This is the key point of my story. For those who don't know me personally, I can say that for a long time beer was my constant companion. There are people who have never seen me without a can in my hand. Some probably considered beer an attribute of my image. It's funny how a person can change in one day.

In general, only after you stop drinking do you realize how much paradoxes concluded in society's attitude towards alcohol. A moderate drinker in the company of teetotalers looks like a drinker, but he always has several friends who drink much more, so his soul is calm. And now we have a whole society of people who believe that an alcoholic is anyone, not him. Another paradox is that while I was drinking, I felt the condescending and hostile attitude of those around me who were light drinkers. When I stopped drinking altogether, it changed not to approval at all, but to distrust with a chill. Interesting? Go ahead.

In fact, between a non-drinker and a moderate drinker lies huge abyss, while from a moderate drinker to a complete alcoholic - one step. It's hard to believe, but it's true. Sometimes it is enough for a light drinker to crash his car, get drunk out of grief, go on a binge and not get out of it in time to find himself over the edge. normal life, and this is the sad truth. Of course, this happens rarely, but this is how people get bruises.

Because of alcohol, I often found myself in stupid situations, and this was the main reason for quitting. Who hasn't wanted to quit after a heavy drinking session? This happened to me, but this time the desire turned out to be serious. I realized that I don't need it, and no need at all. This is very important because many would like to drink less, or drink occasionally. If you look at things realistically, there is no other way but to quit altogether, completely, forever, and never drink again. Such a thought is repulsive, but there is nothing wrong with it. Now I am no longer going to absorb flammable liquids, and I don’t feel “something different.” By the way, since I quit, I probably drink about once a month. At the same time, I don’t like it, I stop and promise myself not to drink anymore. Well, okay, I don't care. Let's get back to the story.

A couple of days after I decided to quit, I remembered the book Alana Carra"An easy way to stop drinking." The book is much shorter than "...to smoke" and much more interesting (probably translated by another person). I highly recommend reading it for those who drink a lot, a little or not at all. That is, everyone. The book is cool, funny, interesting, and educational. So, I lamented it, and it helped me consolidate the effect of the promise I made to myself. Now I’ll briefly give a few excerpts from there.

Why is it important not to drink: facts that are usually not mentioned.
Alcohol is the strongest depressant and is not much different from any poison. It causes apathy, depression, and weakness of will. It makes you see problems as more serious than they really are. It makes you unable to think.
Rotten beer bottle party it won't get any more fun, but alcohol blocks willpower, so after drinking a can, a person doesn’t give a damn about the fact that it’s not fun, and instead of calmly leaving, he will drink the next one. If the party is fun, it will be fun without alcohol.
Alcoholic drinks - not tasty, but a person gets used to its taste over the years. Now I can’t stand the taste of my once favorite beer. But beer makes you thirsty, and you want to drink more. Then the alcohol starts to take effect and you want to drink even more.
Alcohol does not make us bolder, more attractive, or wittier, but it begins to seem so to us.
Alcohol doesn't warm, and even vice versa. This is the most harmful myth associated with alcohol. Alcohol can help warm you up if you've already come from the cold to a warm place and don't plan to return to the cold anytime soon! The body itself restricts blood circulation in the arms and legs in order to keep the internal organs warm (heat in the body is taken from the lungs). By drinking alcohol, this mechanism is disrupted, and heat leaves the body to the arms and legs, and the internal organs cool down. This can lead to very serious consequences.
The fact that alcohol is beneficial in small doses - myth. Even a small dose of alcohol depletes red blood cells (blood cells) electric charge, which causes them to stick together and clog the capillaries, This is bad for the eyes, turnips, and reproductive organs,

And now about what I gained by quitting drinking. Well, for starters, I suddenly developed a good amount of dough. Alcohol is quite an expensive thing, and you always don’t understand where the money goes. It's simple: a drink, a snack, and often a taxi is added. You just somehow stop monitoring how you spend your money. Without alcohol, productivity increases (I personally cannot work even after a can of beer, although for some reason it is believed that a programmer cannot do without beer), efficiency brings money.
Clarity of thought. Actually, in our country this trait doesn’t seem to be very valued, but I’ve already managed to love it in myself. Damn, I like the state when my head crystal clear. This is the norm. This is right. It should be. A boiling pot directly affects the amount of money: you just take more care of yourself and where the money goes. By the way, I can say from myself that alcohol affects your head within a week. That is, once you drink once, and for a whole week you are no longer a full-fledged person, you are not 100% yourself.

I'm going to talk a lot in the future about money and how to have more of it, and I want you to understand that figuring out your relationship with alcohol is really important. To make my talk more useful, I would like you to remember all the bad things alcohol has done to you in your life. Stop and think. Write it down somewhere. If you don't drink, are there people among you who drink? There's still a lot to think about. Also write down the good things that alcohol brought you. If you scored at least one plus, you can write it here, we’ll talk about it. And read" easy way stop drinking"I recommend that you do this, no matter how you feel about alcohol. This does not oblige you to quit, and I can guarantee there will be benefits.

That's all for now.

Although no =) after

I wasn’t an alcoholic, I wasn’t seen at a drug treatment clinic (like they register people addicted to alcohol there), I didn’t have liver pain, I just liked to drink a little. After work, I could grab a glass and a half of beer and chips and come home, relax and watch a movie or football. By the way, I didn’t have any problems with excess weight or obesity either. I also drank at parties with friends or to celebrate events. Sometimes it could swell a lot. In general, by the age of 22 (that’s how old I was when I stopped drinking), I had impressive alcohol experience. If I project my situation onto others, my lifestyle was the same as 70-80% of my peers. Everyone drinks and that's normal.

