Feeling deprived over the holidays

Nothing exciting to report, but I thought I would check in as it has been a while since my last update. For the first time in a while, I have not kept track of my drinking, but I must be honest and say it has been quite a bit. I made the decision before the holidays to suspend my liter a week rule until 2010. I purchased several 1.75 liter bottles of vodka, not sure how many or when. However, for the most part, I think I have kept my drinking under control. My sister was visiting for a week and I don’t think she or my wife had any idea I have been drinking a half liter of vodka or so each day. I started early most days and paced myself so it never really showed. Again, I will also admit that I felt deprived, mostly at several family parties where I seemed to be the only adult not drinking publicly. The trips out to the car are not the same as sharing a cocktail with a cousin, aunt etc. There was one point where a bunch of my cousins were sharing a bottle of nice whiskey and toasting each other. I felt really left out. And, there were many times that I really wanted to hit the local pub to hang out with friends and have a beer, but couldn’t. Oh well, it is almost over. I plan to go dry at the beginning of January, probably after this weekend. I am still not sure how long I will go dry, but it will be at least 2 weeks. Happy New Year all !!!!!

Liter a week rule is out for the holidays

My liter a week rule is out for the holidays.  Last week started out pretty good. I picked up a 1.75 liter bottle of vodka on Monday when I already had 8 or 9 oz left from the prior week’s liter. The good news is that I left it untouched until Thursday when I finished what I had and took about 2 oz from the 1.75.   That means I averaged less than 2 drinks a day during the week, not bad.

Friday went ok with about 8 oz going. But, I went a little overboard on Sat and Sun.  I have not even surveyed the damage yet, but I am guessing I drank close to a liter over the 2 days.  As always, it was spread out over many hours, so I was never too buzzed.

I have no goals for limiting consumption through Jan 1st. However, natural forces will keep me in check for the most part. My sister comes to visit on the 23^rd and she is very quick to notice if I have been drinking. Plus, I expect my wife will be a little more watchful over the holidays. So, I will have to be very careful.  Also, on Christmas Eve, I have to drive an hour or more to my in-laws to celebrate the Christmas.  We will not get home until after midnight. That means that I can probably have a drink or two when I get there but then that will be it as I will be driving.  Note to anyone who thinks even two drinks is too much, I will have the drinks around 6 o7 then have nothing for 5 or 6 hours before driving home.

In January, I will dry out. I am not sure how long I will go. I figure 2 weeks at a minimum, maybe even a month.  That should be a good way to start the year.

AA Meetings don’t seem to make sense for me anymore

I have not been to an AA meeting now in about a month.  I finally figured it was a waste of time. Actually, I decided that long ago.  Originally, I went thinking that it would help keep my drinking in check.  Later, I only went so that my wife would not become more suspicious and ask questions.  For the record, I have nothing against AA. It has helped me. However, until I am ready to quit drinking, it doesn’t make sense and I am not at that point.

The risk I run now is that eventually my wife is going to ask me about it. After I tell her I don’t want to go anymore, she is going to ask me about the drinking. I will have 2 choices: lie or tell her I don’t want to quit.  One side of me just wants to get it out in the open.  Maybe, just maybe we can come to a compromise. That could be that I only drink with her, I promise to tell her about every drink or even that she can buy a breathalyzer to test me when she wants.  In return, I would be willing to cut my drinking down considerably.  Right now I am drinking about 21 drinks per week. I could settle for as low as 4 or 5. I would lose the stress of having to hide it, and still be able to have that social drink once in a while.

The downside is that I don’t want her to have to worry about me all the time.  I hate having to lie, but sometimes it just seems the safest route. Anyway, I hope we can avoid this conversation until after the holidays.

