How To Become an Alcoholic in 25 Days or Less

Warning: This is not the best blog to read if you ever want to look at me the same (parents, relatives, religious folk, people that think their poop smells like roses). This is not your mom's childhood bedtime story. This is probably going to shock, appall, horrify and worry many of you...in that order. Keep in mind I have changed all names of parties involved, and have left out many details that are not pertinent to the subject at hand. This will probably land me in the nearest (fill in the blank) Anonymous group or on the fast track to the psych ward. Kidding about that last part. I probably should not even be writing about this at all, but I believe in the power of honesty, and this is just 25 days in the life of Glori. (And it's also a good way to tell who is reading my blogs because I'm sure I'm gonna get a rash of questions and emailed self help links after this).

I will preface this all by saying I am not going to elude to the fact that this was a recent happening. It could have happened 10 years ago. It could have happened yesterday. But one thing I will admit for sure, it happened. Starting off on the wrong foot, I never really understood how a person could become an alcoholic. I mean I definitely have had experience in the drinking department. I've been a teenager.  I've gone to college. I've partied like the world was ending (Y2K anyone?) but never was an "alcoholic". I couldn't even become an alcoholic if I tried to! I just chalked it up to not having an addictive personality. The point I'm trying to make here is, I never understood how drinking could take over your life. Wouldn't being hungover every day eventually wear on you? How can a person physically drink every day? Don't you have stuff to get done and places to go and people to see? At what point does the state of being an alcoholic actually happen? Some people say it's when you drink alone, others say it's when it interferes with your job, still others say if you can't go without a drink. I say it all starts when one of your best friends, Mr. Instigator, comes to visit for five days with the intention of "running off vodka by Friday" and me, being the stand up friend that I am, complying to fulfill that wish.

Usually when I don't understand a concept, life has a way of showing me how it works at the most unpredictable times. I'm not sure if it was a combo of Dryjuary (not drinking for a whole month) and having an absence of something (in this case alcohol) which created an over indulgence later, or if it was me being hell bent on ensuring Mr. Instigator enjoyed his 5 day stay, but all I know is 5 days turns into 25 days in the blink of an eye when you are living it up. If anyone is unsure of how real the fact that habits can be created in 3 weeks is, take my scientific proof of this post that they can. So here is how to become an alcoholic in 25 days aka my attempt at the next best seller, Alcoholism for Dummies. (All I'm saying is if Shades of Grey and I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell can sweep the nation, so could this). In case anyone is wondering, you have to drink pretty much non-stop for 25 days and watch your life quickly collapse down around you in that short period of time...at least that's what the jacket summary will say.

So this is the long boring chronological day by day part. You can skip all of this and jump straight to the last paragraph if you're pressed for time or have ADD...(kinda like everyone does with the genealogies in the Bible).

My timeline pretty much went something like this:

Day 1: Pick up Mr. Instigator from airport. Work. Meet up with Mr. Instigator, Miss Innocent, and Mr. New Guy who are already at the local bar. Get to the bar fashionably late due to impromptu going away gathering you must attend. Have a drink. The crew decides to bar hop. Go to bar down the road. Have a couple catch up drinks so you can get on your friends' levels. Make final stop at your hometown bar. Drop friends off and are in bed by 12:30am because you have work the next day. Phew! You made it and were home at a reasonable hour.

Day 2: Kind of hungover. Make it through work. Wonder how you can physically drink again but know you must indulge Mr. Instigator. Tell yourself to suck it up like a wo-man. Pick up Mr. Instigator as he refused to go home the prior night and he woke up in a home unaware of his surrounds. Meet up with same crew from last night. Go to a boring bar. Have one drink and move on. Tonight it's Mr. New Guy that wants to find the party. So we stumble upon a bar celebrating the current holiday in pure party fashion. Play pool. Drink. Play beer pong. Drink. Totally forget you were hungover. Then as if the drunk gods want to play into your madness, you get a call somewhere between the time you are deciding if you will drink more vodka or switch to beer, that you don't have to be at work until 4pm the next day. Decision made!  The party is going to last forever and you will be sticking with vodka due to informative work phone call. Now you too share in the joy of Mr. New Guy wanting to find the party earlier. The party does in fact end at the bar, however you proceed to take the party elsewhere. Before you know it, it's 3:30am and you are falling asleep standing up. Go home and crash.

