Should I Limit my Alcohol Consumption or Stop Drinking Entirely?

The question for some people who are struggling with their drinking might be: should you try to stop drinking altogether or is there a chance that you can control it?

First of all, if you find that you can control your drinking then this is good. Chances are that you’re not a serious alcoholic if you can limit your drinking and find a way to have fun with it and not lose control anymore. As for the rest of us alcohoilcs, our alcoholism exists because we can’t control how much we drink - that’s the whole point. So at this point, most of us will be forced to give abstinence a try.

Now this can become especially tricky because most alcoholics actually can control their level of consumption for a certain period of time. Some drunks can actually control their alcohol consumption for many weeks or even for over a year in some cases. But, realize these things: First, they won’t be able to have fun with their drinking while they are trying to limit their intake, and will only be able to manage this through a tremendous effort. And second, no true alcoholic will really hold up with this limited drinking forever; pretty soon they will go overboard and lose control.When you get right down to it, the best course for the struggling alcoholic is to stop drinking.

So essentially, you can try to control your drinking and if you can pull it off and maintain this over a long time frame then more power to you. But be honest with yourself and if you slip up or end up drinking way more than you wanted to then own up to it and realize that you have lost control. Saying that you can control it “when you really want to” is probably denial at that point, and you need to realize that most “normal people” (meaning non-alcoholics) are pretty much always controlling their drinking by default. Another way to put it is that normal people do not have to do anything special to try and limit how much they drink. If you do, then this could be a big wake up call for you.