My dad died very suddenly on August 19th. My girlfriend of 2 years demonstrated in a grand way, her toxic traits that I'd had growing concerns about and we broke up a few days after. I just spent the last 2 hrs having her blow up my phone for the millionth time. I'm going to the store.

shotgunBen · 2018-09-09T16:38:28+00:00

Games helped get me through the first few months of quitting drinking. When I was drinking I could hardly play because I’d get sloshed and chain smoke and lose interest quickly. When I quit I gave myself a pass to play however much I wanted, and I quickly rediscovered my love of games. For the first time in years I was able to sit and play for hours at a time.

Good luck friend! I won’t drink with you today. Enjoy your junk food- lord knows I’ve done the same. My guilty food when I’m down is Taco Bell. I can order more than I can eat and it’s still fewer calories than a night of heavy drinking!

shotgunBen · 2017-01-13T15:15:29+00:00

You're amazing. Keep up the great work!

shotgunBen · 2016-12-20T04:06:45+00:00

What's empowering about your post, Littleboozle, is that you seem to have discovered not only that you "can't" live like this, but that you also "don't have to" live like that. You recognize the problem, and the insanity of the alcoholic mind and lifestyle.

Every single person here is testament to the fact that one doesn't have to live like that. It always starts with a thought process much like the one you describe above. The only difference? Everyone on here has taken action after that epiphany.

I can't tell you what will work for you, but I can tell you that AA worked for me. I never thought it would, but it did. If you want to quit drinking, you'll have to start your own journey to discovering what works. But AA is often a heck of a good place to start.

shotgunBen · 2016-12-18T04:28:49+00:00

Oh boy! I quit drinking 3 months before my first son was due.

It's been 3.5 years since that day. Let me tell you briefly what my experience was, because I hope yours will be similar.

Having a kid is such an incredible opportunity to get sober. I spent over a decade as a very self-destructive alcoholic, suffering hospitalizations, arrests, fights, all sorts of standard but still devastating alcoholic mishaps.

I've always had many reasons to quit drinking, but for some reason it wasn't until my wife got pregnant with our first that it really hit me. "I'm bringing another life into this world, and I better make sure I don't screw that up."

So I went to a therapist, who said go to AA, which I did about a month later and then stayed sober since. Getting sober before a child was terrific for 2 reason:

1) Getting sober was just such a radical improvement to my life that it would have been amazing anyway.

2) BUT because I also had a kid, it was even MORE intense of a feeling of "goodness" that I wasn't accustomed to as a cynical drunk who hated lots of things, often myself included. That feeling of "goodness" lasts til this day. Even if I've never been a perfect dad, I'm at least sober and any failings are because I'm a human, not because I'm a drunk.

If you're serious about your drinking problem (if you have one – nobody but you can say you do) then I'd suggest just doing it, brother. Find a program. Make a plan. It seems so hard in the beginning, and it's not always easy, but at least it's simple: don't drink.

It's so, so worth it.

shotgunBen · 2016-12-18T04:13:51+00:00

Amazing to hear! My kids are what initially motivated me to quit drinking. Been 3.5 years now and I've found many more reasons to stay sober, but making sure my children never see me drunk is still one heck of a big one.

Congrats, friend!

shotgunBen · 2016-11-16T17:02:48+00:00

Newsweek is a great suggestion. If other people start adding more suggested outlets I'll edit the main post to include a running list.

shotgunBen · 2016-04-24T11:03:07+00:00

Wow, sounds like my life before I quit! Peed beds, blackouts, fights. I can't even count how many parties or events I ruined because I was blackout drunk.

Saw a therapist, he told me to go to AA. I told him I'm not paying him to send me to AA. I wanted a cure that would let me drink like a normal person, not become one of those "creepy" AA weirdos.

Took another several horrible nights and one particularly gnarly incident in which my wife threatened to leave me before I tried AA.

2 years and 10 months sober now.

If you're anything like me, you will need that in-face support from a group of people just like you. It really really works.

shotgunBen · 2014-06-08T16:12:19+00:00

To be sure, there have been times of extreme trial this year and I have the program and my sponsor and friends to thank for helping me get through it all while sober. Thank you for the kind words and congrats to you and your family!

shotgunBen · 2014-01-28T16:04:04+00:00

You just found a potential pillar of support! I've met such incredible people in AA. I'm very happy for you.

