There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m fine. What are you talking about? I haven’t had too much. Fine. I work perfectly fine and I find hay in my bills. I haven’t had too much. There’s nothing going on. Fine. No one can tell. Am I a functioning alcoholic?
Hi there! I’m Marcus.
Today at TalkSober.com, what we’re going to be doing is talking about one of the most dangerous types of alcoholic. This is the functioning alcoholic.
You see on the outside, my life seemed perfect.
I had beautiful house, beautiful kids, beautiful wife. Everything seemed okay. But at night, I would often fall asleep passed out. Drink to excess. Deep down I struggled with identity. I struggled with depression. I struggled with anxiety, suicidal thoughts and everything like that. But because I was a functioning alcoholic and because I had this persona to share with the world as this money-making affiliate marketing guru, I wasn’t able to share this with anyone or so I thought.
And this is a very very dangerous thing to deal with, being a functional alcoholic.
So today what I’d like to do in this video is talk to you about what a functioning alcoholic is, how you can get help, and what to do if you know someone who’s a functioning alcoholic. So let’s hop over to the whiteboard and talk about what this is.
Now what we’re going to do is we are going to talk about what a functioning alcoholic is. And I have my notes here.
So what we’re going to do today is talk about what a functioning alcoholic is.
Now by definition, the health places talked about a functioning alcoholic for women having about three drinks a day or 21 drinks a week. A drink can be like a beer. It could be a wine. It could be a cocktail. Whatever it is there, just counting the alcohol content of something. Don’t get technical. I mean you know if you’re drinking 4% beer, don’t get technical. Now obviously seven straight up whiskey’s that you know 7% or whatever it is. It’s going to be a lot worse than having you know the 4% but let’s not deal with technicalities. Let’s deal with the problem at hand which is, “Are you a functioning alcoholic?”
For men it’s a little bit more rigorous. Although for men like me who are five foot one and 130 pounds soaking wet, unless I have a tic-tac, then I look like I’m fat but at any rate we look at this and ferment it’s a little bit different. Again, these are guidelines. Obviously I’m not the size of a normal. You know five foot, 180-pound man. So this stuff hits me quicker or doesn’t hit me quicker when I was drinking heavily.
But for men, it is I believe it’s four per day or 21 per week.
Now when we’re talking about this stuff, what we want to do is look at what a functioning alcoholic is because for me I laughed at these numbers. For me 21 was an average day.
Okay I would consume a box of beer, maybe even more. And the beer that I liked was you know I was up there. Some of them were 9% but no one of them was 11% but those were like nine dollars a bottle, so I didn’t get those too often. But at any rate, my normal day was 21. So here I was. I was consuming in the height. I actually had a keg machine in my backyard office.
This is my keg and it would hold like five gallon. It helped two five-gallon little guys or a seven and a half big guy or a fifteen gallon big big guy.
Now when I was really heavy drinking, we were going through the seven and a half’s like every week at least. Sometimes I refill them. Several times a week or three of those five-gallon guys. So I was drinking a lot. I was heavy but all this was going on 21 drinks a day. Drinking these kegs down, drinking wine, drinking heavy liquor, anything I could get. Even drank vodka, which if you know me I absolutely take it. I hate that taste of vodka. That’s why it’s all in these fruity drinks, because it doesn’t taste very good but I loved straight stuff. I love straight whiskey. I like straight bourbon. All that stuff I really enjoyed it.
And still to this day, I could say yeah you know I would like to enjoy one of those but the fact of the matter is I’m not going to because WHILE THE TASTE MIGHT BE SOMETHING I DESIRE, THE INSANITY IS SOMETHING I DON’T.
So here I was. I was drinking all this stuff. I helped down a job. I worked from home as an internet marketer. You could see a lot of my videos online about that. You can actually see the video the day I went in for help. The day the suicide threat and everything like that I held down the job. Money wasn’t an issue. I mean I had my money issues because of my drinking but it wasn’t a big thing. It wasn’t like I was asking people to pay my bills and stuff.
So these are the things here. This is the normal definition is okay are you having more than three a day or seven a week? If you’re a lady or if you’re a dude, are you having more than for a day?
Now that pretty much encompasses anyone watching this video.
