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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-mo-VGAiko

I don't actually like drinking that much anymore, but somehow I'm drinking like **** anyway.

90% of my thinking is aimed at somehow controlling the outcome of my life. I'm beginning to realise that this is complete waste of mentall effort. You don't get to control the outcomes, you might get a slight chance of influence but you don't get to control in the sort of soviet top-down approach. I swear, I think I do is trying to control everything, how much I drink, what my diet is like and higher up things like my mood, even my hormone drives. Its insane....life shouldn't be like this, it makes you miserable. Where does it come from...suppose human's naturally want to solve problems, its gone to far though. Like I have spent the entire night trying to figure out how to "make" someone like me. How pointless is that? And what do you get for your trouble? An exhausted brain etc. I'm thinking that the very thing that brought me to TSM in the first place (problem solving) may have been a major contributor to why my drinking was such a fuckup in the first place.

Bottom line: life is too complex to control, sooner I realise that fully, the sooner I can give my head some peace.

09.1, there are a lot of things I don't like about AA, but there are also a lot of things I do like... one of them being the serenity prayer. I think it applies in your situation. Just in case you've never heard it, it goes:

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

I'm sorry you're feeling the way you do and I hope it gets better for you. You're right, you can't control everything, but there are still many things that you can control and you need to figure out what those things are and not give up.

Cheers for the reply, much appreciated. I think I need to move somewhere sunnier, winter time in Northern Europe tends to make a me very negative!

THought I was doing well this week but then I had an absolute bender of a night out on Friday. So much so that both my hips are in agony I get a type of avascular necrosis of the hips after I drink very heavily, barely able to walk today. Its one of those days where I consider abstinance as my only option.

Hey 09.1,
Sorry to hear about the bender. I had one saturday night...not a pretty sight Hope you can walk again soon. I love your quote by the way.
Btw...i could be wrong but i think its supposed to work in 2-4months, but, that seems to be if you drink every day. So..if we binge drink maybe it will take longer? Any of the veterens reading know about this?

Jazz

Cheers Jazz. Yeah my walking is coming back around again. I haven't drank since and I had an appointment with an addiction consultant on Monday. Nice man, he reckons I should just quit and stop all this nonsense. In principle, I completely agree with him. But in practice, I'm not sure how easy that's gonna be. Naltrexone isn't licensed for alcoholism in the UK and therefore (being in the NHS) he has no interest in prescribing it to use in this manner. He argued against the idea that the reinforcement is principally based on the opiate-dopamine etc etc system-- He explained it to me but I don't remember it. He thinks that alcohol is too "dirty" a drug to isolate to one brain system and addiction may also be due to GABA, serotonin etc etc. systems. I made the appointment with him, so it seemed rude for me to argue with him. I mean, either I want his help or I don't. I'm not sure though....can I just "not drink" anymore?

As for bingers versus daily drinkers. I don't think there has been a comparative study formally done but intuitively it would make sense for a binger to take more time to cure than a daily drinker.

P.S. Jazz, if you were wondering, that quote is from an essay By Emerson called "Self Reliance". Its definately worth a look if you haven't read it: http://www.youmeworks.com/selfreliance.html

Aaah, if only it were that easy (believe me, I've asked myself that question a million times before). For me, the bottom line is if I could have stopped drinking, I would have, NAL be damned. TSM has been the only treatment that's given me hope.
I hope you feel better!