This has impacted my life so negatively I don’t even know where to start.
My friends and I started drinking at 17 and went out almost every weekend. Every year we had huge events like festivals (Germany has many) and well those were like 3 days being drunk in a row.
If i could turn back time I’d probably just tell myself to not do it and probably do it again anyways.
I’m getting invested in the gym and it’s so good. I wonder how I’d look like today if I would have just been at the gym in my 20s.
Not only that. I wonder how my friend circle would look like cause currently I have no friends I’d consider “friends”. Those were all drinking buddies. They still drink every weekend and more and more I realised they are just functioning alcoholics.
And since I don’t drink anymore (2 years) I’m basically out.
So I’d say alcohol didn’t only have a negative impact on my brain while I was still young (and after) it also hit my wallet, my time for better things (sports)… etc.
Man. Sucks. Sucks to be me.
Now I am happy I have a wife, a house and going in the right direction but it is soooo hard to find friends or atleast people if you aren’t in school anymore and coworkers busy with own life.
If I could give anyone younger advice I’d just stay screw it and go to the gym and find a hobby like climbing, swimming, golfing, tennis or something and get people there.
If I may ask what made you decide you have to change something? I’m in a position where I only started drinking heavily in my mid 30s, this doesn’t lead anywhere good and I’d like to stop. What’s the way out?
If you want to make a change, you have to understand that you’re going to fail a lot and that’s ok. I don’t really like to direct people to reddit, but mostly lurking there really helped me a few years ago before I even stopped drinking. https://www.reddit.com/r/stopdrinking/
I had a lot of times where I just wanted to not drink for one day for whatever reason. Then I stopped for a week here or there… then I tried it for a month to see if I could. Later, I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t drink on vacation so I’d be more present, and I kept going.
I was hoping there would be a r/stopdrinking adjacent here… damn! I’ve been off Reddit for a week and definitely miss the love and support that the sub shows for each other.
There is one: https://lemmy.world/c/stopdrinking
For me it was getting into counseling to find the underlying cause of my addiction, which was my grief. There’s many ways addiction is percieved in mainstream society, with the biggest focus being on addiction being a “disease”. I’d avoid such thinking since, I believe, it only serves to exacerbate the problem. If you’re told that your addiction is a irreversable illness than you’ll attack the symptoms without getting to the root cause.
Ask yourself why you feel the need to drink to excess, what is it that you feel you are missing in your life? We tend to utilize addiction as a way to cope with uncomfortable realities in our lives. If we can figure out what that uncomfortable truth is, we are better equipped to make better, healthier decisions on how we chose to cope with that feeling.
I recommend checking out any of Lance Dodes’ books on addiction, which focus on a evidence-based approach to confronting and coping with addiction. Good luck. Feel free to DM me if you ever have any more questions ;)
I think I asked myself what happens if I do this another decade and where I might be.
I saw my belly fat, my chest fat, looked at myself and signed up for gym. Reading into gym and how to progresse efficiently gave it all an end cause I need protein, I need healthy fats I need good carbs and the most important: Water, Rest (good quality sleep) and no stress.
All this doesn’t allow for weekends drinking or drinking in general. Yes I do drink on vacations a beer or two but I notice after a beer I actually don’t like the taste. My cheat drink now is cappucinos lol.