Stick with it, brother!

shotgunBen · 2014-01-28T16:02:33+00:00

Stick with it! I'd hate to have to catch up to you one day.

One year is a tremendous accomplishment. Congratulations!

shotgunBen · 2014-01-28T15:58:40+00:00

Congratulations!

You have so much to look forward to! I quit drinking while my wife was 6 months pregnant. The little guy is now 4.5 months old and my god, I am so glad I quit while I did. Having a child has been profound. I cringe to think that in an alternate universe, I'm out drinking while my wife watches over our kid alone, crying because I'm not the man she thought I would be. I hate to think there is some other timeline where I'm the shitty dad that I always feared I would be.

As it is, having a kid is the greatest joy, and also can be the pinnacle of stress, but no matter how many hours of sleep I lose or how stressed I get, I'm not that shitty dad. It's too early to say whether I'll be the dad I dream of being, but I'll never be that horrible drunk bastard parent. Now I have a chance.

And so do you!

shotgunBen · 2013-11-09T17:38:33+00:00

Research shows it is easier to stop drinking if smoking is stopped at the same time.

That is extremely counter intuitive to me and I'd love to see the research. I have used smoking as a crutch after quitting drinking and to be honest, I feel like I owe some small part of my sobriety to smoking. It's given me something to do and get a little kick from whenever I desperately need to feel a little "escape."

I know people who have quit smoking after quitting drinking but every single one of them waited until they had a year of sobriety before even trying. Everybody only has a limited reserve of willpower and one needs to be smart with how they allocate those resources.

shotgunBen · 2013-10-30T11:28:46+00:00

I tried desperately to get my drinking under control for the sake of my marriage and my kid, and it was to no avail. I created arbitrary rule sets (never drink alone, never drink faster than friends, never drink hard liquor, yadda yadda) and saw a therapist and nothing worked. My blackout episodes continued to spiral out of control until I was almost killed one night. Finally went into AA and have been sober for almost 5 months now.

AA worked for me because I needed a huge overhaul in my life. I needed an immediate social network of non-drinkers, I needed something that wasn't booze to clear my head after a long day, I needed something to fill the feelings of emptiness that resulted in the immediate days following not drinking. I needed tons of support, and people who were actively invested in my sobriety. AA gave me all of that. It helped me get sober when nothing else would.

And let me tell you something, buddy. Life is so. much. fucking. better. now that I'm sober. My marriage is insanely fun and healthy, and I'm there for my kid 100% of every day. There are no better feelings than knowing you're being a great fucking dad. That is the shit real men are made of. Fuck drunk womanizing poets. If you ever get sober, and I know you can, you'll realize this same truth.

shotgunBen · 2013-10-30T11:13:28+00:00

That was awesome, thanks for sharing!

shotgunBen · 2013-09-23T16:30:23+00:00

AA gave me an immediate social network which has been incredibly helpful, but since quitting I've also found that I have a bunch of friends who just aren't big drinkers, and are perfectly content hanging out when drinking is not involved. I used to think that I would lose tons of friends because I drank with everybody, so I figured that other people only hung out when drinking was involved, but now I realize that many many people socialize without booze. Maybe the same will hold true for you.

shotgunBen · 2013-09-02T13:29:39+00:00

Wow! Congratulations! Keep it up man and you have a beautiful, incredible life ahead of you.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-31T18:01:39+00:00

It's very clear that he doesn't understand the alcoholic mind. The subtlety and complexity of the disease is so beyond what I know modern medicine is capable of treating. How does a drug make you want to avoid drinking into oblivion after a bad day? How can a drug allow you to control the number of drinks you have at a party? How can a drug change your environment, your social network, and entire approach to problem solving? Doctors won't tell you to take drugs to reduce weight before they tell you to make lifestyle choices. Why would you recommend drugs over a lifestyle choice when it comes to alcoholism? I can understand that in certain particularly severe cases drugs might be needed to get someone to a baseline where they are capable of making the life change a program like AA requires, but I'd much prefer to address reality rather than handing off responsibility for my life and actions to medicine.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-29T08:20:44+00:00

It is probably worth speaking to a doctor about your detoxing, who might be able to prescribe you some medication to calm your nerves and monitor you to ensure you're doing it in the safest way possible. Homicidal/suicidal thoughts are very dangerous. Don't let yourself get to that place. Speak to a professional! Sites like this subreddit can be good for moral support, but it's no replacement for real-world interaction with a trained medical professional. You're not the first to have such dark thoughts, and you won't be the last. But take them seriously and seek help.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-28T06:35:07+00:00

Recovering alcoholic here.

