Drinking To Feel

[71nothing]

Drinking was problematic for me about 20 years ago. I was newly in college and hadn't processed the years of trauma I experienced when I was younger. I started to drink during high school. I was so numb by that point that I was walked around like a zombie - not interacting with anyone, not feeling anything. While most people I know drank to drown their emotions, drinking for me allowed me to actually feel something. My therapist now says it worked that way for me because it lowered my inhibitions so I allowed emotion to come through when drunk.

So anyway I stopped drinking about 18 years ago and didn't touch alcohol until my PTSD symptoms reappeared about 6 years ago. My drinking is nothing like it was then however I have recently started drinking vodka over wine coolers. I find myself drinking to feel again. Not often, but may a couple times a month. Tonight was one of those nights.

Drinking allows me to feel something. I have been feeling so numb this week and with my therapist on vacation I haven't had any outlet. I also seem to have more insight to my thoughts, memories, and feelings when I drink. Unfortunately I also feel guilty when I drink. It always seems like a good idea at the time and then as it wears off I lose that good feeling and feel more numb than before.

My thought/question is trying to figure out if there is any benefit to occasional drinking to allow myself to feel and process what I have great difficulty doing when I don't drink.

 

[TLight]

I have flashbacks and get angry easier when I drink, but that's only when stress levels are already intolerable.

I also have thought that it is kinda 'good' I had a flashback and cry and scream, since the rest of the time I'm totally numb and just a functioning robot.

I drink to feel something different than the pain in my head. It also seems to amazingly help when the depression gets intolerable. At least I feel a little something different than depression.

I don't drink til I am drunk at all. In fact, I hate that. But I will have one drink an hour or two and 5 or 6 a day. Sometimes I think it helps. I know its a bad coping mechanism, but everything in moderation, right? I get a bit of relief from the symptoms for awhile. I don't think I'm hurting myself.

Sometimes it's either a drink or two every few hours or take a klonopin to 'change' the way I am. I think drinking is OK and I don't mix the two.

But yes, it does make me feel the past, but as I said, that's when the stress is really high and I get triggered somehow, add a few drinks and I'm off to flashback land.

 

[99Phoenix99]

When I drink...

I can't really explain it well.... but when I drink I feel human.

My inhibitions are lowered and I can actually interact with people without constant wariness. I can enjoy small chit chat when I've had a drink. When I'm sober I have a very clinical mind. I don't mingle for the sake of mingling. To me the thought is that there's nothing to be gained from it.

That's my PTSD. When I'm sober my PTSD symptoms are at their highest. When I've had a drink though? I'm actually at ease. And I've been able to speak to close friends because of it. And I mean really talk to them about the heavy stuff that I normally would never talk about. It helps me past the paranoia and trepidations I have.

It makes me feel like it's ok to have emotions. I always stiffle my emotions, thinking them to be inconsequential or a nuisance.

A drink here or there for me helps. But it may be different for others.

 

[The Albatross]

Initially, alcohol can be a "disinhibiter". It can work, but it is a maladaptive coping mechanism. If it becomes habitual, eventually it can become a behavior. The problem with booze as a coping mechanism, is that over time, some people (like me) develop cravings and urges and the persistence of drinking comes with it's own set of often more problematic consequences.

Also, alcohol is a depressant. For some, it can prolong or worsen depressive aspects.
And too, alcohol when combined with the sugar, is a quick but completely empty "fuel" for the brain. The brain and body can develop a preference for it because it takes so little energy to metabolize. But it is nutritionally poor. If alcohol use, slips into abuse or addiction it causes malnutrition and chronic dehydration. (I have some personal exeperience with these aspects).

 

[Hashi]

What Albatross said!

Also, I think it can only be a stopgap and not a solution. In fact, I think it hinders solutions.

I understand the "help" of alcohol but it only lasts as long as it lasts. It doesn't create any ongoing change. As long as we're using it. we're not working on other methods to reach and cope with feelings. So it lets us continue to not really challenge or change anything.