My 5 reasons why I quit drinking

I didn’t stop drinking right away. The first signals that I needed to quit came to me in April 2014, then for a week I drank every day and participated in some kind of trouble every day. Naturally, I couldn’t think normally about anything other than drinking, so projects piled up at work, and my condition worsened. And I quit drinking, quit for a month. When you quit for a certain period, it is more difficult to do, because... on the one hand, you have a goal, but on the other, you have already determined the period of abstinence and why break yourself if you want to drink?

In general, I held out for a month, but I couldn’t do it any longer. And now, six months later from the first unsuccessful experience of quitting drinking, I quit completely. But this was facilitated by a very deep analysis, comprehension and acceptance of responsibility for everything that happens in my life:

1. Shame. I felt ashamed that I often drink alcohol. I looked at myself from the outside when I came with a hangover to a small office and breathed fumes on those around me. I was ashamed that in order to meet a pretty girl at a disco, I had to give up 50, or even 100 grams.
2. False calm. On Monday when work week It’s just starting, you need to solve a lot of different things during the process and you can’t concentrate on work matters, although you really need to. You go home after work, loaded and tired (because you haven’t recovered from the weekend of alcohol trash and didn’t get enough sleep because you went to bed at three in the morning), you go to the store, buy a couple of bottles of beer, drink them and a warmth rushes through your body, positive rays of goodness and light illuminate your consciousness. It seems to you that everything is fine and the issues will be resolved on their own. And instead of turning on your brain and solving problems, you just forget about them. At this point, alcohol creates a false signal that everything is fine.
3. Lack of ability to control your actions.
4. Lack of sense of proportion.
5. I started taking Self-Motivation training. One of the first and fundamental tasks was not to drink alcohol. I didn’t complete the training, but I never started drinking.

Many people were skeptical that I quit drinking. “Bullshit”, “Let’s have a drink with me”, “Are you sick” - this is a small list of what I heard addressed to me when I refused to drink together. In general, one gets the feeling that every person who drinks with pleasure sees it as his mission to make a teetotaler drunk, to instill confusion in a non-drinker. But this is the problem of our time, that a non-drinker is perceived as something unnatural.

When former alcoholics stop drinking, they experience a feeling of discomfort, the result of confronting which can easily be another breakdown and a return to their previous dependent state. Without any doubt, alcoholism is a disease. So how do people who quit drinking manage to find an adequate replacement for alcohol and feel like a full-fledged person again?

What problems do former alcoholics face?

People who quit drinking often have to overcome the same set of problems. However, having a clear idea of ​​the difficulties that should be expected, you can properly prepare your own mind for what is to come.

All the problems that people who quit drinking face can be divided into the following categories:

1. The real problems created by alcohol are related to human physiology, the perception of changes by the body. Typically, the more experience a drinker has, the worse his health is. You can eliminate troubles of this nature by enduring until the desired changes occur or by seriously working to restore your own healthy well-being.
2. Masked problems concern the emotional sphere of an alcohol-dependent person. Individuals who have quit drinking are meeting many of them for the first time in long years, since alcohol is a great distraction from reality.

Depressive states

A state of despondency is a completely normal reaction of consciousness to However, each person in his own way tries to find a way out of the current situation. Many of us prefer home-based alcoholism as a solution.

People who quit drinking have to relearn how to resist attacks of melancholy. An excellent distraction during rehabilitation here can be walks on fresh air, class own body And exercise. Yoga can help strengthen your mind and body at the same time.

What other rational ways out of a pathological condition do people who quit drinking prefer to use? First of all, this is a regular visit to a psychoanalyst, attending physician, or ordinary conversations with non-drinking friends. In general, to get out of a depressed state when giving up alcohol, it is very important to occupy yourself, benefit others, do good deeds and look for ways to express yourself.

and increased irritability

Treatment of patients with alcoholism always causes frequent attacks of unreasonable angry states in the latter. Often, the roots of such a problem lie in deep childhood and come out as soon as the brain regains the ability to perceive objective reality.

Group therapy and psychoanalysis sessions are of great benefit in overcoming anger and increasing self-control for people who have said goodbye to systematic alcohol intake.

The cause of negative emotional well-being can be special biochemical reactions in the body. For example, one of the most common causes of angry states when quitting alcohol is excessive caffeine consumption or overeating. For most previously addicted people, significant reductions in diet, special diets, and temporary abstinence from caffeine and fatty foods help bring themselves back to normal.

Sleep disturbance

Former alcoholics, as a rule, do not feel adequate rest after sleep, which they need significantly more than non-drinkers. It takes a lot of time and patience to reach a normal, stable state.

What are the most common causes of sleep disorders? Often the real problem for someone who quits drinking is constant insomnia, difficulty staying awake in the morning, lack of dreams or regular nightmares. In the presence of nightmares, their realism is striking. Moreover, their plot is often tied to drunkenness.

To bring their own sleep back to normal, many people who have quit drinking engage in evening physical activity, which leads to natural fatigue and, accordingly, makes them sleep more soundly. Doing a warm-up in the morning makes it possible to energize your body and quickly recover from a drowsy state.

Family problems

People who give up regular drinking face another pressing problem. A drastic change in one’s own lifestyle often leads to inadequate perception of change on the part of loved ones. In fact, people who quit drinking become completely different people in the eyes of their relatives, sometimes strangers and difficult to understand.

Active communication with loved ones helps to reduce tension and reduce all kinds of friction in the family. Forming the image of a non-drinker requires time for family members to get used to the new “I”. Visiting family counseling, Alcoholics Anonymous, or groups on establishing healthy relationships in the family can help you come to agreement.

