The first time I tried alcohol was at the age of 13. I think it was beer. My classmate and I bought two bottles with pocket money and drank them right on the embankment. We were very exhausted in the sun, and we barely made it home (a few rubles were not left for the tram). I can’t say that I liked this experience, but I still have a feeling of my own maturity and coolness: here I am, buying my own beer.
Until graduation, my experiments with alcohol remained about the same level: I drank in the company, because it was cool. Basically, we took ready-made cocktails in bottles, terribly harmful to the stomach. But who thinks about it at the age of 14-15? Sometimes vodka, but "purely symbolically", one bottle for seven people. We drank on the bench in front of the nightclub to save money on drinks inside.
After school, I entered the university and moved from my parents to another city. The first three years she lived in a student hostel. Everyone drank there all the time. No reason was needed, if there was money. Most often they took vodka. Mix it with cola for the best effect. By the way, usually I started a romantic relationship only after a couple of cocktails. It was difficult for me to flirt sober, and alcohol pulled me out of the shell and made me the soul of the company. It’s not very pleasant to remember this, but my first sex also happened on a drunken head. To be honest, I would hardly have looked at that guy if I had not been under a degree.
Then there was another young man. And he, too, quickly figured out my secret - he came on a date with my favorite wine in a thermos and jokingly called me "Miss Cabernet".
After university, I went for an internship to another country. An adult life has begun, full of stress and problems. I lived alone. After work, I went to the supermarket, bought something that I could cook in a hurry, and always grabbed a bottle of wine. I just wanted to relax and for a moment feel light and carefree. Alcohol helped, but several times a week I consistently drank a bottle. Alone .
Yes, in the morning I sometimes felt ashamed of some message dictated by a relaxed mind that I managed to publish on social networks, or for SMS to a male colleague - of course, not of the most business content. But the real reason that made me realize that I had a problem with alcohol was the appearance. Unfortunately, my "hobby" did not pass without a trace: bags under the eyes and a swollen face became more and more difficult to hide under a layer of cosmetics. And chronic fatigue could no longer be ignored.
I decided to gather my will into a fist and stop drinking, but it turned out that this was not so easy to do. Every evening there was an agonizing desire to pour at least a glass into oneself. If I did not hold back, it was not limited to one glass. Once I managed to go two weeks without alcohol, and I proudly told a close friend about it, to which he raised his eyebrows in surprise: “Two weeks? Yes, you are addicted. You don't count how many days you haven't had milk." Probably, only after his words did I seriously think about what was happening to me for the first time. The bottom line is that I have been drinking almost every day for the past five years, and without alcohol I become angry and irritable. Moreover, I was not an angel with alcohol either: according to friends, it was impossible to communicate with me normally, after a few glasses I was furious if they did not want to drink with me, and demanded the continuation of the banquet.
I started searching the Internet for signs of addiction, and all the tests showed that I was almost a complete alcoholic. I categorically disagreed with this, after all, I have a good job, a successful social life, and alcoholics are those who drink all day long, and then fall asleep under a bench.
I convinced myself that in my case we are talking about a genetic intolerance to alcohol: others drink the same amount, it’s just that strong drinks provoke memory lapses and an inability to stop in time for me. No wonder: many people with addiction engage in such self-deception.
Soon I began to have serious health problems: my stomach hurt almost every day. I attributed it to stress and poor nutrition, went to the examination, and I was diagnosed with gastritis. In addition, they said that the liver was slightly enlarged. I was prescribed a diet, and alcohol was banned. It was the first time I was able to go without alcohol for two whole months.
True, I was constantly tormented by the desire to drink and relax, it seemed that I would soon explode from tension. I became especially irritable and angry. All the same friend, seeing my suffering, offered to go to the gym with him to dump negative energy. I agreed. After training, it really became a little easier.
After a course of treatment for gastritis, I decided that it was better for me to forget about alcohol. In addition, I had a new young man who was a supporter of a healthy lifestyle and did not even know about my problems. I clearly understood that even after a single glass I lose self-control and get drunk until I pass out.
All eight months that we met, I did not take a drop in my mouth. But, unfortunately, after our parting, she broke down again and continued to get drunk alone in the kitchen. Only this time I saw what this lifestyle was doing to me: looking terrible, tired, feeling overwhelmed. I didn’t want to go to a narcologist: I was ashamed.
I pulled myself together again and stopped drinking completely. The first few weeks are the most difficult to hold on to, then it becomes easier, and even pride in oneself appears. Now, with varying degrees of success, I do not drink for almost two years. The hardest thing is to lead a social life. At work, I often have to attend events where it is customary to skip a glass or two, and here you need to be firm and refuse offers to drink. To be honest, it's difficult. Most people react to rejection with surprise: “How? Will you not at all?” Usually you want to answer them obscenely. I probably have reasons for which I am not obliged to report to every person I meet.
They say that there are no former alcoholics, so I understand that my addiction can return. But I hope that over time it will be easier for me to resist the temptation.
Recorded: Tatyana Nikitina
Edgar Degas "Absinthe". Photo from liveinternet.ru
Multiple question marks in a row
They came to the group that I led at the temple. Always alone, timidly and quietly. Averting his eyes and hiding his mouth with his palm. As a rule, with difficulty enduring a single day of sobriety. Funny and awkward: too much paint, too little taste, and fashion has managed to run ahead during their absence from the world of people.
Their first question is, are there any other drinking women here? Or maybe everyone goes to a sobriety group solely for the sake of their drinking husbands? After all, this is how it usually happens: the husband drinks, the wife restrains as best she can, prays, cries, swears. After all, this is how we, women, are supposed to be: to be the keepers of the hearth and comfort, an example for children, assistants to the spouse, beauties, clever women, hostesses.