Day 3: You sleep all day until it's time to work. Inevitably still hungover. Get informed by Mr. Instigator that they are getting everyone together tonight as it's the weekend. Dread every second of the day as it inches closer to Drink:30 (that's the time you have to start drinking)...that is until you get that whiff of spring air that suddenly energizes you. Call it a gut feeling but you know tonight is going to be epic. While having said thought, as if to confirm your suspicion, you get that call from Mr. Instigator to have you pick him up because him and his friend, Mr. Indecisive, are already too drunk to drive to their own planned outing. Wait an hour and a half for them to get themselves together, trying to convince Mr. Indecisive that he should in fact go to his best friend's gathering, while making up new drinks in Mr. Indecisive's kitchen to go with vodka. Turns out half a glass of cherry vodka and half a glass of ginger ale goes down pretty smoothly and makes time pass quite well while impatiently waiting for friends. Finally make it to the bar. They have a band playing. Alcohol and live music is your kryptonite.  All your friends are there and the bar is packed shoulder to shoulder. The bar closes with everyone singing an a cappella montage of a song everyone knows. Meet cute but weird guy, Mr. Depp, outside bar and exchange numbers. Pile in car and drive Mr. Instigator, Mr. Indecisive, and Mr. New Guy to a much needed 2:30am Wawa run. Go back to Mr. Indecisive's house. Eat so you can drink more...logically.  Get obligatory 3:30am drunk text from Mr. Depp, because the 3 day rule does not apply when you meet someone after midnight, telling you they are partying and you should come by. Leave to go to random house party with straggler Mr. New Guy who is the only one left with a little spunk in him. Meet more people. Drink and talk. Drop Mr. New Guy off at home at 5am per request and go back to the dying party. Stay up until 7am because Mr. Depp has work the next day and requests your presence to now keep him awake for his remaining couple hours. Drive home and collapse in bed with clothes still on.

Day 4: You do nothing. Literally. You don't even know if you actually slept because you only remember bits and pieces of last night. But you had a great time and you fulfilled the epic night of adventure you smelled in the air. You already drank into the wee hours of the morning...no way your body can handle another night of drinking even if it is Mr. Instigator's last night. Order food. Watch tv with Mr. Instigator. Say goodbye.

Day 5: Wake up not knowing what you are feeling. Most people would call this sober, but you are unsure of it's origin. Go to church. Miss Innocent calls you up to have lunch. You are sad as Mr. Instigator is now on a flight home and you could use the company. Miss Innocent suggests to bring some drinks. You instinctively cringe at the thought of drinking...but comply. Start drinking. Turns out it tastes pretty good once it hits your lips. End up at a bar to eat lunch. Get sucked into a movie at bar. Go to Miss Innocent's house to finish said movie and drinks that were abandoned for lunch. End up back at bar after movie is over...after all there's nothing left to do once your drinks are gone. Decide to leave bar at 8pm because you must be responsible even though the next day is a holiday. Again, as if there is someone listening to your thoughts of trying to be responsible, on the way home you get a text from Mr. Charisma, someone you never actually met before, but have been trying to catch up with, saying his friends ditched him and he's lonely and needs someone to keep him company at the bar around the corner from your house. Convenient. Starting to see the pattern of ridiculousness and being a glutton for punishment and recognizing there's no work the next day, you arrive at bar to meet Mr. Charisma...after all you already have been drinking for 5 hours and this seems like a good idea at this point. You end up having a blast with Mr. Charisma as name indicates. Shots and drinks continue. Bar closes. By this point you are so far gone that you decide it's a great idea to keep drinking. Walk to Mr. Charisma's friend's house, Miss Needy. Drink more. Steal picture from apartment complex wall cuz it's hideous and it's funny. Decide you need to go home. Mr. Charisma walks you home for safety. Give drunken tour of your house. Get into conversation about movies. Drinking and movie watching commences. Mr. Kind Hearted roommate wakes up for work and has a shot with you and Mr. Charisma. See the sun come up and the clock laughing at you saying it's 7am. Go to bed.