I miss socializing at the local bar

I am not sure if it is the holidays or what, but this past Saturday I had a strong urge to go to a local bar and just hang out for a couple of hours.  My wife and daughter were at a birthday party and I had time to kill, it would have been nice to head to a local bar where I would no doubt see a lot of old friends and have a few beers.  I would have had no fear of getting drunk.  I have not hung out at a bar since I got married 7 years ago, but I did when I was single and enjoyed the social drinking aspect.  Of course I didn’t and I wasn’t even tempted as I would not want my family to find out, but that whole deprived thing kicked in.

Anyway, the weekend went well as far as I am concerned. I finished the weekend with about 9 oz left from my liter.  That comes out to about 8oz a day for Fri, Sat, Sun.  On Saturday, I would normally drink a lot more than the 8 oz but something interesting happened.   While my wife and daughter were out at the birthday party would have been my usual time to have a few drinks; however, I was too tired to hide it. The whole thought about how much to drink, when, how to hide it on my breath and then go out of my way to make sure my wife was not suspicious just seemed like too much work.  So, while the family was out, I went to the gym, did chores and had one small shot before they got home. Then, had a few more shots later in the evening.  At least I satisfied one of my goals which is to delay my drinking to later in the day.

I now have 9 oz left to spread out over the rest of the work week.  However, I was out on a business meeting today and picked up another 1.75 liter bottle. Why, because it is safer to pick up away from home. The booze has already been poured into water bottles and stashed in the garage.  Now comes the will power, can I hold off with what I have until at least Thursday, maybe Friday. I think so.

Holiday Liquor Ads, Mmmm !!!

Anyone else notice how the ads for booze ramp up significantly during the holidays?  I see them everywhere.  Earlier this week on the subway, I was staring at an ad for Remy Martin Cognac. I do enjoy cognac.    I wish I was in a position where I could have just one small glass of cognac, good scotch or something similar, and sit back and enjoy it without the worries of my wife or someone else knowing I was drinking.   This is the stuff I am not going to get smashed on, I never do, just one small glass.  I can say the same thing for a nice glass of wine.  Oh well, for now it has to be vodka which I enjoy as well. It is just not the same.

On Tuesday, I was out and about on a business meeting and I picked up a 375 ml bottle of vodka (12.7 oz).  I am not sure why, I guess I am just falling back into wanting the small bit of vodka late in the evening that I enjoy: and, I didn’t save enough from my liter last week.  So, I blew my liter a week rule this week. 

Still, I have been drinking it slowly. On both Tuesday and Wednesday night I drank 3 oz, not really that much, certainly not enough to get drunk or effect my responsibilities for the next day, but still over my limit.

I plan to pick up my weekly liter today or tomorrow.  My goal again will be to save enough after the weekend so that I can have a 1.5 oz shot each night during the week. Hopefully, that shouldn’t be too tough considering I still have 6 oz left from the bottle I bought this week.

one liter of vodka, not bad

Not a bad weekend for me. I picked up my weekly liter of vodka on Thursday, and have about 1.25 oz left for a small good night shot tonight (I wish it was 2 oz).  As usual I spread it out over the 4 days and never had more than a little buzz.

I am a little disappointed in that I drank more on Saturday than planned. And, as usual the reason is that I started too early. My wife took off around 2:30 with my daughter and was not due back until 5:30.  Well, if I am left alone with vodka I am usually going to drink it and I had my first shot around 2:45. By the time I had my last shot around 9:00pm, I figure I had drank around 15 oz.  At less than 2 drinks an hour, I can say I ever got drunk. As I said in a recent post, I wish I had a breathalyzer to see what my alcohol level was a few minutes after my last shot. I really don’t even have a good guess what it would be.  However, I can assure you I was not driving.

I was disappointed for 2 reasons, one is that I am trying to not drink that much in any given day, and second, I have virtually nothing left for the rest of the week.  I have gone many weeks over the last few months drinking my liter in 3 days and going sober 4 days.  I have decided that I like my evening shot during the week, even if it is one small one just to take the edge off.