I know many women who have quit drinking.
Not everyone succeeds. Some turn into real monsters and cuckoo alone in their hopeless swamp. Tell me, do people like that come here or will I be alone? I'll leave right away then. After all, for normal women, I am an enemy, I am a scarecrow, we are on opposite sides of the barricades. “They do,” you answer, “of course they do.” It’s just that they, like you, are disguised, they don’t want to be guessed. —
Is there any point in going here? - sounds the main question. - After all, female alcoholism, everyone knows - is incurable.
Creature on thin legs
Photo from videoblocks.com
Alcoholic. For some reason, zealots of political correctness turn a blind eye to this word. Perhaps for pedagogical reasons? After all, it is not necessary to spare such a thing, but to print it more painfully, so that it would be discourteous. When addicted women are described in the press, there will certainly be thin blue legs, slit eyes, puffy purple cheeks, missing teeth and a hellish smell from the womb. And very often - the word "creature".
The middle gender is intended to emphasize: the alcoholic has betrayed her main purpose - motherhood. A woman is not supposed to drink, by such behavior she leaves her social role, breaking the eternal taboo. Partly because of this, female alcoholism is so demonized in the public mind, giving rise to anti-scientific myths, creepy caricatures and sinister archetypes.
In reality, women who suffer from alcoholism, as a rule, look pretty decent. And when, coming to the group, the newcomer, with whom we began the story, begins to take a closer look, even it is not easy for her to figure out among the comrades present in misfortune. Women tend to hide - and quite skillfully - their drinking. The fair sex manages to remain beautiful for a long time in any circumstances. He is cunning, inventive, often has acting skills, and makeup and the latest achievements of cosmetology are at his service.
In women, by the way, binge drinking occurs almost four times more often than in men (82% versus 22%). Can not be?! Statistics do not lie, but at the same time provide additional proof of the sophisticated secrecy of the drinker of the weaker sex.
If you are a man and want to have the first or second stage of alcoholism, you will have to drink plentifully and daily for at least six months, and if you are a woman, then only three months
The secret usually becomes clear when the problem has gone too far, and the results are obvious (on the face). And it really is an unsightly sight. However, objectively, alcoholism is by no means more detrimental to the female appearance than to the male, but simply our appearance is given more importance. And, say, crumpled clothes or unkempt hair that men, men, get away with, are unforgivable for a woman.
Ethanol and the weaker sex
Photo courtesy huffingtonpost.com
Women's alcoholism, indeed, is not treated. Like any other - that is, male. Strictly speaking, the very concept of "female alcoholism" does not exist. There is one disease - alcoholism, a chronic disease in which you can only achieve remission, but never - a complete cure. Having become addicted, a person remains addicted to the grave - regardless of gender. Which in no way means that he/she cannot stop drinking. Having simply “unleashed”, he will inevitably return to “his vomit” like an evangelical dog, he will never learn to drink “like everyone else” - culturally, without a hangover and hard drinking.
Another thing is that the development and course of the disease in the weaker sex has a number of features, and, describing dependence in women, authors (doctors, sociologists, writers and journalists) inevitably compare it with “normal”, that is, with male alcoholism.
In women - almost like the indigenous peoples of the North - the activity of the gastric enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase, which breaks down ethanol, is reduced
Alcoholism in women develops faster, it is more difficult. If you are a man and want to have the first or second stage, you will have to drink abundantly and daily for at least six months, and if a woman, then only three months. (That not every daily drinker becomes an alcoholic is another matter.) Finally (the third stage), women become an inveterate drunkard after seven years of regular drinking, and men - after 15.
Why is this happening? The fact is that ethanol is much easier to poison the body of the weaker sex (it’s not for nothing that we are still called that). Firstly, when a woman tries to drink on a par with men, the concentration of alcohol in her blood turns out to be much higher - due to the fact that there is less water in the female body. Secondly, in women - almost like the indigenous peoples of the North - the activity of the gastric enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase, which breaks down ethanol, is reduced. Thirdly, we absorb alcohol faster - due to hormonal characteristics. Therefore, it is very dangerous to drink during PMS and menopause, when you are so sad and want to cry so much.
Wash down sadness, longing, pour shame
Alcohol for a woman is, first of all, an antidepressant and a tranquilizer. Ask a male alcoholic why he drinks - and he will tell you a whole story, list the benefits, talk about the male drinking fraternity, reasonably explain the impossibility of stopping. A woman, most likely, will be laconic: "It's sickening to live." We burn boredom, sadness, melancholy, personal happiness that did not happen, and shame with ethanol.
The drunkard from Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince was most likely a woman. Remember: "Why are you drinking?" - “Because it is shameful” - “Why is it shameful?” - "It's a shame to drink" - "Then why are you drinking" ... Etc. (quote exemplary).
A friend of mine called jars of cocktail swill, which she took daily, "anesthesia"
It's embarrassing, really. A woman in hops is capable of breaking firewood. She degrades faster than a man. Scientists have even calculated that moral decline in women develops 3-5 times faster. The figures, of course, inspire a lot of questions: the criteria for this fall, the units of speed and depth, are incomprehensible.
After all, the same act can be condemned with different force - depending on the person of what gender committed it. This, of course, is correct: nobody canceled a girl's honor, women's pride, decency and, most importantly, commandments. True, the last two categories do not have a gender. But forgiveness and condescension are also universal things. Especially when it comes to a sick person (and therefore a suffering person). But not about the alcoholic.
Even pity for her is fleeting and mixed with disgust: "servely." And that makes life even more unbearable. The exit is known. A friend of mine called jars of cocktail swill, which she took daily, "anesthesia." A vicious circle, like on that tiny planet where the Drunkard from The Little Prince lived.