Day 6: You wake up and thank God you had off today. You feel like you are a bit out of whack but surprisingly don't have a headache or hangover. That's your sign...you ignore it of course.

Day 7-8: One big blur as it was pretty much the same day repeating itself over and over. Hang out with friends, drink, work. Nap when possible. There might be a video of you and Mrs. Share a Brain making nonsense talk with edible objects from one of these days.

Day 9: You wake up in a panic. Still not sure whether you turned your alarm off in your sleep or if you just didn't bother to set it at all. You miss work entirely. Talk to sober Mr. Kind Hearted who swears he had a conversation with you and woke you up, and you apparently told him you were awake and to leave you alone. Remember none of this. You are now starting to get blackout drunk as hours of days have gone missing.

Day 10: Work. Decide it's time to slow down this fast pace ticket to hell you've been on. But it's Friday, so you can't sit at home doing nothing. Call Mrs. Share a Brain and Mr. Man Bag and suggest a low key night. They oblige. Go to bar to get food and of course a beer. Hit the movie theater with them and your backpack of beer in tow because after all you should always plan ahead and always pre-game your planned drinking. By the time the movie is over backpack is empty and all consequences fade away. Go back to bar with them because it's still early and you are feeling good. Decide, collectively that you and your friends need to relocate closer to home around midnight. You are coherent enough to drive home, but not enough to stop drinking and call it a night. Mr. Kind Hearted joins drunken crawl with me, Mr. Man Bag, and Mrs. Share a Brain. Walk to nearby bar. Play pool. Drink beer from pitchers because the glasses must be filled to frequently. Get kicked out of bar because it's an hour past closing time. In this state of mind time doesn't exist. Stumble home. Mrs. Share a Brain cooks breakfast while everyone proceeds to drink more. Wave hello to the sun. Everyone passes out at your residence like a scene from the latest apocalypse movie.

Day 11: Curse the same sun you waved at and get slightly angry at yourself for being so thrilled to see it a few short hours ago. Take Mrs. Share a Brain home. Get fed. Muster up enough strength to go ice skating. You are somehow still able to make and keep commitments. Realize that you can't sleep and have to drink again tonight because it's Mr. Birthday Boy's birthday party. Drive to Philly wanting to die from exhaustion. Go to an all expenses paid bar. Order the good stuff. You keep your whits about you as you are hurting from barely any sleep and any energy you have must be used to socialize and stay awake. Win party game and receive a bottle of Jameson as prize. Just what you need, more alcohol. Follow party crowd to another bar. Purpose to leave by 9pm. At about 8:35pm receive text from Mr. and Mrs. Late Comer who make you promise to wait for them because you haven't hung out in so long. Mr. Late Comer buys a round of shots upon entrance. Somehow the beers are now going down like water. There's that "time no longer exists" feeling again. Start talking to guys at the bar. You barely notice all your friends left until Mr. Man Bag gives your keys, which were taken from your open purse, to new guy friends, Mr. Bed and Mr. Breakfast, to ensure I would be doing no driving. Go home with complete strangers, Mr. Bed and Mr. Breakfast. Blackout. Hours are lost somewhere in the cosmic universe.

