I have been a binge drinker for 15 years, but over the last 9 years or so I have developed a pretty healthy daily habit as well. My current daily unit intake is averaging 6 units (beer), and I have really started to feel the negative health effects in the last year or so. I have a fairly strong (some would say extremely strong) family history of alcohol dependance, so I am not surprised by my intake. I was surprised however by the subtle nature of alcoholic craving.

I was always aware that I was on a slippery slope, but I thought there would be some readily identifiable sign (brew shakes or something) that would alert me that I needed to stop. That still hasn't happened yet, but at this point I find myself unable to not continue my daily habit. I can wake up in the morning with every intention of not drinking, I can even make it through the entire work day and still not intend to drink when I got home. However, in the time it takes me to drive home, a fully rationalized decision to stop and get a six pack emerges. I don't even seem to have the chance to have an internal struggle over it. The craving seems to simply short circuit whatever portion of my brain is resisting. That is enough of a signpost for me.

I saw a CNN piece on Naltrexone several months ago and tried to discuss it with my GP. I ended up with a referral to Mental Health which I followed through on, but there was no interest on their end in a pharmacologic approach... so I dropped it. I have been a little too busy to make another go at it over the last several months, but recently started researching Nal again which brought me to this site. Thanks to everyone for sharing their experiences here. This has all been enormously helpful.

I placed an order with River pharmacy a couple of weeks ago and received it on Wednesday. I took 50mg the first day and drank a six pack. The side effects were apparent before my first beer. I was woozy and foggy within a half an hour and a little shaky, but it wasn't altogether unbearable. After going to bed however, it got a little worse. I think I woke up every 15 minutes or so the whole night... I am not sure I ever quite fell asleep. The following day was difficult at work. I was shaky and tired and a little nauseous, but I am not sure that that wasn't simply because I didn't really sleep. Side effects on day two were less severe, and by day three seemed almost unnoticeable. I slept like a baby last night.

Thanks for listening


Pre-TSM 30-60/week

Hi K-Trout and welcome to the site.

I don't know if you ever drink anything other than beer, but if you do (and even if you don't) it would be a good idea to get a firm idea of exactly how many units you are drinking - most of us tend to underestimate (often quite significantly). You'll find plenty of material here and on the web in general, but there are appear to be two main standards in use on this site - the US system and the UK system

A UK unit is 10ml of pure alcohol, a US unit is 17.7ml of pure alcohol. Personally I find the UK system easier to work with, but each to their own.

You don't state above what your goal is - abstinence or moderate drinking. If it is the latter then it is important to know how many units you are consuming - e.g. moderate drinking in UK units, where I am, is based on no more than 14 units per week (for a man) and no more than 3-4 at any single sitting.

My goal is moderate drinking. I generally don't stray too far from beer. For simplicity I went with one unit/12oz of beer when calculating my intake. So I guess I am reporting in UK units.

Welcome. It's too late now, but everyone here would agree that you should have started out at 25 mg because of the side effects on day 1 and worked your way up to 50 mg. The good news is, as you have discovered, the side effects go away within a few days. And I also suffered severe sleep disturbance when I first started as sleep disturbance is a common side effect. Sleep disturbance usually goes away immediately also, although for some it lingers a bit longer.

Hi K Trout - I don't know what beer you drink, but it would be need to be 2.8% alc bv for 12oz beer to be 1 UK unit - I suspect it is stronger than that (e.g. beer here is typically 4.3%). It might be worth checking out - just so you have an accurate handle on your consumption - I thought I did and realised I was underestimating my own consumption by nearly 50%