But there is also good news. Different parts of the brain are not the same affected by ethanol. And if violations of the emotional sphere (mainly depression) are more common in women than in men, then our memory and intelligence suffer much less and more slowly. The cortex of our brains is stronger or something ... And if so, not all is lost.
Don't believe the myths!
The fact that female alcoholism is incurable is not just a myth. This is a harmful myth. He further humiliates the image of a drinking woman - she is no longer a person. And even if she didn’t even have time to degrade to the end, then there is only one way, there, to the bottom. This myth deprives a woman of hope, because everyone knows that she will never be able to quit. That's why they often throw it - it. Strong men leave, confident that they can’t help in any way, and you need to take care of yourself.
Having stopped drinking, a woman becomes more reliable than a man.
I know many women who have quit drinking. Someone got married, someone changed their profession, many got an education, the vast majority began to go to church (baptized, got married), gave birth to children. Some have started leading sobriety groups themselves. Others, younger ones, went on trips, rode motorcycles, surfboarded, wrote books, did everything to make up for a nearly lost life that suddenly became colorful again.
I also know a fair number of families of alcoholics, where only the wife quit drinking and stayed next to her drinking husband in the hope of saving him too.
Yes, having stopped drinking, a woman becomes more reliable than a man. It is not scary to go into reconnaissance with her. Perhaps the reason is the shame she had to go through. "Puke" that you do not want to return to is much more unsightly. Horror is worse. And if a man in remission, reminiscent of drunken deeds, telling funny stories about them is a fairly common phenomenon, then women, as a rule, avoid everything that can remind them of a past life. Too ashamed, too painful, too not themselves they were then.
miracle of miracles
And another mirror. One of the most amazing and beautiful things I have ever seen in my life is a woman who stops drinking. First, some kind of bow appears on it, a white collar, or just clothes recall the existence of an iron, and a hairstyle - scissors.
The next stage is not very attractive. However, the patients of plastic surgeons immediately after the procedures look terrifying. Gradually, and then somehow all at once the swelling subsides, the skin sags, wrinkles appear - our princess slowly throws off her frog skin. But the look is already brightening, decisiveness and faith appear in it. If we talk about the recovery phases, this is the most difficult stage. Now she is tormented by insomnia, remorse, depression, fatigue are attacking, now she is very hard. Transformations only in fairy tales happen quickly.
Men at this time break down more often. They silently and gloomily go into a binge. Women shout: "I can't!" - and continue to fight. One of my good friends, a woman in years, just grabbed books from the shelves and read, read everything in a row, at first indiscriminately, then turned to Russian classics.
“After all, I was once completely different,” she said. “I read a lot, I went to the theater and to exhibitions.” She spoke and did not notice that she had already become another again. And the frog skin went to the fire, and no one would have told by her face what hobby she had recently indulged in instead of reading. A wonderful transformation. And now newcomers, coming to the group, squint with disbelief: did N ever drink too?!
I describe this incident in detail only because that miracle was the first one that happened before my eyes, and after that I was already waiting to see it again. And she rejoiced every time a new future princess came to the group. Alcoholic. Timid and lonely, still believing in myths, but not in fairy tales.
Helped us:
Anatoly Alekhin
Professor, Head of the Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychological Assistance, Russian State Pedagogical University. A. I. Herzen; MD
The end of February, 1996, a month ago I turned 16. How I was waiting for this number! I thought a miracle would happen, a prince would appear in my life or something like that. But nothing happened. I'm still the same gloomy tenth grader in black martens who desperately wants to look cool.
It's a warm spring day, we hang out in the grove. Four girls and a guy whose birthday we are celebrating. This is my first time drinking champagne - more than a sip, and not in the company of my parents.- it works magically. I feel grown up, relaxed, and I love it! After the first bottle, we start a game: we pass a match to each other using only our mouths. With each round, the match becomes shorter, and the game becomes more exciting. In the end, T. and I kiss. This is more than strange - after all, I never liked him.
Then I did not yet know that to make a person more attractive is an easy trick for Monsieur of alcohol. Soon I will be dancing in clubs and singing karaoke. Steal books, jewelry, candies and chips - just to demonstrate courage and sleight of hand. Lying is no worse than Munchausen. Get acquainted first and immediately offer sex. And also take drugs, run away from a cafe without paying, walk around the cemetery at night and drive drunk - nothing was impossible. We found each other with alcohol. And how did I live without it before?
I found a special thrill in hangovers. You drink - and the world is immediately clear, I am weightless, merge with it with every cell and gradually dissolve, as if I were not a body, but a consciousness, a pure spirit. Morning, T. and I are alone in the pizzeria, languidly polishing beer with vodka from a cold pot-bellied decanter. We love each other so much. T. is gentle as a cat, because I have money, and I decide whether to repeat the decanter. I nod to the waiter, T. rejoices.
We have a strange relationship. He is such a typical narcissist. And I, having drunk, each time announced to him that I was leaving. Brought to tears and received emotions. Then she met G. - and left forever. He was caring and loving. Got me hooked on heroin. Then I got tired, and I also left G.. A whirlwind of acquaintances and non-reciprocal loves began to spin (normal guys were not eager to meet a drunkard).
In those years, I was surrounded by many friends - a drinking buddy was easy. But it didn’t matter to me with whom to drink, where and what. I drank with strangers, taxi drivers and cops (thank you guys for not touching me, sorry I don't remember your name). I drank alone, I drank on ICQ, I drank under the radio.
