I don’t know what happened when I was drunk.

[BeLemonTraybake]

A few weeks ago, I was at a work event when Im embarrassed to say got very drunk. I am not a drinker, but I must have just totally overdone it and my body is not used to that.

I have a chunk of time where I am unaccounted for. My colleagues don’t know where I was, but it was at quite a big venue so there could be an explanation for that. There were other groups at the event other than my colleagues. But equally, I really don’t know what happened.

i have been running through scenarios for the past few weeks and have even told my husband my fears, and he had told me he is sure it’s all fine and I just need to move on. But I can’t.

I have run through some scenarios that I have even begun to convince myself of.

I am so upset with myself for this and frightened about what I could have done or what could have happened. I am blessed with an amazing husband and children, and I feel like I could have jeopardised everything.

I have no one really to talk to irl about this. I just don’t know what to do or how to move on and would really appreciate advice.

Im not expecting you to be kind to me here. I understand that this is all my own fault. I’m just in a mess and don’t know how to put one foot in front of the other.

Only the part of me that believes he (and my children) deserves better.

But you haven't done anything to him. You have a great relationship with him and he'd be heartbroken if you left him. Surely you wouldn't leave him in the same thing happened to him?

I think if you'd had sex or been assaulted in a condition that you cannot remember then I'm sure your friends would have noticed that your clothing, hair and general appearance would have indicated thus.

I'm surprised that you'd think "what if I had sex without knowing" rather than "I was sat in a corner pissed for an hour or two"

I can't be the only one who would be worried I'd gone off with another bloke rather than just been pissed and forgotten what I'd done (i.e. nothing noticeable) in my drunken state?

Are you sure your drink wasn't spiked? Having a complete blackout sounds like it could have been. I would go to the doctors and ask for a sexual health check-up and do a pregnancy test if you don't have contraception.

@BeLemonTraybake I expect this is all down to anxiety from drinking too much which can take weeks to get over and that nothing happened. But you could get tested at a sexual health clinic without it being reported to your GP. You can also order free at home STD tests online to test for most things that wouldn't get back to your GP - https://www.sh.uk.

@SnozPoz i definitely drank a huge amount of alcohol, particularly for me who never drinks. So I don’t think being spiked is likely in this scenario.

Talking about leaving your husband over getting drunk and having no memory of a couple of hours seems extreme. If your colleagues found you, they’d have had a pretty good read on whether you seemed distressed or dishevelled. You can make up all kinds of scenarios but in the absence of ever knowing, I’m going to bet something like my EA at the work Christmas party. She chatted a lot of shit to a few people at a completely different Christmas party, had a snooze in a corner, and then got scooped up and ushered through her hotel room door to sleep it off when a couple of colleagues found her in the lift just travelling up and down between the floors.

People get drunk sometimes. There’s nothing to be gained from beating yourself up with what ifs which are in all likelihood not at all what happened, you’ll drive yourself mad. You’ve taken from it that you aren’t going to get drunk again - that’s the important bit. Your children don’t “deserve better” (an otherwise happy family splitting up is better?) because you made a dumb judgement call on handling your wine.

Why did you do this? It seems very strange to be a non-drinker and then drink a huge amount at a work event.

@SnozPoz - I rarely attend events so this was out of the ordinary. Everyone i was with was drinking a lot. I think once I got drunk I just kept going. I don’t really know why.

Did you have any stickiness, discharge, sex type smell on you to indicate you had sex? If not then it’s more likely you just zonked out on a sofa or chair or toilet somewhere. If someone’s boundaries were so lax they’d have sex with you when you’re blind drunk they probably wouldn’t have even thought about cleaning you up afterwards.

Regardless of what happened you can't change anything. You can either view this as a huge mistake & a lesson in life, or ruin the time you have left as a family through guilt and worry. Your husband has forgiven you so for the sake of your family please forgive yourself. We are only human and we all make mistakes. Stop beating yourself up and start appreciating the good in you.

You didn't do anything totally out of character because you were still the same person, it's just that the alcohol level reached meant your brain stopped creating memories. Blacking out is not passing out. You were still walking and talking as normal albeit drunkenly. I've had blackouts and people who were with me said I was the same. Walked home with them etc. But yes, it's a horrible feeling and it made me give up alcohol completely out of utter fear and terror of what I might have done. Which was a very good thing as it made me evaluate why I drink.

Keep calm, keep rehydrating over the next few days, take pain killers and alka seltzer or rehydration salts. Practice deep belly breathing. Yoga or go for a run or a swim to get your endorphins going. Write down all your worse fears.

This will pass. Each day you will feel a bit better.

Sounds to me like you suffer from Anxiety and alcohol has made it worse and formed some sort of OCD behaviour about 'what if I did this' situation. have you felt like this before?
Anxiety for me results in OCD, this is not uncommon.
There is a thread on here (under chat) and people talking about OCD has made them believe to be true, but aren't. Might be worth a read.

well thinking prosaically, if there were no signs that you had sex....disturbed underwear and so on....then I think you can rule that one out. If you were so drunk that you can't remember whether you did or not, then you were in no condition to clean your self up and rearrange your clothing and I doubt that anyone taking advantage of your state would manage to do it either.

I know this is all probably anxiety but I feel like, “what if I did consent to something and just blocked out my whole family and life commitments at the time”. Then that would be my fault. I don’t know if these thoughts are just coming from 3 weeks of going round in a loop about it.

That's what intrusive thoughts do, they seem like genuine thoughts and go round on a loop.

I really think you should try and access some support for your anxiety. You’re being really cruel to yourself.

If anything happened, which seems vanishingly unlikely, you couldn’t have consented and you are not to blame.

In reality it sounds like you are experiencing some kind of reaction to previous trauma which is leading to intrusive thoughts.

I had a terrible upbringing and it took a long time for me to feel worthy of the lovely life I created with my husband.

Please so try and access some further support. Speak with your DH about these feelings of not being deserving and I’m sure he’ll support too. My DH had no idea what my brain was playing out to me on a frequent basis.

Unless you are a person who likes to hook up with random people at parties etc (no judgement, I was one of them once upon a time), it is vanishingly unlikely that you would have willingly gone off and had sex with someone when drunk. If you were assaulted that would be a different story, and you would not be to blame however drunk you were.

However, the fact that you are thinking about these scenarios if you do not have a history of, shall we say, partying hard, is very odd and I wonder whether something else is going on. Either you do in fact remember something, or your unrelated fears about your relationship are surfacing? I and millions of other people have had drunken blackouts and mised time at events and parties, and would not immediately go to "did I have sex" the next day, rather than "oh God was i loud and embarrassing?" or "did I overshare?" for example.

So, once upon a time, I was that person who would have sex with people whilst drunk. This is going back many many years, almost 2 decades. On one occasion, I was followed home by a man who wouldn’t stop following me despite me begging him to leave me alone. I ended up letting him into my flat. I have had counselling for that.

What if I did this again?

I'm not NOT trying to be unkind. I think you do know what happened.

Anyway, if I'm wrong, and you really don't... You spent an hour sat on the toilet. 100%.

Why does it matter?

What do you mean?

Well you won’t if you don’t drink 🤷‍♀️ Easy fix.