- Share This Post
- submit
- 1
-
Sparkle (0)
Hi. My name is Rebekah and I’m an alco- well, I might be an – okay, the Alcoholics Anonymous website quiz indicates that I have a drinking problem. That is to say, I have no problem drinking. A lot.
Every medication I take has warnings about taking it with alcohol.
And even though I’m not washing my meds down with a shot of tequila,
I’m still screwing myself up in a major way by binge drinking every
weekend and waking up on Sunday mornings wondering how I got into my
bed.
This is bad.*
I’ve tried to stop and/or calm down my drinking. I want my Sundays
back so I can do something productive rather than spend them nauseated
and lying in bed with a trash can at the ready. I’ve tried to just cut
out the alcohol altogether – it was actually my New Year’s resolution
for 2008, and I blew it on January 1st when E and I joined friends at
the bar and he met Tim for the first time. That’s reason enough for
drink to be taken.
Then I tried cutting out all hard liquor for awhile, just sticking
to beer and wine. I used to not care for beer much, was a big drinker
of vodka tonics and margaritas and so on. Well, you know what happened
with that one. I LOVE BEER NOW. And I got staggering drunk by the
middle of E’s cousin’s wedding reception because of the free wine. So
this has helped me not at all.
When I couldn’t cut out ALL hard liquor, I decided I would at least
stop doing shots. Since they don’t hit me right away and then BAM! I
fall off the barstool, maybe just sipping something would be better.
But of course, who can turn down free Jaeger bombs when your boyfriend
is working on Valentine’s Day and you’re all alone? Splash! I’m going
to invent a shot and call it “Fail.”
Then I tried just slowing my alcohol intake – drinking my beer
slowly, not ordering another till I’ve finished one, sipping water the
whole time. This works occasionally, but when I get on the drunk side
of tipsy, that all crashes and burns and then… Cheers! Another round
for my friends!
I used to be much better-behaved. When I was with Tim, with E, with
other previous boyfriends, I was generally the responsible one, often
the sober driver. Now I’m the one who tips $8.00 on an $18.00 tab
because my math skills are so far gone, the one you have to fight for
the keys, the one who blacks out and then wakes up in the night
shivering and sick. I’m the one who takes an unhappy friend out for a
drink and ends up hammered herself, my fine ass smacking the bar floor,
blaming my fall on slippery-soled new boots. And I’m the one who goes
to the meat-market bar with girlfriends, points and picks out a cute
boy, and, buffeted by liquid courage, not only goes over and talks to
him but ends up in the back of a cab with that stranger going
who-knows-where.
I was out with KK and Captain and some friends once, and I ended up
rip-roaring drunk (a bottle of white wine tried to kill me, I swear)
and since Captain drove the group and they were staying at the bar, he
put me in a cab with one of his buddies to take care of me and sent me
home. This buddy happens to be the one I wrote about here,
the one who likes to get all huggy on girls and then show them pictures
of his deployed Army wife. Bad move, Captain. Bad move, me. The fellow
started getting huggy on me again when we got to my house and he helped
me inside. I have a vague memory of him kissing me and me saying no, I
don’t want to be “that girl” and reminding him that he’s married and so
on. I woke up about five hours later, in my bed and wearing very
little. What happened between me telling him to stop kissing me and
waking up practically naked?
I don’t want to know. I don’t want to speculate.
Really, why am I not dead yet? How have I avoided alcohol poisoning,
driven drunk, and wandered off with strangers and NOT gotten arrested,
seriously injured, or killed? How have I had three Jaeger bombs at
lunch one day, gone back to work, and not been fired? I should ride
this luck and go to a casino before it runs out on me.
I keep saying I’ll stop altogether. Then I fail at that and decide I
can control myself and drink only in careful moderation. I really don’t
drink during the week and I feel pretty good by the time