I think I had depression. I didn't belong to myself, I didn't control anything, and I never knew where I would find myself the next morning. I was driven by alcohol. The body roamed uncontrollably around the city, and, believe me, it was a wild adventure. The fact that I'm alive is a miracle, I could have died a thousand times.
And I wanted warmth and peace. Happiness, simple as a sandwich with sugar. I remember wandering with a gentleman, staggering along a dark street from one tavern to another, I looked at the luminous windows and imagined how people live behind them, how early they go to bed and read Jane Eyre under the light of a night lamp. And I remember that aching melancholy - why can't I do it too? Coming home, she laid out the sofa and fell right in her clothes. And dreamed of pajamas with bears. In difficult moments, I disconnected from the outside world and went into myself.. I imagined how I come to visit a fictitious aunt - she lives far away, no one will get to us. In a cozy little house, my aunt is frying pancakes for me, and I look out the window, there is a red mountain ash and a cat is walking. And I don't need anything else. And the aunt asks: “Pour some more tea, Yulechka?”
Alcohol was my medicine, the only remedy that reconciled with reality and gave comfort. I leaned on him like a cripple on a crutch. A sober life seemed dull. But it was worth adding alcohol, and everything flourished. I loved everyone, even myself. Whatever happens, pour alcohol into yourself, and it will be better. And then add - to make it even better, even more pleasant, even more love.
I didn't realize it would be the other way around. I remember how I went for a supplement - alone, to a gas station, because my husband was already asleep, and the shops were closed; how she drank all night, and at five minutes to nine she was already standing in front of the shop door; how she swam drunk and almost drowned; how she was ashamed of her swollen face and hated herself; how it was coded and broken; how with horror I looked through outgoing calls and messages in social networks in the morning. How I was afraid one day to wake up in prison or not wake up at all.
Hangovers were long gone. The next morning, the body did not even take water, every day my stomach hurt. I was afraid to sleep - I went to bed with the light on and the TV on. At least once a week the house is a mess, and I can't get up because my head is splitting, tremors, burned throat, fever, chills, heart and brain behave as if they are leaving me forever. The husband was not happy with this situation, threatened with a divorce. Yes, I myself already understood that the games were over, alcohol would kill me, I had to pull the stopcock. She jerked. I got it on the third try.
The first time was not easy. It seemed that all people knew my shameful secret and made fun of me, miserable. In the grocery store, I trotted through the alcohol section. Once my husband and I bought a 50-gram bottle of rum for soaking dried fruits for a Christmas cake. While we were standing at the checkout, I had a fever due to anxiety - now the cashier will wink and say: “You don’t take something, Yulia. Waiting for more tonight." What a cashier! Having met old acquaintances a couple of times, I pretended that I was not me. I didn’t see my brother for a whole year, retired from all social networks, changed my phone number and email address. I wanted to dissolve or fly to the moon.
Having licked my wounds in solitude and mentally strengthened, I realized that I was tired and no longer wanted to be ashamed. I want to come out and share my experience. So in the fourth year of my alcohol-free life, I started my blog, and every time I jump to the ceiling when it sobers someone up.
At some point, a psychotherapist appeared in my life. Together we found out that I can't express anger, say no, I don't recognize my feelings and I don’t really understand where I end and the other person begins. Sometimes I just recounted my days or the past to her, surprised that she didn't wince in disgust.
There was a feeling that, having tied up with alcohol, I received a box with broken glass at the exit, from which I had to glue a vessel. I wanted it to be beautiful and function properly. Make it so as quickly as possible, because so much time has been wasted for nothing! But I moved slowly and slowly. When despair overwhelmed, she lay down on the sofa, ate chocolate and scrolled Pinterest. Cried and freaked out. Didn't drink. The next day it got easier. I learned that the one who walks slowly will go far, and I calmed down.
Nothing reminded me of alcohol anymore: not only did I distribute glasses and glasses, I excluded all triggers, including the old playlist. I became a vegan, for the first time in my life I looked into myself, found my inner child and tried to love him. In any incomprehensible situation, she meditated. She opened the world of psychology and self-development. I took a course of antidepressants and B vitamins. I thought, read and wrote a lot about “why people drink,” and gradually my demons began to recede.
Now I'm 36. The last time I drank was 6 years ago. How do I live? Amazing. Got a cat and pajamas with bears. I don’t want to light up, offer my husband a threesome (thank God, he didn’t agree!), write to incomprehensible people and be ashamed of my actions. No more need to escape into the alcohol dope or hiding in the house of an imaginary aunt. I live here and now, a real life without stimulants, and I communicate with real people. My hands hold the steering wheel and, thank God, they do not shake.
The editors would like to thank Studio 212 for their help in organizing the shooting.
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A noisy company is merrily clapping and laughing next to one of the houses in Chelyabinsk. It seems that they have a meeting of classmates or, say, old friends. They smoke, they talk, they hug. At a quarter to six, everyone climbs the steps of a nondescript office on the outskirts. They are alcoholics.
"I have seen hell with my own eyes"
"My name is Sasha. I'm an alcoholic,” one of the company begins the conversation.
“Hi, Sasha,” the others answer in chorus, sitting in a circle, like in American films about meetings with psychotherapists.
Sasha is forty years old. He is dressed in a warm jacket, stylish jeans and expensive, but not light shoes for winter. Alexander speaks clearly and calmly, as if talking about a football match:
“I started working early, by the age of 25 I had almost everything: money, an apartment in the North, a position as a foreman, a car. I got tired, froze, got bored, began to drink "from the exhaustion". Then more, after a few years of hard drinking, skipped work, I was fired. Then came the white fever. I don't know how many times, maybe 5-6. I do not remember. I coded, swore to myself and others that I didn’t drink anymore, held on for a couple of months, broke down again, “sewn up”, got drunk. "White fever" is not the worst thing. It was terrible when they injected me with something, but I still drank it. All the muscles began to twist, the pain was such that I drank, drank, drank. I have seen hell with my own eyes. Since then I have not drunk. Eleven years. I work, my son is growing.