Changing your usual social circle

Quitting alcoholic beverages predictably leads to changes in the perception of others and causes problems with relationships. As in the previous case, the former dependent person has to adapt his comrades to a new, non-drinking image of himself. At the same time, each comrade often has a different, sometimes rather inadequate reaction to what is happening.

The only one rational decision It may be a matter of refraining from communicating with friends who show support in the aspirations of the former addict. Companions who provoke addiction relapse are not true friends. Therefore, former addicts try to separate “well-wishers” from other people.

Digestive disorders

As soon as a person begins to introduce others to the story of “how I quit drinking,” physical problems immediately replace previously relevant ones. In this situation, digestive disorders are a completely adequate reaction of the body to changes. Such processes are always felt on a physical level when parting with a long-standing addiction, be it caffeine, sweets, nicotine or alcohol.

Digestive problems are an integral part of the healing process. A diet based on cereals, legumes, fresh fruits and vegetables, and any food rich in coarse fiber helps many people who quit drinking to relieve discomfort until the body is completely reorganized.

Difficulty thinking

After completely and irrevocably giving up alcohol, a person has to endure problems related to confusion of thinking. Sometimes the consequence of a sudden refusal of alcohol is hallucinations and unclear expression of one’s own thoughts.

How do former addicts manage to cope with such troubles? The most effective help in in this case This could include exercise, diet, or giving up other addictions, such as nicotine or sweets. Yoga, massage sessions, fitness and gymnastics, and manual therapy can also help you come into agreement with your own consciousness.

Stressful situations

Once a person has seemingly completely managed to say goodbye to alcohol, major troubles or fatal misfortunes often arise that can force him to turn to drinking again. After all, in such situations before, all that was left was to get drunk.

Probably negative emotional condition against the backdrop of problems looming on all sides, this is the greatest obstacle for former alcoholics. But if you manage to heal a wound in your soul without alcohol once, then you will probably be able to repeat this more than once in the future. Over time, consistent movement towards overcoming obstacles only strengthens former addicts and makes them feel their own strength.

If people who have quit drinking again resort to solving problems by consuming alcohol, this most often only worsens the situation, despite the sadness of the circumstances.

Fighting stereotypes

Quite often, people who drink in the past find themselves in situations where it is almost impossible to abandon the behavioral stereotype accepted in society. A striking example would be the organization of a gala feast on the occasion of an important event in the family of a former addict. What should a former alcoholic do if he needs to participate in a feast?

In reality, for the person who found effective method quit drinking and have already managed to give up the addiction forever, nothing bad will happen. Those who have given up their addiction to alcohol can easily apply the principle of adequate replacement by drinking non-alcoholic drinks as an alternative.

Naturally, for the replacement principle to fully justify itself, it is absolutely not enough to simply drink juice instead of wine, but mineral water instead of vodka. A whole host of secondary attributes are important. So, it is absolutely not recommended to pour water into vodka glasses, but into wine glasses. This insignificant detail creates in the picture of a former addict something akin to imitation of alcohol consumption, which is simply unacceptable.

There are a number of rules that can be applied as a simple example of the behavior of a former drinker during a feast:

• when those around you drink wine, you should use a different type of glass or a completely different wine glass, having first filled it with a drink that is sharply different from wine in smell, color and taste;
• if the main alcoholic drink on the table is vodka, it is better to use a sweet, colored carbonated drink as a substitute, pouring it into anything but a glass;
• If those present drink beer from large glass mugs or wine glasses, preference should be given to mineral or sweet colorless water, absorbing it directly from the neck of the bottle.

Society of Alcoholics Anonymous

Often, attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings becomes an effective obstacle to returning to an addiction. Members of such organizations receive psychological assistance and they themselves provide support to others on a peer-to-peer basis.

An Alcoholics Anonymous club may use a church minister to preside over meetings, professional psychologist, psychotherapist, narcologist. However, no matter how the therapy is organized, the main principle here remains the provision of mutual support from the club participants.

Almost every Alcoholics Anonymous club operates according to a program consisting of successive steps on the path to recovery. The main points of such programs are based on the following:

• recognizing oneself as a dependent, unhealthy person;
• entrusting the result into the hands of one’s own spiritual power;
• making firm intentions to fully and completely compensate for the damage previously caused due to addiction to loved ones and others;
• self-analysis and search for reserves for personal growth;
• communicating ideas and one’s own conclusions to other community members.

How do people who quit drinking manage to cope with relapses?

Even a person who regularly hears stories about “how I quit drinking” lurks the danger of allowing a relapse. What should a former addict do if he decides to Once again drink up? The only way out in such a situation is to go through the entire path of recovery from the beginning, a complete return to a sober life.

Ultimately, you shouldn’t traumatize yourself with constant feelings of guilt for allowing a breakdown. Many former alcoholics view such situations from the point of view of gaining useful experience, which simply allows them to exclude negative aspects from their personal recovery program.

Finally

How to stop drinking for free and give up the bad habit forever? Each person finds his own, individual way to solve this issue. The only system that can be called ideal is one that does not force one to look for a replacement for alcohol and does not require changes in behavioral stereotypes.

To achieve a state of complete renunciation of alcohol, most former addicts are helped by saying goodbye to yesterday's life, feelings of personal inferiority, and beliefs in their inability to achieve more. All this requires a full awareness of all the advantages of a sober life, as well as an orientation toward a bright, successful future that promises a person a world without alcohol.

Today I want to tell you how I stopped drinking once and forever.

Preface...

I would like to tell you about my experience of binge drinking, misconceptions, and my opinion about it. I had little experience with drinking, only three years, many will say: “Three years is really experience?! People over there have been drinking for 15 years, what an experience!” I’ll answer that in some ways I have experience, but in others I don’t, it’s still THREE years to nowhere, wasted time.

