.................................................. ...........................................

I do drink with people that are most certainly heavy binge drinkers. That is to say they don't drink during the week, but really get pretty smashed, or at least buzzed-up during the weekend. These people are my family and long time friends. I love them. My wife being among the worst of them as far as drinking goes.

I find myself now-a-days asking her to "slow-down" or don't drink the higher content alcohol drinks. She has been through a lot of depression and stress lately and recently, this has gotten even worse. She even gets angry or disappointed sometimes when I don't have a beer with her during the weekend.

When I talk about cutting down on the drinking, she is merely indifferent about it - basically not supportive at all. Actually, she is more likely to tempt me to drink than stop, despite me trying to change this around.

"Life is too short," she says. "You worry too much, you need to relax - a few drinks won't hurt you!"

Words I hear all the time from her. Words hard to deny, when you're dieing to let go of the problems in your life...and just have a good time with friends.

More so, I have a friend who has diabetic neuropathy and he smokes Marijuana for his pn - he suggests I do what he does: quit drinking and start smoking weed!!!

No way!!! First off it's freaking illegal, man. And it's got to be just as bad as beer! I can't seem to find an answer or more so a "substitute" for my beers. I have high anxiety issues and quit my long term, addictive anxiety medication recently, so this makes things even harder to deal with.

My cat of 12 years had just died last week, and she was pretty much my best friend, and only real comfort in these times.

Oddly, I do keep a daily journal of my symptoms, and had done so for months (over a year now) and I haven't noticed any worsening of symptoms from my drinking.

I'm telling the truth about this. Had I had flare-ups from the drinking, I would have certainly noticed it the next day, but I have not. I do not know why this is. I had simply figured it was because I was somehow shielded by lots of vitamins and that I'm not drinking all that much - in the sense that I drink only one day of the week. Plus drinking water after every other beer, too.

Am I the only person here who felt this???

Yes, those 5 or 6 beers are a binge, but to me that's still less than the so called "moderation" standards of 12 beers throughout the whole week.

For the record, I consider myself a binge drinker, but in comparison to other binge drinkers around me - my intake of beer, and the time I take to consume it, is simply laughable.

Essentially, I admit my purpose for drinking is to get a buzz and release stress. Honestly, what's the purpose of drinking in the first place if you don't get that little "happy" feeling it provides. Sure, it sounds like I have a drinking problem - probably because I admit DO.

I don't know how you guys make it through the weekends, or how you release stress from pain. My doctors are urging me to get back on Clonozepam, because he feels I'm too stressed out and anxiety driven.

And I do admit that my quality of life does go down when I stop drinking for a few weekends -I just get so depressed. Not because of the drinking, but because, I feel I need something to boost me out of the depression.

I feel I do need help to relieve the stress of pn, but simply don't know what to do - and my doctors aren't exactly dishing out the best advice.

Throwing Gabapentin and Lyrica at me doesn't seem to be the answer, not for me.

I'm so wound up by the weekend, as I take absolutely no drugs for the PN pains I have at all. I refuse to take anymore mind-altering anti- depressants or anti-anxiety drugs; it took me so long to get off of them.

And yes, in my opinion, for me, it appears that a few drinks is indeed the lesser of the 2 evils, as I have not had any really bad effects from my drinking yet. Certainly I had bad effects from my once-prescribed drugs.

Sure, I don't get drunk and despite what others may say -there is most definitely a huge difference from getting hammered (stone drunk) and getting a light buzz (light euphoric feeling). I don't drive so that's not an issue - and for those who can't differentiate between a man stumbling drunk and a man just pleasantly buzzed - they are far different. Again, just my honest opinion.

I'm not saying alcohol is good for people with pn, it is not. But it is a tough and hard road to quite drinking, during times of stress and pain, especially when it appears my best friends and family are somewhat dependent on it.

Still, I will try hard - no...I WILL cut down on my drinking. I've done this before, drinking only 3 or 4 beers on the weekend, so at least this is certainly possible for me...and fairly easy, too.

I think I really need to learn how to enjoy myself in social climates without drinking, or at least by cutting back quite a bit.

I'm being honest here - I'm weaker than you guys when it comes to this issue. And if I could quit altogether, I would, but I haven't been able to do that just yet, and this signals a problem in of itself. I hope you don't judge me too harshly on this.

What an irony this is - I can't get drunk, because, I'll get sick, yet I can't seem to stop the social binge drinking either. For the immediate future I will make sure to drink only in TRUE moderation, (2 to 3 beers) and then start exploring how to quite altogether, if I can.

Please wish me luck in this...I need it.

.................................................. ...