Day 12: Wake up having no clue where you are, who's condo you are in, or how you got there. Realize that condo is REALLY expensive, possibly the pent house. You vaguely remember kicking around a soccer ball inside the massive expanse one would call a living room last night. Check on sleeping Mr. Bed and Mr. Breakfast, and say goodbye. Exit through super high class lobby where breakfast is being served. Reek of booze. Still in the same clothes as last night. Wonder if lobby attendants notice. Walk through automatic sliding glass doors to the outside world of the city. Still so drunk that you can't even properly work your phone. Contacts stuck to your eyeballs. Have a "dude where's my car" moment. (Note: "dude where's my car" when paired with "I'm lost in a city and don't know where I am" can make one slightly anxious...do not try if you are probe to anxiety.) Must recount prior nights adventures backwards step by step to get your bearings...kinda like the movie the Hangover only it's your life and it's real so it's a lot less funny in the moment. Wander. Finally figure out how to work your phone and call Mr. Man Bags for moral support and to ask if he had any clue what Mr. Bed and Mr. Breakfast's names were. No dice. Mr. Bed and Breakfast they shall always remain. Find car after doing the whole backtracking hangover thing. Set body on autopilot and drive straight to church, unshowered and unkempt. Sit next to Miss Dancing Queen and apologize for the odor I know she is politely ignoring. Go home and nap for 1 hour. Pack in a fury as you have to drive to VT to snowboard immediately. Starting to wonder why you ever make plans anymore. You are what they call a functioning alcoholic. Leave on long 6 hour journey. Realize things are spiraling out of control as your heart is racing from anxiety and lack of sleep. Drive through a blizzard which takes your mind off of beating yourself up for the last 2 weeks. Finally make it to VT in one piece. Mr. and Mrs. Good Times are happy to see you and present you with jello shots. You oblige even though you want jello shots just as much as you want a shot in the head.  Food is high on the list of priorities however so you go to a bar. The beer gods are at work again and you realize it happens to be Jack Daniels week at the bar. Madness ensues. Meet crazy Canadians and Mr. and Miss L.I. Become best friends with all people mentioned over the course of an hour. You muscle through more drinks. Learn how to play Black Jack. Win random J.D. apparel. Have flash back of being in the same bar a few years prior and take a moment to pause in silence saluting old memories.  The thought of fresh snow and first chair actually override the need to drink and you become the voice of reason to Mr. and Mrs. Good Times suggesting we go home early and call it a night. Reason means your in bed by 1:30am.  Success!

Day 13: Snowboard. Meet up with Mr. and Miss L.I. from prior night. Adventure in the woods carrying snowboard for what seems like miles trudging through backwoods and snow up to your knees to find an old cabin. Make the 6 hour trek home. Collapse in bed.

Day 14-16: You can't recall one single thing from any of these days. Blackout hours are turning into blackout days. I'm pretty sure there was work, a lot of naps involved, coupled with drinking at home at night (not by yourself mind you).  Your house looks like a crime scene as you have had no time to even consider the thought of cleaning. You realize you haven't gone food shopping in a month. I'm pretty sure I ate a can of corn for lunch one of these days.

Day 17: Work. Hang out with Mr. Depp for lunch. Go on date with Mr. Dos Equis. Simply stated your senses are now failing because you can't even use your GPS to find the bar you are going to this night. It might actually be true that you can drink your brain cells away. You have to phone a friend and it happens to be Mr. Man Bags that answers your distressed call to give you directions, so you don't look like a complete idiot to Mr. Dos Equis. Drink good beer (aka high alcohol percentage). Decide that if drinking was to continue we need to go to bar closer to home. Find bar closer to home. Drink. Try to call it a night but in parking lot decide that the better plan would be to move party to Mr. Dos Equios house. After all it is a couple miles closer than your house.  Stay up most of the night and drink. Crash at Mr. Dos Equios house.

Day 18: In and out of sleep all day. Mr. Dos Equios doesn't seem to mind. Go to work at night. Get off at 10pm and kick yourself for promising Miss Innocent that you would show up to meet her at the bar. Drag out Mr. Charisma because you need someone to go down in flames with you, and also prop you up in case you fall asleep standing up. Go to bar with all intentions of fulfilling quota of 2 hours mandatory hang out, then going home to sleep. Drinks go down more smoothly than originally thought. There is dancing and karaoke and you meet fun interesting people and have good conversations. You get sassy and try throwing Mr. Charisma under the bus to a Miss Butter Face. Two hours turns into four. Before you know it, you close out the bar. Go home and sleep. At least that's what we can assume you are doing because you wake up in bed, but haven't actually remembered the act of sleeping for quite some time now.

