Alcohol Abuse and Confidence - I Like It.

When people ask me why I drink alcohol (or in the past, "why so much"), my short answer is that I like the way it makes me feel. It makes everything funny, it makes me forget the problems, and it allows me to have a good time.

But the long answer leads down a darker road. It reeks of a low self-confidence, extreme self-hate, and anxiety. It goes something like this:

"I don't feel good going places where there are going to be people and not being able to drink. I'll stand back against the wall, because I'm 'shy', and no one will even notice me (which is a good thing for me). If someone does notice me, then I will be wary of them, and if I try to speak, I will most likely freeze or lock up. So, I drink alcohol to take that edge off."

Not many people ask, "Why do you drink?" because most everyone does. I happen to drink a lot more than most people, however, and get pretty anxious when in the company of others and there is no loudmouth soup.

I know a lot of people like this. I think that people with low self-esteems tend to group up together. More on that later. The point here is that I, along with many of my friends have a state of mind that is conducive to alcohol abuse.

It all has to do with self-confidence. The person who feels confident, that the world is at their feet, does not have to worry about getting his alcohol in order to feel functional. The person who does not trust people and is self-conscious all the time will seek the beverage (or other things, for that matter) in order to make him "normal".

For a long (dark) period of my life, the only way I knew to curb the anxiety besides cigarettes, was to get a strong rum and coke. If I had nothing to drink, I would be horrified at the thought of going to meet people somewhere. The funny thing is, I wanted to meet people! I wanted to be part of things and make lots of friends and have cute girlfriends - the whole nine. But I couldn't move around because of the damn anxiety.