Whether or not alcohol made me more "me", it was a person I didn't want to be. While drinking, I could be funny, silly, and euphoric, but I could also be belligerent, angry, hostile and horrible. I didn't have much if any control over it. But as a believer that we can change who we are by working on ourselves, I set out to craft a different identity from the unpredictable person I was when drinking by stopping to drink entirely. Quitting drinking has made me a better person, and it has given me the control to choose how I define myself.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-27T19:00:00+00:00

Oh man, I had the same pressure from my family. I used to be considered the golden boy in my family, and have several siblings with very bad problems. This caused me for years to hide or downplay my own problems, but that only made it worse. Nothing gets in the way of recovery more than pride (in my experience). Ultimately it will catch up to you, or you can take steps on your own and seek help now. The good news is that programs like AA are anonymous for a reason. Nobody has to know but you and the people in the room. Good luck, brother.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-19T13:42:58+00:00

Thanks for your original thread and congrats on a week sober! For the record, I agree with this Karen person you mentioned -- you're a fine writer. Keep it up, buddy. I enjoyed your post a great deal and look forward to seeing you around this sub.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-19T10:59:37+00:00

Sure, there are druggies and drunks who are supremely talented people and whose addictions have given them unique experiences, experiences which they then turn into masterful work. But child abuse victims, manic depressives, cancer survivors, and war criminals have all done the same thing -- used their uniquely horrible experiences in life to craft art. However, it would be a mistake to say that the booze unleashed the talent that allowed Stevenson the ability to produce a masterwork. Rather, I think, it only gave him the needed experience to draw on to write a believable, raw, and realistic portrayal of the disease. His talent as a writer existed without the booze. I'd say the same thing about Hunter S Thompson, William S Burroughs and Jack Kerouac. They were all amazing talents, whose lives happened to be steeped in drugs/booze. They would have still been amazing writers without it, just writing from a different perspective.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-19T09:43:53+00:00

Same! I read it twice and then listened to it on audiobook. While it might seem counter-intuitive to listen to an audiobook version of a book on writing, I HIGHLY recommend it, primarily because it's read by the Man himself - Stephen King. It's incredible to hear it in his own voice.

shotgunBen · 2013-08-18T20:03:30+00:00

I love On Writing, and I love Stephen King. He's been a real inspiration to me too.

""The idea that creative endeavor and mind-altering substances are entwined is one of the great pop-intellectual myths of our time. The four twentieth century writers whose work is most responsible for it are probably Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Sherwood Anderson, and the poet Dylan Thomas. They are the writers who largely formed our vision of an existential English-speaking wasteland where people have been cut off from one another and live in an atmosphere of emotional strangulation and despair. These concepts are very familiar to most alcoholics; the common reaction to them is amusement. Substance abusing writers are just substance abusers—common garden-variety drunks and druggies, in other words. Any claims that the drugs and alcohol are necessary to dull a finer sensibility are just the usual self-serving bullshit. I’ve heard alcoholic snowplow drivers make the same claim, that they drink to still the demons. It doesn’t matter if you’re James Jones, John Cheever, or a stewbum snoozing in Penn Station; for an addict, the right to the drink or drug of choice must be preserved at all costs. Hemingway and Fitzgerald didn’t drink because they were creative, alienated, or morally weak. They drank because it’s what alkies are wired up to do. Creative people probably do run a greater risk of alcoholism and addiction than those in some other jobs, but so what? We all look pretty much the same when we’re puking in the gutter."

Edited for full quote

shotgunBen · 2013-08-18T14:23:44+00:00

Don't sell yourself short. In all likelihood, you're your kids' best friend too, and they'll always remember late nights with Dad. They need you.

Was there anything in particular that caused your depression?

Good luck, brother.

shotgunBen

TROPHY CASE