Don’t Drink

I drink because society is safer if I’m passed out or at least too drunk to walk. Fully aware once I’m sober I’ll be suffering more but I got through a night without hurting anybody or hurting myself in a way I can be locked away for.

I had stayed away for over a year at one point and did anything get better? No, I went to jail.

I don’t think people realize people don’t get drinking problems for fun and the mental health **** comes AFTER. It’s more like “undiagnosed/untreated mental health problems lead to addiction lead to more lead to more trauma lead to trying to get treatment but as an addict you probably have no money and shyt insurance so treatment itself is more trauma so at a point you give up on the formal treatment route and find a thing that works or go back to the addiction or a new addiction”

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It’s important to understand how much drinking depletes and damages your body and mind. People really don’t understand how the use of alcohol increases anxiety so when the levels get low the person believes the only answer is to consume alcohol. People who consume alcohol believing it helps do not know about or understand the actual science of what is actually happening in their body.

I am not posting this thread to put people down for drinking. Instead I am sharing the science of what happens to the body and that the body can actually heal if the person stops putting toxins in it that it cannot process.

@MuddyBoots it’s was good that you stopped drinking for a year. It’s important to understand that it takes time to actually learn how to live your life sober. Just eliminating alcohol doesn’t stop life challenges so that is something you will have to slowly learn how to do.
What I do know and have witnessed first hand is that drinking ruins relationships and the ability to work and get along with co-workers. People who develop a problem with alcohol often get into relationships with others who have substance abuse issues. These relationships almost always fail and are dysfunctional at best.

I have witnessed people play the victim card and insist the bad guy is the partner, friend or boss or coworker when the truth is how their own behavior is the problem.

Actually I have seen people make the same mistake over and over again by going to bars and meeting others who have substance issues and not realizing this new relationship is doomed just like the other relationships. Basically they drink and have developed a problem and they fall into a toxic loop only to say “I was abused”. They protect their drinking habits and fail to see that their own issues are connected to how they protect their own problem. This is why this pattern is actually narcissistic.

If you consume alcohol so you can pass out and sleep it’s important to know that when you do that you prevent your brain from cleaning itself while you sleep. What happens is a person ends up waking up feeling like crap and they never feel refreshed. Also what happens is that a person ends up waking up at about 3 or 4 am and are wound up and even anxious because their brain did not get the rest it needs to remove the toxins that collect in the brain.

This tends to create anger issues and depression issues.

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Why alcohol use as a sleep aide is bad.

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More to know.

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Food for thought.

I think people know alcohol is a poison that the body doesn’t like. That’s (at least for myself) half the reason why it’s hard not to drink. I don’t want to live. Even in my sober times my insomnia gets so bad at times I’ll sleep five to ten hours in a full week (and no, I am no sane or functioning and yes I do spend hella time in psych hospitals because of it).

I won’t claim everyone knows alcohol ruins your quality of sleep but I know that’s been drilled in me a lot. (So has “alcohol ruins your mood” well it was ruined before I started drinking why do you think I started?)

Sometimes the choice is between being passed out and killing myself. I’m alive.

I know it seems like I’m defending drinking I’m really not I’m just sick of people acting like people choose to drink because it’s a good option when in reality it just is the least bad option for as long as I can conceive a future (which gets shorter and shorter the worse everything else gets so of course at some point I will relapse)

Hi MuddyBoots. My intent is not to put people down but instead to post what alcohol does that people don’t realize.

My husband has been sober for over 30 years and he is very active with AA and helping others who want to get sober and change their lives.
The first 10 years of my marriage was hard and because my husband didn’t drink every day I did not know he had a problem. My husband was a binge alcoholic.
I wish I had known what is known now years ago.
I have seen a lot and had a friend that died because she didn’t stop drinking and my husband and I did try. Another friend of mine divorced her husband who would not stop and he died of alcoholism in his 30’s.
I know I can’t make someone stop, it is the decision of the person. And I do know many prefer to deny they have a problem and they don’t see the toxic loop they engage in with alcohol. I have seen them make excuses for their blackouts and when they start hearing voices. Oh they take meds and are told not to drink but the ignore that and still drink.
Been around it for years, been married 46 years now. That disease has been around me pretty much all my life. I don’t drink and never had a problem. Yet it was something people around me had problems with.