I started drinking, binge-drinking, at 23, and stopped at 26. I experienced real hangovers, when you shake and vomit from drinking alcohol and water for a week, because when you’re on a binge, a person doesn’t eat, so sometimes he snacks on a piece of bread, roughly speaking. In medicine this is called withdrawal syndrome. Many are mistaken that they drank in the evening, in the morning they feel bad, this is a hangover, yes, in the common understanding, in reality it is only alcohol poisoning, a real hangover is different, it is remembered, sometimes even remembered with nostalgia.

How I quit drinking

So, I started drinking, like many others, because of some problems, which I won’t tell you, they don’t matter, out of stupidity and probably weakness. I thought I’d have a drink in the evening, tomorrow I’ll get ready and normally, I’ll solve problems, and I didn’t notice that “Tomorrow to solve problems” had been going on for a year and a half, and then it lasted just as long. Over the past year and a half, I have been getting ready and preparing to quit drinking. But how was it? My neighbor and drinking buddy, each time we came away from drinking, said, “That’s it, we’ll rest and quit,” but it turned out that I quit quietly, silently, abruptly in one day without preparation. I got up in the morning, drank 100 grams of what was left from the evening and that’s it, I don’t drink anymore, soon it will be 7 years. There was another day like this, March 8, a day with me and not connected with any events, well, except for the women's holiday, it was not a reason, it just turned out that way. What I observed later.

All! I'm quitting drinking!

Many alcoholics I encountered, like me, constantly said the same thing after each binge; what all! I’m quitting drinking!” But in fact, those of them who later quit did so silently, abruptly, without saying a word.

Surprisingly, I still meet people who naively believe that drinking is some kind of salvation. Avoiding problems, a way to forget. Yes, but for a while! While you're drunk! When you wake up, there are more problems in addition to those that already existed! And I’ll tell you a dubious way to forget yourself. If you have any moral problems, a divorce, your wife cheated, whatever else there may be, in a state of moderate intoxication, when you are, so to speak, conscious, it all presses with double and triple force! So saying “This is a way to forget yourself” can only be used for self-hypnosis.

Perhaps later, when you get into it, when you’ve been drinking for more than a month or two, this is also a way not to think about problems. Your life passes only in thoughts about the bottle and how to find money for it, and then, after drinking, think about where to find money for the next one. Then, after getting drunk, you fall asleep again, and when you wake up, everything starts again. Means, a bottle, sleep, this is of course a way, but is this life?

Why do I drink?

I was asked the question “Why do I drink? It seems like he has a head and isn’t scary,” I always answered, “Because I’m a fool.” I always thought that no one would force anything down my throat. No matter what happens, I chose it myself. What am I and probably many of you have heard the answers to such questions? 8 out of 10 people usually answered me, “My wife is such and such, she got me,” “Life is so bad,” and many other excuses, but not himself. Psychology of an alcoholic: Everyone is to blame, but not him, he is poor and he was offended. In fact, he chose this path himself, and there is no point in pitying him. There is little or no justification for drinking. Perhaps there are cases where this matter can somehow be justified, then these cases must be truly out of the ordinary.

Many people are also mistaken when they say “Friends” when pointing to drinking buddies. Drinking buddies are not friends. And they will look for the next bottle together, drink together and everything like that, but because of this it is still difficult to call them friends. Only a few of them will be those who, when drinking together, will not leave you in the sauna with a broken head, allegedly, “We went to meet the ambulance, and then the police took us away,” yeah, the three of them holding hands and stealing all the money from your pocket. I can cite such cases as a carriage and a trolley. Only some can be somehow called friends, and the rest will actually turn out to be slag.

So I stopped drinking and it got worse, I’m angry!

One of the common misconceptions about people who quit drinking arises among people who, fortunately, did not become hostages green snake. I’ve heard many times about myself and people like me, “Now that I’ve stopped drinking, I’ve become worse, I’m angry!” Not everyone, but the majority, who quit drinking, those who feel something, realize who care, begin to feel guilty before loved ones, relatives, friends, for having lost so much time. He let many people down with his weakness; he could have done a lot but didn’t. Here you begin to live with this feeling, fight, try to do something good for these people, sometimes you succeed, sometimes not, but the feeling of guilt does not go away, it eats you from the inside. Therefore, some kind of aggression or something similar arises. Well, don’t forget, you are used to seeing a person constantly drunk, this does not mean that he will be the same sober, alcohol liberates and changes consciousness.

What will I do?

I met some people who said and say that they love to drink and will not give up this business. The conversation is not about them, but about those who want to quit, but cannot dare to take this step. There is probably only one reason, this is the question “What will I do?” And indeed, after a long time of being in a drunken stupor, you can no longer imagine some things that, in principle, you did before alcoholism, but cannot remember how to do them sober. What if you don't wake up thinking about the bottle? How to meet a girl sober? There are many examples. Because of this issue, the process of quitting drinking is delayed for many, while for others it does not occur at all.

Having stopped drinking for some time, it is still difficult to answer this question, the main thing is that the first step has been taken and you have quit. After some time of adaptation, you will find interest, the main thing is to keep yourself busy for the first time, work to death, get distracted by any means, just don’t sit idly by, the first six months, a year will be difficult. It took me 4 months just to get used to a sober life, to understand that you look at the world with sober eyes and it turns out to be real. And just don’t replace alcoholism with other types of drugs, as many do!