"Thank you, I'm sober today"
I am Vika. I am an alcoholic.
Hey Vika.
A blue-eyed girl of about twenty-five in a pink sweater and branded sports trousers says that she has not been drinking for 5 years. By twenty, she was an alcoholic and a drug addict. It all started, like many: I went to clubs with friends. I couldn't imagine how you could go out dancing without having a drink. They offered "what is more interesting", did not refuse. Then there was a quarrel with his parents, who were kicked out of the house, two unsuccessful attempts to open his own veins, parting with his beloved, "who does not need a finished drug addict." Vika came here just like that, because there was nowhere to go and nothing to think about. The first time I went to meetings.
But she continued to drink. There is only one law here: if you have drunk today, you can come to the meeting and listen to others, but you yourself do not speak. “Thank you, I’m sober today,” Victoria ends her story.
“The key word here is today,” they whisper in my ear. No one promises: I will never drink again. Can you not drink for 24 hours? Certainly can. Here, do it! And then another 24 hours.
Twelve Steps to Sobriety
The bell is ringing. This is a symbol, for someone of a new life, for others it is just the beginning of a discussion of another topic. A pretty curly blonde is leading the meeting: “My name is Tanya, I am an alcoholic. Today we will discuss how to fill the spiritual emptiness.
“Hi, Tanya,” a harmonious chorus of voices is heard. Tatyana passes a heavy object resembling an egg in shape to Egor sitting next to him. This is another symbol, the tradition of Alcoholics Anonymous - so everyone is given the opportunity to speak, in turn. You can refuse by passing the stone to a neighbor. Egor says that today he will only listen, and now the stone is already in the hands of a young girl who has arrived from Miass (a city 100 km from Chelyabinsk - ed.).
This stone is passed from hand to hand, you can speak when you hold it, then you give it to your neighbor. Photo: AiF / Nadezhda Uvarova
“When I stopped drinking, I thought everything would be fine with me right away,” Gulya confidently begins, clutching a ballpoint pen in her hand. Gulya has beautiful long black hair, an expensive phone and a wedding ring on her finger. But it didn't get better, only worse. Evening came, I was bored and lonely, there was absolutely nothing to do. Before, I would run to the store, buy beer and fish. I gnawed, drank, you look - and it's already morning, but now it's impossible. I'm still at the fourth level, it's hard for me. The only thing that saves is helping others. When I see that someone needs it, it becomes easier, really. A girl called me today. I persuaded her to come to the meeting the next Monday, she said “yes”, I explained that I was not her mother and not her boss, I was just like her, an alcoholic. And that we need to meet and talk.
Gulya clutches a pen in her hands and leans on the table, she gets nervous when she remembers the past. Photo: AiF / Nadezhda Uvarova
Maria, a participant in the meeting, explains the meaning of treatment to me: the system of rehabilitation of anonymous alcoholics is based on 12 steps of recovery. It is impossible to explain them in a few words, but one must understand that it is not tied to either religion or psychology. Although everyone here has their own God and their own system of life values. The last step is "aerobatics": "I got out myself - help another." That is why they travel at their own expense, without any sponsorship, to correctional colonies. She says, in her opinion, alcoholics among convicts - 80-90 percent. Lion's share. Absolute majority. If I had been sober, I might not have stolen. And he didn't even kill him.
wedge wedge
I'm Vera, I'm an alcoholic.
Hello Vera.
“When I stopped drinking, I ran into a problem - what to do with myself,” says a young girl Vera. - There was one extreme, I hit the other. Obsessed with shopping and beauty. She took loans, did not get out of shops and beauty salons. It seemed to me that since I don’t drink, I should immediately be the most beautiful and expensively dressed. Things brought me nothing but material problems. And I realized that I needed to somehow develop, live, went to church, began to look around, it turns out that there are interesting people around, because I was closed in on myself and obsessed with my loneliness. I began to make friends with people, to apologize to those whom I offended. And I was very surprised how I didn’t notice this before: people began to treat me well, forgave everyone I offended, smiled at me, loved me. Thank you, thanks to you I'm sober today.
They do not want to show their faces, not because they are ashamed of alcoholism, but because they are afraid to break loose, then it will be doubly ashamed. Photo: AiF / Nadezhda Uvarova
The word "former" is not used here.
The meeting lasts exactly one hour. This is reminiscent of the hourglass on the table at the presenter. Each participant speaks for no more than 5 minutes. “It’s my birthday today,” says a middle-aged woman dressed in black, “I haven’t drunk for exactly 7 years and 7 months.”
Everyone congratulates her. Someone kisses on the cheek, another shakes hands, the third just touches his fingers to the palm.
The word "former" is not used here. They are alcoholics forever. Everyone starts their speech with this statement. And this is another law: to admit that you are an alcoholic and that alcoholism is not an addiction, not the fate of the weak, but a disease. And she needs to be treated.
They have no sponsors and leaders. All positions, such as an asset and a chairman, are elected. No entrance fees - voluntary donations are collected for various booklets, office rent, tea and coffee with cookies. On the table next to the clock is a box for them. Someone puts fifty rubles, someone a trifle, another five hundred.
A donation box, a candle, a watch, and a bell are all you need for an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. Photo: AiF / Nadezhda Uvarova
What else to strive for?
I'm Irina, I'm an alcoholic.
Hello Irina.
