I'm never drinking again

I'll be honest - this blog was set up after I'd had a couple of drinks. When I say "a couple", perhaps I should clarify: when I woke up today, there were five empty wine bottles dotted around the lounge. Five. Empty. Wine. Bottles.

I didn't drink them all myself. I was with two others, each of whom had maybe three or four glasses of wine through the night. That means I drank between two and three bottles of wine myself. The occasion? No occasion. There was wine and there were other people willing to validate me by drinking some of it too. That's all the excuse I needed.

My relationship with alcohol has always been pretty bad. I went to an AA meeting maybe ten years ago and decided that never drinking again would be too difficult. Over the years, I lost several friends and arguably one girlfriend because of my behaviour while drunk. I used to regularly drink and drive. I have drunk myself into hospital twice. I have been arrested and imprisoned for being aggressive while drunk - also twice. Bear in mind this is the big stuff - my list of minor misdemeanors would embarrass any sane person.

Twice to date, I've stopped drinking, both times for one year. Both times I knew I was going to start again - I was taking a break, for my physical and mental health and for financial reasons. The second time, I spent a huge amount of the year looking forward to the moment I could finally have a glass of red wine. Each time I got through the year, I celebrated with a binge drinking session. Clearly the temporary solution is no solution at all.

This blog was intended to help me get healthy. Part of the reason for moving house was to afford me an opportunity to reboot - I'm close to family, there are vast expanses of countryside and seaside to explore, there are dogs to walk, fresh air to enjoy. I have a chance here to get to the root of a number of issues which have caused me significant unhappiness in my life.

As you have no doubt been told plenty of times, the first step to fixing a problem is admitting the problem exists. This post is my way of doing that, so here it is:

My name is Donald and I'm an alcoholic.

I'm never drinking again.