Alcohol and AS

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True enough, but that does not make all drinking bad or harmful.

I drink on and off - sometimes I can go through 15 pints a week, other times just 1-2. The way I see it, alcohol can be as complicated or as simple as you want to make it. My only motto with it is, I drink when I feel like it. I do not worry if I'm an alcoholic or not. I don't let drink make me feel guilty. After all, a major sign of alcoholism is to feel guilty after drinking then drink to ease the guilt.

Also, I only drink beers that I like the taste of (mostly ale or bitter) or whisky. After drinking socially for 3 years I've got over the sickness, headaches, and can drink 6 pints without being much more than buzzed. I just don't get how mainstream people (aged 18-25) can drink the equivelant to 1+ bottles of vodka 3 times a week. Worse still, they'll drink tasteless rubbish just to get drunk like their friends.

Whenever I have to attend any social get-together, I always look for the bar or wherever the drinks are first. Drinking helps me relax a lot. I end up drinking a lot though too.

I've thought of downing a couple shots of vodka before job interviews and then washing out my mouth with listerine but I've been too chicken to actually go through with it. However, I know that it would help in a huge way with my nerves. I certainly wouldn't do any worse than I would without the alcohol, and it would be so much less stressful, even if I do still blank out on questions.

I think the OP's point, which i think is an interesting point about the relationship between aspies and alcohol, is that it allows us to take *off* the mask.

Sure ... but do we then have "the real me", or do we then just have "the real me" minus some of my usual-or-normal inhibitions that actually are part of "the real me" I am possibly actually wanting to escape (at least temporarily)?

I no longer drink at all, yet I have no issue with anyone who drinks for any reason at all. I just want people to clearly understand (and I do not insist anyone agree): The effect of alcohol is always-and-only an illusion.

good question.

leejosepho, was there a trigger that caused you to stop drinking abruptly or was it a gradual loss of interest?

My *desire* to stop developed or "came about" rather quickly after I had realized I had lost all control over how *much* I drank, and then I also (next) discovered I absolutely could *not* stop drinking altogether. So, I suppose you could say the fear of dying drunk and of my two young daughters then having to bury a drunken father was the "trigger" that drove me to *want* to stop, but none of that ever kept me from drinking ... and I do not mean to be baiting you further into all of this. In simplicity: I had to find something to take the place of the *effect* of alcohol in order to be able to live without drinking at all, and that replacement or "substitute" ("Alcoholics Anonymous", the book, page 152), was/is spiritual fellowship with others ... and we could easily spend hours talking about all of that.

I drink every single night after work and on my days off I usually start drinking around noon or so. I end up drinking a lot more on my days off.....its probably a good thing that I work a job 5 days a week that doesn't let me out until 9pm.

I probably drink 4 - 6 beers a day. I used to drink hard alcohol, but when it comes to that I think my body craves the sugar and I end up drinking WAY too much and I gained a lot of weight when I tried drinking whisky instead of beer.

I can't remember the last time I went a day without having at least one drink. Does that make me an alcoholic ? Could I stop if I wanted to? I don't know the answer to that question.

Alcohol helps me numb out my feelings and actually helps me to feel like the world isn't just a crap-fulled place. It helps to make this life bearable. Sad but true I suppose......

When I was younger I went to see therapists for depression and I probably took at least 5 different medications that were supposed to help but they usually made me feel worse. Alcohol works better for me than Zoloft, Celexa, Neurontin, etc etc etc.... Ahhhh, good ol' self medication. Pot works good too, but I always end up being paranoid for the next few days. I usually recover pretty quickly from a night of drinking.....

Daily drinking does not prove anything other than daily drinking, and daily drinking is no big deal until it might in some way actually become troublesome.


Until that might become an issue for you, that is not really an issue either. The issues begin when drinking becomes troublesome and the drinker either wishes to control it and cannot or wants to stop altogether and cannot.


May that always be so!

I drink to feel mellow.

After a few drinks I feel more positive about things. I feel calm and that there is some hope to my life.

My liver is about to fall out on the floor but would I rather die or spend every day as a knotted up mess?

Good question.

Interesting point. I think AS makes us more reckless with intoxication.

I really hate the stereotype that Irish people drink more than anyone else. I'm Irish, and I have drunk in the past to self medicate for mental health issues, but I know many many Irish people who either don't drink at all, or drink in moderation. (My brother, a glass of wine with dinner, once or twice a month.)

Hey, me too!

actually, i was refering to a very high tolerance for alcohol, not a proclivity for the substance.

i used to not like the idea of alcohol messing with self control

now im quite happy to have a few too many, but only when i feel safe.

i dont drink much in between, then every day 6 months i get completely smashed. bulding up to it i kinda feel like "yeah, i really need to go get pissed soon"

weird hey.

Both my parents, as good and dear as they were, were alcoholics, and I believe that my mother drank throughout her entire pregnancy with me. I began to drink at college and continued until about eight years ago, when I hung up my guns after being informed that I had type 2 diabetes. It helped me deal with depression, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. I used great amounts of essential fatty acids (borage oil, as precursor to linolenic acid-omega-6, and fish oils-omega-3) along with fluvoxamine (generic for Luvox), a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI). They changed my life. I rarely think to drink, but I can remember all the pleasure, as well as pain, drinking brought me. People like us walk a tightwire. It seems to be our fate. If we don't think that we walk that wire, we are setting ourselves up for a fall. The drink relieved me, temporarily, of obsessions, compulsions, and guilt. The psychiatrists had confessed that they were powerless to do anything--until SSRIs.