All The Dreams I Planned While Drinking I Could Not Start Achieving Until I Stopped
Hello everyone, my name is Chris and I want to share how I removed an addiction that was killing me and finally started achieving my dreams.
I know there are a lot of stories floating around about how people reached their sobriety, and I know they can help other people find the strength to recover themselves.
So I figured I’d share my experience and who knows, I may help someone along the way.
I Am An Alcoholic
I’m an alcoholic who nearly lost everything and I consider myself lucky that I didn’t.
At the peak of my drinking I would consume about a liter of vodka or whiskey and 6-12 beers a day. I built up such a tolerance and couldn’t function without alcohol in my system.
I’m 35 right now and have been sober for roughly 4 years with a few bumps in the road along the way.
At my peak I would wake up and drink about half a fifth of vodka for breakfast just to get my hands to stop shaking and get rid of the sweats.
This was always after I woke up and threw up stomach acid so you can imagine it wasn’t very good.
My Motives Are Clear
Let me be clear that I’m not telling you how much I drank to impress you or show you how far I’ve come along now.
You can’t compare yourself to other people because if you do, you can make yourself feel as good or as bad as you want to feel about yourself.
You can read that and think “well I’m not even close to drinking that much so I must not have a problem” because you only have a problem when you can admit it.
Trust me, I’ve been to programs and rehabs and have met quite a few people who drank more than that for a longer period of time.
There isn’t a score board for how bad of a drunk you are and I sure as hell didn’t think I would ever get to that stage. I couldn’t get myself to stop no matter what I tried.
Even though I was drinking a litter of hard alcohol and beers all day long, I convinced myself I wasn’t that bad because I was only 30ish and drinking heavily for about 7 years.
I met people who drank heavy for over 30 years, so I used the whole “well I’m not that bad... so I have nothing to worry about” excuse for a long time.
Yes, you read that right!
The guy who was drinking a liter of hard alcohol and crushing a six or twelve pack in-between was convinced he was okay because he met people who drank more than him and for longer than him.
I’ll say it one more time, you can make yourself feel as good or as bad as you want by comparing yourself to other people, even though everyone is different and no situation is the same.
I Was A Fantasy Drunk
One thing I learned is that I was considered a fantasy drunk.
Drinking allowed me to believe I was living another life, and I loved that fake life so much I never wanted to leave.
Be patient with me as I try to explain this a little better.
Basically, every time I drank, I would wonder off in my head. I could watch TV and there was a part of me that believed whatever I was watching was my life.
I would sit and fantasize about that life all day until the morning came.
Now naturally, all my fantasies involved drinking so whatever I was fantasizing about involved booze.
Poker And Booze
When I first started drinking, I used to love to play poker and booze it up.
I used to think “how amazing life would be if I could make a ton of money playing poker and drink the whole time I played”.
I used to watch the World Series of Poker and think, “I can achieve that lifestyle one day.” The biggest problem was that “one day” always got pushed back because even though I was certain I would get there.
I just wasn’t going to start “today” because today I was drinking and having a good time.
Well days turned into weeks, and weeks into months and when all was said and done, nothing got done.
I was still a 20 something living in a 600 square foot studio in downtown Denver.
The only reality about my fantasies was I isolated myself from real life because it was easier (and more fun) to stay home and drink.
The Problems And Dreams Only Continued
The problem didn’t end there, I would never stick to a dream, and a few months later I would find something else to dream about.
I played music and would occasionally meet up with other people and play. Everyone liked my music and that was enough to spark the newest fantasy of being a rock star.
I would drink and just play guitar in my apartment, thinking about how cool it would be to tour around world playing for other people.
Naturally I would be drinking the whole time because no matter what the fantasy was, it was always centered around drinking in one way or another, even if I didn’t realize it at first.
Fantasies Were Just That
The real problem was I did a great job convincing myself that all these fantasies were real possibilities, and it would all work out in the end.
I would be very happy.
Since I truly believed all of this, I didn’t think I had a problem because it was all going to work out, and I didn’t want to stop drinking.
The truth is I couldn’t stop, and whenever a real-life issue came up, I’d avoid it all cost.
Family Support
Now I was lucky enough to work for my parent’s company so I had a decent income, and I kind of knew my parents wouldn’t fire me.
I should have been fired multiple times, but my parents were very concerned about me. I think they liked knowing where I was and seeing me every day because this way they knew I was at least alive.
They tried everything to help me. They put me in multiple programs that never seemed to work.
I just didn’t want to quit because I became addicted to living a fake life.
But eventually things started to hit rock bottom and it was time for a change.
The Continued Downward Spiral
At the time I was about 31. I was depressed all the time and my body was starting to shut down.
I was sick all the time and only felt good for a few hours a day. But those few hours were all I needed to keep me coming back.
Unfortunately, I had a decision to make in my life because I wasn’t happy.
I prayed for help and never seemed to get it.
