For years, I believed that I was a better person when drunk – 01/08/2024 – Life of an Alcoholic

I believed for a long time that I was a better person when I was drunk. It was one of the myths I created to justify my drinking. I was certainly fed this idea by everything I saw around me, especially in advertisements, films, series… When I observed people drinking and being happy, socializing, I found everything very seductive and liberating. That seemed great to me and I often repeated scenes from fiction to test it. It was beautiful in the beginning. It wasn’t always a disaster.

The beautiful, colorful drinks seduced me, they looked like a work of art. It’s true that many times it was actually fun… But then, very sneakily, the drink started destroying me. I felt the first bad effects with the first drinks, the first embarrassments, the first times I was asked: Do you remember what you did yesterday? Alcohol slowly and legally destroys people in broad daylight and everywhere. It’s legal in both senses: it’s permitted and it gives a certain status.

I’m reading a great book by writer Rosa Montero, “The danger of being lucid”, in which she mentions the alcoholic issues of several artists. “Alcohol is the greatest misfortune of writers, especially during the 20th century. Of the nine American Nobel Prize winners for literature born in the United States, five were desperate alcoholics, among them Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner.”

I have always enjoyed reading and thinking about how creation occurs. So today I realize everything that these two, just to take the example of the book, went through during their lives to leave us classics like “The Old Man and the Sea” and “The Sound and the Fury”. “Drinking enhances sensitivity. When I drink, my emotions intensify and I put them into stories. The stories I write when I’m sober are stupid…”, said Scott Fitzgerald, who died at the age of 44 due to problems caused by alcoholism.

I don’t know if artistic production is enriched if people drink. I’m not in the industry and so maybe I don’t have a place to speak, but I’m an alcoholic. And I know that everything I do is better if I’m sober. Madness (good madness, the one that people value) is lucidity, I am increasingly certain of this. It’s rewarding to experience sensations and then remember them, without needing to numb myself. Self-knowledge gives me unique and memorable experiences. I feel everything more intensely, be it pleasure or pain, and that makes me grow.

I posted on the blog’s Instagram a video of actor Anthony Hopkins celebrating his 48 years of sobriety, completed at the beginning of this year. Matthew Perry himself talks in his book about the mistakes he made while drunk and the great ideas he made in good conscience.

These people are idols for many people, we often want to be like them. They work like a mirror. Examples of celebrities who expose themselves, who reveal that they are alcoholics and emphasize that the disease is no joke help me a lot. And I’m sure many other people do too. Hopkins says, “Get help!” in such an affectionate way, with a wink, that every time I see it I cry. It’s inspiring.

I recently saw an episode of the program Assim Como a Gente, led by Fátima Bernardes. She interviewed Fábio Assunção and Felipe Camargo, who talked about addiction and sobriety. When I already had my foot in alcoholism but didn’t even know it, I followed the rumors about both and always felt like getting in touch and offering some support (which I didn’t even have!).

In the program, they talk about the difficulty of exposure and addiction. From the stories the media told about their lives. It was especially cool for me the moment when Felipe talks about the humility that we, alcoholics, have to have to admit that we lost the game. And that. It’s not possible, there is a time when you have to throw in the towel. There is no such thing as an alcoholic.

Equally moving is singer Nando Reis’s statement to Piauí magazine about his issues with alcohol. He speaks openly about everything that alcoholism and addiction have caused in his life. Last year I went to a wonderful Titãs show and he seemed incredible there, playing and without additives.

But that’s it. I grew up understanding that drinking was a good thing, related to joy and celebration. That “the great heroes died of overdoses”, with all due respect to Cazuza. In my head, heroes died like this. It was okay to die that way, it seemed cool to me, the person would be immortal.

Well, then I keep wondering how long alcoholism will end the lives of great artists — not just artists, obviously, but cool, intelligent, sensitive human beings. Every day we lose many people to drugs. And I truly believe in the phrase I always hear in AA rooms: alcohol is the leader of the gang. In my active alcoholism, I could drink until I finished, after all it was just alcohol, I never used anything illegal and that gave me peace of mind. I wasn’t doing anything wrong. And with my drinking I ended up in a sinister place, I had hallucinations and even a psychotic break.

It is difficult to accept the disease and talk about it, not everyone is able and/or wants to expose themselves. I myself don’t talk to people close to me about what happened to me. I’ve tried a few times and not everyone understands. That’s why I only talk to people who can understand me. That’s why I feel so much admiration for people who talk about their condition openly. Maybe not because of personal choice, but because they are public people. Fábio Assunção himself said that when he tried AA group treatment, when he left there was a paparazzi capturing photos of him, turning that intimate moment into a news story on gossip sites. Cruelty really has no limit.

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