“You have probably picked up a virus,” they said, reassuringly. Unfortunately, it would take two more hospital admissions before a pattern eventually emerged.
Over a five-month period, my mental state deteriorated dramatically. During this time, I attempted to stop drinking, or at least tried to cut down on the volume I had been drinking repeatedly. But each time, I had found myself drinking again. It was the only way I could get any relief.
One of the more serious and horrifying symptoms I had started experiencing was “visions” of creatures crawling over me at night and attacking me as I attempted to sleep. In sheer terror, I would wake up shouting and throwing things around the room. What I couldn’t understand is why I had been so physically unwell and losing it mentally all at the same time.
“You’re over the threshold,” were the doctor’s infamous words. Initially, I had no idea what they meant and none of it made any sense. They told me that I was alcohol dependent and that I needed to refer myself to detox via the local substance use service.
Finally getting to the bottom of my diagnosis after these mysterious episodes of illness was quite a shock. It also made me feel terrible, knowing that I was responsible for making myself ill.
What started as one to two glasses of wine at the weekend had become more than three bottles per night while working at home into the early hours. Looking back, I should’ve seen my drinking had steadily increased over time. But because I was functioning, albeit in a dysfunctional way, I had no reason to think my drinking had become a problem.
“It’s really important you don’t stop drinking to avoid further episodes of withdrawal,” the doctor told me. Surely telling a patient to keep on drinking is the last piece of advice any doctor ought to be giving, I thought. I’ve since learned that the symptoms of alcohol withdrawal can range from mild to life-threatening. People going through it may experience a combination of physical and emotional symptoms, like I did. Some symptoms are as severe as the hallucinations I experienced or even seizures.
To my credit, I referred myself to the substance use service straightaway. Following an assessment with a specialist medic there, they deemed my alcohol dependency too serious and my withdrawals too dangerous to safely detox in the community. So the only option I had was to be admitted as an inpatient at a detoxification rehab centre in central London.
Upon my admission for detox, I finally met others like me and learned about my condition. I was told that they would gradually wean me off the booze with medication. This turned out to be far more comfortable than what I had experienced up until then. While it didn’t prevent my withdrawal symptoms, the detox made them far more manageable than the times I went cold turkey by myself.
But my fellow residents weren’t anything like me, I believed. I wasn’t an alcoholic, I told myself, and I had no history with recreational drugs either. I felt like a guest attending the wrong party and simply joining in to avoid the embarrassment of leaving.
On the final day of my detox, I was itching to leave. Without realizing it at the time, I was craving alcohol. In fact, I even gave a phony reason to leave a day early. Out of all the residents, I was one of the only people to not be going on to any sort of follow-up program.
“If you leave today without a proper care plan in place, you’ll be back here in no time,” the staff said. They were reluctant to allow me to leave early, but at my insistence they eventually did.
I hadn’t planned or prepared for what I would do when I got home. Going back to the same environment, same routine and same mindset, it only took a few short hours before I caved in and started drinking again later that same day.