Stop drinking for yourself, not someone else

Yes sober life it will be more difficult, there will be many problems, goals, tasks that will need to be solved, this may just serve as an incentive to move on and not return to this life where you had only one interest, just to drink and forget yourself. When you go into drunkenness, no one needs you, many turn away from you, and not because they are bad, but because they are moving forward, and you, unfortunately, are rolling back.
And finally, I’ll add something important. When you quit drinking, quit with the purpose of quitting, and not like many people, they quit for a year supposedly to improve their health and sit, waiting for the year to end so they can start drinking again. Stop drinking for yourself, you have to be selfish, but if you stop drinking for someone else, you will most likely soon return to the bottle.

Pay attention to the title of the article - there Not it says that I know how you (or someone you care about) can stop drinking. I'm not an expert in this matter, I don't know the right way. I only know that one fine day (it didn’t seem wonderful to me at all) I quit and haven’t drank a drop since then. Although, to be precise, I drank from the bottles twice, believing that they contained non-alcoholic beer, but it turned out to be alcoholic. That's all.

That is, I will not save anyone from alcohol addiction. I actually don't know how to do this, I can't do it. And my experience has not helped anyone yet. True, I never really shared it. This is the first time.

Why these warnings? Besides, I have a mania for portraying a guru, and my style can mislead you. Therefore, I repeat once again: I do not understand the issue. I was just an alcoholic and then I stopped drinking. I was thirty years old then, and now, as I write this, I am forty-nine. So, I've been abstaining for nineteen years - that means something.

Don't think that I was a good boy who refused some glass of wine at dinner, no. I was a real drunk who could finish a second bottle of vodka by the end of the day. Of course, I happened to drink away my clothes, pawn wedding ring in a restaurant, ending up in the hospital with a broken face due to drunken madness, spending the night in hallways and on benches, going to buy draft beer with an enamel bucket, drinking medical alcohol without a snack, and so on. In other words, when I say “quit drinking,” I know what I'm talking about. As they say in American books, I played in the major league.

And - what will be perhaps most interesting for you, if you are interested in my experience not for myself personally - I, of course, tried to quit several times. And, of course, there were people nearby who tried to help. "Save". And there was a man who helped. And there were alcoholic friends who were also saved and some were not saved. Therefore, I know what real and unreal help is.

And what’s also important is that it seems to me that in nineteen years I had enough time to evaluate the origins of my addiction to alcohol and the factors that allowed me to last so long (although only the first five years of sobriety were a real nightmare).

Well, now let's talk about everything in order.

Why do people drink?

I am deeply convinced that bad habits it is a derivative, a consequence. That, for example, drunkenness is no more (but no less, alas) than a signal of some kind of internal trouble. It is clear that there is a genetic predisposition, metabolism, etc., but still (so I think) these are all trifles. People drink because their ideas about what those around them, the whole world and themselves should be, do not coincide with their own ideas about what they are.

What follows from this? The fact that you won’t be able to quit drinking without changing these ideas.

In short, alcohol helps you come to terms with the discrepancy between what you want and what you really want. Build a temporary bridge.

What follows from this? And the fact is that if a drinker is stupidly forbidden to drink, he will stupidly begin to go crazy. First, demonstrate neurotic, and then, perhaps, psychotic behavior - if he does not find a replacement. Because what is a bridge? This is a valve for releasing aggression.

The trouble is that alcohol, while temporarily solving this problem, gradually becomes one itself. However, you probably know this yourself. If you drink bitters, you will have both neurosis and psychosis. And the gap between what should and what is necessary will only increase.

Why did I drink?

I think I drank for two main reasons.

Firstly, as a child I was strictly forbidden to do this - although I saw that any entertainment, fun, holiday, recreation was associated with drinking. This was motivating - it’s clear that the child wanted to grow up, and a certain potential for dissatisfaction was accumulating. And as soon as the opportunity arose, I began to restore balance with all my strength. When I entered ninth grade on the first of September, I made a friend, with whom we bought a bottle of Agdam port wine, drank it, as was customary then, in the front door, vomited, lay in a ditch, and the next morning felt like adults. This memory of mine is almost more vivid than the first sex. Initiation has taken place.

What's the conclusion? Give the kids something to drink? I don’t know, but I noticed that at family dinners girls are often given something light to sip on. And why? Because few people think that the girl will get used to it and become an alcoholic in the future. And indeed, girls become alcoholics less often - perhaps precisely due to the fact that they receive this “vaccination” in the form of a few drops, and subsequently the forbidden fruit of alcohol is no longer so sweet for them. They are trusted, they were allowed - but the boys are not. So the boys are having a blast as soon as they get the hang of it.

Secondly, I acutely felt the discrepancy that I wrote about above: my father definitely wanted some other son and could not reconcile with this with the child that he got in my person. Therefore, he raised me quite harshly. I didn’t understand the meaning of his educational actions (at least some of them), but somewhere on a subconscious level I guessed that I couldn’t follow my father’s rules, because for this I needed to be some other child. It is clear that I had a strong need for a “bridge.” Before to a certain extent I filled it with books, but port wine, as it turned out later, had a more radical effect.

What's the conclusion? Don't have children if, for example, you love dogs more. And if you start them, then encourage their natural inclinations. Ah, I think what my life could have been like if, from the age of five, I had been provided with the necessary books and a system for mastering what I read! However... who can know, in the end, what is better or worse for whom?

What was stopping me from changing?

I'm not the last fool, really. How did it happen that all this continued for thirteen years, and even on an increasing basis, which eventually turned into an exponential one? Why haven't I found a way to integrate my views so that no bridges are needed?

There are reasons for this too.

Firstly, of course, national tradition. Whatever they say, this is a powerful thing. I'm Russian - that means I drink. How could it be otherwise? We need to be different from others in some way! Or how? Yes, I was an idiot.

