Thank you, booze.

If you hadn't tried to ruin my life I might never have realised how fucked up I was.

It’s alcohol awareness week. As a recovering alcoholic, I thought I’d take this opportunity to write little thank you letter to booze.

Without booze taking hold of me, kicking my head in, stealing my money and making me a cunt I would never be the person I am today. Which is not to say I am a perfect person. I am just better than I was in June 2015 when I had my last drink. A lot fucking better. Not just because I am no longer hungover and grumpy all the time. Not just because I no longer get lary and abusive in public. And not just because I no longer sneak about the house stealing swigs of voddy or cheeky lines of gack when the kids are in bed and the wife’s in a different room.

I am better because once I’d knocked all that stuff on the head I began to ask myself why I had needed to drink and take drugs in the first place. And over time I realised that it was because I was constantly anxious, agitated and not quite comfortable with myself. I realised that I was constantly in search of some external validation to make myself feel happy and secure. Attention, money, respect, success: these are the sort of things I craved. And when I wasn’t getting enough of those things I would look for an escape in drugs and booze. Had I not got sober I might not have ever confronted the real problem: a gaping hole inside. A scratch that needed itching. A generalised dissatisfaction with myself.

Booze had been a sticking plaster for too long. Once I tore it off I was forced to seek longer term, more meaningful solutions to my malaise. I had to learn how to be comfortable with myself and accepting of the shit life throws at us. So, thank you alcohol, I guess. Without you I would never have gone through the painful but rewarding process of getting my shit together. It took me forty years but eventually I started to learn the difference between the important stuff and the bullshit.

I never hit a rock bottom. That is to say I never ended up shitting my pants in a budget meeting or getting arrested for public indecency. I didn’t lose my home or my family or anything really bad like that.

But like so many alcoholics (I would guess the vast majority) I was locked in a sort of purgatory which was somehow worse. I mean, if I had shat myself or got nicked or whatever at least I’d have a good story to tell when people ask me why I no longer drink.

My drinking started when I was twelve and, at a pace so slow it was almost imperceptible, it grew into an ugly and destructive habit by the time I was in my mid-thirties. By the time I realised it was no longer something I did for fun but something I did to numb pain and discomfort, it was almost too late.

One thing I told myself back then was that my drinking didn’t effect anyone else. It was a private decision and an expression of personal freedom. I told myself that I liked drinking and deserved to have things that I liked. But all of that was bollocks. I didn’t really like drinking; it had just become learned behaviour because I had been doing it for so long. It started out as something I did to look cool and grown up; then it was just part of the culture that surrounded me so I did it to fit in; sometimes I did it for the courage and confidence I had simply not learnt to muster while sober; eventually I was just doing it because I had forgotten how to cope with everyday life without a drink inside me.

The bigger lie I was telling myself was that it didn’t effect other people around me. I told myself that I was able to compartmentalise my drinking. It’s true I would try to not get pissed in front of the kids (but even that rule went out the window on certain occasions such as Christmas day when, like all piss-head dads, I legitimised guzzling beers and Baileys in front of my children from breakfast through to bedtime). I would rarely drink during working hours and, when I was with my wife, I’d try to keep a lid on really excessive boozing. I told myself that drinking was part of my private time. This meant that I did it with mates at the football or on Friday night or - as my problem got worse - sat in the corner of a pub on my own all afternoon.

But none of this really protected my loved ones from the impact of my boozing. I was grumpy and tired all the time. My mind was almost always on my last drink or my next drink. I built too many social engagements and even family occasions around getting high. I invited a coke dealer to my mum’s seventieth, for fucks sake (to be fair, he did great business that night).

I was demonstrably shitter at being a dad, a husband, a son, a brother, a mate and a colleague when I was drinking. Anyone who is boozing regularly will be the same, whether they want to admit it to themselves or not. It’s hard to make that admission because the booze takes over your mind and tells you it’s really not a big deal. “Having a few drink is normal,” it says. “It’s fun. It’s your right. It doesn’t hurt anyone else.”

Booze is full of shit. With any luck, one day you get a moment of clarity, realise that alcohol has been gaslighting you for years and that, in fact, getting pissed all the time really is a big deal.

People talk about the importance of will power when you are giving up drink. Yes, you need that in the early stages. But you need so much more. Will power might help you stop drinking for a day, a week, a month or even a year. But you will not stay sober and learn to embrace all of the joys that go with it unless you address the deeper issues. Why did you drink? What is the matter? How do you feel? Why can’t you seem to relax? These are tough questions. They might seem a bit overblown. You might think that you drink because it tastes nice or you like the feeling it gives you. But why do you need that feeling? That five minute buzz followed by an uncomfortable craving followed by gradual anticlimax, then grogginess then nausea then self hatred and shame. Who needs that shit in their life?

Of course, you might not have a problem with drink, which is great. But I think that everyone has a problem with themselves. Everyone has that scratch that needs itching. You might not use booze to cope with it. Maybe you use exercise, spending, sex or Haribos. Or maybe you’ve got no obvious bad habits but sometime just feel miserable or bad about yourself in an unspecific way. The problem, I reckon, is that we live in a society that places all the emphasis on externalised solutions to our problems. In the olden times, they had religion or some other form of spirituality. But there came a point where we started to think of ourselves as so clever that we didn’t need to reflect on our inner selves any more. All we needed was the rewards of modern life: a good job, a nice house, a flash car; the attention and respect of others; the buzz and excitement of constant sensual stimulation.

Have I learned to stop chasing that shit since I stopped drinking? Have I fuck. You should see the state my overdraft mate. I suppose the important thing, though, is that I now realise that those cravings are unhealthy. That I am happier and more content when I can ignore my desire for control and external validation; to let go of shit; and to just like myself a bit more unconditionally. It’s a lot easier to do that when booze isn’t part of your life.

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Here’s another bloke who’d had enough of booze and chose a different path. Jamie East is five years sober and an extremely eloquent and entertaining advocate of the booze-free life. Like me, he let drinking slowly creep up on him. On this week’s podcast he shared his story with me. Inspirational stuff.

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Some services, links and phone numbers to help you through the tough times

https://www.samaritans.org/ Tel 116 123

@calm 0800 58 58 58

@YoungMindsUK 0800 018 2138

@CharitySane 0300 304 7000

https://www.alcoholics-anonymous.org.uk/

https://cocaineanonymous.org.uk/

https://andysmanclub.co.uk/

https://www.nhs.uk/live-well/healthy-body/gambling-addiction/