I have been... May be MT

[The People]

Drinking too much. Part of it is boredom. Part of it is a habit I got into. Part of it is stress. Part is genetic. I don't have a lot at a time but have 1-2 too often. And to be honest it usually doesn't help relax me. Self medicating.

I don't feel like telling my T. I just know that I need to go less often. GF beer is not cheap.

[nats]

we would be likely to do the same, except we're too cheap to willingly spend the money.

[The People]

Wish w had that problem Nats. We would be in much less of a mess.

[nats]

sometimes being raised excessively frugal is a good thing. it prevents a lot of bad habits purely on cost grounds...

we've found the best way to change habits we don't like is substitution. is there a less harmful habit you could substitute for this one?

[Cammy]

It's so hard to say no to yourself especially when you're trying to dull out pain or stress. It's so easy to end up in a place where you never wanted to be also. It's good that you are recognizing this now, as this is likely going to make you a little more vigilant about what you're doing and why. I know we get into little spates of time where we tend to medicate or drink a bit more than we should. Luckily it is very short-lived for us (like a few days to a week), and is usually due to a spike in anxiety or pain. We tend to try and get to our M.D. with medication requests that we know have historically worked well for us. Once the medication works, the other behaviour drops off for us. Our experience has been that after a few weeks of proper medication, it too is no longer needed. We have to be careful as well since we have a genetic predisposition to addiction. Fortunately, we do not like the taste of alcohol much, however our weakness is in the tendency to self-medicate. We always have to be alert to this issue.