How does everyone deal with this?

[Misty37]

I've decided to stop drinking,after 2 berevements in 6 months my drinking has escalated to a level that has made me question if I have a problem. I dont drink all the time but when I do I find I cant stop for example a bottle of wine but then 6 vodkas on a work night.
I've also made some really poor choices and dont want to do this anymore.
Last night was the first time I've been out since stopping. I took my car and had a few non alcoholic cocktails with dinner (I havent told people yet and dont feel ready to)
One of my friends got really drunk and I just found her soooooo annoying she literally rambled on for ages without pausing for breath,got really opinionated and then had to go and be sick.
Ironically she is not normally a big drinker but it actually spoiled a night I had been looking forward to.
I guess my question is how do you deal with this ? Will I eventually get used to being around people who are drunk and it becomes less annoying?
I dont want to not be friends with people because they drink.
I'm due on another night out soon and I'm looking for advice on what others do to manage this.

[tribpot]

You may find you want to be selective about the nights out. I remember some nights would seem very mellow and others would get messy early on (I don't go out with people drinking now, I'd rather see people during the day). The difference between the mellow and the messy tended to be quite simply the availability of booze. If we were upstairs in a pub and the bar was downstairs, people would just naturally drink slower. The messiest night of all (when everyone was startlingly drunk by 6pm) was happy hour with two for one cocktails and you couldn't share, i.e. get one cocktail of one type and one of another, so everyone was drinking two in the time they would normally have drunk one. The messy ones are just too boring as a sober person.

Think about making your excuses when it starts to become just tediously drunk people. There's no advantage to you in staying at that point. And do think about engineering some social occasions which are alcohol free, like lunches, coffees, etc. You will find it easy if you tell people you've stopped drinking, as it will make more sense to them. (Some will no doubt be arses about it, that's just par for the course).

[Misty37]

Thanks for the advice @tribpot. I thought dinner with usually sensible friends was a safe option . Sadly on this occasion it wasnt to be.
I will take your advice and try to plan other things so it's easier.
I kept thinking god am I this annoying when drunk .

[brightspice]

It's your thoughts about someone that create your feelings for them. You like some people and not others, but the ones you don't enjoy being around still have friends. They're not universally disliked.

So you get to choose what you want to think about your friend when she's drunk. You could think "she's annoying" and feel frustrated or you could think "she's having such a great time" and feel indulgent or you could think "Oops she's had a bit too much to drink" and feel calm.

Totally up to you. It's incredibly powerful.