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Dealing with Addiction

Written and Uploaded August 2002

My name is Steven Waterfield and I am an addict.

Or to be more precise I have an Addictive Personality which means that I become quickly addicted to almost anything once I have taken to it and for the first six months of this year I was addicted to:
Alcohol (9 months)
Pro-Plus (7 months)
Coca-Cola (9 years)
Star Wars (23 years).

The combination the above had a serious effect on my life which sent me into the depths of despair before I picked my self up. So here it is my story of how I faced my addictions and came out stronger the other end.

You don't know you've hit rock bottom until you've been there and having an addictive personality has certainly drove me to mine.

For the first six months of this year I thought that I had hit rock bottom and nothing could get any worse. Then out of the blue I was asked if I wanted to go on holiday by a "friend" at work. Now being as burnt out as I was I agreed and besides I really needed the break (my first real holiday in seven years). Needless to say in retrospect I should have run like the wind or at least hit Tunisia, Las Vegas.........The North Pole as what started out like a good idea turned into an experience!

It was the best of times it was the worst of times and like they say "What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger". Well I'm not dead, and in some respects I'm stronger than I was before the fiasco that would change my life forever.

By the time May came around I was addicted to Pro-Plus (over the counter caffeine tablets), as not only was I using them to keep me awake I was also using them as antidepressants (to which they work brilliantly). Couple this with drinking eight cans of coke per day and at least three shots of Sambuca in the evening (or in one case a quarter of a bottle) and numerous alcopops, beers etc. I was pretty much a Grade A addict.

Nothing new as I realized that I had an addictive personality many years ago, hence never taking drugs in my life. Why risk getting started on something which I know I would not be able to stop.

Now at this point I never realized that I had a serious problem and this holiday was going to be one week in which I was going to be constantly smashed out of my skull and being the party animal that I should have been at college and University. Sadly the party animal never happened although my drinking and pro-plus did.

Now when I am a drunk or high (to which the excess caffeine in my system was doing to me), one or two of the three different sides to my personality emerge.

1. The Professor. If that side of my personality emerges then I become the expert at everything, and my quick-wittedness means that I can make up bulls&*t facts pulled from my rectum to prove a point even though I may be wrong I can always put on a convincing argument that I am right.

2. Mr Nice. When I am him, I tend to speak my mind and spill my heart out to anyone who'll listen. I am also know to give good advice and it's always from the heart. I also become very honest and non-confrontational. I'll back sown from any arguement and walk off just to avoid hassle.

3. Brodie (named after a character in Mallrats). My Internet alter-ego and name of the kind of drunk that I spent most of the days during "That week". This is the determined irrational side to my personality. The f**k everything, party hard and NEVER GIVE UP side of me. Wearing shades even in the dark to maintain the so called 'cool' look this is me at my worst. I won't listen and my "never give up" attitude is very annoying. The only downside to this persona is that "Mr Nice" always rears his head when I'm crashing.

While my traveling companion (on the now infamous holiday to Magaluf) and I rarely spoke after the second day, it was her who pointed out that I had a problem, and no matter what she thinks of me now I hold her responsible for helping to clean me up by noticing my problem to which I never admitted to until it was too late.

In retrospect I should have seen all of the signs. At one point I was in the middle of an argument swigging coke and popping pro-plus just to keep me going.

Now I never suffered form insomnia until this year and I had a bad case in February, and again when I was in Magaluf. It wasn't until I cleaned out my system that I realized that the excess pro-plus and coke was causing the insomnia.

To spend a week by yourself and to not even be able to sleep at night turned that one week into the longest week in my life. All of the time that has passed since that one week seems shorter than the week itself.

Now I realized that I had a problem when I only had eight pro-plus left out of a back of 48 on the last day of the holiday. I subsequently binned the last eight and have been clean since. I also cut the coke down to two a day while still in Magaluf.

Cutting down on the caffeine and sugar so drastically in one shot is one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. I constantly felt drowsy and suffered serious headaches for the first few weeks, before I settled down to my new diet. I still get the cravings to this day (three months later).

Now my craving for caffeine as bad as it was does not compare to that of alcohol. Where as before I was drinking on a nightly basis, literally as soon as I walked in the door form work. I would finish work at 5 pm, be in by 5:30, and be drunk by 6.

This happened pretty much every night, and the real reason I gave up drinking has nothing to do with the ass that I made of myself when I was on holiday but more to do with an e-mail that I sent one of my friends.

The week that I came off of holiday I drank as heavy than I did when I was away and in a shorter time scale. I was drinking Sambuca, alcopops, beer and I even tried Absinth. All to numb the pain that I was feeling inside and to try and find answers. Then one night when I was stone drunk I sent one of my good friends an e-mail to explain the holiday in all of it's graphic details as well as some sarcastic comments that I threw in along the way.

Now cut to a week later when I had sobered up. I had been clean for about five days (to prove how serious I thought I was about not drinking I was counting the days since I last drank) and I found the e-mail that I had sent as I had wrote it in Word and cut and pasted it onto the e-mail.

To say that I was embarrassed about what I wrote is an understatement as the grammar was bad, the spelling was atrocious and the person that was writing was as far removed from me as you can get. I came across as a real looser and that ripped me apart.

That was the moment when I realized how bad my problem really was and as much as it hurt me I was never going to be rid of that addiction for as long as I live I believe that if I ever start drinking in excess and going down that road again, maybe next time it will consume me fully.

It's amazing how easy it is to become dependent on alcohol and for the first few weeks after I quit it ate me up inside coming home from work and not drinking. As the weeks passed I still felt myself wanting if not needing to drink, but I never gave in to my urges, instead I jumped into my car and went for a drive or to the cinema.

As the weeks became months I still have the urge to get smashed but I have not touched Sambuca since June (and I miss it terribly) and even as I write this and the memories that are coming back, both good and bad I would be lying if I said that I do not have the urge to drink again. But I have strength in my personality and who I am. To drink in the frame of mind that I currently dwell would only bring out the Depressing side of my character and that is the last thing that I need while trying to get my site if not my life back together.

Do I ever see a time when I am cured of my addictions?

No. An Addictive Personality is as part of who I am and as long as I live I will latch onto things be they movies, music or whatever to keep me going.

What I do know is that I will never drink like I did for this first six months of this year. I did have a drinking problem and I came back and I never want to go down that path again.

I know for a fact that I have enough self control to beta that demon.

Where as before I was living day to day and not thinking about the future. Without the drink I am planning for the future and I have clarity in my head for the first time in a long while.