(Or - Get Help, if you are already experiencing physical discomforts.)

Too many people that have troublesome drinking habits think that they can 'ease off' the bottle, edge themself back out. It is best to just stop the intake of alcohol, if this is safe to do (if you're not already heavily under the influence), at a particular time.

Complete and abrupt abstinence might NOT be safe without a health professional if you:

* Have been drinking for several days in a row very heavily

* Have recently been drinking enough to experience severe hangovers and withdrawal symptoms - versus - just worrying that you might be overdoing your partying from time to time.

* If you have severe sweats, shakes, panicky feelings, pain, hallucinations.

* If you recently have overindulged so bad that you've blacked out for a long period of time (you may have caused alcohol poisoning and may need medical attention at a point like this).

If you believe that you're experiencing more severe symptoms, or if you experience similar very severe symptoms, seek help right away or try to have a friend make a call for you. Call a local Substance Abuse Prevention authority (these people should be able to provide both 'addiction information'/access and 'physician information'/access). You may need some medical help to get alcohol out of your system safely. A local Addictions control or Addictions counsellor may be able to help you.

* Note - this is a serious detail to pay attention to, because abruptly halting intake of alcohol if you truly are an alcoholic can lead to seizures. There are certain drugs that typically cause more 'out of the ordinary' behaviors during 'drug use' than alcohol might, but alcohol is one of the very WORST, most dangerous drugs to 'detox' from! Some of the drugs with severe 'effects' are safer to detox from than alcohol is. People make the mistake of relating 'drug effect' during drug use to the level of risk involved with detoxifying after use of the drug. When detoxing from some drugs, the psychological discomfort is great, however, the physical risk to the body is almost nothing and the physiology of the body actually improves as the drug wears off. With alcohol, everything about detoxification can place the addict at risk and the body can physiologically go into shock, endure life-threatening heart attacks and other such dangerous effects.

So, while detoxification may be an issue to carefully consider, what does have to definitely STOP in a very drastic manner is an attitude of continuing to 'wonder' if you might be an alcoholic - or - continuing to minimize the results of alcohol or drug use while you take no action at all to either change your use pattern or change your thinking.

If your discomfort is bearable and not severe, (and you haven't been drinking for a few days) then it's a good idea to make a drastic decision, rather than 'ease out' of drinking. Just STOP drinking or prevent yourself from drinking and monitor yourself for a 3-5 day period of time.

If you find that you are obsessively thinking about drinking throughout, then maybe it's time, while you're sober, to seek some help for continued abstinence.

Obviously, if you do not stay sober for more than a couple of days, you'll have your answer and probably have been abusing substances beyond what is reasonable and manageable in your life.

Hubber, "MoralsEthics1960" has a great tip for employers who must deal with an employee with a known addiction problem.

The Hub: "Hey Employer Will You Listen" ? Please see point number 14 (fourteen) that MoralsEthics1960 makes.

An 'unhealthy relationship with' FOOD should not be overlooked, either. Hubber, "carlisetheron" has a nice hub, detailing some good, basic details about FOOD ADDICTION.

The Hub: "Food Addiction: Just Like Any Other Addiction"

Hubber, "radoslaw" has written about SHOPPING ADDICTION - another oft-overlooked addiction problem.

The Hub: "How To Know If You Have A Shopping Addiction"

COMMON EXCUSES and PROBLEMATIC RESPONSES TO WATCH OUT FOR:

* I only drank because my friends invited me to. I didn't want to disappoint them when they were offering alcohol/to party with me.

* I needed to get rid of stress

* I needed to calm down/get rid of anger, stress, depression, hyperactivity, etc.

* I only meant to have 1 or a few drinks - but then something happened

* I lost count

* Just one more (drink)

* Just one more (day/night of 'fun')

* Tomorrow, I'll stop

The truth is, if you feel like you NEED alcohol or drugs for any reason - to calm down, to have fun, to fit in, to get rid of stress, to relieve physical or emotional pain, then you might have a tendency to use alcohol/drugs for the wrong reasons.

Social Drinkers don't feel the NEED to drink. They can have a good time by ordering soda, juice, coffee or other beverages when they're socializing. If pressured, when Social Drinkers really don't feel like consuming alcoholic beverages, they don't consume them. Social Drinkers really do 'have a taste for' alcoholic beverages at times and this 'taste for' the beverages actually leaves them at other times, and when there's no 'taste for' present, a Social Drinker cannot stand the taste of alcohol and will not drink.

A Social Drinker who is finding him/herself starting to drink, according to peer pressure when he or she has no taste for the drink and is not really wanting an alcoholic beverage should pay attention. Going ahead with drinking at this point is a step toward addictive behaviors. IGNORING the proper tendency of the body to avoid alcohol during these times is an addictive behavior.