Irina never had financial problems. This is another category of alcoholics, people of the "middle class", wealthy, managers and owners of companies, practicing doctors, teachers. Those who have achieved a lot in life do not know what else to strive for, they work hard, get tired, and are treated at home with vodka or expensive whiskey.
Irina started drinking with her husband. Her son was addicted to drugs. I drank a lot, binge drinking, quit my job, quarreled with my husband. Then serious health problems began: neurodermatitis, alcoholic hepatosis. She looked sixty at forty. The husband-drinking companion interfered with his drunken conversations, got behind the wheel, bought vodka and drink at the kiosk, left aimlessly, drank, got into the car and drove home. When the stomach, liver and intestines began to hurt so much that she could not get up without drinking to dull the pain, she admitted to herself: “I am an alcoholic.”
Irina has not been drinking for 8 years, but she tries not to miss meetings: she, like everyone else here, is an alcoholic, not a former one, but simply not drinking now, cured. The husband does not want to help himself, they broke up a long time ago, he continues to drink, no matter how hard Irina struggles. But the son of drug addiction is cured. He is almost healthy. “I understand him,” says the slender well-groomed woman. “I am not afraid of drug addicts and I can communicate with them, help, trust.”
For leaflets, business cards and booklets, money is collected from everyone who donates how much. Photo: AiF / Nadezhda Uvarova
"Sobriety should be happy"
The presenter points to the clock: the meeting time is over. Everyone stands in a circle. They hold hands, say a prayer. Everyone turns to his God - such as he sees him himself. Having stopped drinking, Irina says, it is difficult to overcome one's ego: “I indulged myself, I'm bored - I'll drink, I'm reluctant to get out - I drink and wash windows. Sobriety should be happy, otherwise why stop drinking? And that is why everyone needs to find something that is higher and stronger than his ego. According to our system, it is God. We pray, but it has nothing to do with religion as such. Everyone has their own concept of God.
Nobody is in a hurry to go home. Everyone goes to the next room, where there is tea, coffee, cookies and disposable mugs. They talk, someone invites the meeting participants to visit, the other asks for help setting up Skype. Girls brag about purchased dresses. Three women are planning tomorrow's trip: in Beloretsk, the anniversary of the same society of anonymous alcoholics, two years of organization, and they go there, to friends in Bashkiria, to congratulate. At your own expense, of course.
Elena offered to give me a ride home. She has a new white foreign car and barely noticeable makeup. Elena is an engineer by education, deputy director of a large company. The last ten years. Prior to that, after the death of her husband, she drank deeply. She worked as a janitor, ate what she found in the garbage dumps. She says that's why she went to work - s, drunk - if only there was an opportunity to collect bottles and cans - for vodka or alcohol. At work, the past does not hide, but does not advertise. She lives with her mother and doesn't drink at all. Not for Christmas, not for birthdays. No champagne, no wine. This is another law - do not drink a single gram of alcohol.
The office walls are decorated with nature paintings. Photo: AiF / Nadezhda Uvarova
“Come to us again,” we say goodbye to Elena. “We’re not talking about drinking, but about life in general.”
Surprisingly, this is true. I did not hear advice on how not to drink, stop, gathering willpower into a fist. “It's like a club,” Elena laughs, “friends in misfortune who survived hellish hell. Drunkenness is a global problem, in the country they drink themselves to death by factories. After all, even narcologists come to us, they treat themselves for alcoholism, having lost faith in traditional medicine. There is no difference between an oligarch and a hard worker. Although not everyone recovers: one must very much want to be cured.
About alcohol traditions
My mother is the daughter of an alcoholic, her father died at the age of 40 from a heart attack. All I know about my grandfather is that he drank and raised aquarium fish. Mom never told me anything - neither about her childhood, nor about her first husband. I think she has a lot of unspoken pain in her soul. I don’t ask: in our family it’s not customary to climb into each other’s souls. We suffer in silence, like partisans, with an expression of love, by the way, about the same story.
I have never seen my mother drunk, which I cannot say about my father. Mom drank like everyone else - on holidays. Grandmothers also drank, preferring strong drinks. I remember these family holidays: kind, cheerful adults, gifts, delicious food, good mood and bottles. Of course, no one could have imagined that I would grow up and become an alcoholic. I saw that all adults drink, and I knew that when I grow up, I will too, because drinking on a holiday is as natural as eating a goose or a cake.
Early, at the age of six, I tried beer (my parents gave me a sip), and at the age of thirteen or fourteen at the festive table they poured me a little champagne. In high school, I learned what vodka is.
I almost don’t remember my wedding: when my parents left, I started drinking vodka with friends - and that’s it, then failure
My boyfriend introduced me to vodka - we started dating in the 10th grade. I didn't really like him, but everyone thought he was cool. A couple of months later, we were already drinking a bottle of vodka together every day. After school, they bought a bottle, drank it from a guy at home and had sex. Then I went to my house and sat down to do my homework. My parents never suspected me of anything. I quickly developed a tolerance for alcohol - it was bad only the first couple of times. This is a wake-up call: if you feel normal after a lot of alcohol, then your body has adjusted.
How an alcoholic talks
After school, I entered the Faculty of Journalism. In the second year, she got married and transferred to a correspondence course: she was too lazy to go to college. She got married just to get away from her parents. No, I remember being deeply in love, but I also remember my own thoughts before the wedding. I smoke in the yard and think: maybe, well, why am I doing this? But there is nowhere to go - the banquet is appointed. Okay, I think I’ll go, and if anything, I’ll get a divorce! I almost don’t remember that wedding: when my parents left, I started drinking vodka with friends - and that’s it, then a failure. Memory lapses, by the way, are also a bad bell.
