Degrees of Alcoholism

[frogus23]

I'm intrigued by this subject - because, as you can guess, I am not 'an alcoholic'...I don't drink more than about three times a week...but I have an infliction, which I'm sure I share with some pleople, and probably many...I'd like to know about all of you, but in my drinking:

1)I don't drink alone - I literally cannot stomach alcohol without a drinking buddy
2)If I do drink, I don't stop.

This is my whole problem - does anyone relate??

I never ever find myself having a quiet beer after hours in my bedroom...but whenever I go out with friends I will inevitably find myself drinking to the maximum extent, which normally involves mixing wine, beer and spirits, nd passing out in a stupor....

For example, I am in my own home, after having just had a drink & a meal with my family & my brother-in-law's parents....now I am sitting in front of the pc with an empty bottle of wine & a full bottle of wine...

[Weasel]

From my past experience, number 2 on your list will lead to 'an alcoholic'. Every person is different though.

When I did drink, it was never alone and I would not quit until I either passed out or got knocked out. After a while I came to realize that drinking is not for me and my goals in life.

[Luis Antonio]

Well, when I drink more than half tequila bottle I get really drunk, so I'm in the blue like guaraná state. Then there is the loss of memory caused by the full bottle. Then if more than that I dont know what will happen, cause I dont usually drink that much. Only once. And I cant remember much, except arriving home very very drunk.

BTW, dont do it; it is very bad.

[dragon wench]

I really appreciate certain alcohols, wine is probably my favourite.. I recently ate an excellent seafood dinner, and the bottle of Chardonnay we had with it was the perfect accompaniment.
But, I also know that if I never saw the stuff again, I would not be especially devastated (wish I could say the same for caffeine ). On average I'll drink between one and three times a week. In most cases, very little each time.
I do sometimes drink when I am by myself, usually the evenings where my SO is not around, but I'm not truly 'alone' because invariably I'll be chatting on MSN
On a few occasions I have drank to excess and mixed wine, beer and spirits, but after dealing with the consequences a few times I decided it was not something I enjoyed.

[Georgi]

@Frogus Binge drinking is the new alcoholism, don't you know?

I found after a year or so at university I got kind of bored with going out and getting completely wrecked. I only really drink socially, since I don't drink wine or anything one can really appreciate in a connoisseurly fashion. And since I don't really enjoy being ridiculously drunk these days, I don't have trouble not drinking to excess. *shrug*

[Chanak]

Addiction is a tough thing to quantify. I've known quite a few alcoholics during my lifetime, and their addictions manifest differently. Alcoholism does not have to progress to a point where you lose a job, relationships, become abusive, etc in order for you to be an alcoholic. The fact that alcohol can control your behavior (ie, can't stop drinking) is qualifier enough. If you find you can't stop when you start drinking until you pass out, chances are good you are an alcoholic.

What you have to look forward to as an alcoholic: liver damage, psychological problems, increasing dependence, emphysema, various anemias, and so on. If your addiction advances far enough, withdrawal can even be fatal. I witnessed someone suffering from delerium tremens (DTs). It's nightmarish.

[frogus23]

Sweetness and light Chanak

I don't know when my strength of will will have to get tested - at the moment I am telling myself I am too young to try to restrain myself in anything

Of course this means that I have thought I would like to drink less, like so that I could remember half the people that remember me from last time, but haven't actually managed to do it.

I only got concerned about this when some American family came over the other day, and John the father, who is an absolute paragon of responsibility & temperance, as well as a toxicologist, was showing just the same behaviour that I didn't really care about in myself; drinking one glass after another without pausing, consuming much faster than the rest of the company, & rapidly becoming unaware of himself standing out after losing speech skills etc...it was a bit embarassing really.

[Nippy]

I’ve stopped drinking completely, and haven’t touched a drop of booze in 7 months now and I honestly don’t miss it at all. I don’t harbour a grudge against anyone who drinks, nor do I want people to stop. Pro-choice!

