hello people, im bit of a predicament here! well, i'll start from the begining.

When i was 13 (I am now 20) i started smoking cannabis and over the years i became more and more dependant on it, and when i was about 15/16 i tried to give it up, but turned directly to the booze! i then started smoking it again and it made me into a nervous wreck. So at the age of 19 i decided that enough was enough and stopped smoking completely (and Ciggarettes). and have not smoked for a year now. But the problem i have now is that everytime i drink i kick off. I cant see an real reason to kick off when im sober but i feel paranoid when i drink to the extent where every1 around gets nervous. Im now going out with a lovely girl i met about 8 months ago and i really, really dont want to *BLEEP* it up. But if i carry on drinking like this im going to! I think the reason that im finding it so hard to give up is because then i would be sober for the rest of my life, and that scares me (For some bizzare reason) and i need find something else to do sociably, and to talk to people who preferably have/are in a same/similar situation, and can relate to what im going through. Any help would be much appreciated!

by me and my GF.

thanks

 

 

 

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unless your mixing some *BLEEP*, alcohol's addiction is 100% mental. You think you need it, take soda for instance. When you drink it, you keep wanting more, because it tastes good, and then it becomes a habit. If you wanna give it up, the only thing is cut it off, have your girl do the shopping, and don't drink for the next like 10-12 months, after that, start drinknig, but only at parties, make it a special thing. Alcohol really has no chemicals in it to make you addicted, unless your trying to get that high feeling, which is mental. Just knock it.

Unless your experimenting with things, and mixing stuff, then it shouldn't be hard to just drop it cold. Its not hard at all, ive done it on and off befored, its totally a mental thing, and when you can control that, then you'll haveabetter life, because it doesn't just work for that, it works for desire, greed, and jealousy, and it all starts by the basics. If you can get over this, you will get over the fact that your life isn't perfect, and you'll live in a more enjoyable enviornment. Worked for me.

 

 

 

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thanks for the advice m8 its appreciated, i will take it all on board (not over board, ) its nice to know that others have been through the same *BLEEP* and can relate to how i feel. its re-assuring, thanks

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As for completely giving up alcohol it really isnt that hard. I have given it up numerous times for months at a time just because i didnt feel like dealing with the effects and could care less about it and didnt care being a DD forever. When i go out, i act like myself anyway whether alcohol is involved or not so it just isnt something i need. However, there are a few things that keeps me from quiting all together. First of all, i love the taste of rum and beer (not together). Therefore, when i have a bad day or just want to relax, i will make myself a nice drink and just enjoy it. Secondly, i enjoy the games we play with alcohol. Whether it is cards, beer pong, flip cup, etc. i love playing them. I am very competitive at everything i do and so i would never say no to a challenge. Plus, its a great way to meet people, etc.

Just because i still do those things does not mean i get drunk every time i go out. I still go out sober all the time and play games with water, soda, etc. The average night i go out, have a couple of drinks and thats it. I drink casually and enjoy what i drink and dont chug. Plus, i know my limit so i know when i should stop if i dont want to get drunk. My advice to you is to do what you think is best. If you think that you can still drink but not get out of control all the time, then go for it. If you think otherwise, i would quit while i am ahead. If you really care about the girl, then it shouldnt be a hard decision if you think drinking would hurt her in any way (physically or mentally). If you do quit and people offer you alcohol, either tell them you quit and no thank you or just say you are the DD for the night. People respect the DD and they respect those that can go out, have fun, and not need a beverage. Be proud of yourself if you quit because its not the easiest thing to do if your friends and girlfriend do it since you will be around it all the time. Good luck

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Actually soda is more addictive than mary jane. Caffeine is a bad drug kiddies. We are all addicted to them, seriously, bet you've had caffeine withdraws and didn't even know it.

Here's something to comfort you. You don't have to be sober for life. No woman who loves you would not let you drink any alcohol at all in the whole rest of your life! Just cut it down. When you drink, only drink 2 beers. Get a small buzz, who around you likes when you're drunk, besides me laughing in the corner? Don't you want to be like me - the one doing the laughing at?

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Well i just turned 21 a few months ago and that is legal age to drink where I live but that never kept me from drinking. Remember if you tell yourself you are going to get wasted then when you start drinking you are gonna get wasted and nothing is gonna stop you. You just need to realize that not everyone drinks like you might think they do. If you walk into a store and their are 30 people in their they are not all drinking sometimes you maybe the only one drinking and trust me they know. Just think about the fact that everything you could do is very limited by the fact that all you want to do is drink a 30 pack and smoke a pack of cigarettes and spend 20 dollars on food at the convenience store. Then wake up an do it all over again its just gonna keep happening unless you start doing something else. If you do have a job maybe try finding another way of spending your money instead just buying beer every friday night. Try finding something that you and your girlfriend can do instead of drinking if it is both of you that drink then it will be both of you that have you that have to stop.

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after reading all above I just have to add, AA and NA is a good idea. It helped me.
I have been clean and sobber now for 20 yrs. Yes there have been times that I would love a drink or a toke, but then I think. Do I really want to end up like I was? Dependent on Booze and drugs? Letting then run my life? Heck no.

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This is something I wrote in my journal a couple of months ago, it's rather fitting here.

On February 28, I plan to mark my son's third birthday by getting drunk. This will be the act, no doubt, of a selfish and irresponsible parent. But there will be more than the little man's special day to celebrate. His mother and I shall also be raising glasses to the fact that - until the moment those glasses tilt - we will have been sober for two months.

This isn't an alcoholic's cautionary tale of redemption and recidivism. It is much more trivial than that. Like millions of other bloated Christmas casualties, I simply made a new year's resolution to stop drinking for a bit. Perhaps I'm a little unusual, in that I stuck to it. But, according to well-researched lifestyle indicators, an alcohol-free January is now an important fixture in the calendar.

