3 bottles of whiskey a week

LegacyUser

Hi all, going un reg for this, Im currently drinking at least 3 bottles of whiskey a week., i want to know if if have a problem ? I just can't cope with the boredom of and the loneliness of life

Big Bag of Chips

Of course that's a problem. Maybe the boredom of life is coming from the fact that you spend so much time (alone?) drinking.

kylith

I know how you feel, OP. The evenings can be long and boring.

From my experience the best thing to do is to try to find something to keep busy. Check out Meetup.com and join a club, download Steam and start video gaming, Take up knitting or woodworking, start reading, anything to keep your mind occupied while you break the habit of opening a bottle.

milehip

Thats a lot of hard liquor op, I think you know yourself that you may have a problem.
there is a questonaire you can get to tell you if you're a problem drinker I'll try and source it.

You may want to talk to your GP and start thinking about attending an AA meeting.

LynnGrace

There may be something here that would help;

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2057658188

3 standard bottles? Thats about 10 standard pub measures/shots a night more or less OP you do the sums. If you are drinking to relieve boredom you have a problem now matter the quantity. Knock that on the head before it becomes habit. Also physically you have to be feeling the effects.

Richard Hillman

There is the old tried and consistently failed logic of giving up the booze and then sorting your life out. Pay no heed, despite the well meaning of it.

Address the issues in your life and the drinking will reduce itself naturally.

If loneliness is the issue, then you have to learn how to love yourself and love spending time alone. The only way that can be addressed is by doing the things you love or finding new past times.

Xterminator

Richard Hillman wrote: »

Address the issues in your life and the drinking will reduce itself naturally..

The OP drinking his/her-self to death is an issue.

20 pub measures of 35ml per 700ml bottle, @ 3 bottles, = 60 units a week.

Recommended weekly guidelines

Less than 11 standard drinks (approx. 110g of alcohol) in a week for women, and
Less than 17 standard drinks (approx. 170g of alcohol) in a week for men

Op is drinking 3.5 times the limit for men and 5.5 times the limit for women. (and OP says that is 'at least' what they are drinking of not more.

OP go see your GP this week. Be honest about what you drink 7 take it from there.

Please go see your GP & a counselor. Be open & honest about everything. You are consuming far too much alcohol than is healthy and your reasons for drinking are unhealthy as well.

seamus

I agree with Richard Hillman and kylith here. Just saying "knock it on the head", isn't enough. It's an addiction, a habit. The OP can resolve today, "No more whiskey", but when he finds himself sitting watching TV alone at 9pm tonight, that itch will be too hard not to scratch. Just a drop, can't hurt, it's a comfort blanket. And before he knows it, it's 11pm and he's had half the bottle.

Even worse is attempting to stop drinking first and then sort out your life. If you're drinking to relieve boredom and you stop drinking, then you're multiplying the boredom, making it ten times harder to resist. It's basically like telling a person to lose weight by going to an all-you-can-eat buffet and staring at the food but not eating it.

If he can remove himself from the situations where he feels the need to drink, then the desire to drink will ease off naturally. So if the trigger for the OP is sitting watching TV, then he should aim to stop that from happening. So, for example, join some kind of club or hobby that meets in the evenings. Go to the cinema. Or even just take up his own hobby - something which requires his focus and he enjoys and stops him from ending up bored in front of the telly.

What can also be useful are hobbies where drinking actively hampers your ability to get involved. So things like running clubs meet early on weekend mornings, so you can't afford to be even slightly hungover. But it doesn't have to be athletic; having any kind of activity to get out of bed for will make you not want to be drinking the night before.

Teyla Emmagan

Yeah you need some hobbies OP. Get out of the house in the evenings so you're not sitting there bored. Take up a course, or a sport, or go to the cinema. Just keep yourself busy. With the summer coming in you could take up that couch to 5k. Get outside every evening. You will be working on something that will make you feel mentally and physically better and will break the cycle. Before your health breaks down. Because you're playing with fire ATM.

jimmycrackcorm

This is a case where joining a gym is very helpful. Apart from the enormous value of getting exercise and improving your health, the significant benefit is having a routine and in spending the time time in the evenings that reduces the loneliness and boredom that leads to excessive weekly drinking.

peckerhead

Going anom wrote: »

Im currently drinking at least 3 bottles of whiskey a week., i want to know if if have a problem ?

Substitute vodka for whiskey and you've got what I did for oh, ten or twelve years.

You're the only one that can answer your question, OP, or rather yours is the only answer that really matters.

All I can tell you is that in my case, none of the 'underlying issues', 'root causes' (feelings of hurt, despair and loneliness, unresolved grief, etc.) got any better while I continued drinking. All of them got better after I quit.