I've said this before. I'm also not in a totally perfect state of mind right now, but I don't think I will be for a long time. I'm sober, though. Eight days at the moment and I'm mentioning that so that I have publicly stated somewhere that this is how long and so if I ever felt the need to fuck my life up, I could remember this here as one of the countless reasons not to.

If you think the idea of me making this topic is extremely self-indulgent, then okay, I don't necessarily expect anybody to care about this. I'm making it kind of for me but also as a way to make a widespread apology for my behaviour for many years now. I've lashed out at a lot of you over the years for no reason, and no doubt I'd be better friends with you all otherwise. I've also just said some repugnant shit which has absolutely no place in my sober mind. Anyone who has had extensive contact with me has most likely taken some shit from me and I would like to apologise to you all personally but I'll start here.

A lot of things are happening in my life right now, but I'm going to keep this to the drinking thing. I've felt for a long time like I ruined a good chance I had around here to get involved with people I really like. Some of the people here are the few people I really, really like that I have ever met in the world. It is hard to meet people you really like, beyond a level of just company or even relationship stuff. Real stinking compadres around here, I'm saying. In the back of my head when I hear people talk about Barkley 2 I think 'that could've been you, you motherfucker!', as in, I could be involved in the creation of that game if I hadn't taken the isolated, irresponsible and just plain empty path in my life that I've taken this far. So I've lost a lot. Not everything, and I'm lucky because I am still young and I go to AA meetings and hear the entire lifetimes people have ruined. I don't want it to be me because I actually want things out of life, and I know better what they are than most people my age do, I think, and there is no reason other than drinking that I won't be a success. So it's a chemical addiction and allergy that I have let taken control of me and I want it to stop.

So I'm making it stop. I have made it stop. I just need to keep that going, now, and my life will just improve by itself. I can't sit in the house all fucking day doing nothing when I'm sober, I can't lose spans of 5 days at a time where I do nothing but sit drunk in front of a computer screen or, if I'm lucky, go to a party where people don't know I'm a drunk and promptly teach them. It's death!!! Also my symptoms are progressing - half waking nightmares, shakes, puking, paranoia, 3 day hangovers - all that bad crap.

So I'm making this topic to announce that I have quit drinking, which also helps make it more real to me. I have no social life, really, due to my drinking. I'd be doing the same thing with my real life friends, if I had any. I've told the few people who care about me, and yeah I doubt they are taking it too seriously at the moment, since I have quit before and for much longer than 8 days. There was always the thought I'd eventually go back to drinking before, though, and at least right now I see absolutely no reason for me ever to pick up another drink. I hope that 6 months down the line when I am still sober I will have more credibility and I'll be able to show off the good side of me, which exists (I can be cool!), and let this motherfucker who has wrecked my life fade slowly into dead memory.

Also anyone, feel free to talk about your own stuff in this topic. I'm probably going to quickly drift into HOW DO YOU LIVE LIFE kind of stuff anyway. I even started writing a journal in a fucking notebook. I just hope there is enough left for some of you guys to accept my apology and be prepared to see me differently than a drunk fuck-up who is occasionally a complete asshole. It isn't who I want to be, and it isn't who I am at this moment.

Thanks dada. As for the cold turkey question, I'm kind of surprised because I thought it'd be pretty obvious I am not the kind of person who can just have a drink of alcohol. Anything other than completely quitting would be a total lie and the weakest shit I could deliver at this point in my life. I think I will get into some additional things other than AA meetings (they are tiring, and I can't engage with some of it, but I tend to pick up on one or two useful things per meeting), very soon. The most important thing for me is to keep busy, though. Lying around breeds this stuff.

edit:

Yeah, thanks konix. I know I've occasionally worried people as well, which honestly feels like a compliment as twisted as that is. It definitely isn't how I am going to engage with people from now on but that your reaction wasn't just 'that fucker is fucked up again, what a dipshit' (i mean it was probably that, too) helps me feel like I have something decent left to begin rebuilding from. I'm really trying.

I mean just this week I've gotten a possible video comission, 3 job interviews and I went to a lecture about chinese economics I had no reason to go to. That's about 3000% more than I've done in the past 4 months so it's a good start. I'd like to learn how to meet, get to know and care about people next.

oh yeah and nasty details? how about the onset of chronic diarrhea. i got a whiff of that once or twice. i heard from some guys who didn't stop until their 40's that it gets REAL raw. some crazy stuff happens to you.

I dunno if anyone else around here has anything to say about this kind of problem, but like I said, feel free.

yeah, i'm trying to find meetings with a few more young people at them. i mean i'm not averse to talking to older people but in terms of actually hanging out with people i'd like to see if i could find some more young people. there is a tendency for the older folk, like 50 or older, to approach you and start lecturing you about all this stuff to do with AA and what alcoholism is and I know some people might benefit from that but it's honestly just kinda boring cos all kinds of people go to these meetings and some of them aren't necessarily going to be able to talk to me.

but yeah, if there is a place where people are approachable, it is AA. they'll do all kinds of stuff for you at the slightest suggestion because it is part of what they believe recovery means, you've got to reach out like that. i think i believe that too, actually.

who is jamie? The only jamie >I know is jamicus, and he used to have drinking problems

i deny it, there is a phony jamicus at work here

I wish you the best of luck Jamie. Can I ask how your drinking started becoming a problem?

I started drinking when I was 12 or 13, not sure exactly when, but I remember distinctly loving it from the beginning. Within a couple of years I had a reputation. Even people at my high school thought I was an alcoholic by the time I was 16-17 and I do too. It kind of runs in my family - neither of my parents have it, but their parents did. My parents are great and hardly drink. I haven't had a difficult life or anything, so my only explanation is that it is an abnormality in my brain and body which was probably with me from when I was born. It wouldn't have mattered when I started, I would have had a problem with it eventually. So the only thing to do is deal with it head on!

this is awesome but it'd be best to have supervision! not just for support but i mean like, alcohol withdrawal is deadly.

i am not a medical doctor

My eyes are blue but it didn't save me...