The Last Time I Drank, 2004, by Anonymous

From MemoryArchive

Who: Anonymous
What: The Last Time I Drank
When: 2004
Where: USA

I had always liked to drink more than other people, and as soon as I left home I started to drink every night. Just a beer, sometimes a hard drink. On weekends we’d get plastered, but I’d always done that. As I grew older, I found more and more excuses to drink till I was drunk. When things were bad, I drank because they were bad; when things were good, I drank because they were good. All the while I was working and making “progress” in my career (even winning awards and crap like that), so I never gave a thought to being an “alcoholic.” Alcoholics were people who smelled, lived on the streets, and drank Wild Irish Rose. People in my family were just “drinkers,” people who had fun (even when they were beating the shit out of each other). Everybody drank. In fact, I didn’t know anyone who didn’t drink when I was growing up. I never really thought about the fact that booze had laid waste to my family members and destroyed my family. As far as I was concerned, my family was just messed up. Not me, though.

So once I was alone, I began to make little compromises, never thinking that these were related to progressive drinking. Go to bed later. Don’t brush your teeth. Don’t go home for Thanksgiving. Don’t wash your clothes. Don’t call your friends. Don’t go out on Fridays, and so on. After a decade or so, all I did was drink and work. That was my life, and I was pretty happy with it. I didn’t know it but I was heading for disaster, just very slowly. I should have been praying for a rapid “bottom” so that I might get the “gift of desperation.”

Instead I had many, many small “bottoms.” Times when I would blow up at someone, steal something, break something, screw something up, lose a job, or act generally stupid and irresponsible. Despite that fact that most of these disasters (some near death experiences too) all took place when I was drinking, I never thought for a second any of it was because of alcohol. Nope, couldn’t be. The world, I thought, was just messed up. But not me. No sir. I had it under control.

I lost jobs and got new ones. I moved and moved. Wherever I was I seemed to find, almost magically, people who liked to drink as much as I did. Addicts find one another; it gives them comfort. But when something happened that forced another move, I left and never looked back. I’ve got “ex-friends” all over the nation and even world.

The last time I moved was different. This time I didn’t make any new drinking buddies at work, and I didn’t make any new drinking buddies outside work either. I didn’t want any drinking buddies, really. Mind you, I considered this quite normal. If people are too much trouble, then you should avoid them. So avoid them I did. I spent virtually every night after work and all weekend holed up in my apartment drinking. People would ask me out. I’d say “Oh, maybe.” But I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. All I wanted was to stay home and drink. If I had to go out, I’d get smashed first, just in case. Who knows how much booze there was going to be. Didn’t want to get caught short…

I favored big bottles of Cossack vodka. I loved those bottles, especially near full ones. They held promise. The near empty ones made me sad, but there was always more where that came from.

Though I knew I had a drinking problem, I still tricked myself into thinking it all made sense, and that I was really the victim of something or other. The world had screwed me, and this was the logical (and happy) result. I wasn’t a drunk, I was a wounded, free spirit trying to mend himself. Other people just couldn’t understand.

This went on for months and months. I don’t know how long, really. I’d wake up, drink coffee, take speed to get the edge I needed to work (what I do requires mental alertness), and then be totally burnt out (and very aggressive) by about five o’clock, at which time it was back to the Cossack vodka. Repeat. I didn’t really like my life, but I figured that there was no other way. This was my lot. End of story.

Until one day I decided I was going to visit a very old friend in another city. I thought he really liked me and even admired me. We’d known each other for two decades, and though we’d had differences, I was sure he had my back. I’d stayed at his apartment dozens of times, so I figured I was all set up. I emailed him with my plans. I heard nothing back until that evening when I was well into my umpteenth vodka. He said he was sorry, but I couldn’t come visit. He’d started in a 12-step program, and learned not only that I had a problem (he’d always known, really), but that I was harmful to him. You see, whenever I went to his house I’d say I was on “vacation” and use that as an excuse to get drunk and act stupid. He said he had to think of his own well-being first, and that I couldn’t come. Moreover, he said he’d not be able to speak with me ever again unless I went to AA, or whatever.

I was very pissed. Very, very, very pissed. And so I drank some more and passed out.

Then a miracle happened. Now I’m not a religious guy, not at all. But let me tell you this: I’d tried to stop drinking a million times, and it never lasted more than a day or two. That day, however, I resolved to go to an AA meeting, just one. And I actually did. The folks there welcomed me, and I’ve been goin’ back ever since. If you would have asked me a year ago whether I was an alcoholic or whether I could ever stop drinking, I would have said “no” and laughed at you. Really.

But it happened. I’m an alcoholic and I stopped drinking—with the help of AA. My life is better, much better. It’s the truth, and it can work for you.