Sunday went better. I had around 8 oz left and knew that if I started too early, I would want more. So, I waited until 5pm for my first shot. That was not easy. The vodka was close by all day and I started staring at the clock around 3:30, but I held off.   I drank about 7 oz between 5pm and 8:00pm, and it was the perfect amount for a Sunday. I was content and somehow saved a little for tonight.

I am going to take another risk this week and pick up my vodka on Wednesday. The reason is that I will be 30 minutes away from home on business in an area that I can easily go to a liquor store without fear of anyone seeing me. As I have mentioned before, picking up liquor even 2 towns over from me is stressful.   That will leave the challenge of drinking it slowly. I know I have will have a shot on Wednesday and pace myself through Sunday from there.

I don’t know how others might feel about this, but I am content with how much I drink.  I almost never get drunk and I am drinking far less than I was a couple of years ago.  What is frustrating is how much I have to work to keep my consumption to current levels.

Holidays are tough on my liter of vodka a week rule

In short, I picked up the 1.75 liter bottle of vodka 2 weeks in a row.  Darn holidays!  Yesterday (Monday) I had about 5 oz left and drank one shot last night and will probably have one tonight and tomorrow.  I went through a lot of vodka, but it could have been worse.  On Thanksgiving Day I had a few drinks between noon and 2:00pm, but nothing from then until around 8:00pm when I got home.  I was at my brother’s for dinner and the whole planning on how I was going to sneak a few drinks was just way too much work and I decided to go without. 

This past Saturday, I had to go to a cocktail party about an hour drive away. It started at 8:00pm.  So, except for the one drink I had around 1:00 pm and the drink I had when I got home, I was dry.  I was a little worried about going to a cocktail party, and I did have about 5oz of vodka in the trunk of my car, but never went for it.  It made it a little easier to blend in as some were drinking vodka and other liquor drinks in glasses. I filled myself a club soda with a lime and blended right in.  I will admit, however, that all of the bottles of top shelf booze they had displayed on the bar were very tempting. I felt myself fantasizing and deprived at the same time. But, then again, alcoholic or not, I could not drink as I had to drive home and my daughter would be with me as well since she was at her cousin’s nearby.  I don’t mean to suggest that if my daughter was not with me; I could drink, just stating a fact.

I was also worried that my brother in law who hosted the party has a breathalyzer.  I was concerned he would bring it out either for fun or to offer to let anyone driving test themselves.  I did not want to be tested after drinking anything.  On the other hand, I would really like one of those.  I have mentioned many times that I drank a half liter of vodka or so and never felt buzzed. I suspect that a lot of those times, my alcohol content was actually pretty high. If I had a breathalyzer, I might think harder about taking another shot.  I did some research and they range from around $50 to $300. The cheaper ones are not that accurate according to the reviews.  If I wanted to purchase a reliable one, it would be difficult to hide the purchase and the device from my wife.  How would I explain the need for a breathalyzer when she thinks I am sober?  Yes, to all you doubters who think I am fooling myself, she really does.

During both weeks of going over my liter a week rule, there was only one time that I really felt buzzed. That was the day after Thanksgiving.  I noticed that often happens to me when I plan on drinking more on a certain day and don’t, like on Thanksgiving.  I make up for it the next day.   I probably drank 18 or 20 oz for the day.  Although it was spread out through the day, I still felt more buzzed than usual, told my wife I was tired and went to bed early.

Nothing new here, but the 2 most important things from the 2 weeks are: I started drinking too early in the day a bunch of times; and, I was drinking straight from the water bottle (filled with vodka of course), a few times directly from the vodka bottle.  During a period not to far back when I felt I was controlling my drinking pretty well, I was measuring my shots. I have this bottle of cold medicine in my office that has a portion cap on it. Filled to the line it is 1 ¼ oz, I fill it a little more getting me to just about 1 ½ oz. When I use that as I did last night, it is much easier to control my drinking. When I swig from the bottle, I have no way of knowing how much I am drinking at any one time, but I am certain that some of those swigs or I should say chugs approach 4 oz at a time, not good.

Back to my liter a week rule until Christmas, at least.