I don't mean to sound preachy. I'm talking from my own struggles with this, which are ongoing. I wish I hadn't delayed my healing by using alcohol to prop myself up enough to not address core issues and develop healthier coping methods.

 

[BloomInWinter]

I don't drink at all anymore. After several overdoses and injuries, I decided I wanted to live.

I am recovering now. I used to use alcohol because I was numbing the pain, which decreased my anxiety. With lowered anxiety, then the numbing of dissociation would let down, allowing feelings through but without the anxiety.

But it had diminishing returns for me. Every time I used it instead of practicing my coping skills, I wasn't able learn internal coping strategies. I hurt my body, damaged my brain, and did things I regretted (if I remembered them.)

Then, I'd wake up with fresh reasons to hate myself, and drink to alleviate those feelings. It was a perpetual cycle of misery.

I also never want to be the source of another's trauma. The alcoholism in my family caused us all grief, pain, and psychological trauma. I never want to do that to my kids.

The DBT skills & CBT have relieved much of the numbing, now, though it's been hard to work them at times. I couldn't safely begin processing my traumas until I had the skills for affect regulation necessary to be safe.

Drinking helped me survive my childhood. But I have a lifelong task to go back and learn all the normal people skills I didn't get to learn in my childhood. I wish I had other options back then.

I'm glad I'm sober now. There have been many times I've wanted to drink because of the distress I felt at the time. But I got through, and each of those small victories increased my feelings of self-confidence that I was strong enough to handle the next one.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

I agree with the others. I am sober now too. It was an escape for me, but I was acting out and it became a bad cycle for me. I have been sober for years. I wish I could drink but I do not want the problems it caused for me.

 

[Rumors]

I have always liked my beer goggles. It makes looking in the mirror much easier! ;)

 

[Britt.f7]

There use to be no, or rarely, any alcohol in this house. My children really didn't see it unless we went to my families events. My husband began drinking the hard stuff behind our backs when his mother died and we were having issues. When I found out, it stopped. We had counseling. A couple years later, my grandma died and to get through family events I started drinking. But only then, so it was few and far between. Then my mother died and I drank at least a bottle of wine a night for about a year. My husband kept buying the wine for me so I think he was enabling me. My heart doctor told me really any more then 1 or 2 glasses of red wine(what I drink) becomes toxic for the heart. So I cut down. Sometimes I don't drink for months. Right now I'm back at 1 to 2 glasses a night.

Drinking, not now though, did cut down on my inhibition. It helped me be angry and show it when my mom died. Unfortunately, since it is a depressor, it plays havoc with my depression. Which is another reason I cut back. That and for my children.

Yes, I feel guilty.

 

[quaintpapercut]

I am recovering now. I used to use alcohol because I was numbing the pain, which decreased my anxiety. With lowered anxiety, then the numbing of dissociation would let down, allowing feelings through but without the anxiety.

This exactly! But for me it's not alcohol but pot. I find it finally makes the anxiety "break", giving me some relief and the ability to feel. I worry that if I don't use alcohol or pot I'll never be able to feel or understand what "normal" is as being in a hyperviligant/dissociated state feels like my normal.

It's only with alcohol or pot that I actually know what it feels like to be a person without all the anxiety.

 

[kodiak]

For me drinking bought out the guilt, anger even worse and made the depression even worse I've been sober for 10 years

 

[YogiBear]

It is so interesting to read people's views on this.

I suppose I am a bit of a weirdo, but for me I begin to develop a negative association over time with alcohol or medication. If I use something regularly, it will not help me. I do not like the way I feel the next day if I drink too much.

That being said, I do enjoy a drink or two a couple times a week. In any case, it's important to listen to our bodies. What is right for one person, may not be right for the next. Overuse/misuse is not good for anyone. A man should have no more than two drinks daily, a woman no more than one. Saving your servings and having seven beers on on Friday night is binge drinking/alcoholism in my opinion.