Day 19: Again wake up for church. At least you have one good thing going for you. You actually try and make an effort to have a normal day and get to bed on time. Everything goes according to plan. Maybe you reached your breaking point.

Day 20: You were wrong. You come home to Mr. Charisma and Miss Personality drinking at your house. Being hospitable, you join in. Make it to bed at an unreasonable hour, but reasonable if you are comparing it to the last 19 days.

Day 21: Work. You try to have an easy night and hang with Mrs. Share a Brain. Bring a six pack over instinctively. Kill six pack while Mrs. Share a Brain is only on beer two. Go home. Find Mr. Charisma and Miss Personality drinking in the kitchen again. Feel obligated to have one glass of wine, or was that just the six pack making decisions for what is left of your brain. Music is going, laughs are being had and that 1 glass turns into 3 and it's 1:30am before you know it.  Count your sheep...you only make it to 3 sheep.

Day 22: You again sleep through your alarm and miss work for the 2nd time in 2 weeks. Never in your life has this happened to you let alone twice in 2 weeks.  You don't even know what to think anymore. You assume you are still drunk, after all you can't tell as you don't get hangovers anymore. You have accepted that cloudy feeling in your brain as normal. You nearly have a mental breakdown. You realize that this is how alcoholics become alcoholics. You start questioning your life and try to have a heart to heart with yourself and your brain floating in booze. Becoming an alcoholic is a lot easier than you thought. It sneaks up on you. You go back to bed before you seriously lose it, determined you will wake up refreshed. You thank God that you do not have an addictive personality and purpose the experiment is over and will not be drinking and will be staying in. You remind yourself that you are just as funny and personable if not more witty sober and you like waking up in a place you are familiar. When you find Mr. Charisma and Miss Personality drinking in your house this night, you are able to tell them to have fun and that you are going to bed. You stay up until 1am writing and drinking...coffee.

Day 23: Work. You are a little bit sleepy but are feeling good from your off night. You are informed you don't have to work until the afternoon tomorrow. You habitually start devising the drinking plan for the night. Again find Mr. Charisma and Miss Personality drinking wine at your house. You pre-game the pre-game. Decide to meet up with friends at Miss Innocent's house. You pre-game. You finally get to the bar and it's dead. Have 1 drink and go to a new bar. Find the mecca of parties going on. Beer pong, pool tables, dancing, irishness. You drink...a lot. Do tons of shots. You dance. You slap Mr. Charisma in the face and drag him on the dance floor. You start talking to the bouncer. You get hit on by weird creepy guy who keeps buying you more shots even though you can't keep your eyes focused. You are nodding in and out of consciousness. From the corner of your eye you see Miss Personality put Mr. Charisma in headlock. Then proceed to slap him twice. It was the slap heard round the world. Bouncers take Miss Personality and throw her out. You lay your head on the bar table and blackout. There's a first time for everything such as passing out in a bar.  Miss Personality calls cops. Cops come and go as Miss Personality was the one to blame. Mr. Charisma calls Mr. Kind Hearted to pick you up. You are completely incoherent. Mr. Charisma army carries you on his back out of the bar and places you in your shuttle back home. Mr. Kind Hearted puts you to bed. You remember about 5% of all of this.

Day 24: You wake up and laugh at the stories from prior night. Do nothing of worth. Can barely figure out how to microwave Bagel Bites. Work for 2 hours. Mr. Man Bags arrives to your house the same time you get home from work. Drinking commences. You, Mr. Man Bags, and Mr. Charisma go to meet Miss Airport at a bar. Have a couple drinks. Eat pizza even though you don't even feel hunger anymore. Pick up Mrs. Share a Brain. Pick up Miss Innocent. Park and walk to bar. Meet up with everyone else. You know you have to drive so you tell yourself only beer, no shots. You have two shots by end of the night. There is singing and dancing and bouncing and laughing all night. Mr. Depp shows up and acts all crazy. You ignore him and drink more. You flag Miss Innocent and take her home. You close the bar. Go home to drink more with friends. Cook breakfast at 3am. Drive Mrs. Share a Brain home at 4:30am. Epicly fun night. Crash into bed.