I have never been drunk, cannot tolerate drinking beer because it is too bitter to my taste, am OK with wine but do not love-love-love it, and never learned the skill of throwing back a shot of vodka/whiskey/you name it hard liquor, despite the attempts of a number of men at different junctures in my youth to teach me that skill. I could only sip hard liquor as if it were wine, which always caused laughter on the part of people who knew how to down hard liquor in one gulp. With this introduction, by way of saying that personally, I have no relevant background whatsoever to defend alcohol consumption, I have recently listened to quite fascinating audios (videos, to be exact, but I use them as audios to fall asleep to) on YouTube, which gave me pause in thinking of alcohol as pure poison.

First, I listen to many historical audio recordings on life in the Middle Ages, in antiquity, before antiquity, at the dawn of civilization, and then as recently as the 19th century. So, various stories about life in the past. I very much like learning about material culture, about life of regular folk and not just royalty and great writers/painters/musicians, etc. Say, I listened to several audios about how laundry was done in the past and found them fascinating, as I had always been curious about it. To sum up, I like learning about day-to-day life of ordinary people in the past. I realize that I cannot verify the sources in the audios I listen to, but with that caveat, I still found the audio stories educational.

One such account was the history of beer. Apparently, beer as we know it is a product of the Industrial Revolution (similarly to how our ideas about nighttime uninterrupted shut-eye are its product, and the concept that larks, i.e., early risers, are more productive members of society and more ethical individuals overall is its product, too). But early on, beer was a very nutritious drink and a source of calories, B-vitamins, and something else for manual workers. In Ancient Egypt, it was used as currency. Attempts to defraud by diluting beer were punished severely – women who brought such beer to markets or sold it at the taverns they kept were, if they were discovered or suspected to dilute, drowned in their diluted product. Not only in Egypt, but also in Europe, until several centuries ago, brewing beer was primarily done by women. It was as much women's work as cooking, and similar to it. The Western archetype of a witch (a black, tall, pointed hat, a black cat, a black cauldron) is associated with women beer brewers. The cauldron was the vessel in which they brewed, the tall hat, apparently (I am just retelling the story I heard, but not in full, as I fell asleep), was worn by such women as a signal, visible from afar on the marketplace, that they had beer to sell, and I forgot why the cat played a role. The change from women's work to a regulated male guild of beer brewers began, if I recall the story correctly, from the appropriation of the craft by monks at monasteries in the Middle Ages. They actually elevated the craft into a scientific pursuit, developed many recipes, and ensured sanitary conditions, but they also stripped women of their source of income and apparently even contributed to witch hunts, so that it became outright dangerous for women to engage in brewing.

I believe beer in olden days was not only more nutritious than now, but also, it contained less alcohol. It was a weaker drink than now. And clearly that worked, and the pyramids in Egypt stand witness to it, because seriously drunk people could not have erected them.

Then, as everyone knows, alcohol makes for a safer, more sanitary drink than water from contaminated sources, so there was that reason for consuming it: pure survival. But one can argue that now this is no longer relevant, and modern sanitation eliminates rational reasons to consume alcohol. Maybe.

Unrelated to beer, I listened to a fascinating audio about the history of absinthe. The whole French symbolist movement in the 19th century drank absinthe to excess and attributed their creativity to the "green fairy," but the belief that a special substance in absinthe caused altered states of consciousness, which, in turn, led to special creativity, was later debunked. Absinthe contains such tiny amounts of that special substance that the substance could not have made any impact. What made an impact was probably the high alcohol concentration plus the subjective belief, sort of a placebo effect. And then absinthe was demonized in a widely publicized case of domestic violence (murder), which caused moral panic and a total ban, even though, in hindsight, the fault was just heavy drinking overall and not some magically bad qualities of absinthe as a drink distinct from other forms of alcohol. So recently, with both myths debunked (that absinthe is uniquely good for creativity and that absinthe is uniquely bad for society), there has been a revival in absinthe drinking, and the multi-step slow ritual of consuming absinthe is even viewed as meditative, and there is a brand of absinthe called Van Gogh, due to his consumption of it and the famous painting by him.

