A Nagging Fear

This world loves alcohol. It can’t be avoided. Every country, every culture has some form of booze whether it be beer, liquor, wine, or some other sort of spirit. It’s existed for millennia and will most likely be part of our world until our little blue ball is swallowed by the sun, as long as there are people inhabiting at that point.

or booze-swilling robots. That’s fine, too.

So many rites of passage and societal rituals revolve around drinking some form of alcohol. Your strength as a person is often graded by your ability to drink massive amounts of it without showing the effects. If you DON’T drink…wooo, man. Be prepared to be made fun of, have your masculinity/femininity called into question and the butt of jokes for a while. It’s not just a thing that we as humans choose to do, it’s part of who we are.

However, there are a lot of us who don’t deal well with alcohol. Some of us, including a very good friend, are recovering addicts and don’t touch the stuff. Some people are allergic to alcohol. And then there are people like me. I wouldn’t call my issues with alcohol trauma, that would be diminishing those who had issues like alcoholic parents who beat them or drank away their family’s savings or drank themselves to death as their children watched. No, mine isn’t “trauma” but it certainly made an impact on my life.

My mom was a drunk. And not the fun, everyone gets hugs and pizza rolls sort of drunk. No, she was the loud, stumbling, fall-down-the-stairs-at-your-birthday-party-in-front-of-all-of-your-friends drunk. She was the get-pulled-over-by-the-cops-and-get-a-DWI sort of lady. She was the make-a-scene-at-a-bar-because-they-didn’t-give-her-enough-alcohol-in-her-drink kind of boozehound. I was mortified by her behavior on so many occasions. She made me so mad because she either chose to be like that or had no self-control to stop herself. I know there are many who will defend alcoholics and say “they have a disease! You wouldn’t make fun of a diabetic would you?” No, I wouldn’t, but if my diabetic mother was an asshole every time she forgot to take her insulin and did it on purpose on multiple occasions and embarrassed me because of her lack of control, I would have some serious issues with her and her condition.

As time moved on, my mom did try a lot harder to get her drinking under control. Part of this was her choice, but the other part was she had no choice. She was diagnosed with breast cancer. She fought it for 12 years and was told by her doctors that she needed to give up drinking and smoking altogether. She never did. Now, did that have any impact on her not beating cancer? I’m not sure, but I can tell you that it certainly didn’t help. When she died in 2014, we had a passable relationship. It wasn’t sunshine and rainbows, but it was much better. Once we had my son, being a grandma did chill her out a bit. She wasn’t the greatest mom in the world, but she tried to be…sometimes.

When she did pass away, I found it nearly impossible to drink. I couldn’t smell liquor without thinking of her and how embarrassing she would get. I never EVER wanted to be like that. I never wanted to have my son feel the way I did about her. But there was also the lingering thought in the back of my head that addiction is hereditary. If I had a drink here, a drink there, and started to enjoy it and then all of a sudden would I be finishing a bottle of booze a night myself? I don’t know how this works and I don’t want to.

As I get older, I’ve found myself wanting a drink more often. A few glasses of wine, a few beers, a mixed drink, whatever it is. My mom’s voice, which was…abrasive at best, lingers in the back of my head the more I drink. It almost mocks me saying “you’re just like me.” My little brother has shown those addictive personality tendencies. We don’t talk any more because of his drinking and drug use. His voice mocks me when I drink. “You always acted so superior, Mike and you’re just like me and Mom.” Alcohol has ruined a lot of my relationships and it is very hard to take the “it’s just a drink, bro” mindset as easily as so many do. It sucks, because I very much would love to be able to have some drinks with my friends without that nagging fear eating at the back of my subconscious.

I don’t want to be the preachy “I don’t drink” guy, but I also don’t want to be a lush. There has to be a happy medium out there somewhere, but if I’m being honest… it scares me that I may not be able to control it. So…I avoid it, or I drink anyways and hate myself.