Day 25: Wake up after 5 hours of sleep. No hangover. Not hungry. Not tired. Find that the aftermath of last night was cleaned up already by Mr. Kind Hearted. Laze around. Go to get a new tattoo at Mr. Ink's house. Get half naked and sit through hours of an outline. The top half of your body goes numb from being in the same position so long...or is it just that your body is so worn out that it's shutting down portions of itself to conserve energy for later. You laugh as Mr. Ink hits a ticklish spot. Apparently you no longer feel pain either. Go home. Wait for Miss Airport to pick you, Mr. Charisma, and Mr. Kind Hearted up to shuttle you to the bar to meet up for a friend's birthday. You take it slow even though you have a DD. You sing karaoke. Mr. Kind Hearted falls asleep at bar. Mr. Bartender requests you get him out of there. The question is not whether you stop drinking and go home, the question is where to put Mr. Kind Hearted. You ask Miss Airport for her keys. Stumble arm in arm with Mr. Kind Hearted making sure he doesn't trip too badly or run into a street sign. You put him to sleep in back seat of the car and walk back to the bar. Now you start drinking. Many shots and beers are had. You start talking to Mr. Trouble Smirk. The bar is now closing. You take it outside while Miss Airport gets the car. You get in the car mildly reluctant and go home. You sober up and reflect for the first time in almost a month and decide that enough is enough and conclude what you lovingly call your "alcoholism study" before it gets out of hand.  

So here's the bottom line.  After 25 days of drinking heavily every night you should get to a point where you feel nothing if done properly...including hangovers, hunger, and tiredness.  Thus answering the question of how it is entirely possible to physically drink every night.  More alcohol numbs the effects of the prior night's alcohol.  You should also start feeling like nothing really matters and have signs of depression and/or anxiety when not drinking (aka when your mind starts engaging into sober-land again), and have experienced a combination of or all of the following:  your job is on the line, you have degraded yourself and others, probably pissed some people off and burned some bridges you aren't even aware of, you consistently meet members of the opposite sex that are no good for you, your non-drinking friends and family start wondering where you've been and or try to have an intervention, you can function solely on auto pilot, every day feels like a groundhog day, nothing is getting better or worse, and you lose hours and days and can't remember what you did unless you painstakingly take the time to write it down each night like I did.  The trick to becoming an alcoholic is consistency people! 

In all seriousness what I did learn is anyone can become an alcoholic and it's a very easy process so don't judge those that fall victim to the trap.  I'm sure we are all aware of the obvious dangers of being an alcoholic, but to me the most crucial is the one no one talks about.  The silent danger in all of this is the following cycle on repeat.  All Drink=No Think.  While that might be beneficial for a short period of time because let's face it, I know my mind can use a little break every now and again, it's not healthy for extended periods of time because what needs to get handled just starts building up.  It's like running around a track over and over again and wondering why you aren't getting anywhere.  You start wearing a groove in the dirt until you find yourself in the pit of a moat (we are assuming this is a moat with no water or fire breathing dragons).  By the time you realize you're in the moat, there's no way out but a really really steep climb up. All this being said, it wouldn't be right for me to leave you there in the moat.  So just as the analogy states...the key to getting out of the cycle/moat is to...(are you ready for this ground breaking information?)...CHANGE DIRECTIONS.  It's just as simple as that.  Stop drinking, start thinking, and change your course.  This can also be applied to anything in life.  You have to remember you are the only one that has the power to change their own course.  You, through your choices, are responsible for getting yourself into it, and only you can get yourself out of it.  If you are lucky, you might have some friends waiting up at ground zero extending a hand down to give you that last little bit of pull you need to get out.  If you aren't so lucky, give me a shout, because as well as being a skilled blogger I happen to also possess the skill of moat climbing as I've been there a time or two...or one hundred...but who's counting.

PS: Points for anyone that read the entire blog.  Extra credit points for my friends who read this and can pick out who they are lovingly dubbed as in this onslaught of 25 days of madness.