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All of us have a very specific relationship with al**hol.
Some people choose not to use it at all, some drink socially, and there are others who definitely have problems with it…
The kinds of problems that impact their lives in negative ways.
And hopefully those people know when it’s time to call it quits.
AskReddit users opened up about when they knew it was time to stop drinking.
Let’s take a look.
1. You look like s**t.
“My high school girlfriend hadn’t seen me for a few years and bluntly told me I looked like sh*t and need to take better care of myself.
She was super into me all through HS so I went over expecting to get laid, and instead got brutally rejected. Boozing hard really piled on the weight for me.
Quit cold turkey and redirected that energy into eating clean and hitting the gym. When I got the urge to get intoxicated, I went to a 24 hour gym and would run until the urge passed.”
2. You already said that.
“When I’d tell people something and they’d say, “You told me this already.”
Happened to me maybe three times in one week, and I was like, “Damn I need to stop drinking.””
3. Glad you turned it around.
“I threw up every morning and passed out drunk every night for about 3 years. At the end of it I was throwing up blood and my eyes turned yellow.
I had a fatty liver and my plan was to keep drinking until I got cirrhosis and then I’d k**l myself. At some point I started hearing things and getting the shakes so bad by 5pm that I couldn’t send texts. I was only 23 at the time.
I got fired from my job for showing up d**nk too many times, and at 10 am I went to a liquor store and bought a half gallon of the cheapest vodka they had. Didn’t tell anyone I got fired for like 3 days. Something in me just broke. I kept looking down the hole and thinking, if I go to the hospital I can’t drink there. I can’t interview for jobs anymore because I can’t be drunk for those. I can’t continue to exist without money, and I’m already in debt.
I wouldn’t admit to anyone what was wrong, even though they knew. Somehow my mom made me an appointment to see a therapist, and that was the first time I ever admitted my issue. It felt like the weight of the world was lifted off of my shoulders, and I was happy. I told my parents first, then my friends.
My friend Kenny gave me this book called “The Power of Now” by Eckhart Tolle while I smoked like 300 cigarettes on the porch of my house. Poured out all of my liquor and went to rehab to check myself in.
It’s been about 8 years since then, and I haven’t drank since.”
4. Clean and sober.
“It was a long process that involved me slowly realizing that every time I drank i did something i didn’t like myself for. I used alcohol as a tool to hurt myself, and I used it as an excuse to act on my worst emotions.
There were no good or fun times i had while drunk that wouldn’t have been just as good or better without alcohol. I’d have a sh*t day at work, go home and drink about it, wake up with a hangover, have a sh*t day at work… My family or my partner would do something to upset me, I’d drink about it, and become explosively angry, usually ending up with me breaking sh*t and passing out.
Wake up the next day feeling horrible physically and so embarrassed that I’d acted that way. My parents were both lifelong alcoholics and my mother has wet brain–alcohol induced psychosis. She has no idea who I am. She is only 52 years old and she doesn’t recognize me. I can’t end up like that. I have 5 months sober under my belt. And I have today.”
5. Turning point.
“Drove home while I was so d**nk I couldn’t stand. Saw the damage on my car the next day and had no memory of how I got home.
My dad d**d in a drunk driving accident. I just thought “How god**mn stupid do you have to be?”.
Forever grateful I didn’t k**l myself or anyone else.”
6. A work in progress.
“Anxiety made me drink to excess.
Hangovers made me so anxious I could barely function even after the normal symptoms went away.
So, I drank to kill the anxiety.
Then I got anxious about it.
So I drank to kill the anxiety.
Then I got anxious about it.
I’ve been cutting down to a point where “just a couple” is actually 2.
It’s a work in progress.”
7. Not fun anymore.
“It stopped being fun. There just wasn’t any pleasure in it anynore.
I’d get buzzed, or even a little drunk, and just… not enjoy it. Plus, I was starting to see that bigger problems were right around the corner.
It was just starting to impact my relationship, my health, my motivation, etc, and I realized I was kind of at a fork in the road.”
8. Wake up call.
“I woke up one night shaking uncontrollably after a binge that was probably a month long. I gave up then and there only to resume heavy drinking a couple of years later.
Marriage and fatherhood is what made me stop. Never want to be high while in charge of my kid.”
9. DUI.
“I hit a traffic cone with my vehicle. Someone called the cops. I blew over three times the legal limit and barely remember my encounter with the police.
Upon my release from jail they gave me a machine that I had to blow into three times a day. This machine sent a signal to the county telling them whether or not I’d been drinking. I drank again and failed this test and was thrown back in jail.
I h**e being in jail and had my last drink on June 10th, 2017. I am forever grateful to the prosecuting attorney for forcing me to blow into that machine. If I hadn’t have had to do that I probably wouldn’t have stopped drinking.
I’m 30 but I feel that there’s a high chance that I’d be d**d or in prison right now if I had kept on drinking. Me staying sober from al**hol, and hard drugs for that matter, is one of my most important achievements in life.
My life is different but so much better abstaining from alcohol.”
10. No more blackouts.
“Leaving my apartment with $100 something dollars and an 1/8th of flower in my pocket. Remembering being at the bar then…waking up on my couch the next morning.
Still with the same clothes on. $5 in my pocket and a Jack in the Box receipt and no flower. Functional blackouts are totally not chill.”
11. Wow.
“When I realized I was drinking upwards of 5 gallons of beer a week and it caused my to get up to 320 lbs.
I’m down to 204 now and feeling great. I do still have to occasional drink.
Last Friday I had 3 beers and woke up Saturday with a hangover. That sucked!”
12. Moment of clarity.
“Everyone’s “moment of clarity” is different.
For me it was sitting in the shower at 4 am, violently shaking, covered in vomit and blood, sipping Listerine to keep “the fear” at bay, whilst attempting to dig out the many pieces of glass lodged in my shoulder and upper back.
I stopped for a moment and was like “You know what? This isn’t working out for me.”
Celebrated five years last month.”
13. Binging.
“I was a binge drinker and it was a problem. But I always just wrote it off as letting off some steam and having a good time.
Then one night I got the drunk munchies and threw chicken nuggets in the oven at like 3 am and promptly passed out. Filled the house with smoke. My wife was screaming at me.
I know that there wasn’t any danger of burning the house down since the oven is pretty self contained but the idea that I tried to cook anything while blackout drunk was for whatever reason the final straw.
I couldn’t get the image of causing a fire and not being physically able to help my family out of my head. Haven’t had a drink since.”
14. A disappointment.
“My husband was going to leave me and take our son. I was a disappointment to everybody who loved me.
I had been an alcoholic from 19-29 and knew I wouldn’t make it to 30 if I didn’t go to rehab. I had a seizure and I’ve thrown up blood more times than I can count. I woke up every morning wishing I could just stop but I was too far gone so I failed any time I tried quiting on my own. My husband and dad told me they couldn’t do it anymore and I knew they meant it.
The last time I drank was November 25, 2019 and I am a completely different person now. I’ve since had another baby and tried to be the best mother, wife, daughter, sister, and friend everyday since then. I look back at who I was and am so ashamed but I try daily to show myself that I’m not that person anymore.”
How about you?
When did you know you had to stop drinking?
Talk to us in the comments and share your stories.
