shout out

Hi everyone.

I dont really know where to start with everything, but im going to try and get everything down just so I can get it off my chest. I hope you all dont think im some sort of selfish idiot who just wants attention because im not not like that. But part of me just feels that if there are people out there in my situation who listen to me, it'll make things a little bit better. You dont have to reply, but just knowing someone out there took the time to listen to me and hear what I have to say will help. So here goes...

I'm Matty, from Wales. I'm 17 years old and up until afew months ago I thought it was stupid and impossible for someone as young as me to become addictive to alcohol. I always thought that was something that happened to older people and something that was very gradual. This is mostly due to the fact that my mother was an alcoholic. I say 'was' because she no longer drinks alcohol due to the illness which has taken over her over the past few weeks. She has drank heavily for the past couple of years and I grew up watching her doing it. I knew it must be damaging her and begged her to stop drinking, I even threatend to move out and go live my my Dad, this was when I was only 14 years old.

But she didnt stop, and now I have somehow (stupidly) taken the same route as her. I watched her slowly deteriorate into the pale skeleton she now looks like. And the terrible thing is, I cant feel sorry for her. I even hate her for not listening to me and putting me thorugh everything she did with the drinking. Most of my family are angry with me for not showing sympothy towards her, or helping her to the extent they do. But they didnt have to live with her and watch her slowly sink into this state, they dont understand what it was like.

But I'm tottally digressing and talking about her (mostly because I blame her for my drinking problem) when I set out to talk about my own problem and pain. So anyway, I'm now at a point where I'm taking my A-Levels and choosing which University I will go to in the next year. Problem is, that all seems to have gone to $#%^ because of the drinking. I'm not trying to blow my own horn, but I was always a bright child, not a genious or anything, but you know....'bright'....'higher than average', whatever you want to call it. But it all means nothing now as over the past year and a half I discovered the easiness and way out of drinking....I discovered the joyful short term solution which is vodka. And yes; I would admit to a having an addictive personnality, which in no way helps.

So for almost three years (when I first started drinking properly) thing have gotten slowly worse. I'm now even at the point where my hands tremble quite badly during the day. For a long time I thought this was because of blood pressure or something, but now I think it might be because I havent had a drink, as the only time I completely stop shaking is when I've had several alcoholic drinks. It scares me a lot, yet at the same time I dont feel bothered, because slowly I've just stopped caring. And that is the worst part of all this alcohol addiction, the fact I no longer care, the fact I know I may end up in some dead end job, disgracing myself, yet I dont have the strength to stop it. I think part of me is just crying out for someone to grab hold of me and slap me across the face and tell me to stop, but I dont think it will happen, because when I'm sober I try to hide my addiction and deny everything when everyone questions me about how much I drink.

I might not even visit this site again, I might completely forget about it by tommorow as im just getting onto my fith vodka and coke. But I had to do this, I had to say something. Sitting in the living room with my mother today on christmas day made me want to speak out. I saw her lying there on the sofa, asleep from the mass of pills the hospital had given her, and I thought 'I dont want to end up like her'. And I dont, I really dont. But at the moment there is no there to help me. But knowing there are other people like me out there, reading this will help. I hope I dont end up like my mother but I dont want to stop drinking as it seems to soothe everything.

Anyway, thankyou for reading this. I needed to get it off my chest and finally admit it.

Matty.

Matty, good to hear from you, and what you say may help someone you may never meet. Who knows?

But I suspect you are looking for help yourself. I get it when you say “it seems to soothe everything” Alcohol always worked for me. Right up to the last drink I took, it worked. It changed the way I felt. And it changer it fast.

But at a cost. You are just starting to feel the nip of the wringer, there is a good deal more of what you are feeling now coming your way. You know this. You have watched an active alcoholic being consumed by this disease, your mother. And the hair on the back of your neck stands up when you replace her on that couch with yourself. That’s a good thing. It seems pain is a good motivator. When all else fails, pain gets us moving.

One last thing, when I first showed up at Alcoholics Anonymous, I blamed my drinking on my father. He was a drunk and that made me a drunk as well. Men wiser than myself asked me if he ever sat on me and pored alcohol down my throat? I said of course not. Then they asked me if I bent my own elbow, and swallowed it myself. It seems that I willingly drank every drop all by myself.

And I quote… “mostly because I blame her for my drinking problem” Not true Matti, you drink, I drank, because we wanted to. The first thing you might want to do is take full responsibility for Matti. Only then can things change.

Richard

Matty, good to hear from you, and what you say may help someone you may never meet. Who knows?

But I suspect you are looking for help yourself. I get it when you say “it seems to soothe everything” Alcohol always worked for me. Right up to the last drink I took, it worked. It changed the way I felt. And it changer it fast.

But at a cost. You are just starting to feel the nip of the wringer, there is a good deal more of what you are feeling now coming your way. You know this. You have watched an active alcoholic being consumed by this disease, your mother. And the hair on the back of your neck stands up when you replace her on that couch with yourself. That’s a good thing. It seems pain is a good motivator. When all else fails, pain gets us moving.

One last thing, when I first showed up at Alcoholics Anonymous, I blamed my drinking on my father. He was a drunk and that made me a drunk as well. Men wiser than myself asked me if he ever sat on me and pored alcohol down my throat? I said of course not. Then they asked me if I bent my own elbow, and swallowed it myself. It seems that I willingly drank every drop all by myself.

And I quote… “mostly because I blame her for my drinking problem” Not true Matti, you drink, I drank, because we wanted to. The first thing you might want to do is take full responsibility for Matti. Only then can things change.

Richard