Secondly, of course society and its capabilities. These were years of rapidly evaporating meaning - no future was visible ahead. Idols - like Vysotsky, for example - were perceived as bitter drunkards, destroying themselves from the hopelessness of life. In addition, I positioned myself as a kind of bohemian, albeit a peripheral one - I wrote poems, studied at the theater school, and so on. How could you not drink? Especially when you read "Moscow - Petushki"?

Third, women They were always pushing me under my arms. When you make a decision, that's one thing. When you are forced to make a decision, it's different. "Be a man!" coming from a woman's mouth this is a double message. If you are a man, then you won’t listen to “woman”. But if you don’t listen to her, you will never become a man. Schizophrenia, in short. As a result, all attempts to “save” me actually dropped me even lower.

Fourthly (and this is very important) - organism hasn't signaled yet. Evening dizziness, night unconsciousness, headache and dry mouth in the morning are not a reason to stop. These are common symptoms, it happens to everyone.

You know, I've seen quite a lot of people who quit and didn't drink for a while, sometimes even for several years - but in the end they gave up and continued. Because somewhere inside they remembered that they were “allowed.” They just didn't reach the limit.

Limit

This is where I got to the main point. It's called the "limit". Although it can be called “satori” or something else.

The previous four points, plus two more above... and plus everything else that you name yourself - this is what together constitutes an insoluble obstacle. Factors that cannot be avoided. It's no use even trying.

(Now, of course, I’m talking about myself - maybe you have a different experience.)

And since it is useless, then there is only one way left - to go to the end. When I finished reading the thick book by Francois Rabelais, at the end it was written “Drink!” And I just drank - not even just, but with all sorts of twists. I drank both literally and figuratively.

Do you understand what I'm talking about? That my personal method (which I followed without knowing it) was to give myself permission to go as far as possible. I drank day after day, I was in good shape all the time. People came and went, but I stayed and continued. I don’t know how many opportunities passed me by, how many women winced, how many shameful and even disgraceful things I did, how many humiliations I accepted and humiliated others myself, how many times I went under a bag and prison... maybe for some it is seeds, but for me it was a complete measure.

That's why I wrote at the beginning that I don't have a recipe. I can’t advise you to go to the end and then give up your life, health, loved ones, or, finally, addiction. So ask someone else for the recipe.

Story

Of course, it didn’t all start right away, but developed gradually - as I became the master of my time.

Alcohol makes a person (at least it did me) very mobile and generally easy-going. You get used to quickly leaving your seat and going for pleasure. Or - which happens at least as often - from displeasure. Here are the main milestones of my drunken Path of the Bear, which gave me enlightenment.

1. At the graduation party, in the toilet with friends, I drank a glass of port. My dad sensed this and declared that I would not go to build bridges with my classmates, but go home. I didn’t obey (of course, there was a classmate who was like that!..), ran away from my father in front of the whole school, hid in the basement of an unfinished house for three days, fell ill with pneumonia as a result, missed my college exams, and besides, I got married - in order to free myself from parental authority, and in general, I wanted regular sex. I worked at the post office for a year.

2. At the financial and economic institute, I, being carried away by the theater, girls and older comrades, did not attend military department so long that I was kicked out. However, I didn’t visit much there at all. Basic installation was this: if there is something pleasant, why do something unpleasant? Without drinking alcohol more or less constantly, this attitude is difficult to adhere to. True, now I strictly adhere to it, being constantly sober.

3. Not getting into the theater institute the first time, I went to the Leningrad Fashion House (I always had a penchant for sewing) and studied for about two years at a training and production plant to become an outerwear tailor. So, after the post office, I found myself back in my social group- only we still had a couple of young criminals studying with us, who, after their first imprisonment, mastered a peaceful profession. Here, drinking has become quite common and even honorable. Although not always safe. I remember how, while visiting one of the criminals, I vomited into his teapot and was severely beaten - however, then it was perceived as an adventure. In any case, I really liked sewing, this work fed me for eight years and helped me get to know women from a side that men usually don’t see.

4. Studying at a theater studio took me to new frontiers - because of vodka, I periodically did not have good relationships with girls, because I had to talk to girls, but I often didn’t get along. Although there were also kind girls who forgave me everything, and even helped me with their warmth and money, and in general I was married. Or maybe he got divorced then, I don’t remember.

5. The theater institute stopped me for a while, because there was simply no time to drink - classes started at nine and ended at midnight, there were no weekends at all, and it was impossible to skip school. But fate, alas, turned out in such a way that after a couple of years I found myself outside the institute, “having suffered for the truth.” Well, that's where it started...

6. When you have your own house within the city, tenants, a profession that allows you to earn a lot quickly and a lot, an endless series of friends and girlfriends are drawn to you. Some, having had their fill and slept, leave, and others take their place. This condition lasts for weeks. That is, literally two or three weeks at a time, you wouldn’t dry out. At first, everything is, of course, cultural, and then strangers appear, among them sooner or later there are scum and/or thieves, then some kind of ex-love(that same classmate, by the way), who became a drug addict, with her friends - and now it’s almost a hangout.

Yes, I somehow missed four years of my second marriage, but that’s not the point. Other story. And it’s important that in the early nineties there came a time when I was afraid to leave the house if I didn’t have a bottle of vodka in my pocket - it was necessary to periodically “catch up.” We called it "running out of gas."

Worse yet

It is unlikely that I myself could come to my senses in such a stream. The matter was complicated by at least two more things.

First of all, when I drank, I became a nice guy. It happens that people go crazy under alcohol, show aggression, or simply pass out quickly, or their complexion becomes ugly. But I don’t have any side effects did not have. On the contrary, I seemed to be becoming somewhat charming. Truly, our abilities destroy us.