The future husband at that time lived in the editorial office of the newspaper in which he worked. My parents rented an apartment for us and we started living together.
I have always considered myself ugly and unworthy of love and respect. Perhaps for this reason, all my men were either drinkers or drug addicts, or both. Once my husband brought heroin, and we got hooked. Gradually sold everything that could be sold. There was often no food at home, but there was almost always heroin, cheap vodka or port.
One day my mother and I went to buy clothes for me. July, heat, I'm in a T-shirt. Mom noticed injection marks on her arm and asks: “Are you injecting?” “Mosquitoes bit me,” I answer. And mom believes.
Typical alcoholic logic: he never takes responsibility for what happens to him
I remember in detail one day from that period. We were visited by a couple of my classmates. At the height of the booze, we go to a cafe, where we run out of money, and a classmate leaves a gold ring as a pledge. We go outside to catch a taxi. A police car pulls up in front of us. We are drunk, my husband has an open bottle of champagne in his hands. They want to take the guys to the department, and I, being so brave, declare that I have acquaintances in the traffic police. I go around the car to write down the number, winter, slippery - I fall, look at my leg and understand that it is somehow strangely twisted. In a second - hellish pain. The cops immediately turned around and left, and I ended up in the hospital. For nine months with two broken legs.
One fracture was difficult. I had two operations, they put the Ilizarov apparatus. At the same time, I continued to drink, even while lying in the hospital - my husband brought port wine. Somehow she got drunk, being in a cast, fell and pierced her lower lip with a tooth. But in my head there was no causal relationship between what happened to me and alcohol. I thought that it happened by chance, that I was just unlucky, because anyone can fall, and indeed, “the cops are to blame for everything.” The typical logic of an alcoholic is that he never takes responsibility for what happens to him.
About memory lapses
My first husband and I divorced a couple of years after we got married. I fell in love with his friend. Then another and another...
When I was twenty-two, my father's friend invited me to write scripts for a youth series. It was in all respects a pleasant job: I wrote at most a week a month, and the rest of the time I walked and drank. In the same year, my grandmother died, leaving me her apartment, in which I made a real hangout.
In a relatively sober state, fear and anxiety are the main feelings of those years. It's scary when you don't remember what happened to you yesterday. Just once - and consciousness wakes up. You can find your body anywhere - in a friend's apartment, in a hotel room, on bare ground outside the city, or on a park bench. At the same time, you have only a vague idea of how you got here, and you have no idea at all what you have done and what the consequences will be. You're just scared and dark. Why is it dark? Is it still morning or is it already evening? What day is today? Have your parents seen you? You start checking the phone, but there is no phone - apparently, you lost it again. Trying to put the puzzle together. Does not work.
About trying to stop drinking
I took it with hostility when someone hinted at me about my problems with alcohol. At the same time, I considered myself so terrible that when they laughed on the street, I looked around, sure that they were laughing at me, and if they said a compliment, I snapped - they probably scoff or want to borrow money.
There was a time when I thought about committing suicide, but after making a couple of demonstrative attempts, I realized that I didn’t have enough gunpowder for a real suicide. I considered the world a disgusting place, and myself the most unfortunate person on earth, it is not clear why I ended up here. Alcohol helped me survive, with it I at least occasionally felt some semblance of peace and joy, but it also brought more and more problems. All this resembled a foundation pit, into which stones flew at great speed. It must have overflowed at some point.
The last straw was the story of the stolen money. Summer 2005, I'm working on a reality show. There is a lot of work, the launch is coming soon, we plow for twelve hours a day without days off. And here's luck - for once we were released early, at 20.00. My girlfriend and I grab cognac and fly to relieve tension in the long-suffering grandmother's apartment. After (I don't remember) a friend put me in a taxi and told me my parents' address. I had something about $1,200 with me - the money was not mine, “workers”, it was the taxi driver who stole it from me. And, judging by the state of my clothes, he just threw me out of the car. Thank you for not raping or killing.
I remember how, having once again distinguished myself, I told my mother: maybe I should code? She replied: “What are you thinking? You just need to pull yourself together. You're not an alcoholic!" Mom didn't want to face reality simply because she didn't know what to do with it.
Out of desperation, I still went to encode. I wanted to take a break from the troubles that kept falling on me every now and then. I wasn't going to stop drinking forever, but rather I was taking a sober vacation.
I didn't get sober, I just didn't drink alcohol.
In honor of the encoding, my parents gave me a trip to St. Petersburg. The three of us went and stayed with my relatives. Parents with them, of course, drank - how could it be without it on vacation. I couldn't bear to see them drunk. I somehow could not stand it and said in a rage: “Well, why can’t you not drink at all?” Petersburg saved me. I ran away in its rain, got lost among the canals, and then I definitely decided that I would return here to live.
On the encoding (it was a standard encoding with hypnosis), I lasted a year and a half, and my affairs seemed to go smoothly: I met my future husband, there were much fewer problems at work, I began to look decent and earn money, stopped losing phones and money, I got my license, my parents bought me a car. But almost every day I drank non-alcoholic beer, and my husband drank alcoholic beer with me. I didn't get sober, I just didn't drink alcohol.
Non-alcoholic beer is a ticking time bomb. Someday it will be replaced by alcohol, and then the dynamite will work. One evening, when my zero was out of stock, I decided to try the regular one. It was scary (in case of admission, the encoder promised a stroke and a heart attack), but I'm brave.
Encoding is a good thing on one condition: if you put yourself on pause, start changing your life, actively develop towards sobriety, solve the problems that led you to alcoholism. It is important to move in the other direction.
Having decoded, I, as they say, reached for alcohol. It was a huge - even by my standards - binge. Alcohol returned to my life, as if it never left it. Six months later, I found out I was pregnant.
