This post ended up WAY longer than I intended but it was rewarding to type so I'm gonna hit save.

Keep up that mentality of resistance.

I also knew I was predisposed from a young age, as my father and both of his parents have battled alcoholism their whole lives.

I, too, also never saw the appeal of being drunk and actually kind of looked down on or took pity on people who would "need to drink" to have fun. I basically viewed anyone, however much of a casual drinker they were, that way, and tried to avoid being around alcohol or drunk people. I'd had beers and been too buzzed to drive a few times when I was 22-23, and I didn't hate it but I hated the way it made me act in social situations and I'd only drank socially so I kept it well under control.

Then shit got real in my life at the beginning of 2009. I became extremely ill ending with a week-long hospital stay and eventual surgery which required a lengthy recovery with a lot of pain, my car got totaled when I got hit in an intersection by a red-light-runner, that same day I found out my dad cheated on my mom and a ton of other dark shit about my family came out all at once that I didn't need to know about. I was too sick to keep up with school so I had to drop all my classes. Then while I was in the hospital the woman I thought I was going to marry told me she wanted to take a break. I wasn't coping well. I became a zombie, too afraid to let any emotion show. A buddy who knew what I'd been dealing with took me out and forced me to get hammered. I didn't even resist it like I might've before. I wasn't me anymore at the time, so I drank with him at the bar, then we took a handle to his apartment and kept drinking. I loved it. I didn't feel smothered by life for the first time in a while. I was able to just let it go and laughed so hard I cried, then cried so hard I laughed. It was amazing. So I let it in to my life, just occasionally at first, then every other week with a friend, then every weekend, then a few times a week by myself while playing video games. It took a few years to take hold but it came to a point where I was literally always either hung over or drunk every day and I nearly lost my job several times in the last few years as a direct result of being too hungover to go into work. I think if I wasn't so good at what I do I'd have been fired ten times by now. I am/was the very definition of a high functioning alcoholic. This went on for 4+ years. I quit a few times but it only lasted 1-4 weeks before I came back with a bender.

Four months ago my best friend died in a car accident. We had hung out almost every weekend and he was one of the few people I'd skip drinking for a night for so that we could wake up stupidly early the next day to go to a car show a couple times a month. He was my excuse to stay sober to go do fun shit in cars, and I was his excuse to get out of the house and go just forget about responsibilities for a while (he ran a business while being a stay-at-home dad). He didn't know I drank, nobody did, not even my girlfriends over the years (each of those breakups I attribute largely to my addiction, as well). I should've told my friend. He would've set me straight. Had I known then what I know now, I'm certain he would've kicked my ass and made me get my shit together. But I never told him. Through talking to his family and childhood friends at the cremation, funeral and gatherings since, I found out that he was an alcoholic too, and for a few years was as bad as me, from what I hear (his dad and brother are still just as bad). I had no idea and he never talked about it. He had quit a year before I met him, and had been clean for 7 years and was one of the greatest, nicest, calmest guys I've ever met and was a fantastic husband, father and friend. He had a great life and was just happy all the time, nothing bothered him and I never saw him get truly frustrated or angry, and if something did piss him off he had a way of immediately assessing things and dealing with it logically. I dunno how he found that peace after facing such a horrible addiction as this, but I've vowed to be that guy and carry on where he left off.

I'm doing my best to make sure his wife and kid are looked after, and I help with repairs and maintenance at their house as he would've done if he were still alive. It helps keep me from losing myself to the booze because I'm afraid they'll need help with something and I'll be too hung over, or too committed to drinking that night to do it, and that would be letting my friend down. She's gotten better at being alone, and their son doesn't seem so excited to see me anymore (I think I remind him of his dad, since I only ever interacted with him before when his dad was around), so that source of motivation has kinda dried up and I know I need to find a permanent solution that serves myself specifically or I won't stick with it for good. I've already failed my promise, several times, and recently once for a couple weeks at a time, but I keep fighting back too and it gets a little easier each time to just decide, on my way home from work, that "I don't need it. If I do go to the store, I'm only buying groceries, and that's that." If I fail, I make myself get angry at my addiction and pour out the bottle and have shattered and thrown out my whiskey and shot glasses. I admitted it to my doctor, and she's shown me the signs in my blood work that alcohol is affecting my health already but that I still have time to correct it. I have scheduled an appointment with a therapist. I know a 12 step program isn't for me, and I don't know what will work for good, but I'll figure it out. I have to.

It's strange to think that if my best friend hadn't died I may have taken much longer, or maybe too long and it'd be too late, before I found the will power to fix myself. I needed that staggering personal example of what an alcoholic's life can be if they fight back hard enough to earn it. I may never have discovered that. I could've wound up homeless or dead. Fuck.

The kicker for me is how easy it is. It's not difficult to obtain. It's at the store, next to the beef jerky and tortillas. You can't go buy milk or eggs without seeing a hundred bottles of hard liquor and wine, and cases of beer. It's right there, all the time, and it'll ruin your fucking life if you let it.

Sorry for the rant, or whatever this was. It felt good to type it and it's helped me reinforce my decision not to go buy a bottle tonight. I look forward to a day when it's no longer a decision I have to make every single night.

Don't fall down that hole. It's easy to get stuck and is overwhelmingly difficult to claw your way back out.