by Ed Ostrom

Created on: August 21, 2009   Last Updated: August 22, 2009

Deep within the core of my being. I believe that an alcoholic cannot ever again drink socially. Many alcoholics like to believe that the day will come when they have been in recovery long enough that they will be able to have an occasional cold one with their buddies on a hot summer afternoon. But the reality is they can't! If one even considers trying to drink again, it is like playing Russian roulette with sobriety. How do you know if the live bullet in one of the chambers is the one that will come up when you pull the trigger? Taking that drink is setting oneself up for failure.

I would like to share a story with you about an old friend of mine. I first met him when he came as a resident to the treatment program that I was working at. He worked hard on himself and completed the three-month program and left the centre. For the next six months, he did really well attending out patient counseling sessions and regular A.A meetings. He was working his program and doing well. After passing his nine-month sobriety date, he felt it was time to get back into the workforce. He applied for and obtained a position as a night auditor in a downtown hotel. His job went well for about six week. One hot summer night, the cleaning staff at the hotel was short workers, and his boss asked him to go and help clean the beverage room after it closed.

My friend, seeking to do as his boss desired, went to the beverage room. He said that he was very apprehensive about going to the beverage room, since it had been nine months since he was last in a drinking establishment. He said the night was hot, and the air conditioner was not working. After working for a long period of time he was hot and thirsty. Without even thinking about it, he found himself picking up a half-full glass of beer that had been left on one of the tables and he drank it. Right after drinking it, he thought to himself, That was good, even though it was warm. He said, "One cold beer won't hurt me!" So he got a clean glass and filled it up with cold beer and drank it.

Right after that he found one was not enough, and he spent the rest of the night drinking an unknown amount of beer until he passed out on the beverage room floor. Early in the morning, he was found by day staff. He was fired from his job, and the last I saw of him, he was on skid row doing whatever he could to get his next drink.

Just one drink, and he was back into the terrible clutches of his addictive disease. I think that this true story is illustrative of the fact that an alcoholic can never again drink socially. How often this same story could be told over and over again, with different names, different circumstances but the same tragic results.

The truth of the matter is that alcoholics cannot ever drink again. They may think they are strong enough that they will be able to limit their drinking. But in reality, they cannot. Alcoholics have lost control of their drinking, and on their own they are powerless over it. Their daily lives have become unmanageable. If an alcoholic takes one drink, they are putting themselves on a slippery downhill sloop and will soon hurdle out of control.

If you were allergic to a certain produc, and knew if you had even a small amount of that product you could die, would you take it? In a very real sense, an alcoholic is allergic to alcohol and it is a poison that can kill, so why would they risk taking this poison?

I believe that the experiences of many alcoholics prove beyond a shadow of any doubt that alcoholics can never again drink socially.

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