My friend’s roommate told me I am not an alcoholic because I have not lost a job due to my drinking. According to him , not GETTING a job due to DUIs is not the same thing. “Almost everyone gets DUIs.”

Would you wait for a car accident to put brakes in your car? Why do we wait for a “bottom” to get us to stop drinking? I had so many bottoms that my problems with drinking looks like a stock market chart. “Wow we lost a lot today but don’t worry… things will pick up.” Maybe if I just stopped for awhile after a bad night, a DUI, or near-death experience,  I could handle the drinking better next time. I could control it next time.

Not sure when the drinking started to control me.

Maybe brakes in your car is not a good analogy. That suggests that you can stop and go. But we put all kinds of safety devices and preventive measures in other areas of our lives. Addictions make us forget to insure ourselves. We do not notice the problem until after accidents occur.

I just finished Mackenzie Phillips’ book High on Arrival. I know SoberLearning said she had to stop reading it when it got to the incest. I have always enjoyed celebrity memoirs about hitting their bottom. I enjoyed this book even though I did not feel I could relate to any of it. I felt sorry for her. I don’t understand how she could still talk positive about her father after all he did to her and her siblings. But maybe it is not for me to understand.

I did think of my reasons I became a party girl. I wanted approval from my family. I wanted to break away from my loner image as a teen. I competed with two brothers and two sisters for my parents affection. My parents never showed each other affection let alone us. I am not close to any of my brothers, was cut out of my little sister’s life, and have a hate relationship with my other sister. A family of no love created a girl who felt she had to get drunk to be loved.

Sometimes I want to take everything I write about my introspection of my life and take it when I start therapy. “Here, I think I figure out the why. Now just help fix me.”

Mistake 111- I was at a hotel party. There were parties happening in many rooms in this hotel. I was staying on one floor with a friend. Another friend invited me to this party. I knew what he was like so I should have expected what happened.

I was very drunk. I spent that whole day drinking mixed drinks by the pool. That night at the party, I mingled and chatted with lots of people. I brought my own cans of beer with me in a bag. I was not going to run out.

There was a knock at the door. The cops. The party ignored the neighbors and hotel management requests to quiet down. Then I heard someone sitting near me say “quick, clear off the tables!”

That was when I sobered up briefly to notice lines of cocaine on the tables. I don’t know how much coke was in that hotel room but it was enough to make me run. I jumped up and went to the door. I was not allowed to leave because the hosts were outside talking to the cops. Eventually I got out. My friend texted me asking me to come back. “The pigs are gone.” I told him no thanks.

I went to my room and sat in the bathroom drinking. I did not want to disturb my friend that was sleeping. I kept myself entertained with my phone.

I am very thankful the cops did not break in that room. I am not sure if everyone present would have been arrested. I guess if I was, a urine sample would have cleared me. But it was still scary to think I was so drunk, I did not notice what was going on around me. Alcohol was my drug of choice but had me come very close to another side of life.