About Pain Peak
I didn’t think about the child (to be honest, I’m still not sure that motherhood is mine), but my mother constantly said: “I was born when your grandmother was 27, I also at 27, it’s time for you to give birth to a girl” .
I thought that perhaps my mother was right: I am married, and besides, all people give birth. At the same time, I did not ask myself: “Why do you need a child? Do you want to look after him, be responsible for him? Then I did not ask myself questions, I did not know how to talk to myself, to hear myself.
I searched the Internet for stories of women who also drank and gave birth to healthy children.
When I found out about the pregnancy, I was not at all happy, but I promised myself that I would stop drinking and smoking. Gradually. I managed to slow down by giving up my favorite strong drinks, but I couldn’t stop drinking completely. Every day I promised myself that I would quit tomorrow, and I searched the Internet for stories of women who also drank and gave birth to healthy children.
At the seventh month of pregnancy, a placental abruption occurred, I had an emergency caesarean, the child died, and I went into a binge, devoured by guilt for drinking and refusing to lie down for preservation. Blaming yourself was commonplace. He did it, he confessed - and you can live on without changing anything.
At that time, I already had a very severe hangover, I was seriously afraid of delirium tremens. Now it is already difficult to describe this state… You cannot do anything. The head is cracking. Grabs the heart. Sometimes it's hot, sometimes it's cold, you can't lie still, your body is twitching, you're not able to eat and drink, you throw yourself on vitamins - nothing helps. You can’t fall asleep without light and TV, and even with them it doesn’t work very well - sleep is intermittent and sticky. And a huge anxiety, one that is bigger than you: something is about to happen.
I remember sitting in a car with a friend, and I said: my husband forbids me to drink, I probably have to quit, otherwise he will leave. Girlfriend nods sympathetically - hard, they say, you understand. It was August 2008: my first attempt to tie myself.
About living with sobriety
Alcohol is a very hard form of recreation. Now I'm amazed at how my body could handle it all. I was treated, tried to quit and broke down again, almost lost faith in myself.
I finally stopped drinking on March 22, 2010. Not that I decided that it was on the 22nd, on the bright day of the vernal equinox, that I stopped drinking, cheers. It was just one of the many attempts that led to the fact that for almost seven years I did not drink. Not a drop. My husband does not drink, my parents do not drink - without this support, I think nothing would have happened.
At first, I thought something like this: when he saw that I had stopped drinking, God would come down to me on the ground and say: “Yulyasha, what a clever girl you are, well, finally waited, now everything will be fine! I will reward you now as it should be - you will be the happiest with me.
To my surprise, it wasn't like that. Gifts did not fall from the sky. I was sober - and that's it. Here it is, my whole life - the light is like in an operating room, you can't hide. For the most part, I felt lonely and terribly unhappy. But against the background of this global misfortune, for the first time I tried to do other things, for example, to talk about my feelings or to train willpower. This is the most important thing - if you can’t go the other way, you should at least lie down in that direction, make at least some body movement.
The first year of sobriety is hard. You are so ashamed of your past that you want one thing: to dissolve, to go underground. I took my husband's last name, changed my phone number and email address, retired from social networks and distanced myself from friends as much as possible. All I had was me, who drank away fourteen years of my life. who didn't know herself. For the first time I was alone with myself, I learned to talk to myself. It was unusual - to live completely without anesthesia, to be inseparably present in your life, without hiding or running away. I don't think I've ever cried so much in my life.
A couple of years before I stopped drinking completely, I became a vegetarian. I think the recovery process started exactly when I first thought about what (or rather, who) I eat, about the fact that in the world, besides me, there are other creatures who live and suffer, that someone else could be worse than me. Asceticism appeared in my life, which developed me and made me stronger.
Sometimes I remember myself and I don't believe that it was me and not the character from the movie "Trainspotting". Thank God, I was able to forgive myself and finally begin to treat myself well - with love and care. It was not easy and took a lot of time, but I managed (with the help of a psychotherapist). The next step is to develop, albeit slowly and slowly, but go forward every day.
In the summer of 2010, my husband and I quit smoking. I started meditating. Every free minute I read affirmations and convinced myself that I could handle everything.
Three years ago I started. At first, it was something like a diary for me, a platform for reflection: I wrote because I felt an inner need. At first, no one read the blog, but, one way or another, it was a statement about myself - I am, yes, I drank, but I was able to quit, I live.
Beautiful wealthy women come to me, they have husbands and children, and everything seems to be fine. Only every day they secretly drink a bottle of red wine
Then I realized that sitting and reflecting is the same as doing nothing. Because there are thousands like me. They are just as helpless, they do not understand how to stop the war within themselves. Therefore, now I am consulting for people with similar problems. Everyone has different degrees of dependence: beautiful wealthy women come to me, they have husbands and children, and everything seems to be fine. Only every day they secretly drink a bottle of red wine. It is not customary to talk about this, but almost every second person in our country drinks with one frequency or another. That is, drink regularly. And few people admit it to themselves.
I did not want to be ashamed of myself and my past - it bothered me, I felt not free. So I plucked up the courage to talk about alcohol addiction so that alcoholism would no longer be treated as something shameful or top-secret.
I'm being honest: I'm not a psychologist or a narcologist. I am a former alcoholic. And I, unfortunately or fortunately, know too much about how to stop drinking and how not to do it. I try to help those who have realized for themselves that they want to live soberly and are ready to do something for this. In this case, the more information, the better. Therefore, I am here and share my experience - how I drank and how I live now.
Thanks to the photographer Ivan Troyanovsky, stylist and cafe "Ukrop" for help in shooting.
