

My addiction began in earnest two years ago, during my junior year of college. Growing up, I was usually a pretty good kid who went out of my way to avoid trouble with the law, so I didn’t seriously start drinking until I was supposedly “mature enough” to do so. Truthfully though, I have long been fascinated by this seductive substance. As a teenager, I can recall occasionally sneaking nips of my parents’ box wine after they had gone to bed, frequently mixing with orange juice to mask the burn of the cheap wine. I never drank enough to get wasted or even buzzed, just enough to satisfy that urge in all youths which drives us to do things that are forbidden. That said, alcohol is still the only drug I have ever tried, save for a one-time experiment with the legally obtainable DXM (an experience I did not desire to repeat).

I went to a fairly remote university in a small town with very harsh winters. Most students there spend their free time skiing, playing ice hockey, and binge drinking. So I turned 21 in December of 2007, and I was finally able to purchase beer. I quickly had an entire mini-fridge filled with bottles, and drank probably 3-4 times a week, between two and four bottles at a time. Technically not binging, but the worst was yet to come. I grew to love that warm, fuzzy, relaxing buzz one gets from alcohol, with the occasional night of total drunken stupor thrown in (though the resulting hangovers often made me reconsider what I was doing). As summer came and went, I gradually progressed to almost daily consumption. While beer was always my first love, I soon discovered the joys of bourbon and gin, and began mixing them into my regimen as well. My roommate, a friend of mine since high school, was somewhat concerned about my habits, particularly on those occasional mornings when I was practically puking my internal organs into the toilet. Nonetheless, I think we were both convinced that it was just me being a typical college kid.

So now, we fast forward to January 2009. Through the first year, I’ve managed to hold a good part-time job and maintain decent grades. Now I’m starting to realize that I may have a problem. The semester was a disaster, partially due to thoughts that maybe I wasn’t ready to graduate in just a few months and move out into the real world. This only fueled my drinking habits further, and I soon discovered that I preferred to polish off a sixer and watch TV or surf the Internet than do my coursework. I started missing some classes and was soon forced to drop two out of the four I was taking, which angered my parents and increased my depression. Soon, I quit attending my other two classes altogether and just slept in, spending my afternoons and evenings drinking. My parents, hundreds of miles away, were unaware of my drinking and laziness, so when the final grades came in and I had flunked both remaining classes, they were shocked.

They questioned me as to what happened, and I sure as hell knew, but naturally I was in denial and didn’t want them to know anything. My mom, always a good judge of possible solutions and scenarios, even asked me if maybe I had been drinking too much and missing class due to hangovers. At any rate, an ultimatum was delivered – finish during the summer term, or you will have to fund the remaining credits yourself.

So I returned to college for another seven weeks, and I immediately took up daily drinking again. This part of the story has a happy ending though – with the motivation of my parents’ ultimatum, I did finish up with decent grades and graduate that summer. I came home that June figuring that my drinking days were done for good, and for awhile they were.

This past January, after unsuccessfully spending six sober months looking for work, I began attending graduate school at a local university. All of my classes are in the evenings, and I usually get back after my parents have gone to bed. This planted the seed that maybe I could slip a six pack of beer or a pint of liquor into the house from time to time. Within a few weeks, I was doing this every night that I had class and so it has continued until today.

So here I stand. I used to deny that I had a problem, because I believed in the stereotypes that a lot of people have – alcoholics only drink the cheap stuff, frequently drink and drive, have no friends, are usually rednecks or street bums, etc. While these are sometimes true, the reality is that alcohol can become a problem for anyone who allows it to creep into and gradually take over their life.

I noticed the shakes, anxiety, and cold sweat began 3-4 hours ago, and I initially brushed it off as the caffeine in the coffee I drank this morning. Deep down though, I knew better. Within an hour or two, I was online reading about what withdrawal symptoms I may soon experience. While writing this report, the shakes have subsided, but I still feel empty, fuzzy-headed, and depressed. I have a cottonmouth that water isn’t doing much to alleviate. I realize that I may not be out of the woods for another two or three days yet, but I hope I don’t experience any of the dreadful audio/visual hallucinations I’ve been reading about, because frankly I’ve learned my lesson.

I hope.

Exp Year: 2008-2010	ExpID: 85409
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 23
Published: Jun 27, 2021	Views: 1,214
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Alcohol (61) : Retrospective / Summary (11), Hangover / Days After (46), Addiction & Habituation (10), Not Applicable (38)