Even if you’re watching this for a friend, you might be saying, well I have for a day. I mean, is four beers really that much? I mean, a football game is two and a half hours. By the time you get through the football game, maybe you’ve had four. So you look at these. You say, well you know, is that a problem?
Now for me, we look at this and we say, what is functioning and what is nonfunctioning?
Nonfunctioning is like the dude in gutter, homeless, destitute, falling all over himself and this is what we look at.
Now this definition stops these people from getting help because for me, I was like, dude I’ve made a bunch of money. I’m an affiliate marketer. I got a big house. I don’t have to go to work. Everything’s okay. Everyone seemed to like it.
NOW THE PROBLEM WITH THE FUNCTIONING ALCOHOLIC,
HIS PEOPLE ENCOURAGED HIM.
You look at all the things like Charlie Sheen and stuff like that.
It’s like, dude I make a hundred million dollars a year on my movie. I drink as much as I want. I fall down who gives a rip. I’m “winning” and the problem is a lot of this stuff is measured in stacks of cash.
Stacks of cash have nothing to do with an alcoholic.
I don’t care how much money you have, if you got a stack of cash whatever and we’ll get you over here. So you can see my stacks of cash. If you have stacks of cash, doing okay. You’re doing alright.
I remember this. My dad looks at it this way, it’s like okay if you make money then you have arrived. That is winning.
But are you really winning?
Are you really winning?
Are you functional?
Are you happy?
Chances are, if you’re watching this video, you are not happy. Chances are, if you’re watching this video, something is about to break. No one can consume the amounts that I was consuming and be okay.
According to the health people, no one can consume this much without being okay because what happens is it leads to brain issues. So we have brain issues. What happens is the alcoholic. The functioning alcoholic has all these issues and they’re piling up. They’re piling up over and over and over.
You might have money issues to start. You might have family issues. You might have real in chip issues. You might have health issues. You might have hangover issues. You might have a depression. You might have anxiety. You might have suicidal thoughts.
All these things start to pile up but no one says anything, because you seem okay and you’re supposed to have this persona of, “I’m Marcus and I make money. And I’m a functioning alcoholic.”
What that is, it’s stupid.
While all society might say, “Well you know Marcus is winning, Marcus is doing good.” What’s happening is all these things are piling up. All these things are piling up and the person seeks no help. Why do they seek new help? Because they’re not like this guy falling in the gutter.
So what has to happen is something has to give, something has to change, and this person is going along, going through all the stuff. Not talking to anyone because everything on the outside seems okay but he is a functional alcoholic.
Let’s take a look at some of the signs that they say functional alcoholics have.
- You might joke about alcohol or talk about it. Like oh maybe I have a problem, maybe whatever.
- You might miss work or job. I don’t put job because sometimes you’ll miss projects.
- Next a huge one, he needs alcohol to relax/ feel confident.
- Another one, drinks in morning. The morning drinks are like a big one because most people don’t start their morning that day but alcoholics do.
That was one thing I had to have. I was sitting there. I have my coffee cup half full of vodka because it masked coffee pretty good or whiskey or something like that and no one knew. But I would drink there.
- Another big one is drink or drunk when not intended.
A lot of people think that alcoholics like to be drunk. For me personally, I did not like to be drunk. I hated being drunk. I always accidentally got drunk. I liked to be buzzed. But when we look at this, they get drunk when not intended. Which pretty much happened for me all the time.
- Forget what he did while drinking.
This is one thing where you obsess about it. It’s like, are you having blackouts? Are you forgetting about this stuff?
- Deny drinking or hide it.
- Cause people to worry.
Are people starting to worry? Are people starting to say but you know you okay is it six enough I mean you’re gonna be alright. Here you like acting like an idiot and you don’t know it because this is the thing.
Now the big thing about this, the main thing about all of this is the fact that THE FUNCTIONING ALCOHOLIC DOES NOT BLAME ALCOHOL.
This is a big thing whether you got a loved one, whether it’s you. The functioning alcoholic does not blame alcohol. He blames all these other things, whether it’s a relationship, maybe if my wife was nice to me then I wouldn’t drink. If my husband was not a jerk then I wouldn’t drink. If I had $, where I could pay the IRS, pay my house off then I wouldn’t drink. I mean if that wasn’t there, if I wasn’t anxious all the time then I wouldn’t drink. If I had more of this, if I had this.
