For me I talk myself into being "normal" and that could be over one year before i take that first drink. I build up to it wanting, wishing I was like everyone else. I have relapsed recently and trust me it is not a choice its like having the same drive in your mind as you feeling hungry so you eat.

I am a little confused. What are your thoughts and experiences Miss nickyj180...? I'm just starting out with the BB and I don't have an answer.

That was my dilemma nicky!

Every time I took a drink I would decide "this time will be different". I didn't realize then that I had no power when it came to whether I drank or not. Once I took that first drink, I could not predict what the outcome would be.

Then, the next morning when I would sneak up on the hangover, one eye at a time, covering my head with a pillow once the demoralizing puzzle pieces of the night before began coming together, I would swear off the vodka right then and there, only to check my vodka supply 2 hours later for when we would meet later on after work, kid's soccer, etc. True powerlessness.

I never got arrested. I didn't get drunk every night. I was even the designated driver for one or two of my husband's office functions. Of course, we never stayed late and I knew I would catch up at home soon. The disease told me I was doing ok, that everyone else was sure screwed up though. My kids were well dressed, house in tip top shape, worked 50 hrs a week. My husband would tell me "no honey, you're great!."

What I used to think of as denial, I came to know later as delusional thinking. I thought alcohol was the problem, not my mind. What a concept.

the answer to this was in the next sentences if i am a alcoholic i have lost the power of choice and will never get it back i cant think the drink thru nor bring into the front of my mind the memory of the suffering that booze and everything that went with it always bought me. a real alki cant think the drink thru acording to our founders exp. thinking the drink thru works for the problem or heavy drinker but not the real alcoholic described in the bb and I know in my own exp i had lost the ability to do that at some time in my drinking carreer.

Hey Jassa, I was confused about this for a long time. I couldnt understand why I kept on picking up a drinking when I didnt want to and thought I had made a decision not to.

What I found out was that the will power and common sense that I had in other matters didnt work with alcohol - as others have said I have no choice.

It was a crucial thing for me to find out about myself and I find out about it by hearing other peoples thouhts and experience on why they kept picking up a drink. I hoped that this thread would help others in the same way as similar sharing helped me.

Because knowledge is not enough. We are defenseless without accepting a Power greater than ourselves.

As cabledude said, "no choice."

These threads somehow almost always evolve into debates on the interpretations of the text about choice on page 24 of the Big Book and here we go again. I'll stand my ground once again on whether I or any other alcoholic has the "choice" to drink or not to drink.

I have always, every single time I drank, had the choice. Sometimes I postponed the drink, that was my choice. Sometimes I chose to drink immediately. That too was my choice. I often made unwise, death-defying decision to drink, but THAT WAS MY CHOICE.

I can choose to drive without a license right this moment to the corner liquor store, buy a bottle and drink it. I can go to the cupboard in the kitchen where the unopened bottle of wine from last Christmas is sitting and drink the entire thing. I CHOOSE NOT TO.

When we do make those bad decisions we wonder what got into us, as BigBear and the Big Book say. I agree with that. But we do make the choice. If we didn't have the choice to make we wouldn't drink.

If my sponsor is sitting in my house I will always choose not to drink and to keep his friendship. When he leaves I may chose to drink. I will not jaywalk with a traffic policeman watching me, I choose not to, when his head is turned I may choose to jaywalk.

I cannot understand why this is a bone of contention with some AA thumpers. This stubborn debate issue has been so flabergasting to me that I've brought it up at meetings more than once after beating my head against the DS wall of blindness or interpretion. I have never had anyone at all, not one person, in those meetings agree with these interpretations of the BB.

Why is it so hard to see that we all, no matter how far down the scale we've sunken, ultimately the every one of us has the choice to drink or not to drink. There is no question (in my dense mind anyway).

If there was absolutely no choice then why would it be called insanity to do so? To take the next breath is not a choice, it's an involuntary action, it is beyond my willpower and my power to not breath, but I do have the choice and always have to drink or not to drink.

I would ask that everybody ask themselves if they have a choice and post it here.

i think the reason why i kept on taking that first drink as i had lost the pwoer of choice to drink or not, i wasnt drinking because of my problems as i believe they r always theri even if im not drinking.. i kept takin that frist drink coz im a alcoholic and was in the insanity of thinking that i could drink normally like other people....

will power for me kept me dry for 4 weeks or so but there would be the day id drink ... as it jujust isnt enough..

I'm going to agree with Cranky as far as choice for the first drink goes but once you take that first drink any choice you had is gone. One is too much 100 not enough. Why do we continue to do the same thing over and over again and expect a different result? Plainly put because we are all sick and yes while in the thick of our drinking we are insane and no one can bring us back to sanity except a higher power of our own understanding. The trick never take that first drink.

Even after the first drink, as impossible as it seems, we still have the choice. I have the choice anyway. It's tougher for sure, but despite anyone's interpretation of those pages in the BB, I still, personally, have the choice.

I have needed another bottle many times, had to have it because I was still not there yet. And I've walked more than a mile in the rain to get it. I've also rounded up all my pennies to buy a bottle. But I would not walk ten miles in the snow. It's my choice not to. I've come up against that exact choice before. It frustrated the hell out of me to have to do without, but I will decide how badly I want more after the first drink.

If I had no choice even after the first drink, I wouldn't worry whether I had the money for a bottle, I would walk into a liquor store, look around to see if anyone is looking, grab the bottle and run. I imagine now someone will tell me they have done that. I've robbed my son's piggy bank to drink, but I made that choice. I would not bring alcohol into the court during a hearing for my DUIs and duck down to sneak a drink in the room. I could make the choice to do so, but I haven't.

C'mon AAers, those who take every word of the BB literally (and interpret the book in their own fashion) to say I don't have a choice is to absolve me of any liability or responsibility for those dumb or even suicidal choices I make.

I do have a choice today, and I thank God, AA and my sponsor for having it. And my chooser wants to be included as well..... thanks!

Amen, Cranky! We ALWAYS have a choice. I think some folks get so wrapped up in the POWERLESS stuff that they lose track of their own free will.

I enjoy reading everyones personal experiences and thoughts and I was confused with a lot of what was described in AA, so your not alone Jassa. I too believe I have a choice. I don't believe I had a choice before I did some legwork. I certainly didn't have a choice when I was drinking, and struggled a lot in early sobriety, but I do believe I have a choice now.

However, if I choose to pick up that first drink, and it reaches my lips, I'm probably a goner and may lose all concept of choice again. Don't know. I havn't tried it and have no intention of testing any theory out. All I know is that I now make the choice to do absolutely everything necessary to avoid that first drink.

I had a long response to this and even when i went back and read it is sounded good, and then Ithought - short and sweet - keep it short -
So this is my short version of what i wrote -

The disease of alcoholism and addiction - IMO is one of total self-destruction. Until you learn to respect yourself - you will continue to self-destruct and the easiest way to self-destruct is to use - (well for me it is anyway)