brave battling babes get even better without the booze!

[jesuswhatnext]

10 weeks ago i started a thread asking for help - i was in a very desperate place, totally dependent on alchohol, unhappy, lonely and floundering around trying to make sense of it all. i was in danger of losing everything i hold dear.

in those few short weeks, i have got my life back and picked up a few computer friends along the way - we help each other, support each other, and laugh and cry together - if you would like to join us, please feel free - no judging, preaching, sermonising or moralising - we are simply ordinary people with a bloody awful illness!

We have been invited to a bbq over the weekend and I'm trying to persuade dh to go with dd, so i can stay at home. They are the ones who have fun there anyway, for me it's always an ordeal even with drink.

I really like these people, but this is all in my second (crap) language and I find it so hard to communicate.

maddogs - I know exactly what you mean. The weird thing is that I have found that when I am off the booze I actually have more confidence. I know that I may not be the most interesting person in the room but nor am I slurring, being inappropriate or leaving with them with bad memories of me, "Did you meet that Moomin? What a pisshead/ joke/ pain in the arse!" Also attending AA meetings has made me more confident round strangers - admittedly they are very, very friendly strangers! But I still have to chat to them!

"I bet that you are all of those things WITH a drink too."

I'm NOT though, I am finally able to behave like a normal human being.

For me maddogs I can act like a normal human being when I am a drink or so in but then the alcoholic takes over! And all I am concerned about is the next drink. Sadly I cannot stop at those 1 or 2 drinks...!

Very good point RedMoomin. I cannot stop either. Would I rather be seen as a bit shy and awkward or as a blethering, annoying drunk person?

That's the choice I think!

Being shy and awkward will not kill you either - or harm anyone around you.

Sorry if that was a bit gloomy!

I bet that you are all of those things WITH a drink too."

"I'm NOT though, I am finally able to behave like a normal human being."

In that case, get onto the Patent Office now because you have discovered the cure to mankind's ills and will make a fortune.

Let me understand - you turn up at a party sober and are shy, awkward and uncomfortable.

You take a single drink (and it must be alcohol, because soft drinks don't work, right?) and all of a sudden you get this download into your head of Bob Monkhouse's best material, you have no problem talking to complete strangers about anything at all and do not hesitate for a second to do so, and suddenly there is no place you would rather be than at that party.

Three questions before I buy it off you - does it really work instantly, or does it take, say, half an hour (about the time it takes most people to feel comfortable at a party where they don't know many people? Have you ever seen it work in someone else, or does it not work so well for them, turning them instead into belligerent, dopey shambling fools? And have you considered how you will market this to the muslim world? I mean, they must be crying out for an elixir like this to liven up their famously conservative and muted parties and festivals, mustn't they?

Seems like a while since MIFLAW has kicked some ass... too busy flirting with JWN and pretending to be Morse recently

MIFLAW

The answer to your first question is that it works pretty much instantly (meaning it's psychological more than anything else, right?). However it works much better if I am already not sober when turning up at the party

In my head, yes, I instantly become a more interesting, funny person who can talk to anyone without dying of shyness.

However, no, I have never seen this work for anyone else! But they don't need it and I do, they are interesting to start with! Or something, that's how it seems to me anyway.

So no need to market it - it's only ME who this works for, geddit??

Maddogs - I know what you mean about not being sober when you arrive, part of my 'getting ready' involved music and a cold bottle of white. That way I could pretend to be a moderate drinker with everyone else as I was already a bottle ahead

toclear - yep, done that one too!

:o @ Red & MIFLAW!

"However it works much better if I am already not sober when turning up at the party" - but that means that, when you drink it, you are actually NOT any of those things - unless you are awkward etc in your own home?

"But they don't need it and I do" - because you are unique, yes?

Have you heard the definition of an alcoholic, much bandied around in AA but not actually theirs, as "an egomaniac with an inferiority complex"? Does it fit?

You still haven't told me why devout Muslims not only don't need this magic potion, but live in fear and suspicion of it. Is there no one shy in Pakistan? Is it like being surrounded by millions of dark-skinned Bonnie Langfords, effortlessly tap-dancing and jazz-handing their way to the mosque?

MIFLAW - again!

I see the wonderful MIFLAW has been working his magic again!!!

Brilliant post about the three questions MIFLAW.

Miflaw you are tying my brain in knots a little. I COULD rationalise every one of your arguments, but appreciate that you are trying to make me look at this from a different angle and it's working.

The Bonnie Langford image is very disturbing. Maybe the shy Muslims just stay home?

"an egomaniac with an inferiority complex" does strike somewhere uncomfortable.

"I COULD rationalise every one of your arguments" - I am certian that every single one of us on this thread has a black belt and bar in rationalisation and would expect nothing less from you.

Nevertheless, I guess that coming here means you migth be able to talk everyone else into believing that black is white but are finding it progressively harder to convince yourself.

Which, though it may not feel like it yet, is excellent news.

In the mean time, remember - you can't kid a kidder!

Have been told all my life by many people (parents, teachers, friends, bosses, my PhD supervisor, random people that I've just met) that I am TOO QUIET.

Drinking gives me a little more confidence, even if it's false confidence, to be a little less quiet.

I'm not saying this to make me unique or whatever, just because it really does feel like drinking helps.

My father used to say years ago that I suffered from an inferiority complex so maybe I fit half of the American description but not sure I agree with first half, don't see myself as an egomaniac (not selfish enough)

"don't see myself as an egomaniac (not selfish enough)" - you don't see your drinking as at all selfish, then? No one else is harmed or inconvenienced?

"Have been told all my life by many people (parents, teachers, friends, bosses, my PhD supervisor, random people that I've just met) that I am TOO QUIET."

so talk more.

"because it really does feel like drinking helps." So why stop? If drinking's doing you so many favours, why not do more of it instead of less?

Desire - it's not an American description, I don't think.

Oh definitely kick ass time so:) to me an egomaniac is someone who is so conceited that the only important person in their life is themselves and that is not me:(