Drinking was the only thing that saw me through the tough times

Drinking was the only thing that saw me through the tough times

Like many people, my life has not exactly been a bowl of cherries. From childhood family problems to my own marital difficulties, from my teenaged struggle to find meaning in my existence to my recent financial woes, it seems like every day of my life has offered little more than a 24-hour struggle to avoid complete mental breakdown.

Through it all, there's only been one thing I could count on - one companion that's always been at my side, one friend that's never led me astray: alcohol. Yes, for much of my life, drinking was the only thing that saw me through the tough times.

By John Andrews

I was barely out of my youth the first time drinking alcohol helped me make it through a particularly difficult period. It was my fifteenth birthday, in fact, and my father had gone a little overboard with my birthday spanking, if you know what I mean. No, it wasn't the first time he'd hit me, but I was determined to make it the last. That night, as I gathered my belongings and prepared for my premature escape into the world of independence, I found a half-full bottle of my father's whiskey. Although I didn't care much for the taste, I hastily guzzled it down in celebration of my pending liberation.

To make a long story short, I didn't end up running away from home that night. Instead, I ended up passing out on my bedroom floor. And you know something? In the harsh light of that April morning, I realized that running away from home was not such a great idea. It turned out that drinking had helped me both forget about my father's physical abuse and deter me from making a big mistake in running away.

I've been drinking my problems away ever since.

In fact, looking back on all these years, I think it's safe to say that by now, if it hadn't been for drinking, I probably would have ended up on skid row, in jail or even dead. With as much shit as I've had to go through in life, as many nights as I've been on the brink of emotional and mental collapse, it's perfectly reasonable to envision myself having resorted to some sort of self-destructive behavior instead of just crawling inside the bottle for a few days. It's pretty hard to cause yourself harm when you have zero control over your basic motor functions.

With alcohol being so readily available, I often find it hard to believe that so many people turn to self-destructive activities like listening to rock music or overeating whenever one of life's little hurdles puts them back on their heels. Equally confusing are the ideas of going to a psychiatrist or joining a support group. Whenever I need to find someone to listen or a group of people with similar problems, I needn't look any further than the closest pub! You'd be suprised how many others use the bottle as their pillar of strength.

Well, no matter what remedy you choose to combat this cancer called life, remember: like a hangover, the tough times will pass.