Secondly, I could not “find myself” - unlike, as it seemed to me, the people with whom I was wasting my life. I had some kind of feeling of inferiority, I did not see a single serious talent in myself, and most importantly (what I wanted most of all) - the talent to gather people around me. I wanted to cause delight, to be the center of attention, but in fact I was simply providing an area for parties. If I had been on the street, no one would have remembered me. At least that's what it seemed to me - those were my ideas. And alcohol helped me forget about my insignificance.

Later I realized that it is normal to feel worthless when you have no meaning in life. This happens to every person, but people deal with it differently. Someone uses the shields that society helpfully provides (property-family-work), someone continues to test themselves in nihilistic self-destruction, someone searches and finds their way, and so on.

I tried everything: property, family, work, self-destruction, creativity, living at someone else’s expense, and... and as a result, it seems to me, I found some kind of my own path. But I assure you, I did not find it as a result of quitting drinking.

The rescue

When I tell you where salvation came from, you will understand that it could not have been planned. And if it were possible to plan, I would probably earn millions by freeing citizens from alcohol addiction.

But, let's talk about everything in order. And, since I have numbered lists everywhere in this article, I’ll start listing them again.

1. After freedom of enterprise was declared in the country, people’s consciousness began to change. Suddenly it seemed that it was very easy to get rich - you just had to find money and open a company. And I, being so mobile and without a life mission, really wanted the next changes. Although I did not come to them right away, and not without external pushes.

From this point I draw a bold conclusion that “people” drink when they do not see opportunities to improve their lives. At the same time, if such opportunities appear, the results (the sobering of the nation, that is) must wait ten to twenty years. Feedback, as you know, goes through the system with a delay...

2. I got the right girl. What do I mean by "correct"? Very good. She didn’t want to get married (by that time I had already divorced for the second time), she didn’t want children, social status meant nothing to her. She, perhaps, was the first Taoist in my life - she lived the way she lives. She fed me and protected me, helped me with my work, we watched movies endlessly (8 movies a day, back then they were still rented), and in general everything was cool. She didn’t nag me, but drank with me. Or she didn’t drink when she didn’t want to, but she still didn’t drink.

Over the six years that we lived together, I learned the most important things about relationships - so important that the story about them deserves a separate book. As for drunkenness specifically, I understood the following: there is no need to interfere with a person. If you are worried that your loved one is drinking, change him for someone else or go to a psychologist to deal with your anxiety. And if you “love”, share his fate, drink with him. Or just let him live his life. This sounds crazy, does it seem like disregard, indifference? Perhaps so. But “caring” people drive their loved ones to the grave. And I haven’t drunk for almost twenty years. Think about it.

3. I have read all the books of Carlos Castaneda. Contract. This, as far as I remember, was a nine-volume book. When I finished, I had some strange experience at night - no hallucinations or anything like that, but something turned over in me. It was as if I had seen a terrible dream (terrible not in terms of a nightmare, but in terms of the depth of revelation), the content of which was forgotten, and the memory of it remained forever as some inexplicable life revolution, a mystical experience.

In general, the influence of art and culture cannot be overestimated. This influence is ambivalent - powerful ideas open the mind and require adequate doses of alcohol (and, of course, tobacco, and what else you use). But it also helps you quickly reach the limit, find the treasured chest at the very bottom and emerge to the surface. Of course, there is no guarantee that you will emerge, it depends on your luck.

4. And most importantly, they began to lose strength. Years of trying to take the body by storm finally bore fruit. I discovered that I was getting drunk faster (and before I didn’t get drunk, I just got tired of drinking and passed out), I became unpleasant to myself (once I hid a bottle of vodka in the stove in the midst of fun, then forgot about it, and began accusing everyone of stealing , and only remembered it in the morning, what a shame), and if I don’t get over my hangover, I feel terrible. I couldn’t go to bed sober - I was overcome by fears.

These are still flowers. Once I woke up with a bitten tongue, and the ambulance team was fussing around me - it turned out that at night I had an epileptic seizure. The doctors joked and left, I lasted three weeks, and then started again. Six months or a year later, I don’t remember, the attack repeated - but that didn’t stop me either. At all, Last year before my thirtieth birthday I remember in some black tones.

I often say at trainings that as soon as you hear your diagnosis, you will immediately stop drinking, eating, smoking and other excesses. This is not entirely true. Health is good, but it's not everything. You know where to dive, but you also need to know why to dive. I am absolutely convinced that without the first three points one fourth would not be enough. I just had friends for whom the bell also rang, but who had neither the right girls, nor ambitions, nor consciousness-expanding books. And they met their fate.

How it all ended

It would be more correct to call it, perhaps, “How it all began.” But it was perceived precisely as the end. It was as if life had quickly turned upside down. Two events occurred one after another that made further exercise with alcohol somewhat pointless. To begin with, I had a third attack - and it was terrible because it happened in reality. I saw how my hand was completely out of control and began to wriggle in the air like a snake, and at night they called an ambulance again. It was an apocalypse, but the next event finally finished me off (as you understand, I didn’t calm down). My good friend and top-ranking drunkard, who is also my dentist, was celebrating his birthday. I came to visit him and got drunk to a bestial state somehow in the blink of an eye. They loaded me into a taxi, drove me home, on the way I vomited endlessly, and at night too... It turns out, in general, that now I had enough... well, not one glass, but very little.

I heard that this happens when people move to the next stage of alcoholism. There was no Internet then, I could not study this issue, but the changes were too obvious.

What was the point in continuing, you ask? And how to continue? Drink a glass and go on an IV? What about fun? Long story short, that birthday was the last day I drank anything containing alcohol. Then the awakening began.