I made a deal with myself that I was either going to stop dreaming and start achieving, or I was just going to kill myself.
I had to seek medical help because I was so physically addicted to alcohol I couldn’t just “stop."
I’ve done this time and time again but the result was always the same.
I would get clean for a month or maybe two but then things would hit the fan, and I was right back where I started.
I was hospitalized about four times due to overdosing and when my parents lost their company I was leaning more on the ending my life than achieving things.
I didn’t need that much money to live the life I was living, but I didn’t know where I was going to get that money.
One thing was for sure, the drinking couldn’t continue!
Slowly Turning My Life Around
I bought a house in 2009 (while I was still drinking everyday) and decided to rent out two of my rooms on craigslist to get money to pay for everything in 2013.
Eventually my parents started their company back and I was working for them again.
I knew I needed to do something different.
I finally quit drinking for a long period of time and started working on little side projects.
I started writing on a website about fantasy sports in hopes to win a $100 prize that was given out at the end of the month.
I won it a few times and really liked writing and playing fantasy sports so it didn’t seem like work to me. I was also making a little money playing fantasy sports so this was just a bonus.
AA and support groups never worked for me, and I remember someone once telling me “however much time you spent drinking you should spend in AA”.
Fuck that!
I drank from the moment I woke up to the moment I passed out at night, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to be in AA meetings 24/7.
But fantasy sports took up a lot of my time.
I was happy applying my time researching and watching all the games. I was making some money playing fantasy and writing. Even though it wasn’t much, the dream of doing this full time popped in my head.
There are a handful of people who play daily fantasy sports for a living.
Perhaps I could be one of them!
I knew it was a stretch, but I was more focused now because I wasn’t just drinking and dreaming, I was actually being active in something that I enjoyed that had potential.
This Lead Me To More Interesting Things
Eventually, I received a message from a guy named Richard who was looking to start his own fantasy sports review and information site. He didn’t want to do the writing part, but rather run the tech side of things.
He read my blogs on the other website I was freelancing on and asked how much I would charge to write for him.
The money would have been nice at the time, but I saw a bigger picture and figured I’d do it for free. He could pay me if things started taking off.
After all, I was still making money playing fantasy sports, and I was still getting a cash prize for my blogs almost every month.
Over the years we became close friends and chatted all the time about our website, and it gave me a new purpose.
Now I wasn’t just fantasizing about stuff, I was doing stuff and things could become a reality if I kept plugging away!
Richard is a smart guy who works in the medical field and makes a great living doing what he is doing, but his passion is in tech and he is always looking for that next big idea.
I was lucky to build the relationship I did with him because he always included me in his vision and gave me things to work on.
We made a little bit of money with our fantasy sports site, and it kept me motivated because I was seeing results.
At the time sites like Fanduel and Draft Kings were really new, so Richard came up with the idea to write about how it all works and strategies to picking your teams.
I ended up writing three books (Football, Baseball, and Basketball) on Amazon, and eventually became a best seller in their respective categories.
These Projects Kept My Mind Busy
We started diving into other projects as well and figured all we were losing was our time if things didn’t pan out.
This was something we were willing to risk because I was spending that time previously on drinking which got me nowhere.
This had potential to be something more.
Not to mention when you enjoy this stuff, it doesn’t seem like work. I was going to be playing and writing about fantasy sports anyways so it was a great platform to get my name out there.
More Life Decisions I Had To Make
My parents shut down the company last year (2016).
I had some tough life decisions to make.
The housing market in Colorado was insane, and I bought my house when the market was WAY DOWN.
I decided to sell my house and move to Las Vegas where the housing market is very affordable.
I made over six figures on my house and was able change my life forever.
Dreams That Are Starting To Come True
All these years I dreamed about doing things, but I was never getting any of them done.
Well a few days ago I played a poker tournament and go figure, I was playing with a guy I watched on TV.
Between the time I quit drinking to now, I’m living in Las Vegas, I’m playing poker with pros and holding my own, and I’m writing about things that I care about.
Sure, I put in a lot of work but one thing is for certain, I wouldn’t be here if I was still drinking.
I spent so many years fantasizing about this life and now I’m living it.
Alcohol Isn't Part of My Life Anymore
Alcohol isn’t the center of my dreams and isn’t a part of my life anymore.
In fact, it was the only thing holding me back from living the life I wanted.
When I was driving home from the poker tournament, I had that “holy shit” moment.
For years I would watch these guys on TV and thought, “I can play with these guys."
I just accomplished a dream of mine!
It was never the “dream” that was unachievable, but rather the way (or lack thereof) I was going about achieving it.
I’m not going to tell you how to live your life. But for me, I can’t have alcohol and that’s fine.
If you can, more power to you but you’re not me, and I know what I need to do if I want to be successful and live out my dreams.
It all starts with not picking up a drink because once I do that, I don’t do anything at all.
Thanks for reading, it means a lot!