And then, most intriguing and unusual, was an interview with the author of the book Drunk that YouTube offered to me based on prior listening history, but that I didn't find grabbing and didn't listen to beyond the first few minutes, but did become intrigued enough to look up the book on Amazon. Here it is, pasting the summary from Google AI, with the caveat that it may hallucinate and I have not read the book and not verified AI's output:

"Drunk
Book by Edward Slingerland
Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization by Edward Slingerland argues that alcohol's intoxicating effects have been crucial to human development, helping build social trust, creativity, and cooperation, which were essential for the rise of civilization. Drawing on neuroscience, history, and anthropology, Slingerland posits that getting drunk isn't an evolutionary mistake but a tool that lowers inhibitions, fosters bonding, and solves complex social challenges, even suggesting that the desire for alcohol may have driven the development of agriculture.
Key arguments in the book:
Social bonding: Alcohol reduces inhibitions, allowing for greater trust and cooperation, especially among strangers, which is vital for large-scale societies.
Creativity and problem-solving: Intoxication can enhance creativity and help solve problems that logic alone cannot.
Evolutionary advantage: The ability to get drunk and cooperate in groups gave humans an edge over other species, making civilization possible.
Historical evidence: Slingerland points to evidence like the oldest known recipe being for beer, not bread, suggesting alcohol production predates agriculture.
Neuroscience: Ethanol downregulates the prefrontal cortex (the brain's control center), leading to relaxation and the release of feel-good chemicals, which facilitates social bonding.
What the book covers:
Interdisciplinary approach: Uses evidence from archaeology, history, neuroscience, psychopharmacology, social psychology, literature, and genetics.
Challenges conventional views: Counters the idea that alcohol is purely an evolutionary mistake, despite its costs.
Historical context: Explores how low-alcohol beverages were the norm for most of history, with built-in safety limits. "

The last bit was actually taught to me when I was a child, reading Ancient Greek myths. I was taught that Ancient Greeks drank only wine diluted with water. 50/50, if I recall correctly. I actually prefer such wine.

Again, I personally have never experienced the disinhibiting, relaxing effects of alcohol, and for me, the only draw is taste: I sort of like some wines, and I really like weak cocktails, such as lemon ball, but with more lemon and less vodka than the typical recipe calls for. I do not drink such cocktails regularly because they contain a lot of sugar and empty calories, but I like their taste. Other than taste, good or bad, there is nothing sensory or experiential in alcohol for me, and in a way, I wish I could experience more at least once in my life to know what it is that people talk about so much, because otherwise I feel disconnected from the experiences of vast scores of fellow humans. That said, of course, I realize I am lucky that I am not at risk of alcoholism. But more to the point, there is a very wide range of alcohol consumption, and just because some people are alcoholics and cannot manage low or moderate intake doesn't necessarily mean that other people, who are not at risk of alcoholism / domestic violence stemming from alcoholism / relationship failures / unhealthy enabling/ codependency bonds / dysfunctional parenting – the whole list of ill effects of alcohol – that such people shouldn't drink alcohol at all.

To Muddy's point, I am sure people who are alcoholics do not become alcoholics by choice, by thinking it would be a good option. But people who choose to drink in moderation because they like it for whatever reasons, or a host of reasons, including for social cohesion and ritualistic gatherings, should have the freedom to make that choice.

That said, I recently attended the SF International Tea Festival and learned about a new movement to create tea ceremonies that mimic the social cohesion and connoisseurship of alcohol-mediated gatherings without alcohol. I even saw a bottle of white tea packaged to look like a champagne bottle. That seems like a worthwhile endeavor and if it takes root, it might offer the best of both worlds: social cohesion without the ill effects of alcohol on the body.

I think I will borrow the Drunk book from the library one day to familiarize myself with the arguments made by the author and the research he cites. But I also understand full well that people who have been badly affected by alcoholismsm, e.g., children of alcoholic parents, are usually not open to the arguments that attempt to find an evolutionary reason in the humankind's consumption of alcohol. For them, alcohol is pure evil. I understand that.

Oh, and lastly, apparently, Ancient Romans were always slightly intoxicated and that colored their whole history, the laws they made, etc.

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Stop lying to yourself about drinking and thinking you are ok when you drink. You are actually not more fun under the influence of alcohol. Not to mention that you really do damage your digestive tract and that swollen belly is irritation to your bowels not fat. That is damaging your delicate microbes that ends up causing anxiety and depression as well as poor quality sleep.

Tart - that is interesting. I wonder what is Slingerland's interpretation of drinking in the bible, esp stuff that happened directly after the great flood.