What I would say is that I agree with Chanak. Alcoholism and addiction is something that can be apparently differently in different people – which is why some people can never recognise it…

[C Elegans]

Like 50% of all people from East Asia I can't degrade alcohol properly due to lack of aldehyde dehydrogenase isoenzyme. This works as a natural antabus, so I don't drink alcohol at all. However, I have had many opportunities to study alcohol dependency and abuse. The major issue with alcohol consumption is not whether you fulfil the formal critera for dependency or abuse, but how damaging a certain level of consumption actually is for your health. Alcohol is a toxic, and you have acute and long term effects. Please consider the following:

1. Binge-drinking is much more harmful than continous drinking. The acute neurotoxic effect of alcohol is highly correlated to plasma concentration. When you get very drunk, you simply kill off a lot of brain cells at that occation because the concentration of alcohol reaches the level where the cells die. If you drink the same amount of alcohol every day over 1 week instead of at 3 single occations, the concentration of alcohol in your blood is much lower and thus the brain cells survive.

2. Experimental studies of the effect of alcohol on brain function, shows that the adolescent brain is more susceptible to damage than the adult brain. Even though a person may be fully mature intellectually and personality-wise at age 17, the brain, especially in males, may still not be fully developed. It is known that the myelinasation, ie the wrapping of lipids around the axons of the nerve cells, is not finalised in males until the late teens. This may be the reason why the young brain suffer from more cognitive deficits than the adult brain, given the same amount of alcohol intake. The young brain gets more severe memory problems, and problems also last longer. You must ask yourself whether you think it's worth it to reduce your cognitive abilities or not.

3. Binge-drinking is a risk factor for future development of severe alcoholism. Not drinking alone is a protective factor. I am sure you are aware of many risk factors such as development of tolerance (ie you need to drink more and more in order to get the same effect), abstinence symptoms, etc, but not being able to stop drinking once you start, is actually a fairly severe risk factor.

4. Many people with neuropsychiatric conditions closely associated with serotonergic neurotransmission, are at higher risk for alcohol abuse than other people. People with depressive or bipolar conditions are both more inclined to drink more alcohol because it works as self-medication, and they are also at higher risk for developing dependency and abuse. Drinking a fine tasting wine to a good dinner is one thing, but everyone who drinks because it makes them feel good, rather than because it tastes good should consider a more specific pharmacological treatment than alcohol can offer.

[Moonbiter]

Let me try to drag my foot out of my mouth for a moment:
I have a long tradition of drinking. I live in a country where the hyped standards of "being on the edge" alcohol-wise has gone off-kilter completeoy. According to our (state funded) scientists the rest of the world are raving alcoholics. Every citizen of southern Europe is a complete disaster area. I mean, they enjoy a glass of wine or two EVERY DAY during a meal ON WEEKDAYS and have a bit more ON WEEKENDS! Read those big letter combinations together, and you get a message.
The sad fact is that my fellow countrymen are the worst binge-drinkers on the planet. Put them on any Charter airplane, and they will, if the aircrew allows it, drink themselves to death.
Back to the issue at hand. I agree with C.Elegans on most of her input, despite it being an exceptionally tiresome read. I myself often find myself in Frogus' situation (as some previous posts here might have shown ) when one wine bottle is empty and you're going for the next, alone by the pc. Does that make you an alcoholic? Weeellll, maybe, but that's according to standards of where you live. I myself lived the rock'n'roll circus with Bourbon on my cornflakes in the morning for four years. Yes, at that time I might have been considered an alcoholic. So were we all. Ten years later, and I don't touch the hard stuff, I'm still prone to open a bottle of wine after I've finished the first one, which according to the experts and probably true, is supposed to be a problem. I don't get hammered from two bottles of wine, and it always stops at that. Even when I'm alone. I spend a lot of time alone, as my wife travels all the time. I would never even THINK of having a beer when Comrade Droolski(my son) is around, which is pretty much all the time. I also at the moment work 10-12 hour days, and as I'm getting on a bit, drinking ain't what it used to be. So when I'm all by my lonesome and having a tipple, I drink too much. Period. But I never get blind drunk, even when rehersing with my band. It always stops at a certain point for me. I don't know how old you are, Frogus; but what you're presenting ain't worse than most, and you sure as hell ain't an alcoholic.