Still, I reckon a mere experiment in January is for dilettantes. In my experience it takes a full three weeks to get used to having no alcohol in your body, so this amounts to a contemptibly brief one week of true clarity. Melvyn Bragg, somebody once told me, gives up drink for the first month of every year. I say, what a lightweight. If Melvyn were hard, he would be on the lime and soda till March.

I'm not boasting boast. I didn't give it up because I wanted to be pious about my health. I gave it up precisely because I cherish drinking. Denial, of course, contains its opposite. I've been fantasising about cocktails every day since January 1. Like a wine expert sloshing the juice around his palate, I have been turning it lovingly over in my imagination.

This, I swear, is not the same as being desperate for a drink. Truly, I haven't wanted one. Abstinence from alcohol needn't be - to use the melancholy, depleted jargon of our era - "detox". The point of restraint (and here I part company from the Brahmans) is to sharpen the capacity for pleasure. I like to think of it as an off-calendar Lent, my own private Ramadan. I want to know the desert, better to appreciate the flower (or is that knowing the dessert, the better to appreciate the flour?).

Of course, staying off the booze may indeed be the "healthy option". Despite pretending to despise the vacuous, neurotic urge to get on a health trip, I once capitulated to lifestyle fashion and tried the "Leslie Kenton 10-day clean-up diet".


As with all disciplines, abstinence is a craft to be learned and honed. After the Kenton error, it was a few years before I again felt sufficient self-disgust to have another go at cutting back on anything. Then, last year, I gave up alcohol for 10 weeks. This was because I suddenly realised that the only previous time I had gone for more than a fortnight without drinking, I had been at school, 17 years ago. Not drinking was something I could now try, as if for the first time. Like the old-style drug dealer of media mythology used to whisper: go on, just try it once. See how you feel.

And yes, it does make you feel kind of funny. For the first few weeks you're maybe a bit shaky. Like any symptoms of withdrawal, this period is the hard part (a minor head cold can be exaggerated by your twitchy nervous system into life-threatening bird flu). But then comes the moment, after 20 days or so, when your body becomes accustomed to its new state. Colours appear brighter, smells sharper, reflexes faster. In the mornings you notice that your tongue is still moist. You begin to understand the deeper symbolism of William Blake, the engrossing atonality of Miles Davis's *BLEEP*es Brew.

The euphoria doesn't last, though. Like the effects of any drug, you get used to being sober, and begin to need more and more of it. So you cut out coffee, cigarettes, carbohydrates, dairy products, red meat - anything to keep up the ascetic high. But it doesn't work. After two and a half months, I had lost a stone and a half, and I wasn't even overweight in the first place. I became skinny, utterly bored, and utterly boring. It was over. I went out and drank a bottle of vodka. The next day, my body enfeebled by health, I endured one of the worst hangovers of my life.

Yet I had learned an interesting lesson. When I woke up on New Year's morning this year, I resolved to give up drink for the only reason that can guarantee lasting benefits. It's a variation on the plight of the tippler in The Little Prince who drinks in order to forget why he drinks. Instead, what you should do is stop drinking, in order to remember why you drink. Lord Byron was right: intoxication is the best of life. But you have to fine-tune the body to appreciate just how good it can get; service the liver; unpickle the brain.

And then you're ready. For splendour of variety, no illegal drug can compete with alcohol, refined through millennia by by several civilisations. Cocaine and marijuana, hallucinogenics, narcotics and so on - these offer merely simplistic jingles of experience: potent, perhaps, but limited in range.

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Tips for giving up alcohol

Drinkline - National Alcohol Helpline
Helpline: 0800 917 8282 Monday - Friday, 9am - 11pm , Weekends 6pm - 11pm
Offers help to callers worried about their own drinking and support to the family and friends of people who are drinking. Advice to callers on where to go for help.

Alcoholics Anonymous www.alcoholics-anonymous.org.uk

Stopping alcohol completely is usually best. Otherwise, reducing to a safe level of drinking is an option.

If you are trying to cut down, some tips which may help include:

consider drinking low alcohol beers, or at least do not drink 'strong' beers or lagers.
try pacing the rate of drinking. Perhaps alternate soft drinks with alcoholic drinks.
if you eat when you drink, you may drink less.
it may be worth reviewing your entire social routine. For example, consider:
cutting back on types of social activity which involve drinking.
trying different social activities where drinking is not a part.
reduce the number of days in the week where you go out to drink.
going out to the pub or club later in the evening.
try to resist pressure from people who encourage you to drink more than you want to.

Reply

Tips for giving up alcohol

Drinkline - National Alcohol Helpline
Helpline: 0800 917 8282 Monday - Friday, 9am - 11pm , Weekends 6pm - 11pm
Offers help to callers worried about their own drinking and support to the family and friends of people who are drinking. Advice to callers on where to go for help.

Alcoholics Anonymous www.alcoholics-anonymous.org.uk

Stopping alcohol completely is usually best. Otherwise, reducing to a safe level of drinking is an option.

If you are trying to cut down, some tips which may help include:

consider drinking low alcohol beers, or at least do not drink 'strong' beers or lagers.
try pacing the rate of drinking. Perhaps alternate soft drinks with alcoholic drinks.
if you eat when you drink, you may drink less.
it may be worth reviewing your entire social routine. For example, consider:
cutting back on types of social activity which involve drinking.
trying different social activities where drinking is not a part.
reduce the number of days in the week where you go out to drink.
going out to the pub or club later in the evening.
try to resist pressure from people who encourage you to drink more than you want to.

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