I do a lot of my gourmet cooking with Marsala wine & a really good bourbon. It cooks the alcohol out but leaves the good flavor. Every once in awhile I come in after working outside on my farm & have like a juice glass with a fuzzy navel, or margarita or mango juice with a little spiced rum. All just for the flavor of tge drink mix not the alcohol. Some dinners just call for a small glass of wine & pizza sometimes gets a small glass of dark beer/ale locally brewed. Mostly I hate how I feel if I drink more than that & always feel I have to have it all together living alone & responsible for all my animals if anything happens.

I’m not drinking anymore not because it’ll shave years off my life or worsen anxiety or sleep or screw with my GI system or fry my liver or whatever but because organizing my life over not dealing with life is a very messy way to be dead but still remain breathing.

It’s not the lack of sleep or anxiety or depression that gets to me (I’ve dealt with all of those since I was very young they’re nothing new, depression at least is a welcome reprieve from mania and mixed states and I notice no difference in anxiety sober or post-drinking). It’s moreso the shame of having to hide it and constantly reassure by lying and how a life in active alcoholism is, although “easier” in that I have an illusory escape at all times, also hard for someone who easily feels guilt and shame and is constantly calculating my moral worth (and punishing myself for decreasing it when I do not really have to).

Thats the stuff they should talk about when they’re trying to talk about the price of problematic drinking. Most of us don’t give a flying f—- about our surface level wellbeing.

I’ll admit I skipped over the super long posts (had an opposite reaction to a med to help me focus (started before I last relapsed btw before anyone gets on my arse for blaming the med when it was alcohol) so they increased it naturally) but I tried getting the gist of the posts and videos.

I will read the book, find out and update the thread.

I also wonder what he makes of comparing drinking societies to non-drinking societies. There is a long history of both and I am sure he was intrigued enough to want to learn how religious prohibition of drinking affected the course of history in non-drinking societies.

Tart, i wish i had met you when i was a child! Someone inquisitive! I know i had always been underemployed, but i was so exhausted by the end of the working day, i didnt know how to move on.

I think a lot of people genuinely don’t know what happens to the body and brain when they consume alcohol. People consume alcohol when they socialize not realizing how that can take their body a few days to recover from. People think that because they go out on Wednesdays and Fridays and drink (party) that they are not harming themselves.

I feel like the people that genuinely don’t know probably really aren’t causing a significant long term impact. Having two drinks on a Friday once a month and saying it’s not going to kill you is probably accurate. They’re probably more likely to die from the road rager on the way home or a Twinkie habit or something before the. tbh. Are they going to have effects for awhile while their body detoxes it? Yeah, but livers will function as long as they didn’t overdo it. I mean there is a reason bars are busier on Fridays and Saturdays than Mondays.

I didn’t know this but giving it more thought, yes there tends to be a point of intoxication where the person turns angry.
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I saw a lot of different behaviors when it came to alcohol use. My husband often had to drive individuals to meetings who lost their license for DUI. I remember them complaining about the inconvenience of having to take mandatory classes too. They got caught and failed the breathalyzer test. They thought they were ok to drive, well they all think that. Yet, they don’t think about others or the risk when drinking. Some drink, get high on pot and use cocaine. They don’t even think about the consequences.

Some, yeah. I’ve known someone whose most proudest moment was fooling a cop when they got pulled over while drunk and drove away. On the other hand, I know a couple people who don’t even drive because drinking is more important but also they’re not ready to risk killing someone. I think knowing about harm reduction and how to meet people where they are at is important.

My husband was often abused when he tried to sponsor someone new to the program. I remember one guy that would call him in the middle of the night angry and entitled.

My husband actually got to see what it’s like being the sober one. Yet he didn’t realize how that is what he put ME through. Yet I had seen that dynamic happen with my parents so because it was familiar I thought it was normal.

That is when there was no internet or social media or cell phones.

Yeah. You still have to put up boundaries. There’s a difference between expecting an alcoholic to be perfect because they learned some, on an emotional level, meaningless facts and seeing someone trying to get better and letting them screw up without abusing you and then on the other extreme just completely enabling the addiction and letting them abuse you. I know it’s a hard one to manage where you are on a given day but it’s kinda like how a big noisy family with a lot of kids shouldn’t take in a severely traumatized aggressive dog. (That was a lot of leaps I jumped over in dots so I probably just came across as an asshole but whatever at this point I’m probably dying idgaf)