Answered questions(13)
You Don't Need To Do Anything But Be Born And Die...
I am an alcoholic in recovery. I am 8 months sober and I am feeling OK. I drank for 20 years. Do I need to get my liver checked out if I do not have any worrisome symptoms?
Read answer →Damage is Damage, But Different Damage is Different
Smokers who quit smoking by a certain age and stay quit for decades eventually have the same risk for cancer and early death as people who never smoked at all. Is this the same thing with heavy drinkers?
Read answer →I Do Not Know the Severity of Your Alcohol Dependence, But...
I quit alcohol 16 days ago. The first days were really hard but after day 3 I felt better than I had felt for a long time. Yesterday all of a sudden I started feeling disassociated and extreme anxiety for no reason and I have had nagging anxiety bugging me since I woke up today with no cause for it. Could what I am feeling be related to my withdrawal such as related to PAWS? I never took the vitamin regimens that were suggested to me to avoid PAWS but is it still too late to do anything about it?
Read answer →Twelve-Step Programs DO Work
Does anyone else have a problem with the 12 steps forcing you to constantly look back at all the shit you did that just makes you feel terrible today now that you are trying to move on? I know I am supposed to learn from it and make amends but the whole process picks away at my selfworth? Are you experts absolutely sure that AA is a helpful program? I feel like I can do this but it is like AA is telling me that I cannot. I feel like even if I can stay sober I will just feel like useless garbage.
Read answer →Look Again at Your Own Words - Your Answer is Already There
Why do I feel so ashamed when I wake up after drinking if I did not do anything that I am ashamed of the night before? I do not think there is anything wrong with getting drunk in my own house. I am not a violent person actually I am supposed to be a very happy and funny drunk but no matter what happened the night before I wake up feeling so ashamed I could almost cry.
Read answer →Your Premise is All Wrong!
I know my son has smoked marijuana. He is the type of person who is probably going to experiment with different things whether I want him to or not. I know better than to try to stop him from doing what he is going to do anyway, so I prefer to try to just steer him away from the most dangerous choices he could make. He is smart and he can spot bullshit a mile away, so I also can’t lie to him or tell him something unless I am sure it is true. I want to give him a list of drugs and rank them from most dangerous to least dangerous, based on their addictiveness, and risks of short term and long term consequences. I think if he and his friends had this information they might make better choices about what they will use. If it is not too much trouble, can you tell me what are the worst and what are the least dangerous drugs for teenagers to experiment with?
Read answer →A Note From Your Doctor
I have spent almost half my life in active addiction primarily to alcohol but I am a functional addict. My addiction may cause me a lot of health and family problems but I always got to work on time and got my job done and I am proud of this. I cant stand people who bring their personal life to work. Now I am 21 days sober and it’s the longest I have been sober in years and I admit that I am very on edge and irritable and most of all I really can’t focus on my work. I can’t think straight and my short term memory is pathetic I am just trying to take things one day at a time and going to meetings every evening. I am a county clerk. Ironically I was a valued employee while drinking but yesterday my supervisor called me into her office and reprimanded me for my poor work attitude and sloppiness. I am so discouraged right now because I can’t do any better than I am doing and now I might risk my job. I don’t want to tell my workmates about my alcoholism so I don’t know how to explain myself and I am worried that I am going to be sober but unemployed.
Read answer →You're Overdue for a Meeting!
Life hurts so much I can’t take it unless I am drunk. I has 6 months sober a few years ago and it was the best time of my life but I could not keep it and I can not get it back. My need is too strong it is stronger than anything. I am in so much pain and I feel like I do not know what to do.
Read answer →Denial is Not a River in Egypt
I am a heavy drinker but not an alcoholic. I am 20 and I get drunkish 4 or 5 nights per week. About half the days after I get drunk I am very shaky the next day. It quite noticeable because my parents keep serving soup for dinner as a starter course and I have to keep making excuses to avoid the soup because if I try to eat hot soup with a spoon it is very niticable how shaky I am. On the other half of days, even though I drank about the same amount the night before, I am not shaky at all. I know that I am drinking too much and I need to cut down eventually but for the time being is this shakiness that I get half the time indicative of a serious problem I need to worry about. The fact that I only get like this half the time is the part that I don’t understand.
Read answer →How Long a Lifetime Do You Want?
I had to stop drinking for an unrelated digestive crisis. I am a 56 year old lifetime heavy drinker and I know what alcohol does to me. I am moderately dependent physically because I drink every day but I am able to stop with no serious issues when I need to. This time I am sweating an insane amount every night when I try to sleep. I have to get up in the night every night to change my pyjamas and bed sheets because they are literally sopping wet. Why is alcohol detox making me sweat like this when it never did before? Is this a sign of something gone really wrong inside me?
Read answer →You're in the Danger Zone
Long time weekend binger. Very straight laced during the week and then by Saturday I just get smashed and smoke a lot of dope and drink a lot. Hangovers always sucked but were tolerable. Now, just out of nowhere, they are excruciating. I am 29. The last 6 weeks of hangovers have felt like the worst I have ever had. Why would I just suddenly start getting exponentially more hungover after doing what I have been doing as I have been doing it for years before?
Read answer →How Long have You Been Drinking?...
Is it within a range of normal that a guy could still have some mild shakes after 2 weeks without drinking. I am also still much sweatier than usual. These shakes are nothing dramatic but I wouldn’t want to try eating a bowl of hot soup at the moment so they are noticeable and they are hard to explain away at work. One of my rowdier students actually asked me in front of the class today if I was nervous about something. I am a teacher so being a drunk is frowned upon though I am sure some of my peers knew I drank rather more than was good for me. I never drank before or at school so I am perplexed to be having such extreme and lasting shakes. For the last 6 months I was a daily 2 bottle of wine a night drinker. Prior to that I was more a heavy but still social level drinker.
Read answer →It's Not Just About Neurons
If heavy drinking leads to brain damage does moderate drinking, within safe guidelines, also kill brain cells, only more slowly. Or is there something qualitatively different that happens when you pass a certain threshold?
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