Well, as I found out today, your teeth itch the whole of the next day.
Seven weeks ago I might have had my first bender. Over the course of three weeks I averaged between ½ to a bottle of Jack a night. Of course, there were concerts, and parties, and happy hours, and going away parties, and camping trips, and more happy hours, and I’m young, and I have the good drinking genes; but they all just sort of ran together. Party Saturday, then Family Guy is on Sunday nights; have to drink for that. Then a few friends want to go out Monday night, etc. I would have stopped after the first few days, but everyone seemed to like me better. Hell, after going on a company camping trip, wherein I drank myself into such a stupor I’m surprised I didn’t fall into the fire, I went into work on Monday feeling more welcome than ever. The girls looked at me differently, the guys treated me differently; I even had my own catch phrase.
Accordingly, the following week those guys and girls looked to me to initiate happy hours, which, of course, meant that I had to attend to them all. The following week was the last week for one of the guys in my lab. Part of the lab manager’s responsibilities is to organize the going away parties, right? All three of them, right?
I spent the day after his last party in bed, feeling my heart beating, telling myself I had to slow down. I wouldn’t drink for 28 days, four weeks, standard rehab time. I spent the better part of that time in the lab, 12-16 hours a day.
28 days ran out on Saturday. I went to the lab for a few hours, did some work, went home, felt a little lonely and popped in the tape of Howard Stern’s last terrestrial radio show. I know it sounds stupid, but Artie was drinking Jack, why shouldn’t I drink Jack too. After all, I was saying goodbye to some old friends. (Send the kids to the neighbor’s Marge, I’m coming home wasted). I had to go back to the lab for several hours today, performing some of the most boring assays known to man (dissecting fruit flies). My hands were shaking, I couldn’t thermo-regulate, I was irritable, etc.
My teeth haven’t been itching for several hours now; I’ve scratched them with some left over bourbon. I’d hate to overreact and call myself an alcoholic, after all I stopped drinking for a full month pretty easily. And I’ve seen alcoholics; my dad, and friends of my dad, who wound up in the hospital after rupturing their esophagus dry heaving, breaking their back falling over the railing of our front porch, or wrecking their Z28 Camaro (and giving it to me); they’re alcoholics. I’m just lonely. Right?
Hey, those guys didn’t start out that way.
I think the fact that you’re asking for reassurance means you know something’s not kosher here. It sounds like nothing but a string of excuses: excuses to drink, excuses to keep drinking, excuses as to why you’re not an alcoholic, etc.
Happy
Because it’s like cheating on the exam in your Ethics class?
Seriously, your body might be telling you something. Listen to it. I’ve had friends and relatives swallowed up by indulgence.
If you need to set yourself a period of time to not drink, and if you’re counting down the hours during that period – you may very well have a problem with alcohol. “Normal” drinkers (whoever the hell they are) don’t need to do either of those things.
twicks, recovering alcholic
You’re not an alcoholic. You’re a guy who likes to drink. You had fun drinking, you decided you didn’t want to drink for a period of time, and now you’re back at it. So what? Don’t let these kill-joys get you down. Drinking is a problem when it interferes with your life. If it’s not interfering with your life, do what makes you feel good.
As AC/DC once sang, “So come on and have a good time / And get blinded out of your mind.”
Which one sang that, the one that died from drinking too much?
No, the guy who replaced him. Sang it on the album that came out right after he died, too, in a song entitled, “Have a Drink on Me.” No one ever accused AC/DC of being sensitive.