They are waiting for this magic to happen.
They might play the lotto like I did. I was like okay maybe one day I’ll win dollars and everything will be solved. My wife will be happy. She won’t worry about this stuff anymore. I’ll have all the money to pay all this stuff. I won’t have to work anymore. Then I can settle down, relax and drink like a normal person. We look at this and the problem with the functioning alcoholic is he’s always looking for this. Even if I got that million dollar jackpot or whatever was, I would have still had a problem because the problem is inside of me. The problem is me and alcohol.
A lot of people don’t look at this but all these problems we’re about alcohol. I look at it now. I’m two and a half years sober. Has a lot changed. Well I sold my house while I was drunk and I was able to get another house, two and a half years later. Two years later which is cool. So I’m kind of in the same position. My house is a little less now than it was before because we moved across the country but nothing really changed.
None of this stuff changed.
My wife didn’t say, oh well you’re sober. Now I’m gonna treat you good or you know people didn’t say, hey yours over now. Yeh let’s give you money. Let’s treat you like a king. No it didn’t happen.
What happened was I realized that alcohol was a lot of my problems.
It was a lot of my depressive problems. There’s a lot of my anxiety problems. There was a lot of my personal relationship problems.
It was a major problem but the alcoholic, the functioning alcoholic has a blind spot.
They cannot see that this is causing the problems. They can’t see it. I don’t care how much you pointed out to them. They’ll say, well I was always kind of anxious and that’s true but now it’s a lot worse. Now your brains overcompensating for all this liquor you poured in it to feel better.
So what’s happening is there is a blind spot and we’re going to talk more about the blind spot in the next video. But what I want you to do now in this video is go over to TalkSober.com/function. On that page, there’s gonna be a little answer quiz thingy that you can take to figure out if you are a functioning alcoholic. But really quick if you’re having a lot of drinks. You’re worried about it and you can’t stop. Chances are you’re functioning alcoholic and while people might encourage you on and say, Wow man that dude really can hold his liquor, this stuff stacking up and you need to do something about this now.
So go to TalkSober.com/function. Take that test. Check out the next videos that appear after this video. We’re going to talk about what to do when you decide to get sober, how to do it safely, everything like that.
What to do if you’re a functioning alcoholic and how to straighten your life out over the last two and a half years. I’ve learned more than I learned in the previous years of my life. In those first years of my life and if you can’t do math, I’m now in those first years of my life. I went through life as if everything was happening to me. The IRS stuff happened to me. The drinking thing happened to me. All this stuff happened to me. Life was happening to me. And it wasn’t good. Why does all this bad stuff happen to me? I lived my life as that.
Now I learned some new ways of living which I’m going to show you on this channel. So subscribe to my channel. There’ll be a little subscribe button somewhere and follow me on YouTube and we’re going to go through this stuff.
I’m going to teach you how to stay sober and live a life that is more meaningful because we’re going to deal with all this stuff. We’re going to deal with this stuff. We’re going to deal with anxiety. We’re gonna dream to deal with mental problems. We’re going to deal with your past. We’re going to deal with whatever is plaguing you.
So subscribe to my channel. Hop over to TalkSober.com/function. Take that test and I’ll see you in the next video.
If you’re functioning alcoholic, please get help.
Even if everyone says that you don’t need help, listen to your voice of reason. There’s somewhere in you that knows that this stuff is going to pile up. It’s going to spiral and I don’t want to see you spiral out of control as bad as I did and have to be drug to a mental institute and deal with 24/7 anxiety at a rehab, unless you have to. If that’s what you got to do, that’s what you got to do but I’d rather see you get better on your own and get better now by realizing this. So check out my next video the blind spots in the alcoholics brain.
Go over TalkSober.com/function. You’ll get that little quiz about functional alcoholics. I can’t talk today but you’ll get that quiz and I’ll put a link to the video about the blind spot. So thanks again. TalkSober.com. I’m Marcus. Have fun, enjoy and let’s start getting better.