Awakening

If you think this awakening was pleasant, it's not. It was not pleasant at all. Not at all. I discovered that without vodka I didn’t want to do anything at all. That it was the drinking that gave meaning to everything. Work, friends, sex, food, books, what else? All this has lost its taste. And don’t think that this taste quickly returned as soon as the body “cleansed itself”. FIVE LONG YEARS!!! That's how long it took me to decide that I was living again, so that existence would no longer seem insipid. And it took at least another ten years to stop feeling the unconscious need to drink. Which manifests itself in dreams, for example, in an envious look at a person with a glass of cold vodka in his hand, and so on.

But first, some guy with bulging eyes appeared in our life, who gave me two capsules to swallow and said that if I drank anything in the next six months, I would be finished. These capsules had such an effect as if they boiled me from the inside. Uncle appeared two more times - the second time he programmed me for a year, and the third time for a year and a half. Surely it was nonsense, but it helped to hold on.

What have I lost

Yes, now about what I lost. I, of course, understood that such a global change would not just happen and would require some sacrifices, but I didn’t really understand the word “global.”

I've lost all my friends. When I stopped drinking, people simply stopped visiting us. And why do you think? Because I stopped letting them in, the bastards - it hurt me to look at their drunken faces. I never saw almost any of them again and I’m very glad about that.

I lost my job. Well, how did you lose it? It was my job, no one could kick me out of it. But I completely lost the desire to sew. Of course, I did this from time to time so as not to starve, but from under some kind of internal stick. What was I doing? Yes, I lay on the couch and watched movies. We watched “The Naked Gun 2” more than forty times, for example. My girlfriend fed me. Life was somehow bright and monotonous. I think I lay like that for a year.

I lost my sense of myself as a healthy person. I had to go to the doctors, who measured my head with instruments and definitely said that I had about six months left. Then this categoricalness became somewhat blurred and was reduced to the statement: “If you drink, you will die.” I believed, in general, but what?

I lost the house - my grandmother's inheritance, with all its contents- and went into huge debt for a long time. My entry into the entrepreneurial arena was not successful, to put it mildly. I almost lost my freedom, but somehow it happened here.

Together with home and work I lost a solid source of income and a permanent roof over my head., and bought in exchange headache in the form of a company, taxes, endless expenses for rent, employee salaries, advertising, etc.

Of course, I am not writing this to complain - some ten years after the start of the sober experiment, I was already happy that everything happened exactly like this. I am writing this so that you can appreciate the scale of the changes that can await you when alcohol leaves your life.

On the other side

Didn't all these experiences - both before and after awakening - make me who I am today? Didn’t he give me meaning in life, relationships, philosophy, a comfortable life and a job I love, respect from clients and the ability to get up and go to bed at any time? What would I teach if the first half of my life was spent worrying about sessions and state assignments, quarrels with my wife, vain attempts to love my mother-in-law, and dull work? Is this the kind of life I would like? Non, merci!

People tend to look for explanations and meanings. You don’t want anything in life to happen just like that. When I look at the thirty-four years that have passed since I drank my first glass, I cannot help but think that it was, in fact, the path to freedom - in my own, domestic way. So what should I say finally? I'm glad I started, I'm glad I quit, I'm glad I could write about it now.

Parting words

I also want to make a few parting words - I hope that you will take them with humor. That is, you will not follow them headlong. But I still want to write them - for the sake of the genre.

First for the parents.

1. To prevent your child from growing up as a drunkard, it is better to take care before his conception that his ideas about what is and what he wants do not differ critically. This doesn't mean that you have to "give him everything", it means that he should feel deserving of everything he has.

2. You don't need alcohol to motivate your child too much - and it can happen if he has strong feelings about it, whether positive or negative. Whether he envies your fun under the gas or hates it, in any case he will be at risk. There is no need to show that alcohol has any significant meaning for you - that you are dependent on it or consider it a hellish evil. An even attitude is just right.

3. Give birth to a child when you are sure that society really needs him and can give him scope for his talents and opportunities for his development. What will he have left except drunkenness and drug addiction if all the doors are closed? Big world will they be closed to him?

Now for our personal life partners.

4. Remember that if your partner gets drunk, the responsibility will lie with you. “When we got together, he was so promising, and then...” This “later” is entirely on your conscience, it was you who pushed him down, not up. Why are you responsible? Because a relationship is a system, each part is responsible for the functioning of the whole.

5. Only love changes. If you make trouble, ban, threaten, blackmail, or act on the sly, you will only make things worse. Let the person follow his own path, share his mental map, accept his choice... if, of course, you love him. And if you want to redo it, it’s better to find someone else.

6. Remember that drunkenness can be a sign not of weakness and stupidity, but of strength and intelligence. It is absurd to call on a person to be more stupid than he is, or to feel less subtly.

7. Alcohol abuse is always a reaction to imperfection - one’s own or those of others. You are part of this environment, aren’t you? That means yours too. So there is nothing to be offended by - on the contrary, we need to change. Exactly for you.

8. Remember that when your partner stops drinking, he will look at his life with sober eyes and you may break up. And the more he drinks, the more likely this outcome is. So don't try too hard.

And finally for drinkers.

9. Don't regret what you lose because of your drinking. Someday you will understand that losses provide an opportunity to find yourself, your purpose. A person without purpose is... well, so.

10. No matter how you explain to yourself the reasons for your drunkenness, it only means that something is wrong in your life. Don't tell me you already know this. You don’t know that it is your knowledge that is “not so.” You don't see a way out because you're looking in the wrong direction. Exit where the door is, not where you think it should be.

Ask questions in the comments.